About those punt blocks and blaming the players....

[Jrock88]

rivera is too soft.. one practice during the bye week for a team that has lost 9 straight? good preparation ron

[Silent Majority]

tolbert has to take that guy on the 2nd one , no? we are just unfocused. undisciplined team right now

After watching it a couple of times. It was going to fail either way. The outside guy was almost in better position as the inside guy. Coaches should have called a timeout.

[PantherWake]

High school football 101 - block from the inside out and everyone calls out their man. Doesn't seem overly complicated, but this staff has had a way of making simple things look difficult.

Yup this is the same coaching staff that still starts Dwill

[Mr. Scot]

Voth contrasts the post game discussion here: Panthers, Vikings explain what happened on blocked punts

 

Rivera...

 

“That was a miscommunication, and part of it is, we practice it. There’s a lot of noise going on out there. The personal protector is trying to make corrections and adjustments for the movement that they had. They timed their movement up pretty good. We tried to counter it with the calls, and at that point, we’ve got to make sure that we get those communications out and that we hear it.”

 

“Both of them were individual breakdowns, very disappointing. Individuals got beat up and under. An individual turned the wrong way. Those are individual breakdowns that will be corrected.”

 

 

On the flipside, Vikings ST Coach Mike Priefer...

 

“[We overloaded] both A gaps. Theilen was in one A gap, and Andrew [sendejo] was in the other, and we’re fortunate that they both came free, … “You put a lot of stress on the long snapper when you do that, but we obviously beat the snapper, and the upback (Thomas DeCoud) had to choose one or the other.”

 

...and special teamer Adam Thielen

 

“We knew someone was going to come free, and I just kind of came free. Nobody blocked me.”

 

It's not hard to see that the Vikings found something they could exploit, yet Rivera still puts it on 'individual breakdowns'.

 

 

[KSpan]

Thomas DeCoud is the least physical NFL player since Deion Sanders. The guy just does not like contact.

[JawnyBlaze]

It was an individual breakdown.  Same individual breakdown that's cost us 9 games this season.  The individual breakdown of Ron Rivera.

[JawnyBlaze]

Thomas DeCoud is the least physical NFL player since Deion Sanders. The guy just does not like contact.

 

I remember one play he put his head down and stuck a RB going full speed at him.  Didn't shy away, or try to arm tackle or anything.  I think the "DeCoud doesn't like contact" rhetoric is a bit overblown.  I've seen him square up ball carriers plenty of times, he just isn't always at the right angle to do that.

 

[Chaos]

Thomas DeCoud is the least physical NFL player since Deion Sanders. The guy just does not like contact.

You misspelled Roman Harper

[KSpan]

I remember one play he put his head down and stuck a RB going full speed at him. Didn't shy away, or try to arm tackle or anything. I think the "DeCoud doesn't like contact" rhetoric is a bit overblown. I've seen him square up ball carriers plenty of times, he just isn't always at the right angle to do that.

Between what he does on defense and what is shown in those vines (he's the upback), the guy clearly doesn't like to hit. He's a respectable deep safety, but the physicality isn't there. Not his game.

[CatMan72]

The one thing you NEVER do is allow pressure up the middle on punt protection... If you fail at everything else, you protect the A gaps, so I don't understand how the first block happens under any circumstances?

[KSpan]

You misspelled Roman Harper

He's another story... he likes contact, but only when the opponent isn't looking for it.

[CatMan72]

The one thing you NEVER do is allow pressure up the middle on punt protection... If you fail at everything else, you protect the A gaps, so I don't understand how the first block happens under any circumstances?

 

Not to answer my own question, but Rivera mentioned a communication/timing issue so maybe the weakness they found was that DeCoud as the PP tends to overcompensate in protection adjustments for outside pressure when an opponent shows that and then they all jump inside? 

 

Either way, this gets back to a coaching problem. No way Rodgers should still be our ST coach at the end of the day today. First time two punts have been blocked in a game SINCE 1975. 

 

On the 2nd block, Jacobs depth on the edge was wrong from the moment he lined up... was Rodgers jumping up and down on the sideline screaming at Jacobs? Why didn't we call a timeout? 

[CatMan72]

Thomas DeCoud is the least physical NFL player since Deion Sanders. The guy just does not like contact.

 

This wasn't about contact, DeCoud setup the protection wrong and was in no-mans land when they penetrated both A gaps... at that point it didn't matter who he chose to block because the other guy had a free run to the punter. 

[KSpan]

This wasn't about contact, DeCoud setup the protection wrong and was in no-mans land when they penetrated both A gaps... at that point it didn't matter who he chose to block because the other guy had a free run to the punter.

Looks to me like he made a choice in the first Vine and let the guy run right by him without touching him, though his head was turned to the left. Tolbert was the up back in the second block.

Either way, we can all agree that the whole thing is ludicrous.