phatoosdey

excerp from ESPN Page 2 - Easterbrook: A numbing problem



......The Indy cap won't be helped by the new monster contract granted Dwight Freeney. Many groused that Freeney did not even crack the top 25 for sacks. But sacks are a dubious stat: Quarterback hurries and quarterback hits (quarterbacks tend to play less well after they have been hammered a couple of times while releasing the ball) are as important, and Freeney consistently excels in those two categories. What I don't understand is the way opponents game plan for Freeney. Football lore says of defensive ends: Run away from an end with strength and toward an end with speed. When Reggie White was in his prime, smart offenses ran away from him. When Bruce Smith was in his prime, smart offenses ran straight at him. Yet offenses don't run straight at Freeney. According to "Pro Football Prospectus 2007" -- and the Pro Football Prospectus series is, hands down, consistently the best independent football analysis available anywhere -- last year, Indianapolis opponents called only 18 running back rushes toward Freeney, the lowest number of running back rushes toward the right defensive end faced by any defense in the league. If I were concocting a game plan against the Colts, I'd run straight at Freeney to neutralize his recovery speed on plays the other way, and to make him stop thinking about the quarterback and start thinking about the run.

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