Resign Isaac Sopoaga???

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
Hey thanks for the free peek!

I notice 4 of the first 5 ranked players play for really stinky teams. Buf especially gave about 3 miles a game running. What's up with that?

Also, I see Vince is at #13. That seems odd. Why is that?

Because it is based strictly on individual performance, they review snap by snap and basically assign points based on performance, so if the defensive tackle makes a stop at the line of scrimmage, he gets credit for that, if the defensive tackle gets knocked off the ball and makes a tackle 4 yards downfield, he loses points and if the defensive tackle is well blocked and the offense happens to simply have a good playcall, then the points will likely be neutral, that and difficulty of opponent is figured in as well.....ie.......holding Adrian Peterson to 2 yards vs holding Beanie Wells to 2 yards.

I think ICE will be cheap. We should try to resign him but try to get a TRUE NT that can really push the pocket back. That combined with Justin Smith would be deadly.

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:
Because it is based strictly on individual performance, they review snap by snap and basically assign points based on performance, so if the defensive tackle makes a stop at the line of scrimmage, he gets credit for that, if the defensive tackle gets knocked off the ball and makes a tackle 4 yards downfield, he loses points and if the defensive tackle is well blocked and the offense happens to simply have a good playcall, then the points will likely be neutral, that and difficulty of opponent is figured in as well.....ie.......holding Adrian Peterson to 2 yards vs holding Beanie Wells to 2 yards.

Interesting. I will try to put on my squinty glasses and look at the numbers closely in your graphic. if you can repost a larger jpg without getting sued by pff that would be great!! Anyway, i think there must some statistical bias about bad teams that makes interior defensive lineman that play for them appear better performing than their peers on more successful defenses. The odds of those teams having horrible records but the best interior defensive lineman in the league is astronomically small. It flies in the face of common sense too. If they were so good, why are the defenses so bad?

Anyway, no way Vince is #13. He's always in the top 5. This year was no exception.

Ofcourse we should re-sighn him....he's a total leader on and off the field....people that don't see that, really doesn't follow this team to much....

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
Interesting. I will try to put on my squinty glasses and look at the numbers closely in your graphic. if you can repost a larger jpg without getting sued by pff that would be great!! Anyway, i think there must some statistical bias about bad teams that makes interior defensive lineman that play for them appear better performing than their peers on more successful defenses. The odds of those teams having horrible records but the best interior defensive lineman in the league is astronomically small. It flies in the face of common sense too. If they were so good, why are the defenses so bad?

Anyway, no way Vince is #13. He's always in the top 5. This year was no exception.

Realize I listed the rankings solely in terms of run stopping for this year, that's not the overall player ranking. They still had Wilfork listed as one of their players in the AFC East.

As far as the bias portion, from what I see, I think its more of a case of good defensive tackles that happen to play on piss poor teams. You can take those tackles, play them anywhere and they'll be good, they just happen to play on rosters that aren't up to par, if you reviewed the defense of the Bills, you'd see that the team as a whole is lousy at stopping the run but the defensive tackles have held up inside and that the team was mostly gashed on the outside.

Originally posted by 80849er4life:
Ofcourse we should re-sighn him....he's a total leader on and off the field....people that don't see that, really doesn't follow this team to much....

That and a $1.00 will get you a cup of coffee.


I find that people typically defend mediocre players by using some form of superlative to make them seem mystical.


"He's not a run of the mill defensive tackle that is a dime a dozen and performed worse than just about any other NT in football this year......he's a LEADER, he's a VISIONARY."


This team will not be short on veterans or leaders, with or without Soap and they just might get some competent performance at NT without him.

I'm 50/50 on this. I'd rather have him back over starting RJF

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:

Originally posted by 80849er4life:
Ofcourse we should re-sighn him....he's a total leader on and off the field....people that don't see that, really doesn't follow this team to much....

That and a $1.00 will get you a cup of coffee.


I find that people typically defend mediocre players by using some form of superlative to make them seem mystical.


"He's not a run of the mill defensive tackle that is a dime a dozen and performed worse than just about any other NT in football this year......he's a LEADER, he's a VISIONARY."


This team will not be short on veterans or leaders, with or without Soap and they just might get some competent performance at NT without him.

Your funny dude

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:
Realize I listed the rankings solely in terms of run stopping for this year, that's not the overall player ranking. They still had Wilfork listed as one of their players in the AFC East.

As far as the bias portion, from what I see, I think its more of a case of good defensive tackles that happen to play on piss poor teams. You can take those tackles, play them anywhere and they'll be good, they just happen to play on rosters that aren't up to par, if you reviewed the defense of the Bills, you'd see that the team as a whole is lousy at stopping the run but the defensive tackles have held up inside and that the team was mostly gashed on the outside.

Well, maybe, but the odds are astronomically low that the two factors are only coincidentally related. BUT......maybe the two factors can be related i.e. lousy teams get top draft picks = use them for DT's = good production from these players on a barfy defense (for now)....so it bears further investigation....

Originally posted by GEEK:
I really feel like the Isaac Sopoaga situation is much like the Adam Snyder situation from last year. You know what you are going to get in terms of talent, but there could be a sleeper guy that the coaches really like.

Last year, Boone replaced Snyder, and the whole board crapped their pants - including myself. I tried washing those bad boys, and the stains didn't come out.

This off-season, we could see RJF anointed the starting NT role, and a FA/draft pick to bolster the depth.

That's a perfect comparison. I was scared to see Snyder go too because after seeing how terrible Rachal was, Snyder looked pretty decent. Both Sopoaga and Snyder were basically rated as bottom 5 starters at their position in the league though. Pretty scary too, because McDonald and Justin are so good on the line you'd have to think Sopoaga gets pretty favorable matchups most of the time, yet still plays poorly.

Originally posted by Disp:
That's a perfect comparison. I was scared to see Snyder go too because after seeing how terrible Rachal was, Snyder looked pretty decent. Both Sopoaga and Snyder were basically rated as bottom 5 starters at their position in the league though. Pretty scary too, because McDonald and Justin are so good on the line you'd have to think Sopoaga gets pretty favorable matchups most of the time, yet still plays poorly.

Its exactly like the Snyder situation, 49ers fans overrating the hell out of an average/below average player. Just as Snyder did, watch Soap go elsewhere, struggle, flame out and end up as a backup or be cut.

Never could wrap my head around why some people's homerism is such that they'll even ignore what is perfectly obvious when it comes to underperforming players on their team.

I was pretty surprised when I saw how bad his ratings were. I don't have the premium for PFF, but I knew he was getting rated really poorly all year long. I figured Whitner would've been rated our worst defender honestly.

Originally posted by Disp:
I was pretty surprised when I saw how bad his ratings were. I don't have the premium for PFF, but I knew he was getting rated really poorly all year long. I figured Whitner would've been rated our worst defender honestly.

Whitner and Soap were easily the worst two on the 49ers defense this year and the ratings reflect that. Culliver and Rogers were so-so and both had very good games as well as bad ones but Whitner and Soap were consistently bad. Whitner gave up more touchdowns than any other defensive back in the NFL. Soap got knocked out of the play by a single blocker more than any other NT in the NFL. Upgrades for both need to be identified and acquired.

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:
Whitner and Soap were easily the worst two on the 49ers defense this year and the ratings reflect that. Culliver and Rogers were so-so and both had very good games as well as bad ones but Whitner and Soap were consistently bad. Whitner gave up more touchdowns than any other defensive back in the NFL. Soap got knocked out of the play by a single blocker more than any other NT in the NFL. Upgrades for both need to be identified and acquired.

I'm surprised about WHitner. He hit pretty hard this year. Did his coverage ratings go down in the latter part of the year? They didn't turn into a sieve until the Pats game.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
I'm surprised about WHitner. He hit pretty hard this year. Did his coverage ratings go down in the latter part of the year? They didn't turn into a sieve until the Pats game.

This isn't accurate. He got picked on all year long, gave up more touchdowns than any other defensive back in the NFL. A safety that hits hard but can't cover is pretty much useless and Whitner really struggled at times, people talk about Rogers regressing, but Whitner fell back even further, additionally, he's definitely undersized for a strong safety, that was an issue that was brought up when he was first signed and still rings true.


My ideal solution is to find a true deep safety, Goldson's more of a hybrid than anything else and has the size to play at strong safety, thereby the 49ers would need a coverage safety like Phillip Thomas or Bacarri Rambo to cover the free safety spot.