RIP Buddy

Scoot26 · Jun 28, 2016

didshereallysaythat said:
It's a load of shit.

Not really. If you want this thread to just be "thoughts and prayers" please visit another forum.

Desperado34 · Jun 28, 2016

Curious, was he really not a good HC for Philly?

Desperado34 · Jun 28, 2016

Thanks Rory, I'm still having my first coffee so bear with me here.

I don't know much about his eagles tenure, nor his AZ stop.

didshereallysaythat · Jun 28, 2016

Scoot26 said:
Not really. If you want this thread to just be "thoughts and prayers" please visit another forum.

It just seems trivial/petty/rude I don't know the right word to use.. But have at it I guess.

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

FirstTimer said:
Ryan wasn't a bad coach but it's easy/amazing to see how many bad coaches got hired in his era. For an NFL Head Coach to have zero idea of offensive strategy or even the playbook is pretty insane. Just a very interesting era of coaching hires.

Ryan's comments about "running the God damn ball" because he had no idea about offense reminded me of Trestman's press conferences after he was hired and hearing the huge disparity in how his comments about the defensive side of the ball sounded compared to the offensive. I still remember posting here that it was a bit concerning to hear him stumble his way through questions about the defense.

My comments.

And my comments above about Ryan being "bad" were in direct response to Rory's comments about his personality...which wasn't great in a certain sense.

Can we seriously stop this and get back to discussing Ryan's football career/legacy?

Rory Sparrow said:
Kind of an odd way to phrase the question. To whom are you speaking? Here were my thoughts...posted mere minutes ago!

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

didshereallysaythat said:
It just seems trivial/petty/rude I don't know the right word to use.. But have at it I guess.

Honestly, STFU and go away.

Ryan wasn't perfect. We are discussing his successes and failures as a coach in the NFL. Nothing more

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

Rory/anyone,

Did Ryan's 46 concepts of loading the line and mixing and dropping blitzers and rushers influence Dick LeBeau and the zone/fire blitz concepts?

I've never really read a ton on LeBeau but Jaws article about his review of that Chargers/Fouts game and on down the line sound like early concepts of the zone blitz.

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

Unannounced Fart said:
Although they had a fierce rivalry while they were both coaches, Bill Parcells admitted years later that Buddy Ryan influenced the NFL more than even Bill Walsh. RIP Buddy.

Link?

I'd be interested to read that.

didshereallysaythat · Jun 28, 2016

FirstTimer said:
Honestly, STFU and go away.

It's almost as if you consider me not welcome to share my opinion.

didshereallysaythat · Jun 28, 2016

Rory Sparrow said:
The trivial/petty/rude part of this thread is your presence in it. Let me know when you have the ability to a) engage in a normal conversation, b) discuss football and c) refrain from trolling in a thread involving someone passing away.

Thanks in advance!

I am still waiting for your response to my post 85 all Bears team. You directly asked me for my opinion on it and then you never engaged the conversation any further. Thanks!

bearsfootball516 · Jun 28, 2016

Damn. One of the greatest defensive minds in history. RIP.

Asswipe Johnson · Jun 28, 2016

didshereallysaythat said:
It's almost as if you consider me not welcome to share my opinion.

You've got this backwards. It was you who decided to tell other posters how they should remember Buddy, and more specifically, how they shouldn't.

zack54attack · Jun 28, 2016

RIP.

I still shed a tear when watching the scene on 30-for-30 where he writes the letter to his former players.

Desperado34 · Jun 28, 2016

Crazy to think the 85 Bears are so relevant 31 years later.

Camden Cutler · Jun 28, 2016

he lived a long time..rip bud

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

Rory Sparrow said:
46 concepts somewhat influenced the zone blitz concepts, but the zone blitz originated with Bill Arnsparger's Dolphins defenses of the 70's and 80's and predated the 46. Arnsparger would rush an OLB and drop a DE (Matheson or Bokamper) into coverage, essentially exchanging rush/coverage assignments. It became more complicated, but that was Arnsparger's original concept.

The very good Chuck Fairbanks Patriots teams of the mid-70's were among the first to use the 3-4, and what they would do is outside rush both the weakside ILB and the weakside OLB. Offenses in those days almost always lined up in some type of pro formation with one TE and 2 RBs split on each side of the QB. The problem was that you only had one RB on the weakside to pick up both blitzing LBs, and offenses took awhile to adjust their pass protection schemes.

Buddy Ryan's 46 kind of meshed these two concepts. He'd overload one side of the pass protection by having both OLBs (Wilson and Marshall) on the same side. At the same time, not every player in the 46 eight-man front would be rushing the passer. Sometimes Ryan would only rush 3 DLs and have Dent drift back into coverage. Ryan would have his back three guys (2 CBs 1 FS) play a 3 deep zone. In some ways, it was a conservative defense, but the threat of lining up in a defensive formation that had 8 players near the line of scrimmage with both OLBs on the same side of the field usually had QBs hurrying their throws regardless of blitzes.

I think it was Ryan's concept of "safe pressure" that influenced LeBeau more than anything. And Ryan's mixtures of playing zone behind blitzes was more diverse than the early Arnsparger model of merely having an OLB and a DE exchanging rush/coverage assignments.

It just seems trivial/petty/rude I don't know the right word to use.

But in all seriousness.

Thanks for the response.

Do you think the 70's and 80's was the most innovative defensive era for the NFL. Seems like almost every defensive concept being used now can really directly chase their roots back to the 70's. The offensive side of the ball is a bit more blurred but I would think that if you made an NFL Defense "family Tree" you'd see the biggest explosion of long lasting concepts happen in that 10-20 year period.

TishLover · Jun 28, 2016

Buddy Ryan's letter to the '85 Bears
http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago/bea...nscript-of-buddy-ryans-letter-to-the-85-bears

To my guys,

In 1981, many of you signed a letter to George Halas to save my job. Now I’m writing a letter to all of you to say thanks. I wish I could be there to say it in person, but this will have to do.

Thank you to the Super Bowl Champion 1985 Chicago Bears, the greatest football team in NFL history. You gave me the best memories of my coaching life.

You all mean the world to me. I’ll love every one of you until the day I die.

I told you this a long time ago, and it’s still true: You guys will always be my heroes.

Love,

Buddy Ryan

FirstTimer · Jun 28, 2016

Rory Sparrow said:
Hard to say. In the 70's, a lot of the great coaches were defensive guys (Shula, Landry, Noll, George Allen) and the rules favored the defense. A lot of the innovations 'worked' because you could get a good enough pass rush with your four DLs, and were then free to do whatever you wanted with the back 7. I think if you looked at true defensive roots, you'd see that a lot of them can be traced back to the 1950's.

In some ways, I think the influence of Coryell and Walsh, along with the 1978 rules changes in terms of both pass protection (blockers allowed to extend their arms) and pass coverage (5-yard bump rule), forced defenses to be even more innovative in the 1980's. Buddy Ryan's and Dick LeBeau's innovations were in direct response to the passing game...how to get pressure on QBs but not sacrifice too much in pass coverage.

To answer your question, its hard to say which period was the "most innovative" for defenses. I'd say it was 1950-1958, when Tom Landry introduced the 4-3, defenses had to figure out how to stop the LA Rams and Cleveland Browns passing offenses, and one-way players became the norm.

Very fair point about the 50's I may have misused the term most innovative as well in a certain sense when I more meant that you saw the biggest explosion of different concepts, but narrowing it to the 70's may have been short sighted. You'd have to roll the 80's into it due to the influx of new concepts due to the defensive adjustments to the 1978 rule changes.

I was reading a lot of stuff lately based on an NFL Network show claiming the 70's was the best decade of the NFL so I've begun to nerd out on the 70's and trickle into the 80's a bit so my question may have had some bias in it.