Reality of GOOD ILBers

[HardRightEdge]

Somewhat Interesting Stats I saw today, doesn't really change my opinion on Blake Martinez though.

Since 2017...

• Blake Martinez: League-leading 362 combined tackles (233 solo, also leads league), 23 TFLs, 7 sacks.
• Bobby Wagner: 340 combined tackles (219 solo), 22 TFLs, 2.5 sacks.
• Luke Kuechly: 317 combined tackles (199 solo), 29 TFLs, 3.5 sacks.

The really good news is his passer rating against has improved from 118 last season to 108 this year according to pro-football-reference.

2019: 1 forced fumble, no INTs, no passes defended, 1 sack, 3 tackles for loss, lots of late clean-up tackling, not much impact.

 

[Half Empty]

I disagree. Martinez is easily a top ten 3-4 defensive ILB.

What other kind is there?

 

[PackinMSP]

Regarding great stats for ILB, Nic Barnett had "great stats" with us when he was here but no one called him great

 

[greengold]

The ONE we really missed on was Eric Kendricks... We HAD HIM! Ted went with Randall and it likely cost us a SB. Took us years to recover from Ted's first two picks that year.

After looking up advanced stats on Kendricks, Kuechly, Wagner, Martinez, Devin Bush and Ogletree, it is clear to see we have deficiencies in coverage, allowing passer ratings around 118 vs. 80 ish. Kendricks' PDs are off the charts. Missed tackles % is very high for us with Martinez vs. many of those other players. Though, some are somehow worse... A lot of give and take, which I believe is normal.

If there is a utopia here, it would have been Kendricks, the one guy I wanted Ted to take from that draft. Damn. We needed ILB in the WORST way, and the BEST one in the draft was there for the taking. Damn Damn Double damn...!

I still believe we would fare FAR better popping Summers in there to start alongside Goodson.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

I think we should just stick with two guys who are late round picks who can just cover some but TACKLE consistently, no missed tackles, broken tackles, etc...

Unfortunately inside linebackers capable of doing that rarely last into the late rounds of the draft.

There's a lot of LB's I'd take over Blake. Off the top of my head:

Devin Bush
Fred Warner (he's a stud, btw)
Darius Leonard
Roquan Smith
Keuchly
Deion Jones
Bobby Wagner
KJ Wright
Eric Kendricks
Jarrad Davis
LVE
Tremaine Edmunds
Donta Hightower

I'm sure if I actually looked up more players, I could find more.

There's no denying there are better inside linebackers in the league than Martinez, but most of them aren't available for the Packers to sign.

back to OP, I love Martinez (hes top 5-10 ILB) and I'll love for us to sign him but what others are saying is that there NEEDS to be someone to compliment him.

The Packers shouldn't re-sign Martinez to a deal averaging several millions a season considering the way he has performed so far in 2019.

Final note, if I am Packers ILB coach Kirk Olivadotti, I'm thinking a lot about my future job security after the season ends if this continues.

Olivadotti hasn't been given enough talent to work with, his job shouldn't be in danger.

 

[PackinMSP]

Yes i know, the point of this thread was that these guys don't just "grow on trees"

It's really difficult to get guys who are that good

Obviously it would be awesome if we could draft a guy who played safety in college and "mold" him into the next Brian Urlacher

We tried that with Nic Barnett, and although he was "okay", he wasn't really that good

The other thing is that we play a 3-4. A 4-3 ILB is probably "easier" to find, I would imagine, than a 3-4 ILB. Just my guess.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

The other thing is that we play a 3-4. A 4-3 ILB is probably "easier" to find, I would imagine, than a 3-4 ILB. Just my guess.

That's hardly a factor as the Packers play less than 30% of the snaps in their base defense.

 

[mradtke66]

The other thing is that we play a 3-4. A 4-3 ILB is probably "easier" to find, I would imagine, than a 3-4 ILB. Just my guess.

Meh.

3-4 ILBs are more or less a 4-3 Middle and Weak-Outside linebacker. Not appreciably different. They have very similar alignments, responsibilities, etc.