From Snow to Wilks

[Mr. Scot]

Mike Kaye on a discussion we've had here before...

Agree or disagree?

[Mr. Scot]

Kaye adds this...

 

[Catsfan69]

I just think it's intellectually dishonest for people to critique Wilks in this area.

How many defensive staff members did he lose?

Did he lose two corners and have to sign a batista?

He was given a schit sandwich and told to make it delicious. 

[Ricky Spanish]

Defense played about the same overall, Highs were still high but the lows were waaaaaaaaaaay lower with Holcomb than with Snow. It was the inconsistency that was baffling. One week they look great, the next week they let Joe Mixon score 5 TDs.

[Mr. Scot]

7 minutes ago, Catsfan69 said:

I just think it's intellectually dishonest for people to critique Wilks in this area.

How many defensive staff members did he lose?

All the ones he fired

Yes, he was shorthanded, but to be fair some of that was by choice.

[t96]

4 minutes ago, Catsfan69 said:

I just think it's intellectually dishonest for people to critique Wilks in this area.

How many defensive staff members did he lose?

Did he lose two corners and have to sign a batista?

He was given a schit sandwich and told to make it delicious. 

I mean, even aside from this year as interim HC, he was never even that good of a defensive coordinator. His 2017 season left a ton to be desired considering the amount of talent we had on D, and he clearly was nowhere near as good as McD was in his years here under Ron. Then he was pretty bad coordinating the D in Cleveland after AZ fired him. 

 

I think Wilks is an incredible leader of men, has generally solid football sense despite being very conservative in his coaching and is a great secondary coach. But he's not some defensive Xs and Os guru. Rivera honestly was, the game is passing him by a bit at this point (and Wilks too as he's from the same mold) but he got some incredible seasons from his defenses, getting more out of the talent than most other coaches would by coaching to their strengths and putting guys in a position to succeed within his scheme. 2013 is a great example. Yes we had prime Luke and TD and Hardy was dominating, but the secondary talent level was an absolute joke and our entire interior DL was rookies who still needed developing. 

 

Wilks will lead the guys as well as anyone but I don't consider him a great coach for running a great D whether as HC or DC. I really think the best spot for him on a contending team would be what he was initially brought in to be here : assistant HC and secondary coach. If he gets the 49ers DC job I'll be happy for him and that'll be a good spot considering the talent level but it'll be a considerable downgrade from Ryans for them.

[Panthera onca]

If Wilks wanted to hang his hat on being a defensive guru and was using that angle to get the head coaching job on a permanent basis, he failed miserably. His defense was the same or worse than that of a college coach from the Big 12.

[Khyber53]

Considering the firing of the HC in a busted season, perhaps we should judge his impact based on how bad it COULD have gotten. Interim coaches and low player effort go hand in hand.

Somehow, Wilks kept the team competitive. That's worth a tip of the hat, at least.

 

[TLGPanthersFan]

I agree and disagree. As people have said highs were high but lows were really, really low. 
Never liked his defensive scheme and he was fired not only from Arizona, whose defense was horrible under him and Holcomb, who he wanted as his DC here. But from the University of Missouri and Browns. Both as DC. 
I think I read somewhere that Missouri’s defense actually got better when Steve left. 
 

[Kentucky Panther]

Mike Evans and Tom Brady on the verge of retirement killed us in the biggest game of the season. Before that, it was Mitch fugging Trubisky. We saw enough of Wilks defense to know we didn’t want him 

[Mr. Scot]

13 minutes ago, t96 said:

I mean, even aside from this year as interim HC, he was never even that good of a defensive coordinator. His 2017 season left a ton to be desired considering the amount of talent we had on D, and he clearly was nowhere near as good as McD was in his years here under Ron. Then he was pretty bad coordinating the D in Cleveland after AZ fired him. 

I think Wilks is an incredible leader of men, has generally solid football sense despite being very conservative in his coaching and is a great secondary coach. But he's not some defensive Xs and Os guru. Rivera honestly was, the game is passing him by a bit at this point (and Wilks too as he's from the same mold) but he got some incredible seasons from his defenses, getting more out of the talent than most other coaches would by coaching to their strengths and putting guys in a position to succeed within his scheme. 2013 is a great example. Yes we had prime Luke and TD and Hardy was dominating, but the secondary talent level was an absolute joke and our entire interior DL was rookies who still needed developing. 

Wilks will lead the guys as well as anyone but I don't consider him a great coach for running a great D whether as HC or DC. I really think the best spot for him on a contending team would be what he was initially brought in to be here : assistant HC and secondary coach. If he gets the 49ers DC job I'll be happy for him and that'll be a good spot considering the talent level but it'll be a considerable downgrade from Ryans for them.

Truth be told, I think Wilks gameday skill set is actually better suited for a head coaching position than a defensive coordinator.

Unfortunately, one of the things that makes or breaks a head coach is smart staffing.

I don't think he's got it in that area.

[BrianS]

Kaye is also basing his comments on some ridiculous stat as well.  "Middle of the field passes"?  Really?  When has that EVER been a stat anyone cared about?

When talking about defense, there is only one stat we should care about:  Points.  If a team drives 99 yards on my defense and comes away with zero points, I'm ok with that.  Frankly, that's probably a big win for the defense.  If an offense completes 100% of their passes against my defense, but only scores 6 points, who am I to care?

It's all about points.  You can use the other stats to help discover why you may be giving up points, but points are the stat that matters.

[Varking]

I mean… his lows were super low. That Bengals game was uglier than anything I can remember here in a long time. We also just didn’t want to cover Tampas best WR with a second guy for some inexplicable reason. 
 

I think it evened out to a wash basically. The good stuff was good but there were some god awful head scratchers after Snow left as well. 
 

It damn sure wasn’t great. 
 

We let Joe Mixon look like the best back in the league. Then we made a down year Mike Evans look like he was better than Justin Jefferson. I haven’t seen this kind of stubbornness since Rivera was here. 

Edited February 7, 2023 by Varking

[rebelrouser]

16 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

Considering the firing of the HC in a busted season, perhaps we should judge his impact based on how bad it COULD have gotten.

You mean how bad it SHOULD have gotten. Wilks screwed us in the draft with his mediocrity.