(11-26-2019, 09:36 AM)LMD Wrote:

(11-26-2019, 02:24 AM)TJBender Wrote: I had kind of assumed that Russell was drafted as a potential replacement for Dareus. Bryan is more of a Calais Campbell type, at his best when he's free behind the line. Russell is a space-eater. It's never the most encouraging thing in the world when your team loses a key contributor and the high draft pick and that position doesn't see a huge jump in snap count, but it's understandable in this situation.

Now, if Calais or Abry had gone down and Bryan was losing snaps to Russell, that would be a huge red flag.

I don’t disagree, in principle. Where I lose that train though, is when I realize this isn’t the first week Dareus was out. If this was the first week post-Dareus, it’d be one thing. But this is a couple weeks without Dareus at this point. Russel apparently wasn’t good enough to even cut into Bryan’s snapcount the first few weeks after Dareus was IR’d, but now he plays one week and out-snaps Bryan.

This also isn’t just Russel cutting into Bryan’s snap count; this is Russel coming off being inactive every week to play more snaps than Bryan.

If after weeks of letting Bryan replace Dareus, the team concluded that the one move they could make to try to salvage the run defense was essentially benching their first round draft pick for a guy who wasn’t good enough to make the active game day roster as a space-eating run-stopper the past few weeks, I think that leaves room for worry about Bryan’s overall career trajectory... 

(11-26-2019, 06:59 AM)NYC4jags Wrote: Wait a minute...

The jags give up 200+ yds on the ground in consecutive games and decide to see if putting a 320 DT up front might help them gum up the middle.

It didn’t work, but it makes sense people. I don’t get the gripe here. It’s not like the run d was gonna get worse. LOL

I’m more worried that Bryan basically got shelved for a guy who couldn’t make the active roster. I understand Bryan’s role isn’t to be a space-eating run-stuffer like Dareus, or hopefully Russel. But he’s still a first round draft pick playing the interior of the line; he should be, at least, somewhat competent to play the run. Yet he’s basically the only guy who lost playing time—to a guy who was inactive every week, even after Dareus went out—in an attempt to save this run defense. 

With how many issues the run defense had, in total, you don’t see any reason to worry that the one move they made was reducing Bryan’s snap count? (I’m not counting the linebackers coming back from injury as that wasn’t so much of a strategic choice as a “our first option is finally available again” move.)

If this team signed Tommy Bohanon off the scrap heap this week and then gave him more snaps than Fournette next week, would we say “well, Tommy’s a better blocker and the team needed to find a way to block better for Foles, so it makes sense Fournette, a running running-back, lost snaps?” (I realize this is a significantly more dramatic example than Russel v. Bryan, but I haven’t had any coffee yet today, so this is the best my brain can come up with. I’m open to better comparisons.)

1. Russell has been on the team all year. He made the roster out of camp.
2. Bryan hasn't been "benched" in favor of Russell. He played 22 snaps to Russell's 26. Campbell and Bryan do the same thing most of the time. Russell is a space eater. Bryan as the primary run stopper wasn't working because that's not what he's built to do, but Russell and his 325 lbs. are a natural fit at the position.
3. Signing Bo is a nutty example, yes. It would be more like if Fournette was placed on IR and Armstead took over the starting job, but the team decided that Ervin is a better third-down option then spent most of the game in passing sets. Yes, Ervin would get the majority of snaps in that situation, just like how Russell has gotten lots of snaps while the team is spending most of its time not defending the run. It's not that Armstead is necessarily mediocre or underachieving. It's that Ervin is a better fit for what the team wants to do in the formation they're spending most of their time in.

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