Al Golden's Defense

[*ochocincos*]

(03-07-2025, 03:22 PM)samhain Wrote: I kind of agree.  Seems counterintuitive to dump the only high-end player on the defense.  However, if you lookout it from the perspective of Al rebuilding it from the ground up with handpicked players, it stings a bit less.

Trey will potentially give them another 16 million of cap and a likely day 2 pick to work with.  They need a lot of linemen.  They need multiple linebackers.  Is the defense currently close to being good as is?  I really doubt it.  Lou took a minute to let established veterans fall off of the branch.  Maybe letting Trey go is more proactive than reactive.  

Only problem is, I have difficulty associating the word "plan" with this front office.  All 3 big name guys that want deals seem to be experiencing super-reactive responses from the FO.  A plan would have been paying these players before the cap went up and the positional market exploded.  They failed that test miserably.  They are waiting til the last minute on a guy like Chase that is a no-doubt keeper.  

So, basically, there could be a really well thought out plan for the defense.  It could solidify a good, young defensive core for the next stretch of the Burrow era.  

Or they could be doing what we've always seen them do.  Reacting, not giving a shit about league wide trends, and being generally unable to meet big moments as an organization.  

I hope like hell it's the first option.

Let's see how long it took Al Golden to turn ND into one of the top defenses in the country so we can get an idea of how fast Golden can turn around a bad defense.
Golden was the DC for 3 years (2022-2024).

The two years before Golden got there, the defense allowed 19.7 PPG each year, which was 14th and 15th in the country.
In 2022, they allowed 23.0 PPG, which dropped to 39th in the country.
In 2023, they improved to 15.9 PPG, which jumped them to 7th in the country.
And finally in 2024, they improved a bit more to 15.5 PPG, which had them at 5th in the country.

So yes, Golden did improve the defense some, but 1) it was already really good, and 2) there was a decline his first year taking over.
Hope we don't see a similar trend in 2025 with the Bengals, but with so many new faces, I would argue it's likely, at least in some facets.