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New York Jets’ Wayne Hunter: Best Backup in NFL or Scrub?

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I’ve said many times I enjoy having Rex Ryan coach the Jets. He brings far more to a rivalry than say, Chan Gailey does. But as we start to catch on more and more to Rexy’s act it’s starting to smell more and more “snacky”.

Take for example the conflicting reports below.

First Rex’s response when asked if he’s concerned if Damien Woody won’t be able to play on Thursday:

If he’s ready to go, he’ll be in there.  If not, we feel good about Wayne Hunter.  We left Wayne isolated a lot of times on that (Mario) Williams guy.  There’s a reason that (Williams) was the first pick in the draft.  He’s pretty good.  We have a lot of confidence in Wayne Hunter. We’re fortunate.  We feel like we have the best backup tackle in football in Wayne Hunter.  If Wayne has to play, we know he’ll do a great job  (and give) a good account of himself.

Okay, then we have this report from ProFootballFocus.com:

Although the Jets won, the performance of Wayne Hunter (-7.0) is a major cause for concern. After a first-quarter knee injury to Damien Woody, Hunter filled in at right tackle and gave up a sack, a hit and eight pressures, as Mark Sanchez had to constantly escape the rush in the second half. If Woody is unable to go on Thursday night, the Jets might like to consider leaving more extra blockers in to help Hunter out, because that much pressure is a recipe for disaster.

Look I understand what Ryan’s doing, he’s trying to build the confidence of a young player. To let him know his coach believes in him. But doesn’t this act start to ring hollow at some point? Wouldn’t it just be better to say nothing at all?

Regardless of how accurate ProFootballFocus’ metrics are or are not, it’s safe to say Wayne had a marginal-at-best game. And Rexy might to save Woody and make sure he’s 100% for the Patriots game. That would give him over two weeks to get completely healthy.

But if Wayne Hunter plays against the Bengals, he could get Mark Sanchez de-Sanchized. 

Wayne Doesn’t Know If He’s The Best Or He Sucks

Reiss & Bruschi ESPN Podcast: Answering a Question from PatsPropaganda

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This season’s addition to the must-listen Patriots list has been Mike Reiss and Tedy Bruschi’s podcast. Nowhere else will you hear two people who are more knowledgeable about the Patriots (unless you count BB’s weekly radio appearances on WEEI’s Big Show).

Tedy was a founding father of the “Patriot Way” and his insight and commentary is as good as it gets. Especially in this setting with Mike Reiss where Bruschi doesn’t need to worry about coming off like he biased towards the Pats.

This week Tedy answered a question that I submitted and I transcribed his answer below. 

PatsPropaganda: Was there ever a time that a Bill Belichick game plan really surprised you?

Bruschi: Many times, I remember once we were against the Buffalo Bills. Where the real excitement starts is on 3rd down day. Because once you win on first down, second down you get them in those medium to long situations and that’s when you can throw all these complex schemes at them. We got the game plan and I looked at it and there wasn’t one down lineman. There were a couple defensive ends but everyone was sort of walking around. You could basically not put your hand down so you’d be running around trying to confuse the protection. That was a really different wrinkle we used for the Buffalo Bills one week. Especially when Rob Ryan was there, he’s now the DC of the Cleveland Browns. Him and Bill used to come up with some funky stuff where we would say “Rob-o we need some help deciphering this”. Linebackers were in the A gaps with linemen right next to them. It made it fun and interesting because you knew when you went in there on Wednesday or Thursday you’d have a chance to do something unique.

Some really great stuff from Tedy, though it probably makes a lot of Pats fans squirm to think all those complex and fun defenses were coming from one of the Ryan brothers. It certainly provides some insight into the effect Rob Ryan had on Bill Belichick from a game plan perspective and that type of scheming certainly sounds a lot like Rex’s style as well.

It’s also interesting to note the Patriots busted a similar defense out last season to help generate pressure, this time it was five linebackers and six defensive backs so it was dubbed the “Five and Dime”. But again there were no down lineman and everyone was just wandering around trying to create confusion.

Some Pats fans probably wonder why we don’t see more of this. Personally I think it’s because with a young defense you want them to be able to do the fundamentals first and foremost. Once you have those down (i.e. 2011) you can start to get a little more cute with your defenses and how you disguise them.

 

From the real 54 to the fan 54….

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Here’s this week’s updated DVOA graph (note – defensive DVOA is flipped to make it easier to read, technically negative defensive DVOA is good).

What can we determine? The Pats offense is elite, no question about it. Per the earlier post this current Pats offense is second only to the 2007 Pats offense. Sorry Randy.

Defensively it looks like the Pats might be stabilizing. Would love to see their best performance of the season against the Lions. It could be just what they need to kickstart the stretch run, but it won’t be easy. The Lions will come out throwing to test the Patriots poor pass defense.

Special Teams have leveled off after a hot start. They’re a little above average, perhaps Pierre Woods was brought back to give them a spark.

https://www.patspropaganda.com/heres-this-weeks-updated-dvoa-graph-note/

Football Outsiders: Patriots #3 Overall DVOA

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Will have the DVOA graph coming shortly but for now check out this little nugget from this weeks rankings about the Pats offense.

One thing that’s interesting about this year’s parity is that it only exists in terms of total team performance. There are extremes at the top and bottom of the ratings for offense, defense, and special teams. (Well, the bottom of the ratings for defense, anyway. Not the top.) Let’s go back to the Patriots for a moment. Do you wonder how the Patriots have gotten to 8-2 despite a young, undisciplined and outright poor defense? Well, no matter how good you think the Patriots offense has been, they’ve been better. Based on our numbers, this is the second-most efficient offense the Patriots have put on the field, trailing only the record-breaking 2007 team. In fact, this could be the best offense we’ve ever measured other than that team. Yes, the Patriots are only seventh in the league with 5.6 net yards per play, but they’ve been outstanding at extending drives and extremely good at avoiding turnovers. The Patriots are first in DVOA on third and fourth downs, and their 78.8% rating is far ahead of any other team. (Atlanta is second at 50.6%.) Meanwhile, only Kansas City (seven) has fewer turnovers than New England’s nine, and one of those Patriots turnovers was a Hail Mary pass at the end of regulation before their overtime victory over Baltimore. The Patriots aren’t keeping the turnovers down through fumble recovery luck – they have only one fumble that they themselves have recovered to go with the three that their opponent have recovered. As a result, the Patriots are tied with the 2004 Colts as the second-best offense we’ve ever tracked through Week 11.

Tom E. Curran: Patriots have cut cord to past

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Tom E. Curran: Patriots have cut cord to past

Nice read from Tom E. and he’s totally right. This team is overachieving right now. Anytime you’re 8-2 with (statistically) one of the worst pass defenses in the NFL you’re getting a combination of timely plays, great coaching, and luck. 

As to how long this can continue we’ll see. But this is not a dominant Patriots team. They don’t beat themselves and they make plays when they have to. Continuing to do that when the games matter most at the end of the season and into the playoffs is a whole different challenge.

Luckily there’s still time to improve the areas that desperately need improving. 

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When you do the drills in training camp, you have your linebackers blitz against your tight ends and running backs. Then somewhere along the line, you usually have your defensive backs blitz against your backs because their involved in pickup and you have different secondary blitzers. You kind of get a feel for who’s got a natural feel for the blitz and who doesn’t, as far as timing and technique and that kind of thing. Guys that pressure well, you have a tendency to bring then more frequently than guys where that’s not as good of a strength in their game. I’m not saying you don’t bring them, too, but there’s guys you want to bring, [then] there’s other guys that you bring because it’s good for the scheme, but maybe they’re not necessarily your best blitzers.

BB on realizing that Arrington might be skilled at rushing

https://www.patspropaganda.com/when-you-do-the-drills-in-training-camp-you-have/