Blue Bombers - 2025 Regular Season - Discussion Thread

[Goalie]

Put Doug brown and a healthy prime stove at DT and I bet we have more sacks. It’s the talent or lack there of. None of our DTs are elite. They are all just ok really. None are brown or stove for that matter. 1 prob makes a difference. Ffs Jake Thomas is a starter. 

[Blue28]

2 minutes ago, Goalie said:

Put Doug brown and a healthy prime stove at DT and I bet we have more sacks. It’s the talent or lack there of. None of our DTs are elite. They are all just ok really. None are brown or stove for that matter. 1 prob makes a difference. Ffs Jake Thomas is a starter. 

I 100% agree with Goalie here -> our defense is not built around sacks - HOWEVER - the DL should be able to get more pressure than they are.

[Goalie]

I see they also brought in a couple DL who sound like maybe immediate upgrades to our current crop of crap. So play them. 

[wbbfan]

19 minutes ago, Goalie said:

Put Doug brown and a healthy prime stove at DT and I bet we have more sacks. It’s the talent or lack there of. None of our DTs are elite. They are all just ok really. None are brown or stove for that matter. 1 prob makes a difference. Ffs Jake Thomas is a starter. 

Oh easy. If you took off jake, and kornys snaps and put in the worst imp DTs we've had the last 2 years you would have significantly better front play, pressure, sacks, hits disruption etc. 

18 minutes ago, Blue28 said:

I 100% agree with Goalie here -> our defense is not built around sacks - HOWEVER - the DL should be able to get more pressure than they are.

In the CFL, you don't need to have the highest sack total. But you NEED to cause disruption at least. You don't even need pressures and hits. If you can push the inside of the pocket back onto the lap of the QB within 3-4 seconds consistently, you force the qb to go from about to toss it to having to look down, avoid the disruption, find another spot, reset, look back down field, and try to find a target. OR, they have to try and throw over a mass of humanity (when cfl qbs are pretty short in general) and risk their arm on the follow through. Which still messes with mechanics a lot. 

In the past, teams that ran 30 fronts understood this. They focused their down linemen on guys who could win a bull rush 1-on-1, or could shoot a gap with a swim move and loop into the pocket. People here would always be stunned when the bend but don't break argos managed to sack our qbs repeatedly in a game. And while it is not the fastest way to rush/pressure/sack, it is one of the hardest to defend and prevent disruption from in the CFL. Because every team is rolling 2-3 NI interior OL (most always 3, you usually see 2 on bad teams), the Canadian OL are much less adept at dealing with nose tackles, pass rushing 3ts, and 4ts. Those guys, often imports, are generally in the 275-300 lbs range but insanely powerful and surprisingly athletic. With diverse rush ability, and the ability to run tite fronts, twist etc that makes the assignment harder to plan for. Sure, if you get the double on the 4t with the tackle, it should be pretty easy. But the other side of that you have a 1on1, or you have a 1on1 with the nose. And the C, is most often filled by guys undersized and who aren't higher end picks. 

How many Cs in the cfl today could lock up a prime stove 1on1 for most of the game? None imo. 

 

For the level of pressure/disruption we get from our OL, we would be as well off taking thomas out and playing 1 less dl in general. 

[17to85]

2 hours ago, Goalie said:

They don’t seem to care about pressure and sacks as much as other teams. They have allowed 70 points less than the guys who do tho. So whatever the bombers are doing is working better than what B.C. is doing. You and others want them to concentrate more on sacks and pressure. That’s not really the Younger way tho. Our D is built around our defensive backs really. It’s built around coverage and basically confusion. It’s not about sacks and pressure and hasn’t been since JY took over really. 

No one is asking for all out blitzes, but the defense isn't successful because they put Jake Thomas out there for 80% of the snaps at DT or DE. Put better players on the line and you can maintain the same defensive system while also having guys who can breakdown an offensive line without having to sell out for pressure. Is what they're doing working? Overall yes, but when you give qbs all kinds of time eventually they are going to find some plays.