So then we only have 4 good rushers and the only way to get them all on the field together is to play our best rusher out of his natural position or else we take one of them off to put him at his natural position and have Taco, Danna or Kaindoh on the field.

Welp

I'm just not worried about it.

At all.

Chris Jones playing DE or DT or w/e the **** is of no concern of mine. I've spent little to no thought on this subject.

What IS a concern is the woeful lack of depth at DE in general and my gut tells me that CJ moving to DE is the result of that lack of depth, not that they think CJ is just gonna knock dicks in the dirt.

I'll be curious to see who they add at DE between now and week 6, and who (if any) emerges in camp.

As of right now, that's the last position group that needs addressed on this team.

If it doesn't change, i foresee many threads about lack of a pass rush in our future.

For the position opposite Clark, how much worse is the Danna/Taco/Kaindoh/Ward quartet than the Kpass/Taco/Okafor/Danna/Ward quintet from last year?

I don't see that much of a difference, to be honest. Kpass and Okafor are the only differences, and Okafor was his usual broke dick self all year.

We're basically down Kpass from last year. Oh ****ing no.

We had only 32 sacks last season compared to 45 in 2019 and 52 in 2018.

That’s a huge drop off.

Pass rush is definitely the biggest pain point on the team right now. And last year it was quite evident that it was a big problem.

Yeah, but it wasn't good enough last year.

We made it to the goddamn Super Bowl and if we had a single healthy starting offensive linemen, we probably would have won.

You guys are worrying about something that doesn't really even matter. This defense is good enough to win a championship even without a top notch pass rush.

Period.

Eh, with a functioning OL sure, it's closer. But the shit sandwich OL took alot of heat of the D that didn't do shit in the SB.

We were an offsides away from the SB in 2018 with an atrocious defense.

Saying it wasn't good last year isn't some kind of death blow.

Everyone acts like we can't discuss this or that here because whatever reason. We're just talking about what could or needs to improve, but with Reid and Mahomes, they're gonna be right there in the AFC champ game either way.

Dude, read the thread.

There's such a thing as discussing without being so ****ing doom and gloom.

I've read the whole thread.

I'm not sure who's been so doom and gloom. The Chiefs didn't really bring in much at DE so now they're moving Jones out there as they were able to really bolster the interior DL and Jones has shown some ability to kick out there.

We'll see how it works. If it doesn't, they can move him back to the inside where we know he kicks ass. It's a good situation to be in if it works because they'll have their best 4 on the field at the same time.

I don't know why anyone would be "doom and gloom" about it. It's a 14 win roster. Sure they could use an extra body here or there, but thats whatever.

That right there is pure speculation. That's the whole point of this discussion - we have no idea if they're moving Jones out there because they feel the NEED to or because they WANT to. It could absolutely be the latter but most of you guys just want to assume it's the former because you think they are weak at DE.

Again, you're automatically leaning towards him not being as good at DE as he is at DT. That's not something you know and you have no idea how the team feels about it.

So you're saying that almost the same exact group less 2 veteran starters is as good as the former?

That's a stretch dude.

That's like back when CP was convincing itself that Niang/Remmers was going to be a good a tackle duo.

The position group, on paper, is weaker than it was last season and it wasn't good last season.

And they still made the Super Bowl with one of the worst offensive lines in the league.

Yes, the DE position needs help.

But in the grand scheme of things, it isn't likely to be a big enough problem to prevent them from achieving their goals.

They're going to have FIVE new starters on the offensive line, which was THE biggest issue with last year's roster.

They can't fix every problem all at once.

IMO the pass rush was our biggest issue minus one game.

We could not get any pressure on teams like the Raiders and then the SB highlighted that.

Aside from the Frank Clark sack I don’t think we got barely any pressure on Brady the rest of that game

They went 14-2 and made it to the Super Bowl with that pass rush.

You simply can't dismiss that.

I agree but that was last year. Teams change and get better/worse every year.

It’s clearly a problem to our brass bc they brought in Melvin Ingram. They know it’s a big pain point

Not saying we’re doomed. We do need to look at perspective. We blitzed DB’s a lot last year and in the Super Bowl Brady had forever to throw the ball.

We freak out about the OL in one game but don’t see that the DL had no injuries and was ass in that game too.

I think we try to get a DE next month. Maybe revisit with Ingram

They brought in Ingram as due diligence. If it were a huge pain point, they would have signed him instead of signing Reed and all the other guys they've acquired since then.

They acquired another offensive tackle and traded for a CB - both positions are LOADED - but they haven't signed another DE.

I don't think they see it as a dire need at all.

That’s bc (per Nate Taylor) Ingram is notoriously pushy with salary and wants a lot. Basically more than he’s worth. Did that with the Chargers and Nate indirectly said he did it here too

What about Everson Griffen?

Cheap and can still produce.

Sure. And the fact that the Chiefs let him walk away and haven't really talked to him since just further reinforces my point.

If the need at DE were that extreme, they would have signed Ingram for whatever he wanted...

Or they would have pursued someone that was more willing to sign.

Ingram's reputation isn't unknown to the Chiefs. The fact that they brought him under those circumstances suggests they see him as a luxury, not a need.

For all the talk about our pass rush, we have 3 guys that are capable of double digit sacks.

It’s not nearly as bad as people are making it out to be.

Yes, you’d like the talent at DE to be better, but pass rush is a unit thing. Our interior pass rush is as good as it gets.

And Taco was damn good when healthy last year, Danna flashed as a rookie, and Ward did in his lone start as well.

Gay being on the field more will also help with his explosiveness and ability to be a terror when blitzing.

Completely overblown IMO. Just need to stay healthy and they’ll be fine.

I asked how much worse it is.

Are we going to be so horrible at DE next year that people are going to say things like, "Man, at least Kpass was mediocre!"

No. No they're not. You can say, "You don't know that" all you want, but nobody is going to ****ing say that. We lost nothing.

So this has ****ing sucked. Badly. Jones is getting neutralized as a pass rusher for the most part by back up quality OTs, is a massive liability in the running game, and his "replacement" inside, Reed, is a complete waste of space.

I thought this was going to be a scenario where Jones is moved around to attack the weak links on opposing OLs with pass rush, but he's legit just playing the DE spot and doing it quite poorly.

I agree with this but it’s not easy to rush when they are running so much. So many times I couldn’t even tell where the ball was. Ravens did a great job keeping us guessing.

Man, at least Kpass was mediocre!

I'm actually willing to give this experiment more time. Against traditional offenses, Jones will likely be fine at DE.

But against a mobile QB and offense that runs the read option so much, he is not a good fit. He's just not athletic or experienced enough in the role to cover the space necessary to make the big plays.

Ravens schemed him out, just ask The Franchise. She knows.


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I agree with this. My concern is that we took a great DT and turned him into an average DE.

But that's not necessarily Jones' fault, it's Veach's. We had no other choice at DE.

Browns
Ravens
Titans

We will likely have to beat at least one of those teams to advance to the Super Bowl. I'm guessing we'll have to beat two.

Like I said early on in this thread, I do not want to move my All Pro Dlefensive Tackle to Defensive End.

That's fair. The Browns and Titans are pretty traditional anyway.

The Ravens are just so unorthodox with all of the misdirection, read options, and insanely mobile QB. People can hate on Lamar all they want, but he is a great football player. There's a reason his win percentage is second only to Mahomes.

The ravens have had one of the weakest strength of schedules since LJ took over there. It's why they're one in done when they face real competition in the playoffs. Are defense played terrible yesterday (minus the honeybadger ofcourse). We led this game most of the way by double digits. And if that stupid bastard puts 2 hands on the ball, we win.

Bullshit. He's been starting for nearly three full seasons now. You don't just keep getting lucky for that long.

He is a great football player.

Jones looked completely lost and confused on several plays. He was a liability against Jackson and now we'll see if other teams can scheme against him the same way. It don't look good but we'll see.

Great football players win in the post season. Lamar is a talent. But he chokes too much to be great. He's beaten up on a bunch of bad football teams. And ppl want to act like that doesn't matter. I get you play who they put in front of you. But he and the ravens are garbage in the post season for a reason

What if i told you that Lamar has been stupid lucky, beaten a shit ton of bad teams and is a fantastic athlete that plays football? All of these things are true. It takes a perfect storm for him to do what he did last night normally. But you cant discredit what he has done.

He is not a primary DE.

His biggest flaw at IDL is that he doesn’t always maintain discipline against the run. We can survive that in the middle - but that spells disaster at DE, which we saw last night.

I don’t mind shifting him to Edge on obvious passing downs, but if he can’t handle read-option or set the edge on the outside runs, we are ****ed.

Hopefully we adjust that going forward.

I'd love it if he played for the Chiefs. As a running back.

Shit imagine a shifty runner like that behind this line!

It's unfathomable to me why this wasn't the plan all along. Why the **** are you moving an elite DT to be an average DE. If the answer is necessity then Veach needs a punch in the ****ing mouth.

As a DE, he's not gonna have to defend the option very much in the NFL.

As much as that sucked last night, that offense is so weird and unique to the NFL.

It's entirely possible that Jones agreed to the contract he agreed to in exchange for the promise he could play DE more.

That's my feel of the situation, anyway.

That doesn't reduce the problems he's having out there, but hey.

He shouldn't have been playing DE at all last night, especially if he's primarily playing contain.

Stopping the run isn’t one of Stone Cold’s specialities.


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I rewatched the Ravens 4th down conversion with a minute left. Chris Jones was playing inside with Okafor on the outside & he got basically pancaked by Villanueva.

Embarrassing


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In fairness, the Chiefs did not react to the Ravens unbalanced line. The Chiefs were totally out schemed. Jones faced a double team and tried to split it but failed miserably. May have been different story if he did not have to beat the double team. Schwartz does a nice job breaking it down.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Ravens finish off the Chiefs with a beautiful extra lineman unbalanced tackle over QB power. Chiefs don’t align right and the Ravens cave down the left side. Double team to the linebacker, puller inside out. Love it. <a href="https://t.co/m9DYZ1Nnp5">pic.twitter.com/m9DYZ1Nnp5</a></p>&mdash; Geoff Schwartz (@geoffschwartz) <a href="https://twitter.com/geoffschwartz/status/1439918962884726787?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 20, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The Ravens lined up and snapped it really quick. Got us confused and misaligned.

So poor coaching.


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KC seemed to handle it before well enough.

Yep. They looked like preschoolers out there.

Tbh, Chris looked slow last night. I really thought he'd come off the snap a little more explosively, but for the most part I just didn't see it. Motoring right past the RB when the hand-off happened right in front of him a couple times didn't help. Kind of wondering if Jones has some kind of visual issue?

I love Chris Jones, and honestly for the most part he seems more disciplined than he did before Spags came to town, so I'm trying hard not to criticize, but he has to do more than just rush the passer.

And last night I'm pretty sure we were mostly mush-rushing to try and keep Lamar in the pocket, but Jones still has to at least look for the hand-off. Or recognize the screen. Hoping he cleans up his game some before next weekend.

Wild speculation. It would be rare to have any sort of stipulation in his contract. % snaps at the position he wants? LOL. Spags will tell you where to line up.

I think it's clear this experiment has failed. Chris has ALWAYS sucked at contain.

He needs to move back to tackle right away.

We cut Clark after this season and I'll bet Veach addresses both DE positions.

Probably had a lot to do with him not being experienced at playing that scheme at DE. Looked to me like he was doing a lot of thinking and that, understandably, slowed him down a ton.

In hindsight, it probably would have been better to slide Jones back inside for this game and roll with Clark and Okafor on the edges.

We also should have kept Ogbah. None of our moves seem to work out on the DL.

Craig Stout is white trash

Stupidest shit ever.

He was invisible yet again…

Time to re-evaluate this, Chiefsplanet.

An understated part of the 2022 season is how often the Chiefs have lined Chris up at Defensive End on obvious passing downs.

And he has wrecked from that spot this year. 15.5 sacks, matching a career high and it SHOULD have been 16.5 (why did that after the play penalty against the Colts invalidate a sack?)

Another elite year from the MVP of our defense.

Bumping because I believe there’s space for good discussion here but will leave it be if I’m alone in that take.

like most things spags has done to our defense, they get better with age

this is only a concern for me going forward if we face lamar

Without looking at data, I want to say they’ve been way more selective about when they’re lining him up there (3rd and longs, up by 2+ scores, or in 2 minute drills/obvious passing situations).

That has allowed CJ to FEAST.

He comes cheaper at DT and he seems to be at his best when we move him around so there’s no need to try to make a permanent switch to DE where he’d be exposed again by a mobile QB and read option heavy offense.

He also seems bigger this year. I mean he's a ****ing monster!

I know we don’t pay people like him, but ****ing pay the man his money. We’d seriously be lost without him on defense.

Oh yeah, I want no part of him being moved to DE full time (well, I should caveat this, because I didn't want him at DE at ALL after last year).

But him rotating in and out of that spot has seemed to be an awesome adjustment this year. He just wrecks OT's with bullrushes and it's beautiful to watch.

BUMP