Fisher Guns Down Four Pillars

Anthony Bafaro

When the dust finally settled, when the melded blood and mud had dried and crusted over in the new day's sun, there stood one man, masked in black lenses and a finely-combed beaver pelt lip garnish.  Lying lifeless, beyond the barrel-smoke of his break-action, were four pillars: Faith, Character, Core Values, and Team First.

The 49ers are finished, you understand me?
I see a red sash, I kill it.  You tell Jim Harbaugh
the Rams are coming.  You tell him Jeff Fisher is coming,
and Hell's coming with him, you hear me?
Hell's coming with him!

With the four pillars lying in the wake of the franchise, St. Louis Rams fans are about to be embraced, for the first time in their history, with real, cut-throat, football.  The Greatest Show on Turf was a fantastic display of offensive ingenuity and precision, but it was not trench warfare.  What’s coming now is not just smack-you-in-the-mouth football, it's make-you-bite-the-curb football. 

If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you know I’m not a Spagnuolo hater.  However, in this game, you’re not going to survive 

if you insist on bringing choir boys to a street fight.  You can’t pass on great football ability just because some 22-year-old kid likes to get drunk in the off season and has been in a bar fight or two.  I’m not saying seek out a team full of criminals (though I would set a one felony minimum for all defensive players, preferably aggravated assault), but we can no longer afford to draft and sign C-grade players that go to church over B-grade players that go to strip clubs (goodbye Brandon Gibson, old friend; oh how I will miss mocking your steady supply of Sunday blunders).  Part of being a good coach is being able to handle those kind of guys until they grow up.  That’s why you pay Jeff Fisher $7 million dollars per year; he knows how to contain the hoopelheads enough to utilize the maniacs inside of them. 

This balance of discipline is particularly evident in Fisher’s defenses.  According to information gathered by NFC West blogger Mike Sando, from 2001-2010 the Titans led the league in both unnecessary roughness and roughing the passer penalties.  Fifteen-yard penalties can be back breakers, especially in critical situations, but these stats only tell part of the story.  Over that same time period, the defenses as a whole were, on average, in the bottom half of the league in total penalties taken.  There isn't a wholesale lack of discipline.  They don’t rack up lazy, sloppy penalties (like, say, constant delay of game and false-start penalties immediately following your own timeouts); they go full speed, break late, and crash hard, mostly into the opposing quarterbacks.  That same level of barbarism is applied on the offensive line, where Fisher coached teams are consistently in the top-ten for fewest sacks allowed. 

There is a definite psychological factor to this game, and intimidation through physical oppression seems to be Fisher’s weapon of choice.  Earlier this month, in an interview on 101 ESPN’s “The Fast-Lane,” Fisher noted that he motivates his players to take pride in the way that their physical play affects opponents after the game and going into the next week.  That kind of philosophy helps you win divisions.  Don't just win the game, make sure your opponents have to study next week’s game plan from the ice tub.  Make sure your opponents barely have the moxie to suit up for next game, let alone win. 

This team will finally have an identity, one that’s more about attitude than schematics.  Over the course of Fisher’s career, he has been good, bad, and middle of the road in a number of offensive and defensive categories.  He’s suggested that the talent level of individual positions will determine the game plan (of course, so did McDaniels).  How much he throws will depend on his passing game talent.  How much he blitzes will depend on the penetration ability of his front four.  Being flexible in scheme allows for the full utilization of all players’ strengths.  A confident willingness to take a chance on some "red-flag" players provides the opportunity to improve roster strength overall and brings a tangible edge to the style of play.  This team will not necessarily be identified as a running team, a passing team, or a blitzing team, but they will have an identity.  They’ll play through the whistle, then steal the whistle, throw it on the ground and laugh maniacally as they stomp it to pieces.  They’ll protect their own quarterback and disembowel his counterpart.  They will physically degrade and embarrass their opponents every chance they get.  The Fisher-era Rams are coming, and Hell's coming with them.

Faulk or Jackson???

Here is  a hypothetical question: if you were running an NFL team and you could choose between Marshall Faulk or Steven Jackson in the prime of their career for just one season, who would you pick?  I think a great majority of people would take Faulk without even thinking about it.  Faulk had a great career that finally came to a halt in the Hall of Fame.  The city of St. Louis loves him.  We were told at nauseum that he was a genius football player with a great football mind by the likes of the most respected football analysts of our time, including John Madden, Pat Summerall, Al Michaels, Bob Costas, etc. etc. etc.  Additionally, he does great analysis on the NFL Network now.

But, I would take Jackson over Faulk.  Hear me out on this one. Although Faulk was amazing, there a few things that sway me to the Jackson side.

People around the league don’t give enough respect to what Steven Jackson has done in a Rams uniform with the pieces that have been around him for so many years.  Let’s compare both Faulk’s and Jackson’s best seasons statistically.  I used pro-football-reference.com’s rating system, which has a formula that rates all of the stats in the league that year and assigns a number that they call “Approximate Value” for the season, and chose the highest number of their careers.  According to this number, Faulk’s best year, statistically, was 1999 and Jackson’s was 2006.

Marshall Faulk – 1999 – Rams 13-3 Won Super Bowl

Accolades for 1999 Season - AP Offensive Player of the year, Pro Bowl, 1^st Team All Pro, 1^st Team All Conference , 1^st Team AP All NFL, 1^st Team All NFL Sporting News

Stats – 1,381 Rushing Yards – 12 Total TDs – 87 Receptions – 2,429 Total Yards

Steven Jackson – 2006 – Rams 8-8 Missed Playoffs

Accolades for 2006 season – Pro Bowl, 2^nd Team AP All NFL

Stats – 1,528 Rushing Yards – 16 Total TDS – 90 Receptions – 2,334 Total Yards

Marshall had a great year in 1999 and had an arguably better season in 2001, but many of these numbers are very comparable to Jackson’s.  Jackson had more rushing yards and total TDs.  Surprisingly, he also had more receptions in 2006 than any year Faulk played in St. Louis or Indy.  So why did Marshall get all of the accolades in 1999 and Steven get snubbed in 2006?  Was it the team that was better?  Was it Marshall who had the flashy plays that made every highlight reel in America? Or was it all of the national coverage of the emergence of one of the most prolific offenses in NFL history?

Additionally, let’s look at their stats up to the age of 28.  Faulk’s last year of 1,000 yards rushing came when he was 28, and Jackson was 28 this past season.

Marshall Faulk – 2,155 Carries for 9,433 yards (4.38 yards per carry) and 79 Rushing TDs, 548 Receptions for 5,447 yards and 31 Receiving TDs.

Steven Jackson – 2,138 Carries for 9,093 yards (4.25 yards per carry) and 52 Rushing TDs, 369 Receptions for 3,003 yards and 8 Receiving TDs.

Clearly, the numbers favor Faulk.  However, Faulk played on the greatest show on turf, which had probable Hall of Famers on the offensive side of the ball in Warner, Pace, Bruce, and Holt.  Bruce, Holt, and Warner spread the field and stretched the field—to its max.  This caused defenses to play deep and left a lot of field underneath for Faulk to run the ball into open space or catch passes with room to run.  In other words, he benefited from the greatness and effectiveness of his probable Hall of Fame teammates.

Jackson seems to perform every year he wears the blue and gold, despite playing with atrocious offenses.  He has miraculously put together seven consecutive 1,000-yard rushing seasons, something Faulk never did.  His yards per carry are nearly as high as Faulk’s, even though he has not had wideouts, nor a quarterback, to spread and stretch the field and open up rushing or catching room underneath.  He trails substantially in rushing TDs, but the Rams score a TD only once per game, compared to the three or four Faulk’s Rams teams scored.  As for receiving stats, for much of Jackson’s career, the Rams have had no passing attack at all, so it is improper to expect Jackson’s receiving stats to be there if the team doesn’t have any.

If Jackson had the luxuries Faulk had, he would most likely have higher rushing yards and yards per carry than Faulk, and possibly better receiving stats.  For example, if you remove the 1999 through 2001 seasons from Faulk’s stats in the example above (i.e., until he was 28), all that is left is Faulk’s years on Indy, a team that had offenses similar to Jackson’s Rams.  During that time, his yards per carry decreases to 3.82, nearly half a yard less than Jackson’s average.

Another stat supports Jackson’s value.  Excluding incompletions and sacks in 2006, Jackson touched the ball on a whopping 54.8% of offensive plays compared to Faulk’s 43.9% of offensive plays in 1999.  One would think that because they were going to Jackson more in 2006, defenses would be stuffing the box, thereby decreasing the amount of space he has to run before impact with a defender and making it more difficult to get positive yards.

Now, think about putting Faulk into today’s Rams lineup.  Think about Faulk standing in the backfield in a split back set with Brit Miller on his left.  Spread wide are Brandon Gibson and Austin Pettis striking fear into the visiting cornerbacks that are waiting in terror while staring at the wideouts across from them.  Don’t forget Lance Kendricks on the line making defensive coordinators shake with how they will cover such a behemoth across the middle.  Are you scared at what you see?  What team is not going to stuff the box with at least 8 or 9 men (or ten because Gibson can’t catch and runs backwards when he does), play tighter coverage on the wideouts, and just beg for Bradford/Feeley/Clemens to beat them with their arms.  How do you think Faulk would do? 

Faulk was and is known as one of the best all purpose backs in NFL history.

But Jackson is better.

Written by Jon Wekerle