SaintManJ83
Who Dat Say Dey Gon Beat Dem Saints!!!
Last year Baltimore seemed to stonewall the Wildcat better then any team that played you guys. What was the key to their success in your estimate?
Miami vs Baltimore Playoff Game of 08'
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AccordOn13z
2014 "I Win" Champion.
How limited we were with Pennington running the huddle. Not to mention the bad mistakes he was making. The wildcat did OK against them the problems were the INTs by Chad P.
Dolfan5000
Mark my words, I'll get mine
I believe three of our starters were out. But the wildcat was only so effective because we ran it only a handful of times and the same play over and over pretty sure it was the power straight ahead Brown play. That and coupled with how ineffective Chad Pennington was that day (four INTs) we had an atrocious offensive outing wildcat or whatever we played.
SaintManJ83
Who Dat Say Dey Gon Beat Dem Saints!!!
Alleman was one of our castoffs. He was drafted by us in 07'
Fins_of_Fury
In a contract year
not to mention this years wildcat is a completely different personnel grouping, featuring big powerful blockers rather than a qb and recievers. this years wildcat is not a gimmick but a power running set. i think last years wildcat was a mismatch against the ravens beastly defensive personnel. this year i dont think it will be shut down much at all.
Aside from the injured O-line, we often seemed to abandon the Wildcat early, especially once we got behind or we thought it wasn't working.
This year the difference is our line is 100% healthy (and upgraded at Center) and we are far more committed to it. Since we practice it so much, there are rarely missed blocking assignments (unlike last year), so opportunities for defenders to make a huge play are much more limited. Defenders have to win their one-on-one matchups, and it's doubtful you're going to school any of our blockers (even the FB) that badly to really blow up a Wildcat play regularly. Add to that the fact that our backs are powerful and sort of fall forward anyways, and you can start to see why it will keep doing what it's doing...getting chunks of yards...4, 5, 8, 10 at a time while physically destroying defenses.
This year the difference is our line is 100% healthy (and upgraded at Center) and we are far more committed to it. Since we practice it so much, there are rarely missed blocking assignments (unlike last year), so opportunities for defenders to make a huge play are much more limited. Defenders have to win their one-on-one matchups, and it's doubtful you're going to school any of our blockers (even the FB) that badly to really blow up a Wildcat play regularly. Add to that the fact that our backs are powerful and sort of fall forward anyways, and you can start to see why it will keep doing what it's doing...getting chunks of yards...4, 5, 8, 10 at a time while physically destroying defenses.
SwimminInIndy
Starter
Last year's wildcat was just a kitten compared to this year.
Mr. Magoo
Ayatollah of rock and rolla
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It also helped that Baltimore had a truly dominating front 7. Ngata, Suggs, Lewis, Scott, et all, are as good as you'll find. The only way to shut down the Wildcat is to have people like that who can defeat one on one blocks on a regular basis.
Like the Jets and a lot of other "overload blitz" teams, the Saints are fun to watch in passing situations as they do a great job in the secondary disguising coverages fooling the offensive lines' blocking schemes.
But none of that matters in the run game. You have to stay in your gap and defeat your man. And I think the Dolphins have a pretty big advantage up front. For all the talk of the Saints being fifth against the run, the truth is the haven't had to defend the run much, as they've been able to get far enough ahead on offense that other teams have abandoned the run. Ellis, Vilma, Smith, et all, don't scare me.
As long as the Saints can't get to the point where the Dolphins have to abandon the run (the way the Saints have been playing, that could be the second quarter, but I'm a big believer in the notion that every dog has it's day), I will feel pretty confident about the Dolphins winning the game. And if it comes down to another drive with five minutes left to win the game, I think we do.
Like the Jets and a lot of other "overload blitz" teams, the Saints are fun to watch in passing situations as they do a great job in the secondary disguising coverages fooling the offensive lines' blocking schemes.
But none of that matters in the run game. You have to stay in your gap and defeat your man. And I think the Dolphins have a pretty big advantage up front. For all the talk of the Saints being fifth against the run, the truth is the haven't had to defend the run much, as they've been able to get far enough ahead on offense that other teams have abandoned the run. Ellis, Vilma, Smith, et all, don't scare me.
As long as the Saints can't get to the point where the Dolphins have to abandon the run (the way the Saints have been playing, that could be the second quarter, but I'm a big believer in the notion that every dog has it's day), I will feel pretty confident about the Dolphins winning the game. And if it comes down to another drive with five minutes left to win the game, I think we do.
CW_McGraw
Scout Team
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As already stated, our OL was crippled. Pennington played his worst game as Dolphin. The Ravens are, of course, an incredibly talented defense, so there was really no way we could have moved the ball on them without a decent OL. No team could really run the ball on the Ravens and we certainly weren't going to blow the doors off of anyone. On top of that, IIRC, we only had three WRs active for that game so we couldn't really spread them out. It was as bad a match up as we could have asked for.
We didn't run the ball with much success out of the WC last season. Most teams shut it down. After the NE game, we really only had success out of the WC utilizing trick plays.
So, it shouldn't be surprising that a good defense shut down and offense that wasn't very successful to begin with.
This year, we're utilizing the WC with much greater success.
So, it shouldn't be surprising that a good defense shut down and offense that wasn't very successful to begin with.
This year, we're utilizing the WC with much greater success.
Clipse
mediocrity sucks
Our banged up O-Line has a little to do with it. Ed Reed, Ray Lewis, Terrell Suggs, Bart Scott, Haloti Ngata, Kelley Gregg, and Trevor Pryce making up the best defense in the league had a big part to do with it as well.