Jenkins and Johnson out. McGee on IR.

2 rookie corners.

A rookie nickel.

A rookie back-up (Thomas).

This is like a much more modest, much less destructive repeat of 2011.

Like, having gone through a war, now, it’s a bar brawl. Same thing…smaller scale.

rfl wrote:

zn wrote:
The way I see it? This team dominates at times. If it were a more inherently stable team (and I think circumstances led to the instabilities) it would dominate more of the time. If it were a bad team OR a badly coached team, it would never dominate, whether for stretches or not.

This is exactly correct.

And that is precisely a definition of a poorly coached team. I think that, by consensus and across the spectrum of most sports, a team that is “inherently unstable” is understood to reflect poor coaching. Especially in American football, which is pre-eminently a coach’s sport.

So, I view your comment–with which I agree–as an indictment of Fisher and his staff.

One example. You mention ’11 and McDaniels. Well, that was a coaching disaster. McD. utterly failed to adapt to and coach that unit to its potential. And Spags hired him and let him run wild. It was precisely a coaching staff catastrophe.

Well, this year, Fisher hires a wild DC and lets him leaqd the league in blitzes while recording a league record for pass rush futility through 5 games … all with a superb DL. Insofar as this season is like ’11, it is a coaching failure.

ZN, you keep saying you see things differently. But your description of what is happening is pretty much what I see … except that you keep avoiding a harsh judgment of Fisher’s staff. Frankly, I don’t really get what you are trying to argue.

Let’s just hope they turn things around and we can all be happy.

I just see it so differently. I don’t think this is a poorly coached team. I think it’s a team with bad growing pains and confidence issues. I see execution issues, but it’s not like it’s a vet team that does all the wrong things…it’s a struggling to be consistent, younger team, and I put that on players. As I said, what I see on the defense is something I think I have seen before–in early 2011, for example, when the offense was out of sync and just not comfortable with what they were doing. I put that down to them not really having a handle on the McD offense. That’s what I see with the Wms defense.

The fact that Fisher keeps saying “you stay the course” meaning stressing the same things tells me (to my ears anyway) that players are having problems adapting and executing and you react to that by continuing to do what you are doing. One day that will even out.

I can’t imagine a team BOTH changing a coordinator and starting its 3rd qb and being seamless and smooth. Toss in the youngest secondary in the league. That’s a recipe for “a team that struggles out the gate.”

So I just see units struggling to adjust. To me that’s experience.

I don’t get down on coaches unless they’re guys like Linehan who clearly lost the team. Previous Fisher teams have long stretches where they are tops. Same with Wms defenses. So I look at execution above all. I also think everyone would look better if the team were winning, and I think they lost games because of multiple bad errors, and to me those errors go to execution.

I mean clearly you make good points in your as usual articulate way, but I am just into my own way of seeing it right now.

Not much. But, he should be ready to go soon.

This is from Oct 17:

The Rams listed center Barrett Jones (back), defensive tackle Alex Carrington (knee), wide receiver Austin Pettis (ankle) and running backs Stacy (ankle) and Chase Reynolds (hip) as probable after they took part in full workouts Friday.

from off the net

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tbux

We are 2-4 and that means we have a major uphill battle to respectability. A loss means we are officially done for the year- cant be 2-5 and come back from that. A win means 3-4 and not out of it. Now odds are we aren’t going to the playoffs this year, but at the same time, you never know if a young team gets on a roll and gets confidence- we do have enough talent if things start clicking- namely the D. Get CL back in 2 weeks or so and that could be huge to a team on a roll. Confidence is a great thing. If we can somehow win in KC ( I would say is a long shot but possible) and the youngins like GR, Mason, Gaines, Donald etc continue to get better- Tavon starts going off, and get CL back– man O man- 9-7 is suddenly possible. Now admittedly I am a pie in the sky type-glass half full type of guy- but if we can beat a Seattle team, we can compete with anyone (well besides maybe Den). Have to have this one though to make anything else possible. We regress, and have mistakes and turnovers etc- we are officially done. This is a must win game- no question. Here’s hoping we get up for this one, build on the big win last week and pull off the upset in KC. That would be a big win.

[BUT]…hurt corners only make it worse. Dline has to dominate and we have to run the ball well- two tall tasks. Probably have to have some big plays on ST and may need a turnover or two all the while playing nearly mistake free football. I do think it is winnable- but I think it is going to be a very tough one to win. Need it though- no way around it. If we do win, the confidence could be sky high and that could be a great thing for this young team.

Percy Harvin trade: Multiple reports of discord behind the scenes for Seahawks

By Danny Kelly

http://www.fieldgulls.com/2014/10/18/6997821/percy-harvin-trade-seahawks-russell-wilson-nfl

As more details trickle in about the Seahawks’ stunning decision to trade Percy Harvin to the Jets, a picture of persistent drama behind the scenes is starting to form. The multiple reports of Harvin’s discontent with his role on the team and in the scheme all point to the idea that the Seahawks simply grew tired of having to deal with the chemistry issues he was creating.

The well-connected Lance Zierlein reported through a series of tweets and an appearance on Dave Softy Mahler’s show on KJR Friday afternoon that Harvin’s well-documented off-field issues continued after he arrived in Seattle. Zierlein noted that Percy Harvin punched Golden Tate at around the Super Bowl time last year (with Tate showing what looks to be a black eye in this photo), and that he nearly got into a fight with Russell Wilson this season (this was, reportedly, a big impetus to ultimately pull the trigger on the trade). Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times had a source that corroborated the report of the Tate fight, and Condotta also added:

“A source also said Harvin had an altercation with Seattle receiver Doug Baldwin in the week leading up to the final exhibition game this August at Oakland that resulted in Baldwin getting a cut on his chin and each player being excused from practices that week. Harvin, who did not practice for two days before that game, did not make the trip to Oakland for what the team said at the time was “a personal matter.”

There was a good amount of angst at the time, with fans and media members alike wondering aloud what the details around with Harvin’s “personal matter” really were.

Warren Moon, who is close to a good number of players and coaches on the Seahawks and who mentors Russell Wilson, said this today.

“One thing Pete Carroll wants is great chemistry on the field as well as off the field. And they had a tough time trying to figure out how to fit Percy Harvin and his skill set into what they already do as a philosophy offensively with Marshawn Lynch running the football and their play-action game. And then there was a little bit of a chemistry problem within the locker room at times with Percy, because he’s a different type of guy. So I think the combination of the two made it to where he was expendable. . . . One thing . . . Pete is really, really big on is chemistry and everybody feeling comfortable with one another. And I think that’s what this team has been so successful with the last three years. They’ve really had a great camaraderie, and they didn’t want to do anything to disrupt that.”

Mike Florio of PFT added another interesting angle to all this, noting that the Seahawks were looking to avoid allowing Harvin create a rift in the locker room related to Russell Wilson’s leadership style.

“As one source explained it to PFT on Friday evening, the Seahawks possibly feared that Harvin had sufficient influence over enough of the locker room to launch a mutiny against quarterback Russell Wilson, who despite not yet getting a franchise-quarterback contract possibly has become the target of some resentment among players who don’t share his complete devotion to the game, and who regard the third-year quarterback as a player-coach.”

This fear has roots with Harvin’s history, as it was reported the final straw in the Vikings’ decision to trade him was that he was badmouthing then-starting quarterback Christian Ponder at the time.

Perhaps the biggest issue, or at least the ultimate final straw, is something that Bob Condotta and John Boyle both reported Friday night: that Percy Harvin refused to go back into the game late against Dallas, when Seattle was trying to drive downfield to re-take the lead. Harvin missed 11 of the Seahawks final 17 snaps and this strange usage had confused pretty much everyone watching; it was something that Pete Carroll tiptoed around with vague comments about game flow and ‘readiness’. I would have to think for Pete Carroll, Harvin’s refusal to go into the game as a form of protest for touches or usage may have been the most egregious affront to the whole philosophy and culture of the Always Compete program he’s created in Seattle.

The Seahawks have not yet issued a statement about the trade, but it’s expected Saturday afternoon once the paperwork goes through with New York. Harvin is still subject to a physical.

QB Smith writes career’s second act with Chiefs

By Joe Lyons

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/football/professional/qb-smith-writes-career-s-second-act-with-chiefs/article_c420e5fc-e724-507b-ba5c-aab0dc1771a8.html

Alex Smith was in the midst of his finest NFL season in 2012 when he suffered a concussion in a Nov. 11 game against the Rams.

On a scramble late in the first quarter, Smith fell awkwardly and was hit from behind by linebacker Jo-Lonn Dunbar. Smith stayed in the game but took another hit on a quarterback sneak early in the second quarter.

“It was probably a combination of both (hits),” Smith told the Post-Dispatch’s Jim Thomas after that season. “I definitely got my bell rung (by Dunbar) and continued to play. I didn’t have any (concussion) symptoms after that, though. Then on the QB sneak is when my vision went and I was really kind of disoriented a little bit.”

Colin Kaepernick, a second-round draft pick in 2011, took over in that day’s 24-24 tie at Candlestick Park and held the job even after Smith recovered, leading the 49ers to the Super Bowl in New Orleans, where they fell 34-31 to the Baltimore Ravens.

Smith finished that season with a career-best 104.1 quarterback rating, completing 70.2 percent of his passes for nearly 1,750 yards with 13 touchdowns and just five interceptions. During the offseason, Smith was traded to the Kansas City Chiefs for a pair of draft picks.

Speaking with St. Louis media this week, Smith said he is comfortable with coach Andy Reid in Kansas City and has avoided the what-ifs surrounding the end of his stay in San Francisco.

“I haven’t give it any thought, to be totally honest,” said Smith, whose 3-3 Chiefs host the 2-4 Rams Sunday with a noon kickoff at Arrowhead Stadium. “It’s been great (in Kansas City). I feel like I’ve been here a while in football years, all last year. This is home.

“I think (Reid) is such a great teacher of the game, especially on offense and quarterback play. He’s been around a lot of guys, different guys. Every single day you know what you’re getting. You come to work every single day, it’s a great environment to learn and get better and go out there and cut it loose.”

Reid has a similar respect for his quarterback.

“Alex is doing a good job for us. I really enjoy coaching him,” said Reid, also in his second season with the Chiefs. “He just kind of takes care of everything. He’s not only a good football player, but he can handle a lot of things. When you have a few young guys around him, he just makes sure everybody’s right. It’s a tribute to him and his ability to do those things.

“He’s pitching the ball good and manning the offense well.”

At times during his NFL career, Smith, who signed a four-year, $68 million contract extension in September, has been criticized for his frequent checkdowns — he has attempted just nine passes of 20-plus yards this season — and has been labeled as a “game manager.”

“To be totally honest, I’m old enough that I don’t really care as long as we win,” the 30-year-old said. “I could care less what they call me.”

Smith went 21-1 as a starter at Utah under Urban Meyer, finishing fourth in the 2004 Heisman Trophy voting after passing for nearly 3,000 yards and accounting for 42 touchdowns and with just four interceptions. He was drafted No. 1 overall in 2005 by a San Francisco franchise coming off a 2-14 campaign.

As a 20-year-old rookie, Smith struggled with injuries and consistency. In nine games, including seven starts, he completed less than 51 percent of his passes with one touchdown and 11 interceptions. In his first six NFL seasons, Smith worked with six offensive coordinators under head coaches Mike Nolan (18-37 record) and Mike Singletary (18-22).

Smith’s fortunes, as well as those of the 49ers, took a dramatic turn when Jim Harbaugh took over in 2011. That season, Smith enjoyed his best season to date, completing better than 61 percent of his passes for 3,144 yards with 17 touchdowns and five interceptions for a team that improved from 6-10 to 13-3, won a division title and lost in overtime in the NFC championship game to eventual Super Bowl champions, the New York Giants.

After the trade to Kansas City last year, Smith helped engineer another major turnaround as the Chiefs — who finished 2-14 in 2012 — won their first nine games and finished the regular season at 11-5 before losing 45-44 to Indianapolis in a wild-card game.

Smith, who stands 6 feet 4 and weighs 217 pounds, completed nearly 61 percent of his passes in 2013 while throwing for 3,313 yards with 23 touchdowns and seven picks. Through six games this fall, he’s thrown for 1,270 yards with nine touchdowns, four interceptions and a 64 percent completion rate.

“Alex is playing very, very well,” Rams coach Jeff Fisher said. “Alex has deceptive speed; he can pull the ball down (and) run for big plays. (He’s) making really good decisions. They’ve done some amazing things with him as far as timing’s concerned. That ball’s coming out, and it’s accurate, And they put a lot of stress on your defense by the way they disperse the receivers.

“There’s really nobody in that offense who can’t get into a route and catch the football.”

And then there’s running back Jamaal Charles, who a year ago led the AFC in rushing with 1,287 yards, caught 70 passes for 693 yards and finished with 19 touchdowns. This year, after missing the better part of two games with a high ankle sprain, Charles is starting to come back: Over the last three games, he’s averaging 89 rushing yards and has scored on two runs and two pass receptions.

The Rams have had success this season containing top-level backs such as Minnesota’s Adrian Peterson (21 carries, 75 yards), Philadelphia’s LeSean McCoy (24, 81), San Francisco’s Frank Gore (16, 3Cool and Seattle’s Marshawn Lynch (18, 53), but that won’t matter on Sunday.

“Completely different challenge this week in the run game,’’ Fisher stressed. “It’s a lot of read-option … so I wouldn’t compare them (to the last few weeks). Now they’ve got a big back (Knile Davis) they go to every once in a while…. We were building ourselves to play the power running game in our division because there’s a lot of similarities between San Francisco and Seattle. (But) this run game this week is going to be a big challenge for us.’’

The Chiefs, who opened the season with losses to Tennessee and Denver, rallied to win 23-20 last weekend in San Diego on a 48-yard field goal from rookie Cairo Santos with 21 seconds to play and will be looking to build on that momentum against the Rams, who are also coming off a key 28-26 divisional win over Seattle.

“To be perfectly honest, when you’re in the middle of it, you don’t have time to reflect on your past,” Smith said when asked about the Chiefs’ season. “It was a big win last week, bringing us back to 3-3. … We’re coming back home and doing whatever we can to get to 4-3.”

Fassel talked about it. They saw it on film. Chicago ran a similar play years ago with Hester, which was called back. What they saw was that when Seattle’s punter wants to pin a team back, the ball go’s to their left, or the Rams’s right. So they simply set it up to take the coverage unit toward Austin in the opposite direction. The problem Bailey had is that he couldn’t run TOWARD the ball, because facing the ball would give it away. He had to run with the ball and catch it over his shoulder.

It took me awhile when that play was happening to figure it out.