What does an NFL team look for in a player to fit the 3-4 WILB? Very few if any college guys have ever played the position. So how do scouts appraise the guys eligible for the draft.
Dansby was probably the tallest WILB in the NFL. Most of the others are 6'1"-6'2" and 240. So why not take a "hybrid" DE/olb like a Kindle or Misi and make him a WILB? Guys who are Dansby's size and run 4.6-4.7 40s. Seems to me that you would want to have a taller, heavier guy covering the TEs and RBs and flowing to the running lanes.
Why wouldn't a guy like Derrick Johnson,a guy who ran a 4.44 forty in High School fit the bill?
Thoughts?
Not so much Misi--just because we need someone to step in in the first quarter of the season, and all he's played (outside of a half-dozen plays in the Senior Bowl) has been a defensive end.
But I'm starting to warm to Kindle as a WILB. He can bring the pass rush ability that people have complained that Dansby was lacking, and he has experience at the position already. He gives the Cards a lot of positional flexibility, as well. I wouldn't at all be against drafting him in the first if Weatherspoon and McClain are both off the board.
I like Derrick Johnson, as well. Had the uncapped year not come into being, I think he would have been a target of the Cards in free agency. I think that if the Cards don't find a solution to the WILB problem this season (or if they begin to like Kindle more as a long-term replacement for Clark Haggans), then he could well be the Cards' primary free agent target next offseason. He's a softer version of Karlos Dansby, IMO, but he'd be much better than a guy like Jamar Chaney, whom many have been offering up as a good replacement. Johnson is smooth in coverage, but doesn't offer much when asked to work in the phone booth or work against the run.
The thing that people aren't really understanding about losing Dansby is how much pressure it's going to put on our defensive secondary--especially Adrian Wilson. Dansby was--as you say--unusually adept in coverage, especially considering his size. What that allowed the Cards to do was use Adrian Wilson as essentially the WILB and then move Dansby into a safety position. That's how the Cards confused Brett Favre so much in the Vikings game last year.
But now if we end up with an ILB like McClain, we're essentially working with two guys who are minuses in pass coverage (in Hayes case minus-minus). That's going to force Wilson and/or Rhodes to pay extra attention to the middle interior/exterior zones, and leave the team open for the big play in the seams from tight ends especially (we saw last season how frequently Wilson was abused by TEs--even a one-legged Jeremy Shockey).
Because the safeties are going to be under extra pressure in the middle of the field, the cornerbacks are going to have to play more off-man coverage and cover-4 rather than the press defense packages that many people here are excited about when we brought Donnie Henderson in. I don't worry about that as much as others, because that's how Pittsburgh tends to run it's pressure packages, only with more Cover-3 because Polamaulu (sp) has the range to cover the "creep" zone all by himself. Wilson doesn't have that range or the instincts.
One reason I think we tried so hard to keep Rolle is that Rolle probably could've patrolled that area in our 3-safety packages, but we'll likely see fewer of those now.
OR we could see just as much--if not more--because we're going to have to pull one of our ILBs and have a passing package where essentially Lenon and Wilson are the linebackers and Rhodes and Ware/Johnson are playing behind them.
