Literally the only enjoyable thing (at least from a Nashville perspective) about the Titans' 20-0 loss to Houston was the Finnegan-Johnson scuffle. I loved how Finnegan was clapping and laughing at it, although I think from an unbiased perspective, it makes him look like a dirty instigator. He clearly knows how to get under the opponent's skin. Unfortunately, sometimes he lets himself go a little and ends up drawing a flag (or getting kicked out), which would bother me... if I thought he was doing more harm than good on defense for the team.
Finnegan seriously cannot guard decent receivers. He's not as bad as Nick Harper was last year, but it seems to me like he's always turned around and just waiving his hands up when a pass comes his way. He is a solid tackler and blitzer, and is particularly good in run support, but I think his coverage skills are third on the team. That's right, I think the rookie Verner is the best coverage guy we've got. And McCourty is alright, too.
I'm not saying Finnegan should lose his starting job. I think overall he is better than the second-year McCourty, but I don't think our defense took that big of a hit once Cortland was ejected. Although that may have been because Andre Johnson (9 catches) was also ejected.
Now another thought, this time on the real game.
Rusty Smith looked awful. But that wasn't surprising. What WAS surprising was that we ran the ball 12 times. Seriously? A team with one of the best running backs in the league runs it only 12 times in a rookie QB's first NFL start?
And Fisher's comment on Monday was even more complexing: "Clearly our plan going in was to get the run game going and Chris going to take the pressure off the rookie quarterback. We were unable to do that, Rusty took a sack and we had a second-and-10 and you need to throw to get out."
Stop right there. We need to throw on second-and-10? Since when? When in your ENTIRE CAREER has your offense been prone to throwing it on second-and-10? Remember last year's game against the Texans? Well, I'll remind you.
Third quarter: Second-and-10: Lendale up the middle, no gain. Third down? Chris Johnson draw play. 91-yard TD.
Let's get the rest of that Fisher comment: "I think we had eight third-and-10 plusses out of 12 third-down attempts, and those are difficult to overcome."
So how many did you try running with CJ? Zero.
Back to last year: First quarter: third-and-19: Chris Johnson left side. 57-yard TD.
I just don't see why Fisher abandoned our best player to let a rookie QB try to throw it down the field on third-and-long. That makes no sense. And not only does it make no sense, but it's the complete opposite of what Fisher offenses have done the last 10 years. And yeah, I criticized him (and 'Dinger) a lot for it, but you know how they say a broken watch is right twice a day? Well we were coming up on the time when the watch was gonna be right (i.e. Fisher's usual strategy was gonna be the right call)... then Fisher moved the hands to make sure it would still be wrong!
I recognize the Titans offense was in a tough spot on Sunday. But our game plan didn't seem like it was designed for a rookie QB. When you don't game plan around your team's strengths and weaknesses, you're setting them up for failure.
I know the players take most of the blame, and they should. But once again, no one will question Fisher's coaching scheme. And maybe that's because of that awesome fight. But I think it's just another example of Jeff Fisher coaching blunders that go unnoticed and uncriticized.
No comments:
Post a Comment