Browns vs. Steelers GDT

[bruceb]

8 hours ago, skywlker32 said:

Wasn't even aware I was notable enough to be remembered.

Nah, after seeing how well he blocks Freddie will send Hunt to chip both of them, at the same time!

[Thomas5737]

10 minutes ago, bruceb said:

9 hours ago, skywlker32 said:

Wasn't even aware I was notable enough to be remembered.

Nah, after seeing how well he blocks Freddie will send Hunt to chip both of them, at the same time!

Quality reply

Kudos

[candyman93]

 

[brownplaque]

2 hours ago, brownie man said:

The fact Freddie will be coaching Thursday is my biggest concern. 
 

We really need to force some turnovers and give that ball back to our offense with good field position in this one 

I have been reading a short while but I had to join last week just for comments like this one. I'm not calling you our in particular your post was just the first one I could find bashing Freddie since I have been able to post. I just got to ask, and this is for everyone, what is with all the hate for Freddie Kitchens? The penalties, confusion and mental errors are entirely on the fact that nearly the entire offense never played together in pre season. It is not the coaches fault that these guys don't take their preparation seriously. Coaches, GMs and even the NFL are losing control over these players more and more each day. The lack of cohesion and rhythm on offense is going to get better with time together and hopefully they learned a very valuable lesson and they will all be hear ready to go next offseason. For the record I was a Gregg Williams fan and I am not even ready to throw the towel in on Freddie. We have some very winnable games coming up to end the season. Can we at least see where year 1 takes us before we start burning witches at the stake?

[bruceb]

20 minutes ago, brownplaque said:

The penalties, confusion and mental errors are entirely on the fact that nearly the entire offense never played together in pre season. It is not the coaches fault that these guys don't take their preparation seriously.

I agree somewhat as to the first sentence at least in the earlier games, but since then it is mostly on the coaching.

Part of the coaches' jobs is to make sure these guys take their preparation seriously.

[VigilantZombie]

Good luck tomorrow gentlemen.

Hopefully everyone gets out of here healthy. Unfortunately it's a physical rivalry so the odds are not in anyone's favor

[LETSGOBROWNIES]

9 minutes ago, wwhickok said:

Good luck tomorrow gentlemen.

Hopefully everyone gets out of here healthy. Unfortunately it's a physical rivalry so the odds are not in anyone's favor

Let’s not get crazy with the “rivalry” stuff.

We’re gonna win a game or 6 for that to be the case, but yeah, let’s hope everyone comes away injury free.

[bruceb]

9 minutes ago, LETSGOBROWNIES said:

Let’s not get crazy with the “rivalry” stuff.

Any HC that cannot get his players to understand that we hate PIT and want to destroy them, in part because of how they have destroyed us for so long, isn't worth his salt.

[candyman93]

I’ve been really impressed by some of our rookies: Greedy, Mack, Gillan, and Seibert. I won’t care if Takitaki and Redwine end up busts.

 

Special teams is no longer a nightmare. Greedy and Mack look like long term starters.

[Mind Character]

6 hours ago, brownplaque said:

I have been reading a short while but I had to join last week just for comments like this one. I'm not calling you our in particular your post was just the first one I could find bashing Freddie since I have been able to post. I just got to ask, and this is for everyone, what is with all the hate for Freddie Kitchens? The penalties, confusion and mental errors are entirely on the fact that nearly the entire offense never played together in pre season. It is not the coaches fault that these guys don't take their preparation seriously. Coaches, GMs and even the NFL are losing control over these players more and more each day. The lack of cohesion and rhythm on offense is going to get better with time together and hopefully they learned a very valuable lesson and they will all be hear ready to go next offseason. For the record I was a Gregg Williams fan and I am not even ready to throw the towel in on Freddie. We have some very winnable games coming up to end the season. Can we at least see where year 1 takes us before we start burning witches at the stake?

Beyond wins and losses, how does one evaluate whether a Head Coach with Coordinator responsibilities is doing well or not?

There's a lot of people that will just blame the coach for everything. Blaming the coach becomes an excuse to not think with nuance and thoughtfulness about the reasons for observing certain outcomes.

Ultimately though, the HC is a trainer, teacher, and leader who's responsible for training and teaching habits of thought and behavior of those people he leads. Penalties aren't really about the "entire offense not playing together" as tons of offenses don't play together in the preseason. Now, if you're talking about Chemistry you'd have a point.

There's individual/player responsibility for the issues we've seen this year for sure; however, when a person is the executive program leader head coach of an organization that means that issues of preparation, play-calling, time-out usage, getting the play in early so the QB can process the defense before snap, situational football decisions, coaching challenges, and player discipline all fall under the purview and control of the head coach's teaching and learning program.

We've often been terrible at time-out usage, penalties, getting the play in early so the QB can process the defense before snap, situational football decisions, coaching challenges, player discipline, and preparation (e.g., getting blown out by the Titans). We've been poor in other areas such as offensive game-planning and situational play-calling.

All of those things are things the Head Coach is responsible for training to a high standard. 

Ultimately, while it's okay to want to let Freddie get the full year before evaluating him we've seen a lot of data that suggest some critical/fatal flaws especially given the fact of our team's "talent" and the barometer that is playing against other quality run/coached football teams.

Edited November 14, 2019 by Mind Character

[Thomas5737]

1 hour ago, Mind Character said:

Ultimately, while it's okay to want to let Freddie get the full year before evaluating him we've seen a lot of data that suggest some critical/fatal flaws especially given the fact of our team's "talent" and the barometer that is playing against other quality run/coached football teams.

So should McVay be on the hot seat? The head coach is ultimately responsible for the product on the field but you do have to take into account variables. The Rams had a very good offensive line last year and that offense was great for the most part. This year the line hasn't been good and their QB in turn hasn't looked good and their play calling hasn't looked good. I know the Rams were good last year and have a much better record than us this year but the product on the field looks eerily similar minus them getting some turnovers and turning them into scores.

Freddie's challenges haven't been terrible. Obviously you should never challenge a PI call because they don't overturn them but realistically he wasn't wrong. Same with the Mayfield sneak, he definitely made it to the line to gain they just don't overturn spot penalties unless it's obvious or the Raiders game last year against us. He should know better so he isn't without blame but he also wasn't wrong on most of his challenges.

Play calling has been bad because execution has been bad and execution has been bad because we have a few bad offensive linemen. Can't run it in from the 1, bad play call. If people pick up their blocks and Chubb only has to carry one man into the endzone it is a TD. There were 3 or 4 to meet him though and that is just the line getting their tale kicked. Opposing defenses know we can't pass block so they take away the quick routes, we know we can't pass block so we take away the deep routes/double moves. It isn't easy to make this offense work when we only have good protection 1 or 2 out of 10 pass plays, it looks much easier for the opposition when they get good protection on about 75% of their pass plays. Much easier to dial up a double move to create separation if you know you can't keep your QB clean for 3 seconds. We can't do that. Hubbard and G-Rob have regressed, Bitonio has regressed a bit and RG isn't anything close to what we had last year. We couldn't even hide Cam Erving when he was our lone bad offensive lineman we sure aren't going to be able to hide 3 guys. Now Baker becomes a 1 read QB then dump it off because beyond that he is rolling out and we're all getting frustrated with it. If he does hit a guy the timing is often off because he had to get rid of it before the pressure got to him and the ball hits the receiver as soon as he turns around and it bounces off of hands or a facemask.

Okay, that's my prologue my complete response is incoming here shortly.

[matt27j]

Alright alright alright. The way Freddie has coached has been aggressive from the beginning. Basically trying to run the chiefs offense out there despite the inexperience and lack of cohesion. 

Why? Because he knows you aren't winning in the playoffs with some conservative offense. 

Obviously it backfired a bit but Baker has learned through it and Chubb is doing very well. 

If the offense can continue tomorrow night what it had been doing then the momentum will keep going. This is the type of defense you have to be able to beat. One that doesn't allow time to throw downfield very often. What we have been doing is the way to do it. Runs, short drops, etc. Just gotta capitalize in the rz.

[Mind Character]

4 hours ago, Thomas5737 said:

So should McVay be on the hot seat? The head coach is ultimately responsible for the product on the field but you do have to take into account variables. The Rams had a very good offensive line last year and that offense was great for the most part. This year the line hasn't been good and their QB in turn hasn't looked good and their play calling hasn't looked good. I know the Rams were good last year and have a much better record than us this year but the product on the field looks eerily similar minus them getting some turnovers and turning them into scores.

Freddie's challenges haven't been terrible. Obviously you should never challenge a PI call because they don't overturn them but realistically he wasn't wrong. Same with the Mayfield sneak, he definitely made it to the line to gain they just don't overturn spot penalties unless it's obvious or the Raiders game last year against us. He should know better so he isn't without blame but he also wasn't wrong on most of his challenges.

Play calling has been bad because execution has been bad and execution has been bad because we have a few bad offensive linemen. Can't run it in from the 1, bad play call. If people pick up their blocks and Chubb only has to carry one man into the endzone it is a TD. There were 3 or 4 to meet him though and that is just the line getting their tale kicked. Opposing defenses know we can't pass block so they take away the quick routes, we know we can't pass block so we take away the deep routes/double moves. It isn't easy to make this offense work when we only have good protection 1 or 2 out of 10 pass plays, it looks much easier for the opposition when they get good protection on about 75% of their pass plays. Much easier to dial up a double move to create separation if you know you can't keep your QB clean for 3 seconds. We can't do that. Hubbard and G-Rob have regressed, Bitonio has regressed a bit and RG isn't anything close to what we had last year. We couldn't even hide Cam Erving when he was our lone bad offensive lineman we sure aren't going to be able to hide 3 guys. Now Baker becomes a 1 read QB then dump it off because beyond that he is rolling out and we're all getting frustrated with it. If he does hit a guy the timing is often off because he had to get rid of it before the pressure got to him and the ball hits the receiver as soon as he turns around and it bounces off of hands or a facemask.

Okay, that's my prologue my complete response is incoming here shortly.

On whatever it is your trying to compare with McVay: Come on man...McVay? Really?? Nothing about my comments would suggest anything about McVay needing to be on the hotseat. McVay?? Seriously?? Sometimes I really have no clue where you're coming from in making these comparisons.

Sean McVay Went to the SUPER BOWL. That means there is history of success. And Guess what the Rams are 5-4.

If you really want to talk about personnel and the Rams, we can. OLine issues are one thing. The real issue for them is that their all-pro RB Todd Gurley is a shell of himself due to no fault of his own but for injury. Beyond that, the Rams WR1 Brandin Cooks has been out with injury, they lost Sammy Watkins, Cooper Kupp is a step slow in some games returning from injury, and Robert Woods is losing a few steps as well. They lost Lamarcus Joyner and Suh as well.

The Rams NEVER had a pass rush on the outside even with Dante Fowler and Wade Phillips have been make lemonade from lemons mostly and getting the defense to play above its head and talent for years despite having the best defensive player in the game (Aaron Donald) and a few other good, aging role players.

Wade Phillips maximized the defensive talent. What McVay did for that offense was maximize the talent now they have a plethora of issues to overcome and without the illusion of the run game (i.e., what Shanahan and McVay offenses require) they have to re-invent themselves. We'll see if they can.

---

On your challenge claim: It's not even close to the main issue... but Dude.. I mean.. just look at your words here before you rationalized the action.. it's wild: Obviously you should never challenge a PI call because they don't overturn them but realistically he wasn't wrong. Same with the Mayfield sneak, he definitely made it to the line to gain they just don't overturn spot penalties unless it's obvious or the Raiders game last year against us. He should know better so he isn't without blame but he also wasn't wrong on most of his challenges.

I mean... come on man. Like.. seriously. You have to operate within the parameters of the NFL officiating landscape that means you don't throw a flag based on some idealized way that we all agree officiating should be, but you have to do so based on the fact of where officiating is regarding the "Call Stands VS Confirmed VS Overturned and make challenge decisions in an informed manner: If we were to put our money up on those call remaining as "Stands," they were the very definition of "Call Stands," and anyone that knows football knew they would go that. There's been 3 or 4 challenges in this way. He's was wrong. 

The Challenges issue has also folded into the Timeouts Usage issue as well as the play-call after a challenge or timeout issue aka the "run the same play with Chubb after the challenge at the goaline issue.

----

On your play-calling claims: I never mentioned one thing about the play-calls at the goal-line this past week. I didn't criticize them at all. After watching the game in-full I put those mostly on the OLine with the thought that maybe there was the opportunity to spread out one of the plays to give a different look but I didn't have a problem with Freddie's play-calls down there at all. I wouldn't have run behind the right side with Teller but that's a player execution hat on hat thing. 

There are some that will group those play-calls in with other play-calls as bad simply because they don't like the outcome. I try to on this forum be more nuanced, not generalize, and be more specific. It would be too long to specify the issues with play-calling this season as I've detailed them else where (e.g., 3rd and 3 run with Hilliard in the redzone followed by a 4th down QB sneak with Hilliard trying to play 4-D Chess, the lack of play-action passing when our QB is best at it and our RBs success have created the conditions for it to be successful, not attempting deep shots to keep to keep the defense honest, the overuse of trips right or left over and over again with no variation routes, no rhythm throws routes or RB 1st option passes to get Baker going, etc).

-----

On execution blame: What came first? The poor player execution or the poor coaching? What came first the chicken or the egg?  The best coaches are able to effect change. Maybe the players don't switch up a few weeks but 8 weeks? The way I look at it is that poor execution over the course of a few weeks can be on players but over the course of 7 or 8 weeks? That is on the Head Coach and Coaches as their primary job is to AFFECT CHANGE. They are tasked with training, teaching, and developing winning habits of thought and action. If those things don't change in 2 months or get better, that's a real problem of coaching. That does not however mean that there isn't also a problem with the players as well. The root of execution issues in your mind is the offensive line which then effects how the execution and the play caller looks. The offensive line has been poor in spots but mostly has been fine and blaming the OLine doesn't account for the scheming, discipline and other execution issues we've predominately had all year.

--

To me, head coaching is about affecting change; it's about establishing habits of thought and action that lead to winning; it's about managing situational football decisions appropriately; it's about getting the talent level to play at least at but more so above their abilities/talent would suggest. A head coach that has coordinator duties has to scheme, play-call, and affect positive change over his unit. Heretofore, Freddie has been consistently below average at best across and worse than that at times.

I can say all that and acknowledge that Freddie gets too much of the blame and is the target of unjust criticisms from those that just want to lay all bad things no matter what at his feet.

Edited November 14, 2019 by Mind Character

[Kiwibrown]

The rams are a poorly built team.

Cooks is overpaid.

Gurley is done and possibly now the worst contract in the nfl.

Goff is either over paid or on a slump.

Weedle looked done last yesr and they paid him big money.

There offensive is average.

Tehy are in a mini rebuild

[Mind Character]

Soon we'll see/believe 2 things:

1.) Mason Rudolph will be our favorite player in the league after everyone on here gets to see how truly awful his 4 yard throws and panic backpedal toss up throws are. We'll be wishing he stays their QB for a long time.

2.) 1 more win and it might actually be pretty pretty nigh.

---

I've been saying it for 2 weeks, but this is the time. Rudolph has 4 turnovers (2 INTs; 2 Fumbles). We turn 2 into TDs for 14 points. Baker and OBJ finally get wild with Kareem Hunt and Chubb power this offense to new heights. Kareem and Chubb together make it hard for opposing defenses to cue in on what we're doing b/c Freddie is now forced to switch things up and design quick rhythm passes to Kareem because of Kareem's skill set. In the end, it helps Baker establish flow early game. Callaway and OBJ catch deep shots and our offense steps into its new explosive identity.

Browns 30; Steelers 10. 

"Freddie... Freddie.. Freddie..."

Edited November 14, 2019 by Mind Character