Herm Edwards: Still a liar

I put a question mark after it for a reason... I wasn't sure. I vaguely remembered you, or someone else, posting a column of yours after week one or week two, in which you were all over Herm. You pointed out one instance in which he ran the ball five times in a row, including third down. Does that column ring a bell? I was only pointing out that after those first two losses, this whole board jumped all over Herm. If you weren't part of that group, I apologize. As I said, I put a question mark next to (led by Whitlock?) for a reason. I am not positive, so I was asking. But my other memory of it--and I don't have it put to perfect memory, so maybe I have this all wrong, and by all means correct me--was that you were calling for Herm's scalp after the first or second loss in that column in which you were all over his play calling. I could have it wrong, so if I do, set me straight or link to the actual column if it is still to be found. I suppose I could Nexis it, if I wanted to take the time...

And I am not calling you out on this... I wouldn't do that without allowing you a fair chance to snipe at me. Either way, you were just doing what a columnist does. I have no problem with it, especially since you have since given Herm the credit BYH won't.

 

The Jets shit the bed after that because they had invested everything in Chad Pennington and his arm fell off.

Herm managed to put together a pretty good defense, though. They had a nice draft the year they got Jonathan Vilma and Erik Coleman for that defense, not to mention Jerricho Cotchery and Adrian Jones on offense. The problem last year was the bad luck seeing Pennington and Fielder go down one after the other and having to throw Smurf Bollinger out there. The offense couldn't sustain any time of possession, and I don't care how good a defense you have put together, if they are on the field all the time, they are going to wear down and eventually start to give ground.

I think a sign of how underrated Herm was is what that defense looks like now under Eric Mangini. It's still early to judge him as a head coach, but he strikes me as the type who needs to make his players fit his scheme. Good coaches don't do that. They come up with a scheme that works well for the players they have. So they are running that Belichik 3-4, even though they don't have the personnel for it. And their defense has looked miserable, considering some of the quality players they have. They don't have a true nose tackle (DeWayne Robertson does not clog the middle like a Ted Washington in his prime) and Vilma is made for a 4-3, which gives him more room to roam, freelance and get in on more tackles. To me this is just bad coaching, even though some of the things they did in the draft building the offensive line and coaching up those guys, offsets it a little. Herm would have never forced a bad scheme on the defense, and he knew enough to get out of the way of guys like Ty Law, Vilma, Hobson, Coleman, Ellis, Abraham (when his vagina wasn't bruised and he was on the field) etc. and let them do their thing.

 

You know, Tony Dungy can't coach an offense worth crap either. Yet the Colts have the best offense in the league... The best players and Tom Moore as your offensive coordinator will do that for you.

In his tenure with the Jets, Edwards had the horrible Paul Hackett, not Tom Moore, and a noodle-armed QB, not Peyton Manning. Big differences. And Hackett was the same kind of coach that I accused Mangini of being. Married to his bastardized version of the west coast offense, even when it wasn't working. Hell, when they brought Vinny Testaverde back after Pennington got hurt, the only strength he had left in his ancient body was that he could air out the football, so they should have gone all Norv Turner, used Curtis Martin to set up the pass, and then play-actioned and tried more big plays downfield. But Hackett was incapable of thinking differently and they tried to stick to the same dink offense that worked OK with Pennington (but coincidentally, not with Santana Moss, which was why they had to get rid of a guy that talented! They couldn't try to tailor the offense to a guy with big-play capability, which is what a smart coach does. Tom Coughlin has shown offensive flexibility given the Giants weapons!)

Anyhow, the point is that Herm isn't that bad of an offensive coach (he is conservative, but he has a team right now built around a surprisingly decent line given their losses, and a very good running back), He does have to rely heavily on his coordinator, because like Dungy, he is a defensive coach. Pair him up with Tom Moore, and he could be Dungy-like. I don't know a whole lot about Mike Solari, but for years he was in charge of what was the best offensive line in the league. So I give him some credit. Guess time is telling.