Younger's defense

[dd]

Agreed and also, no one, other than Brandon Alexander, who himself was more of a Richie Hall guy than a Jordan Younger guy, has been successful at safety. No one.

That's true. BA was the only safety we've had since Loffler that was an impact player back there, all others have been a step behind/trying to figure it out/invisible.

[bunker]

Who's to say Findlay would be any better in Younger's system than anyone else? And it's hard for draft picks to get on the field and play with the way our coaching staff approaches things. Even Oliveira had to wait a full season. Jake Kelly was drafted in 2023 and is only now getting reps.

There's truth to what you are saying, but the other part of the equation is that our drafting has often not been very good in terms of player quality.

When players showed they could play, they were given an opportunity. Guy like Wallace was starting into his second year. Liam Dobson also started very quickly.

Going through our recent draft picks,  I don't think Jake Kelly is good enough to play, and Anthony Bennet definitely wasn't. Clercius  played as a rookie, and is a borderline talent in terms of being a starter. Chris-Ike I think is played to a level commensurate with his talent, ie part time as an extra blocker and on STs. Shay and Smith have done little so far to show they deserve more playing time, although that could change as the season progresses.
I'm struggling to think of any draft picks Osh held back from playing on their ELC, who went on to have a major impact elsewhere.
Don't have the energy to go through the Americans, but I know Pokie Wilson and Vaval both started for us as raw rookies, with essentially no pro experience. As did Scheon.
No question Osh likes his vets, most coaches do. But IMO his major problem is hanging on to them a little after their best before date, out of loyalty.
I think he's willing to give young players a chance to play if they show him they are ready.

[Tecno]

Our D is/was great against a pass-only QB in a pass-mostly O.  It is/was great against a run-only QB (Ford/Crum-style).  But our D stinks against the young pass/run QBs, and even worse when they have a decent OL & RB.  And now our D stinks even against the oldster pass-mostly QBs because we're letting even the oldest escape & run into a wide open flat -- or do delayed RB draws on 2nd down.

Both '25 and now I watch other O's scheme all RECs to clear our flat and leave a wide open outlet for their QB to gut run or edge run.  It's a free bingo spot.  Our DL is too slow to give chase and they seem incapable of effecting both edge contain and A/B gap escape routes similtaneously.  And every "LBer" has dropped way back to keep the zone intact.

It's so bad that even BLM was able to run unmolested for a 1st down against us.  Almost unheard of for BLM.  1 run for 15!!  Holy cow how is that possible!!

When I watch other D's, they never fully vacate the flat.  Usually at least MLB & WILL are still there until it's 100% clear it's a pass.  If a QB runs they are at least close by to give chase.

As long as we leave this open, every QB will be able to convert almost every 2nd down.  Our blanket coverage might work perfectly, and sometimes does, but then they just take the free outlet.  When I'm in the stands watching this, it's extremely frustrating.  And when it's BC or MTL it'll get downright embarrassing.

Now... compare to when Zach runs, there's 3 guys all around him, usually tackling him at the LoS, and everyone holds their breath as we contemplate how long the "neck" will be this time.  The problem isn't Zach, as he's just as fast as BLM, the problem is other D's don't leave this freebie open like we do.  They all get on top of a QB swinging out right basically immediately.  Why can't we?

[Tecno]

Younger runs much more pure zone. It starts as zone. It stays zone. There's a lot more moving pieces, linebackers covering routes, others filling run lanes.

Except our D has been broken down by guys like the TSN talking heads, especially Lapo.  It's been stated many times we are running match coverage, or some hybrid.

And it's clear we're not always just in zone because you can see how many times Moxey or Nichols was isolated on one guy and getting torched.  In zone there should be at least one other guy there unless it's a very very deep go route, which most of these weren't.

The systems are not the same at all and the unit has gone further and further away from what Hall used to run over time.

My theory is Hall is still almost as much the DC as Younger, in terms of X/O's, scheme, etc.  Maybe Younger calls the plays at the moment.  And Younger certainly is the main interaction with the players, practice, etc.  But the brain stuff is still a ton of Hall.  He's sitting right there in the D booth every single game with the headset on!!  Heck, I see him more often than Younger in TSN game coverage -- I couldn't even tell you if Younger is on-field or in-booth!  That's how little I see him.

Your theory has one major hole: our run D.  If what you said was true, our run D should have been stout under later-year Hall (pre-Younger).  But it wasn't.  Our run D has been going to heck since Stove left.  So you can't say it's just Younger having every LBer go deep to cover the zone.  Hall was also allowing that flat to vacate on the regular, and when our DL wasn't good enough to stop runs at LoS anymore, it was already falling apart.

What we have now is just Hall++.  And maybe it would still work fine -- IF we had a Stove.  Which we don't (do we? -- Ceresna later season?).  If we can stop the run, and stop the QB escape freebies, with just 4, then I think we can get back to winning real quick.  But in the last 1.5 years I've seen no indication we have any hope of doing that.

My philosophy has always been '18-'21 Bombers: stop the run & make them beat you with the pass -- because the pass has way more that can go wrong for the O.  Now O's run against us at will, and smart ones even get their (possibly geriatric) QB involved.

Back to basics.  Stop the run.

[RebusRankin]

You actually think its not JY running the D? Its his show.

[Sir Blue and Gold]

If Richie Hall was still running the defense the defense would make sense. Because regardless of how much success he had in any given year, you could see what we were trying to do.

[Blue In BC]

The 1st practice should give us an idea of whether we get any players back from the IR. There will be strategic adjustments but those may be more difficult to understand from practice reports.

The day before the game before we'll see if they change the make up of the game day roster via players becoming healthy, or tactical changes. IE: an extra DB instead of an extra DL as a DI.

Our choices are limited based on our IR problems. But there are a few things that might change.

While I'm not specifically suggesting it, Kornelson coming on could mean an import coming off and a DB added. I do see that in the realm of a choice we might make.

[Throw Long Bannatyne]

There's truth to what you are saying, but the other part of the equation is that our drafting has often not been very good in terms of player quality.

When players showed they could play, they were given an opportunity. Guy like Wallace was starting into his second year. Liam Dobson also started very quickly.

Going through our recent draft picks,  I don't think Jake Kelly is good enough to play, and Anthony Bennet definitely wasn't. Clercius  played as a rookie, and is a borderline talent in terms of being a starter. Chris-Ike I think is played to a level commensurate with his talent, ie part time as an extra blocker and on STs. Shay and Smith have done little so far to show they deserve more playing time, although that could change as the season progresses.
I'm struggling to think of any draft picks Osh held back from playing on their ELC, who went on to have a major impact elsewhere.
Don't have the energy to go through the Americans, but I know Pokie Wilson and Vaval both started for us as raw rookies, with essentially no pro experience. As did Scheon.
No question Osh likes his vets, most coaches do. But IMO his major problem is hanging on to them a little after their best before date, out of loyalty.
I think he's willing to give young players a chance to play if they show him they are ready.

Nothing wrong with their drafting, they've brought in a few good players every year whether they needed them or not. Problem is coming off a 5 year GC run not every draft pick gets a fair crack at a starting job, O'Shea likes his vets and they've established a pecking order that favours experience over youth, that attitude is supported by the vets leading the locker room.  On less established teams there would be more opportunity for rookies to gain playing experience, but that also comes at a cost of multiple rookie mistakes and those teams rarely go far in the playoffs.  Nobody ever said football was easy.

[Blueforlife]

Nothing wrong with their drafting, they've brought in a few good players every year whether they needed them or not. Problem is coming off a 5 year GC run not every draft pick gets a fair crack at a starting job, O'Shea likes his vets and they've established a pecking order that favours experience over youth, that attitude is supported by the vets leading the locker room.  On less established teams there would be more opportunity for rookies to gain playing experience, but that also comes at a cost of multiple rookie mistakes and those teams rarely go far in the playoffs.  Nobody ever said football was easy.

Agree all, well said
Shay and Smith might still work out  way too early to write them off imo

[blue_or_die]

The discourse about safety is a little strange. Back in the day it was a great place to hide a mid-tier Canadian. But we see how much the game changes when we have a lumber-layer there like Loffler and BA.

I like Kramdi as a SAM but I don't think we should be overthinking this - if we are talking about needing improvements at S then to me this is an admission that we are lost on the whole defense (which I guess is the greater discussion in this thread). We have a bunch of DBs and should easily be able to fill a safety in there who should - in a worst case - not get in the way and be a net-negative. In a perfect world, they can be valuable in QBing the secondary out of the huddle, cover their man/zone to prevent the explosion play, and lay some crushing hits that will make QBs think twice about throwing down the middle.

Here's a weird suggestion just for fun - how do we think Griffin would do there? He's probably more valuable as an LB but I bet the guy would blanket the whole field and could do some damage to slotbacks who dare enter his zone!

[Throw Long Bannatyne]

The discourse about safety is a little strange. Back in the day it was a great place to hide a mid-tier Canadian. But we see how much the game changes when we have a lumber-layer there like Loffler and BA.

I like Kramdi as a SAM but I don't think we should be overthinking this - if we are talking about needing improvements at S then to me this is an admission that we are lost on the whole defense (which I guess is the greater discussion in this thread). We have a bunch of DBs and should easily be able to fill a safety in there who should - in a worst case - not get in the way and be a net-negative. In a perfect world, they can be valuable in QBing the secondary out of the huddle, cover their man/zone to prevent the explosion play, and lay some crushing hits that will make QBs think twice about throwing down the middle.

Here's a weird suggestion just for fun - how do we think Griffin would do there? He's probably more valuable as an LB but I bet the guy would blanket the whole field and could do some damage to slotbacks who dare enter his zone!

Statistically Griffin is one of their better defensive players and I believe the off-season plan was to provide him with a starting job at SAM so he could play every down and not rotate out.  Kramdi is not currently playing the traditional Safety role, sometimes he's deep center but other times he's lined up in the box or even on the line of scrimmage as a pass rusher. I guess this creates confusion, but for who's benefit?  They did not do this with Cam Allen last season, he played the traditional deep Safety role and they kept his job simple, he rarely got involved in run stopping.  It's early in the season but never too early to get back to the basics of sound positional play, running to the ball and good tackling, the athleticism is already in house.

[bunker]

Nothing wrong with their drafting, they've brought in a few good players every year whether they needed them or not. Problem is coming off a 5 year GC run not every draft pick gets a fair crack at a starting job, O'Shea likes his vets and they've established a pecking order that favours experience over youth, that attitude is supported by the vets leading the locker room.  On less established teams there would be more opportunity for rookies to gain playing experience, but that also comes at a cost of multiple rookie mistakes and those teams rarely go far in the playoffs.  Nobody ever said football was easy.

Who are the rookies you feel are talented enough to start or rotate in on a regular basis, but have been blocked by less talented vets and/or O'Shea?

[Throw Long Bannatyne]

Who are the rookies you feel are talented enough to start or rotate in on a regular basis, but have been blocked by less talented vets and/or O'Shea?

I don't feel that way at all, I agree with the approach the Bombers have taken, thus I'm not crying about not drafting Fletcher cause he wouldn't have started here anyway.  Rookies sit at the back of the bus.