11-15-2023, 12:04 PM
(11-15-2023, 11:56 AM)WeezyBengal Wrote: Blame the front office. Wonder if they "value" the position now?
They went bargain shopping with Nick Scott, let a quality player in Bell walk, and left 12 million in cap room on the table. No one to blame but themselves.
Lou said it himself - "I don't want to think of what this defense looks like if we lose both Bell and Bates." Lou told you before the season even started.
It’s a bit unacceptable too because literally everyone said resign Bates or Bell
We all were ok with losing one but literally everyone said you can’t lose both
Bates and Reader are the pieces that allowed Lou to call defense the way he was calling it.
We are able to stop the run with a light box because Reader and we could call cover 3 so much because we had Bates who freelanced so well the cover 3 actually felt like we had 4 deep defenders back cause Bates played like he was 2 guys in coverage. That also turned our cover 2 into a pseudo cover 3 because Bates was able to cover so much ground
Without Bates we are basically
Turnover or bust.
Run defense also disappeared because Bates and Bell were decent run support guys
We just let too much talent go at once
This was a year where you kept one guy to integrate the new guy THEN let the other safety go so the impact isn’t this big
-Housh
