TL;DR and all that
The wide 9 is no excuse for bad run defense.
But it actually is.
Lawrence Jackson in 2010 and 2011 played LE and then RE and had around 250 run defense snaps He was a positive grade both years and still generated a pass rush.
Less of a pass rush and more run D isn't exactly a positive in our system. There's are reason he's been third fiddle.
Willie Young in 2011 in 99 run defense snaps did as well.
Sample size called, said it has something to say about this.
KVB was slightly positive in 2010 and really fell off in 2011 as he become undisciplined especially on those reverses.
Old age and variance happen.
Avril needs to be more disciplined because all the other DEs proved they can do both.
By proved you mean flashed over a small sample size and/or were good one year and not so much the next? Variance is relevant in football as well, as I'm sure you know.
Another prove it year for Avril. This is a very good thing for the Lions in the short term. He's playing for a contract still so he will play hard.
I agree with this 100%
Less KVB and more Lo Jack and slightly more Willie Young than last year but still alot of Avril playing hard.
Back to your main point of the wide 9 not being an excuse. Lets looks at some actual articles about the system rather than just the DE rankings overall because our system is very unfriendly to DE's vs the run while someone in a 3/4 will grade out much differently.
Here's Dick Vermeil talking about the evolution of the wide 9
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204528204577010151428713934.html
"The Wide Nine is, in part, a response to the sea change in the way NFL teams play offense: More and more, they are incorporating elements of the "spread offense" pioneered by college teams, sending extra receivers downfield. As this offensive revolution takes place, defenses have entered a state of flux as they figure out how best to cover the NFL versions of college offenses.
There's some evidence the Wide Nine may be a good antidote to the spread offense. One of college football's top defensive teams?Michigan State?regularly runs the Wide Nine, which it uses to stymie quarterbacks before they ever have a chance to release the ball. The Spartans have given up the second-fewest yards per game in major-college football."
Here's a good article about the formation and some components and flaws that are naturally built in.
http://igglesblitz.com/philadelphia-eagles-2/wide-9-talk/
"The goal of the Wide-9 front is to get pressure on the QB. Other fronts concentrate on stopping the run. Wide-9 focuses on rushing the passer.
WR ???????.. TE ? RT ? RG ? OC ? LG ? LT ???????.. WR
..........????.?? DE ???... DT ??? DT ???.?. DE
Sorry for the crude diagram.
The goal of the DEs in this front is to stay wide and rush the QB. The DEs don?t need to be big. They need to be fast and to play with good leverage. Short, medium, and tall DEs have had success in this front. The key is to fire off the ball and either beat the OT with pure speed or to hit him with such power that the blocker is driven backward."
Now lets talk about our philosophy as a team on defense. What do we want to do? Do we want to try and force teams to abandon the run by shutting it down and forcing them into throwing the ball more? With our secondary, obviously not! Do we try to be extremely balanced and game theory optimal forcing teams into situations where the decision between running and passing is indifferent? No! We want to put points on the board, force teams into having to throw to keep up, and basically just send our front four on a pass rush every play hoping to get sacks and force turnovers. In essence Schwartz and Co. really don't care about leaking on run defense because by the time the third and fourth quarters roll around they expect/hope to have put enough points on the board that other teams won't really have the luxury of running the ball and will be forced to play catch up.
Here's an example of this
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...9-do-the-lions-ignore-the-cornerback-position
"The Lions use the pressure that their defensive line generates to set the tone for their defense. They have an inordinate amount of talent across their defensive line and they will go as far as this unit takes them. This brings us to how this scheme impacts the rest of the defense.
Cornerback is a position that some consider one of the most important on a football team. In the new NFL where quarterbacks are slinging the ball all over the field it seems like a common-sense approach to cover the wide receivers. It appears that there are multiple ways to do this.
The Lions feel that they can effectively cover wide receivers by reducing the amount of time that the quarterback has to throw the ball. Looking at their results it is easy to see that the Lions have some reason to believe that what they are doing is paying dividends.
These dividends come in the form of sacks and interceptions. The Lions had 21 interceptions in 2011, finishing fifth out of 32 teams. They also had 41 sacks which put them in a tie for 10th in the NFL. "
and here
"This brings us back to their scheme and what the Lions do on defense well. They get after the quarterback and pressure him into making mistakes. When they get pressure, they get good cornerback play and when they don?t they look very bad, especially when injuries force their nickel and dime corners into starting roles.
Even the best cornerbacks in the league can?t cover wide receivers for a long time. The defensive line makes it all go and the Lions can get away with average play out of their secondary as long as they get a high level of play from their defensive line."
So as you see, the whole "Avril plays the run bad" thing is overblown in regards to his role with our team. It's not what the staff expects of him. If they could have a Cliff that grades out
A - positive at run D and only slightly positive as a pass rusher
B - grades out poorly as a run defender but very high as a pass defender
their going to take the latter every time. It's what they want and ask from the DE position in our system. If you have complaints about our run defense take them up with Durant, Levy and Speivy as those guys missed a ton of tackles and were, imo, the real liability in regards to run defense.
