Richard Smith

[SuperstarII]

He needs to go. His defensive schemes are not working and for crying out loud he has 3 #1 picks on his defense. How atrocious can this man be?

[johndoe]

its gonna be a pain in the butt to have to learn a new defensive scheme but he just isnt getting the job done

[Carlos]

Richard Smith sucks and needs to be sent packing at the end of the season.

[Texas Rider]

I fell Ya brother. We have all the pieces there( still need help in secondary) and we still giving up tooooo many yards. This guys need to have the pink slip in his mailbox when they get back home.

[Clamp]

our defense has kept us in this game so far, but they keep giving up the big play. we hold them to third and long and they give up a 20 yard play. its happened all game and all year. idk if that is from Smith's schemes or not but something needs to be done.

[vonbock]

Hey MArvin Lewis will probbably get fired this year. Everywhere he is defensive coordinator, he is #1 in defense. That would be the answer.

[Texas Rider]

My own opinion. Our secondary is not good enough to run a zone D. Smith is either to stubborn or dumb to not see that. We have huge holes in our secondary.

[sleepwalker]

We have been a tad better with Faggins out, but the injuries have forced us to be vanilla. That is not entirely Smith's fault, but I have been saying all year that I personally have not liked his game plans.

But be realistic, things would be different with Dunta out there. We were never really a great zone team, now we are forced to do it.

Some bad luck, just my opinion....However, I would like to see a change at DC at the end of the year.

[DeclanJr]

We got no pressure on the quarterback today. He had all day to find receivers and throw the ball. I think the secondary held up their end, but our D-Line is suspect. MW sack was a gimme. He got handled all day.

[sleepwalker]

A better secondary might make the qb hold the ball a second or two longer which would really help out D-line out too I think anyways.

[GT]

He needs to go. His defensive schemes are not working and for crying out loud he has 3 #1 picks on his defense. How atrocious can this man be?Can't argue with you about the schemes, personally I believed they would have brought more than 4. He applied no pressure what so ever.:confused:

[outofhnd]

We need DBs like no tomorrow.

[HomeGrownTexan]

Our defense didn't have their best day, but they weren't the reason why we lost this game............the offense was, you can't dodge every bullet when your facing a team like the Browns......the offense didn't hold up their end of the bargain and the defense was worn down.

[sleepwalker]

I hear people complaining on the radio about the vanilla 2 deep zone base stuff.

I think people are being slightly retarded, it's a patchwork secondary with no dunta.

I mean do you really expect to win moving hutchins and bennett out on the island and ask them to man up? It's just not realistic.

[trutexan02]

I got three words for Richard...
BLITZ THE QB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We blitzed ONCE...ONCE!!!!!!!

Result: SACK AND FORCED FUMBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Was that not what we wanted? We disliked that call so much we didn't call it once more!?!??!?!?!?!

Our mind set on D has to change from "Let's stop their Offense" to "Their O-line has to stop our D"
Be agressive and go after them!!!!!!

Our D played well today, but needed to step up and make some plays to shorten the field for the Offense
I think Richard is the reason that didn't happen. He held them back and didn't let them play to a strength that no one in the NFL has seen yet.

[HomeGrownTexan]

Our D played well today, but needed to step up and make some plays to shorten the field for the Offense.

You mean like when Bennett intercepted a pass and returned it deep into Browns territory?

Again the defense did their job today......could they have done better.....sure, but they weren't the reason we lost the game, Houston actually played Cleveland better then most of the teams have played them defensively all year.

The offense didn't show up to help them out at all, if you want to bash the team, bash the offense....they were the ones that kept hanging our defense out to dry.

[BIGTEX1]

You cant leave them on the field all day and expect them to defend a short field.

[trutexan02]

You mean like when Bennett intercepted a pass and returned it deep into Browns territory?

Again the defense did their job today......could they have done better.....sure, but they weren't the reason we lost the game, Houston actually played Cleveland better then most of the teams have played them defensively all year.

The offense didn't show up to help them out at all, if you want to bash the team, bash the offense....they were the ones that kept hanging our defense out to dry.


Oh no! By no means am i giving the O a pass. They played very poorly. No doubt about it.

I think the D could have been more impactful if not for very conservitive play calling from the DC. That's what I'm saying. Frankly, the D did it's job, the O didn't. But we could have been terrorizing Anderson today but the game plan seemingly didn't allow it.

[BIGTEX1]

You cant gameplan a pass rush or blitz when you dont have DBs who can cover man to man.The brown o line has only allowed 10 sacks in 11 games.Add the fact our D LINE cant rush.

[DeclanJr]

You cant gameplan a pass rush or blitz when you dont have DBs who can cover man to man.The brown o line has only allowed 10 sacks in 11 games.Add the fact our D LINE cant rush.

I thought that the DB's played a pretty solid game. The defense was on the field way too long. We got no pressure on the quarterback.

[trutexan02]

You cant gameplan a pass rush or blitz when you dont have DBs who can cover man to man.The brown o line has only allowed 10 sacks in 11 games.Add the fact our D LINE cant rush.

But you can create a little indecision with less time to throw the ball. Give our young DB's a chance to make play on the ball.
Besides our DB's play very well today. NO BIG PLAYS. Von Hutchins played very well coming from Safety to Corner. I'd have taken a chance.
plus there were a good number of checkdowns indicating that coverage was there. Suppose we had blitzed, Lewis would have been kept in for protection. then what.. Anderson has to beat us on the fly. Maybe he does, maybe doesn't. But we all saw what he did with no pressure on him. Winslow all day.

[HomeGrownTexan]

Y'all do realize Cleveland has one of the best Olines in the league and a young Bruce Mathews playing LT don't y'all.

There really hasn't been a team that's been able to "terrorize" them all season............Anderson has all day to throw and Cleveland has a bright future and it's all because of their Oline.....Houston needs to take note.

[dalemurphy]

Can't argue with you about the schemes, personally I believed they would have brought more than 4. He applied no pressure what so ever.:confused:


there was one blitz all day. By the way, that was the Mario sack and FF...

I'm not one of those guys that scream to blitz every play. HOwever, a little unpredictablility would be nice, especially when we're getting handled up front.

[trutexan02]

Y'all do realize Cleveland has one of the best Olines in the league and a young Bruce Mathews playing LT don't y'all.

There really hasn't been a team that's been able to "terrorize" them all season............Anderson has all day to throw and Cleveland has a bright future and it's all because of their Oline.....Houston needs to take note.

Funny Anderson was running for his life in Pittsburgh. they didn't have many sacks to show for it (if any). But they disrupted his timing. Blitzs don't nessecarily end in sacks but most of the time I'd say incompletions. Wouldn't you agree?

I haveta honestly say, an occasional blitz impacts how a OC calls the game. Just like when teams stuff the running game the OC decides play action is a good call cuz the D is stacking the line. Cause and Effect. We gave them no "cause" to reduce receivers (effect)and put undue pressure on the secondary. Which I think we can all agree is wet behind the ears.

And yes, I do realize they have a very good O-line. It will only get better. But I can tell all the way from Shreveport LA that the D-line isn't good enough to pressure consistantly by itself.

[BIGTEX1]

Remember these players are backups so they havent played and practiced all year in this system.I agree they have played well last 2 games.I thought they would be torched after losing Daunta but they stepped up.If the o would control the ball longer by getting 1st downs you dont exspose the D to so much pressure.This teams problem is not scheme or coaching its trying to get 22 players who want to win and will accept nothing else.No body wanted to fire anybody last week.

[Texicano]

He needs to go. His defensive schemes are not working and for crying out loud he has 3 #1 picks on his defense. How atrocious can this man be?

I agree. We just need to clean house and fire everybody and start over from scratch methinks. ;)

[aj.]

I hear people complaining on the radio about the vanilla 2 deep zone base stuff.

I think people are being slightly retarded, it's a patchwork secondary with no dunta.

I mean do you really expect to win moving hutchins and bennett out on the island and ask them to man up? It's just not realistic.


I recommend that people read this because it's one of the few posts in this thread that is worth reading.

[edo783]

I recommend that people read this because it's one of the few posts in this thread that is worth reading.

I doubt they will AJ. They would just rather whine and make stupid remarks/suggestions on here and the radio.

[HydrOshocK]

Oh no! By no means am i giving the O a pass. They played very poorly. No doubt about it.

I think the D could have been more impactful if not for very conservitive play calling from the DC. That's what I'm saying. Frankly, the D did it's job, the O didn't. But we could have been terrorizing Anderson today but the game plan seemingly didn't allow it.

No team has terrorized Anderson all season long. Teams have blitzed him and he's made them pay. What makes you think we would've had any more success?

[HydrOshocK]

You cant gameplan a pass rush or blitz when you dont have DBs who can cover man to man.The brown o line has only allowed 10 sacks in 11 games.Add the fact our D LINE cant rush.

Agreed

[HydrOshocK]

But you can create a little indecision with less time to throw the ball. Give our young DB's a chance to make play on the ball.
Besides our DB's play very well today. NO BIG PLAYS. Von Hutchins played very well coming from Safety to Corner. I'd have taken a chance.
plus there were a good number of checkdowns indicating that coverage was there. Suppose we had blitzed, Lewis would have been kept in for protection. then what.. Anderson has to beat us on the fly. Maybe he does, maybe doesn't. But we all saw what he did with no pressure on him. Winslow all day.

Our DBs played well today because we didn't blitz a lot and ask them to cover Edwards, Winslow, and Jurevicius man-to-man.

[TheLBCoach]

Richard Smith tells himself this before every game:

"It's okay if we give up field goals, just not touchdowns. We can bend, just not break."

I agree that he should be fired as soon as the game clock hits 0:00 in our Week 17 game.

[trutexan02]

No team has terrorized Anderson all season long. Teams have blitzed him and he's made them pay. What makes you think we would've had any more success?



You'd be wrong. His stat line against Pittsburgh: D. Anderson 16/35 123 3 0
Leading receiver Winslow 5 for 46. (*short yardage) 13 was his long.

All three TD's in the first half. Adjustments and pressure = LOSS

Leading Tackler was FS (4) followed by the DE (3)
It looks like that all the way down the roster. It came from everywhere.
NO sacks.
Disruption that's what Pitt banks on.

He didn't make anyone pay for coming after him there.
Unless you live in a hole you know Pitt brought the heat.

And we did show we can bring it, with the one and only blitz we sent.
Could we have been better had we blitzed? Maybe, maybe not, but we didn't even try.

[texans83]

I agree with what some of you said. The D did play well today. It is not their fault we lost. The browns have one of the best offensive lines out there and we could not blitz more because they would have just checked off and threw something short but with winslow even a dump off route he can take it to the house, and I dont know for sure but I bet thats why we didnt blitz more. Like I said the D was tired and was forced to go back out there in terrible field posistion and after a brief break. In all honesty it reminded me of the begining of last year. We have to go down field more often with our playmakers. It will open up and when it isent there then we can run right up the middle. Didnt you all see thats exactly what the browns did to us and what they have been doing all year. We were forced to cover the deep stuff late and thats when they just ran us over. The only thing I really saw that the DB's need to work on is tackling. Man they were going high every run and they were just bouncing off. They need to go low with a big bruiser back like JL. Im very upset about the loss but as good of a offence that they were our D (which is very young and unexperienced) played pretty good. But our O needs to step it up.

[noxiousdog]

At home, Cleveland has scored 7, 51, 27, 41, 33, and 27.
Away, Cleveland has scored 24, 17, 27, 28, and 33.

I think we did okay considering we're down Dunta.

[El Tejano]

I think Cleveland's offensive line and defensive backfield beat us yesterday. Plain and simple.

[texans83]

I think Cleveland's offensive line and defensive backfield beat us yesterday. Plain and simple.

that is what I saw

[SuperstarII]

The problem is that he didn't get pressure on the QB. I saw maybe two times they put pressure on anderson and one was a sack.

[3andOUT]

I thought the defense played well for the first half and then wore down, mainly because the Browns dominated time of poss.

I saw the most vanilla 4-3 ever for most of the day which is beginning to frustrate me. I'm tired of the same rush four, keep everything in front of you defense. It's way too conducive to letting the opposing quarterback get in a rhythym and almost any NFL QB can pick a D apart if he's allowed time. I'm not saying go blitz-crazy but please mix it up a bit.

I did not see us even attempt to create a little confusion yesterday by mixing up looks prior to the snap. Everything they showed 10 seconds prior to the snap was what we were bringing.

[HydrOshocK]

You'd be wrong. His stat line against Pittsburgh: D. Anderson 16/35 123 3 0
Leading receiver Winslow 5 for 46. (*short yardage) 13 was his long.

All three TD's in the first half. Adjustments and pressure = LOSS

Leading Tackler was FS (4) followed by the DE (3)
It looks like that all the way down the roster. It came from everywhere.
NO sacks.
Disruption that's what Pitt banks on.

He didn't make anyone pay for coming after him there.
Unless you live in a hole you know Pitt brought the heat.

And we did show we can bring it, with the one and only blitz we sent.
Could we have been better had we blitzed? Maybe, maybe not, but we didn't even try.


Well I was speaking in general terms but I stand corrected. Anderson had an off day against the #1 defense in the league in the very first game of the season.....go figure. But in the second game against the Steelers Anderson threw 3 TDs and wasn't sacked once. The only other team to really bring any heat on him since was the Patriots, who pretty much roll every team they play with the exception of the Eagles in their last game.

And it's worth noting that both teams run a 3-4 scheme where it's much easier to disguise blitz pressure. We run a very vanilla 4-3 and we have been horrible at disguising blitz packages, which is why we had a tendancy to get burned earlier in the season.

[trutexan02]

Well I was speaking in general terms but I stand corrected. Anderson had an off day against the #1 defense in the league in the very first game of the season.....go figure. But in the second game against the Steelers Anderson threw 3 TDs and wasn't sacked once. The only other team to really bring any heat on him since was the Patriots, who pretty much roll every team they play with the exception of the Eagles in their last game.

And it's worth noting that both teams run a 3-4 scheme where it's much easier to disguise blitz pressure. We run a very vanilla 4-3 and we have been horrible at disguising blitz packages, which is why we had a tendancy to get burned earlier in the season.

ah ha. Good note. We are seemingly talking in the same terms, but you make a good point. I just think we didn't need to disguise it being we a 4-3 team. They know we have four monsters coming after them and one from any three LB spots would make them honest in pass protection. My primary point is pressure, and our front four obvously wasn't applying it. A few more blitzs could have helped some. Maybe make them pause on a doubleteam for a split second. Near as I can see that's about all Okoye needs to squeeze between the Center and Tackle.

Without any pressure Anderson has proven to this point he can make you pay for sure.

The Pats are an exception to just about every rule in the NFL. i cringe saying that too. I hate those guys. They could rush the waterboy and register a 5 sack game it seems.

[Liberty_White]

I think we should be more creative on defense. We should be more willing to take the risk and bring pressure, and I don't think it has to be overly complicated. That being said, we all have to realize that without Dunta it is much more difficult to line up and bring pressure.

[HydrOshocK]

ah ha. Good note. We are seemingly talking in the same terms, but you make a good point. I just think we didn't need to disguise it being we a 4-3 team. They know we have four monsters coming after them and one from any three LB spots would make them honest in pass protection. My primary point is pressure, and our front four obvously wasn't applying it. A few more blitzs could have helped some. Maybe make them pause on a doubleteam for a split second. Near as I can see that's about all Okoye needs to squeeze between the Center and Tackle.

Without any pressure Anderson has proven to this point he can make you pay for sure.

The Pats are an exception to just about every rule in the NFL. i cringe saying that too. I hate those guys. They could rush the waterboy and register a 5 sack game it seems.

I agree. More blitz packages would definitely help but I think Smith is gunshy because he knows when he blitzes we have a tendancy to give up much bigger plays in the secondary. Maybe that will change in the future (if he remains as DC) once they have upgraded the personnel but we'll have to wait and see. In the mean time I bet he continues to play it safe. :(

[HydrOshocK]

I think we should be more creative on defense. We should be more willing to take the risk and bring pressure, and I don't think it has to be overly complicated. That being said, we all have to realize that without Dunta it is much more difficult to line up and bring pressure.

Outside of the fact that our secondary is suspect in man-to-man coverage, I think the other reason why Smith continues to play it safe is because our defense has been fairly solid lately. We're generating more 3-and-outs and not giving up the really big scoring plays like we used to. We've also been able to contain the run better. If you look at our games you'll notice we've been able to keep it close in the first half (a lot of times we are actually playing with the lead). It's only when our offense starts turning the ball over and giving our defense a short field to defend, with very little rest, that the games start getting out of hand because our defense tires out. And by that time if we bring the blitz and get burned on it then we're in an even bigger hole.

Again, I'm not saying we shouldn't blitz more. I'm just speculating on why I think Smith calls the games the way he does.

[dalemurphy]

Outside of the fact that our secondary is suspect in man-to-man coverage, I think the other reason why Smith continues to play it safe is because our defense has been fairly solid lately. We're generating more 3-and-outs and not giving up the really big scoring plays like we used to. We've also been able to contain the run better. If you look at our games you'll notice we've been able to keep it close in the first half (a lot of times we are actually playing with the lead). It's only when our offense starts turning the ball over and giving our defense a short field to defend, with very little rest, that the games start getting out of hand because our defense tires out. And by that time if we bring the blitz and get burned on it then we're in an even bigger hole.

Again, I'm not saying we shouldn't blitz more. I'm just speculating on why I think Smith calls the games the way he does.


This is the NFL. Almost all games are close through the first half. The problem is that our defense basically relies on the offense to make a mistake and does very little to disrupt what the offense wants to do. By the second half, in most games, the opposing offense is quite comfortable and we have no answers when we need to make a play.

For instance, against Cleveland, Derek Anderson never got touched until the third quarter. He could drop back, count on a 4 man rush, count on the same zone coverage, etc... Unless we have dominate personnel and execute that vanilla package at a very high level, we can't be so predictable. The o.c. and the QB are made way too comfortable and allowed to find rythm.

[HydrOshocK]

This is the NFL. Almost all games are close through the first half. The problem is that our defense basically relies on the offense to make a mistake and does very little to disrupt what the offense wants to do. By the second half, in most games, the opposing offense is quite comfortable and we have no answers when we need to make a play.

For instance, against Cleveland, Derek Anderson never got touched until the third quarter. He could drop back, count on a 4 man rush, count on the same zone coverage, etc... Unless we have dominate personnel and execute that vanilla package at a very high level, we can't be so predictable. The o.c. and the QB are made way too comfortable and allowed to find rythm.

Tell that to the Patriots

[willieg52]

Richard Smith is just to conservative for my liking. He hardly mixes it up and if a DC can predict what you are doing from week to week, it makes any game for an OC easy to plan.