I didnt realize... It just seemed clear when those two got banged up, the entire defense stalled. And the whole team became a .500 club mid season...
I didnt realize they did so well to finish...
Any chance that was because the dline started getting healthy again. And perry came back to 100 percent gradually?
There were obviously a few games where the defense bombed last season, (San Diego and Carolina stick out the most), but for the most part the 2015 defense was the consistent part of the team. There wasn't really an identifiable turning point for the D last year where they just started stalling out.
The only real stalling out was on the offense with their inexplicable dropoff after Week 6. That was the real story of the season.
Raji certainly played better earlier in the season but overall didn't make enough of an impact to be missed much going forward.