How good is a 5 - 2 Defense?

[Davidson Deac II]

Wide tackle six. 

[Toundra]

Let me re use a famous quote from Kotor 2.

 

Apathy is death.

[Peppers90 NC]

well if they try to drop CJ in coverage again on a WR I cant remember if it was Maclin or Matthews, we have no shot.

[Mother Grabber]

Let's go 2-3-6

Cason - Ealy

Davis - Luke - CJ

Ealy - Bene - KK - Jones - Star - Norman

??????

 

sounds like the Taints no fly zone, future of defense in the NFL!

[Panthers8969]

New idea- 4-2-1 we only have 7 real players on the field anyways

[updownsigma]

How about a 4-3-0 because that's essentially what we have now

[Peppers90 NC]

New idea- 4-2-1 we only have 7 real players on the field anyways

think had we been able to get away with 12 guys those few times how little extra help they would have provided

[panthers55]

As a base defense no one runs it outside of college.  Do we do it against obvious run plays even now?  Yep.  Since no base defense is run most of the time and teams go back and forth it could work situationally depending on down and distance.

[CPantherKing]

The Panthers are rushing 4 and dropping 7. May as well be running a 4-2-5 nickle package all game. Problem is they cannot cover for 5-6 seconds.

 

So they are negating the 2 best defenders on the field by doing this in Davis and Kuechly. Not putting their players in position to make plays.

 

So, putting a 5th person rushing the passer and playing the run will be more beneficial when you have 4 players who cannot reach the QB against 5. I would not do this with a 5th DL. Instead you should have either Kuechly or Davis blitzing every play. Mix them up. Let them play the run to the QB. Guarantee you the QB will not have 6 seconds in the pocket. Ball gets out faster, make the QB hesitate, or have the QB force balls by getting him off his spot. While this is not optimal, this will pay more dividends than dropping your 2 best defensive players with 5 more into pass coverage for 6+ seconds.

[Kuhndog94]

2 - 5 - 4...

Star - Short

Ealy - Davis - Luke - Klein - Hardy

Melvin - Harper - Jones - Norman

[Riverboat Ron]

3-4

 

                                      Short-Cole-Star

 

Cam                                                                             Benjamin

 

                           Davis-Kuechly-Klein-Johnson

 

                                    Bersin-Boston

                

[Killa Cam 69]

Man madden has really screwed people up

[BuffaloBills62]

I will do my very, very best here but I do advise that I do not know enough of the talent of this team in the box to really comment too much in detail.

 

When looking at this team I see the biggest weakness is at LB.  Which is ridiculous and you just kind of drop your jaw and wonder what the hell I just said.  But, it is true.  You have Kuechly and Davis.  That's a damn good duo.  But, you have AJ Klein who gets exposed and is more of a Jack then Sam.  He's not as bad as people think, he 's just not in the right system.  A 4 LB lineup would not work, either; you have 2 LB's and putting 4 on the field means you now need 2 more LB's and not just 1.  But, the Panthers are closer to a 34 lineup then they are a 43 lineup.

 

Perhaps going 4-2 and playing with a monster is better.  I like this article.

 

A monster formation would look like this

Johnson - Short - Lotulelei - Horton

Davis - Kuechly - Klein - Lester/Benwikere

DeCoud/Harper

 

I have been looking at Benwikere enough to know he might be better as a package player or the monster back type.  I am not sure he has what it takes to get to the RB's that close to the LOS but I think he has a smart enough head to catch up and adapt.

 

Back, to your 5-2 defense, since you're trying to try something from nothing, I'll get back to it.

 

Dwan Edwards is one of the most special kind of players you can find in the NFL.  The veteran depth player who does not cost you much, contributes when he is in and is not a liability.  In Buffalo, Pettine successfully stood him up on the outside to drop in to coverage (against Gronkowski, too!) or blitz the passer on the weakside.  He played as a hybrid OLB/DE in this role.  He is equally effective across the LOS at any position, however, I would avoid keeping him in the middle when you have sufficient talent there to get the job done - but it's not going to stop the run like you need.

 

You're working on securing the outside and stopping the runs around the edge and trying to do that with a 5-2 is not going to work.  I do not know if any MLB in this league is fast enough to get to the edge to make the tackle in a 5-2.  Kuechly, as good as he is, could not even do this unless he got magical flying ability.  You need an OLB who can shed blockers and has the range to play to run and seal an edge to let Kuechly clean up.

 

The best thing you can do is find yourself a FA.  One I want you to look at is Justin Durant in Dallas.  Durant would give you help in covering the pass, free up Kuechly shore up a weak position.

 

Anyway, I know a thing or two about defenses but not enough to give full weight on the Panthers without more study.  I will take a better look over the next few weeks on answering this question.

[TonyN]

Running a 5-2 would not be much different than running a Wide Tackle Six...

 

At this point it is really semantic bologna.

 

How often do you see DE's drop into coverage these days???

 

Connor Barwin, the DE/OLB  who repeatedly gave us trouble Monday is a DE/ OLB.

 

The guy is 6' 4' 265.

 

Is he a LB or a DL???