Bears fan here. Been lurking a bit to see what you guys thought about the matchup this week. Seems like a good board with knowledgeable posters. I wanted to chime in on the 3rd down conversion percentage thing. Prior to the bye, this team was awful on 3rd down (tied for worst in the league). Following the bye we largely eliminated the 7 step drops that were getting Cutler killed, got some continuity on the offensive line and Martz started calling balanced run : pass games. If you look at the performance following the bye in a vacuum, we improved to 5th in the NFL in terms of 3rd down performance. Week Against Completed Attempted Percentage Week 1 Detroit 6 14 42.86% Week 2 @ Dallas 6 13 46.15% Week 3 Green Bay 3 9 33.33% Week 4 @ Giants 3 12 25.00% Week 5 @Carolina 3 18 16.67% Week 6 Seahawks 0 12 0.00% Week 7 Redskins 2 10 20.00% Week 8 BYE Week 9 @ Bills 7 12 58.33% Week 10 Vikings 11 19 57.89% Week 11 @ Dolphins 10 18 55.56% Week 12 Eagles 3 10 30.00% Week 13 @ Detroit 5 9 55.56% Week 14 Patriots 3 8 37.50% Week 15 @ Vikings 2 10 20.00% Average (Pre Bye): 26.29% (tied for worst in the league with Arizona) Average (Post Bye): 44.98% (tied 5th with Chargers) Teams ahead: Saints, Falcons, Patriots, Colts Should be a really good, hard fought game with hopefully no injuries on either side. Looking forward to it.
Ironically, the best this team has looked all year (Eagles and @ Vikings) were the 2 lowest in terms of 3rd down efficiency after the bye. Go figure.
Well, third down efficiency is not everything, heh. If that was your point. But I appreciate the stats previous to the quoted post. Sounds from that that along with Jet problems stopping the third down conversions that the Jets can hardly assume they will do that to Chicago.
All this means is that the Jets can't sit back and wait to intercept Jay Cutler on third down, better get it done on 1st or 2nd.
I think a big part of the improvement has been being relatively successful with the run on the first few downs. Forte / Taylor aren't world beaters, but they are serviceable. I honestly haven't seen much of the Jets this year, but by the stats it looks like you guys are pretty solid against the run (4th, right behind us in terms of rushing ypg). If you guys contain that and force us to be one dimensional, it could be problematic for us offensively.
That's pretty much been our bread and butter on defense this year. Our D doesn't force a ton of turnovers but they do a good job of forcing third and long situations by stuffing the run and defending the short passing game. That sets up a lot of long situations for opposing offenses. From there it's just a matter of not blowing any coverage assignments and getting off the field. This past Sunday the Steelers were able to establish their run game and got themselves into a lot of 2nd/3rd and short situations early. When we did manage to get them into third and long Roethlisberger was able to extend plays with his feet, our coverages broke down and they picked up several of them.
Thanks for the insight. How good are your LBs at covering short to intermediate passes in the middle of the field? How aggressive is your pass rush? I'm pretty sure Rex likes to throw a lot of exotic blitz packages in. Your secondary is obviously fucking awesome (can I say that here?). How good is your offensive line? Sorry about all the questions, I just haven't seen much of the Jets this year beyond highlights. You guys have any q's about my take on the Bears, fire away.
1. Our LBs are horrendous in coverage over the middle of the field. Literally horrendous. 2. Our pass rush is still aggressive, but not as much as in the past, because we are just not getting there very often. Rex still blitzes too much on 3rd down, though. 3. Our secondary is actually not that great....other than Revis and Cromartie, who is solid, our nickel and dimers are not that good and our safeties are erratic. 4. Offensive line is one of the best in the league - had been struggling, but I think they're back for good after an excellent showing last week.
I agree with all of this. However it seems as though the Martz system is purely vertical, Olsen has like 30 catches this year. That's an advantage for the Jets.
Our linebackers (and safeties) have been mediocre in coverage all year. Right around mid-season teams figured out that they're better served avoiding Cromartie & Revis and started attacking the middle of our defense with regularity. The Detroit and Cleveland games are probably the best examples of this. Nate Burelson ate up our D over the middle and Josh Cribbs was on his way to doing the same before he got hurt. Our D does a decent job of generating sacks (I think they're 10th in the league in sacks) but they don't really generate constant pressure. Plenty of times the blitzes just get stoned at the LOS. We really lack a true pass rushing talent. The OL is probably one of the better units you'll see this year, although our RT Damien Woody is out. Last week they used the #2 and #3 tight ends more than probably any game this year, probably to try and slow down the Woodley/Harrison tandem. They both ended up having pretty quiet games. I wouldn't be surprised to see them do something similar this week to defend Peppers.
Philosophically, you're right. Martz loves the vertical attack. Unfortunately, he has to scheme with the worst offensive line in the league. That has forced him to change up his game planning pretty substantially (which has been paying dividends). There simply hasn't been enough time to let those kind of routes develop. If Cutler holds the ball for more than 3 seconds, chances are he's going to have to scramble out of the pocket or take a sack.
It sounds like your offensive line against our defensive line is really going to be one of the key matchups to watch. This defense is predicated on generating a consistent pass rush with the front four. When they are able to do this, they are really hard to play against. When QBs have time, they tend to pick apart the gaps in the zone coverages.
Its pretty damned impressive that Chicago has had as much success as they have had w/a less than stellar OL.
Excellent post. How often does Peppers line up at LE as opposed to RE? I'm scared shitless if he's matched up against Fake Woody and T-Rich, but I'm confident D'Brick can take him.
Brick is obviously the better matchup for the jets, but in either case, i think they are gonna have to double team Peppers often, regardless of where he lines up.
It's completely random. Rod Marinelli tends to move him around a lot so it's more difficult to scheme against him. If he starts having success at a particular spot they'll kind of continue to pound him at the weak spot. Israel Idonije is having a great year too (8 sacks, 3 FFs) he just often gets overshadowed by Peppers.
