Why did it take so long?

[*ochocincos*]

(12-12-2018, 07:56 AM)TheBengalsMind Wrote: Those, talking about the Bengals faithful, who have managed to make it through a Cincinnati Bengals game this season have noticed something off with this defense.

With the hiring of Teryl Austin our defense has ran a lot more zone coverage this year. We have seen it affect our CB's, our linebackers and even our star rookie last year Carl Lawson.

All of a sudden we weren't bringing Carl Lawson off the edge and leaving our CB's in man-to-man coverage. We would instead bring Lawson to drop back Atkins into a zone defense.

This last game against the Chargers we played our defense in a lot of man-to-man coverage and William Jackson responded by playing his best game all season and it isn’t a surprise.

Here’s what Sam Hubbard had to say: “We were playing a lot of man-to-man. Be fundamentally sound. Don’t cheat looking in the backfield and that was how the game went. Eye discipline. I think our secondary played really well and gave us a chance to get after the quarterback.”

The fact that Teryl Austin was fired isn't surprising, as our guys weren't responding to it well.

The fact that it took this long to change back…is very disturbing if your a Bengals fan.

William Jackson III according to PFF earned a season-high 86.5 overall grade against LAC on Sunday, as he allowed 2 receptions for 9 yards from 5 targets on the day.

This was the Jackson we saw last year.

In fact, if we have Dalton we win that game.

Because he settles down our entire offense when he's in. You can clearly see that in the way the offensive line plays without him.

Our offense lineman have had there fair share of mistakes and they even put the nail in the coffin for the season when Price got Dalton killed.

But the uptick in penalties on our offense line, since Dalton has been hurt, has been stark.

That's not to say Jeff has been bad, I think he's done good with all things considered.

But Dalton wins that game.

But back to the point.

Why did it take so long to go back to last years defensive formula?

I always thought WJ3 and Dennard were better suited for man coverage, and Dennard specifically for press man coverage.
When it comes to the LBs though, I don't think they quite have the coverage ability to play man coverage, they have to stick to a zone. Unfortunately, even that didn't work.
I never bothered to research Austin's defensive scheme when he was in Detroit, all I remember is they created turnovers (fantasy football points!), but if he always operated in the scheme we saw when he was in Cincinnati, it probably was never going to work because the Bengals don't have the personnel for that.

To be honest, I was surprised Kevin Coyle wasn't promoted to DC after Guenther left last year. He wasn't the best DC ever but he did have the following defensive rankings in Miami when he was DC there...
2012 - 19.8 PPG (7th)
2013 - 20.9 PPG (8th)
2014 - 23.3 PPG (20th)
2015 - Coyle was let go by interim HC Dan Campbell in early October.

I would have happily had Coyle over Austin, as Coyle never had the worst defense in the NFL in both yardage and points per game.