My problem with Greene, is that yes, he may get you 1000 yards with 4 ypc, but he leaves a lot of yards on the field. I think he has below average vision (which is accentuated in absence in short yardage situations). Because of his below average vision, he leaves a good amount of yards on the field. For instance, on his 31 yarder in the KC game (his longest of the season), if he cut right instead of left in front of the safety, he could be in for 6 and have another 47 yards. Instead he cut left and runs into a CB. I dont think Greene is a plus player at the RB position for us, but my point is that if we HAD a plus player at the position, just imagine what it could do to this offense and run game. And then you add in Greene’s inability to play any kind of role in the passing game, which is becoming a necessity in today’s NFL, and there is a lot to be desired. I really like Greene in a running-by-committee backfield, but when he needs to carry a full workload its a different story. Any way you look at it, this team NEEDS one of the other backs to step up and share a workload with Greene. Also- you say he is less than 100% healthy much of his career as if its a positive. Its not. Its a big negative. If he’s not always healthy than you are not getting the best you can at the position and its not a good situation. This also shows that Greene struggles to stay healthy an entire season, which obviously is not a positive; its almost like him “punishing” a defense actually punishes himself...
I agree with everything you said. Greene has only shown us glimpses of excellence and if the season started tomorrow for better or worse he would be our feature back. We have a bunch of young guys and Tebow to help complement. Maybe, we are sitting on a gold mine with one of these young guys and we won't know until camp, preseason and when we finally strap up. I am all for mixing it up with our backs to keep fresh and healthy legs on the field. More important than anything to our defense is for our offense to protect the football. We are going to win games with our defense. If we can pound the rock and keep the clock moving we will commit more of their players in the box (opening up BIG pass play opportunities) and keep our defense fresh and off field (allowing our defense better chance at BIG play opportunities).
Greene's lack of vision will stop him from being a top 5 back in the NFL. I wouldn't expect more than another year or two out of SG at this point.
To do that we will need to convert on Third down. Hopefully a lot of third in shorts. The offense does not need to score a ton of points but three and outs will be killer
That's not true at all! Schotty ran LT up the middle countless times, and it still failed. He also involved Greene in the passing game too often, when that was LTs forte. I wish I could find the breakdown on who ran X amount of runs in what direction, but that's hard to find. The problems with the run game were largely offensive line issues, not directly on Greene. When he's running into 2-3 linebackers each time, he's not going to get far and he's going to get worn out quickly. Any running back can bust a big run with a hole the size of a truck to run through. Greene's obviously not an all pro or anything like it, but he's improved each year here, even last year despite all the offensive issues. The offensive line is key to our success, and it especially will be this year. People are acting like Greene has hit his ceiling already, and that the line has nothing to do with it. Come on people. There's more to football than the QB and RB. Sanchez and Greene are practically the only people on offense who improved this season. Give em a little credit.
