Smoot Lays the Smack Down (Redskins vs. Ravens)

Good corners do not make 95 tackles because such a high number of tackles means that corner is giving up away too many completions and thus is not feared by QBs.

Asomugha and Revis both have a far lower amount of tackles and NOBODY would argue that they're even on par with Hall; both are better. The reason why? Testing them usually results in a play that gains 0 yards(incompletions) or worse.
They do not sacrifice coverage for a small marginal gain in INTs. Breaking 10 picks in a season is a difficult task, and converting picks into points is hardly a guaranteed matter. The point differential between a successful INT by Hall and failed attempt by Hall must be a positive value, otherwise, he's likely hurting the team. Yes, you want guys who can grab picks when the situation DOES present itself(which Stonehands could not do), at the same time, you don't want them to take too much risk and then give up points.

Hell, Hall has never had more than 6 picks in a season. Thus, AT MOST, he would fetch 42 points based on "successful" picks. Since not every pick results in points, that number is far lower. But his number of UNSUCCESSFUL picks gives the opponent points. Since he is such a habitual gambler, I believe assuming he attempts at least 16 times a season to grab those picks is not out of the question. Heck, if his failed gambles led to a field goal every time, the points he snatch for the team and the points he helped cough up would be equal.

I think you're missing the point or I'm not be entirely clear. I never put Hall in Asomugha and Revis' class, I'm not crazy. I also pointed out there are a couple of ways you could read Hall having 95 tackles. I suppose you could also reason away his ints and 16 defended passes. What's not really up for debate is that Hall is one helluva playmaker. And given the talent he's been playing with for the past three seasons and changing systems, I'm pretty satisfied with his production as a Redskin. Actually I'm very satisfied with his play as a Redskin.

As far as the aforementioned corners, frankly I don't see them play every week. So I don't know how many tackles they miss, how many coverages they blow, and how many ints they drop. By the way, of the top corners in the league Charles Woodson happens to be my favorite.

What I hate about this whole Hall bashing/praise argument is that people disregard the overall communication problem that exists among the defensive backs. People have such a hard on hatred for Hall, that all they see are his faults and proceed to b*tch and whine about it to the point that it takes over threads. Then you have people that proceed to argue back, making Hall sound like he's the best ever.

Our defensive backs as a group have problems and they do not begin or end with Halls flaws. For many years we've seen all of our secondary get beat deep, screw up assignments, and completely botch the zone coverage. This offseason having our starting safeties (Atogwe and Landry) and a new starting corner (Wilson) out with injury during training camp and preaseason games did not help.

I hope that Haslett, the DB coaches, and the secondary gets their act together on this overall problem. Unfortunately, this adjustment will need to happen during the regular season.

Oh, I'm sorry, but there's a better corner who has donned the Redskins uniform and has some rings to boot as well. Forgive me for having high standards. Any rudimentary cost-benefit analysis would show that Hall is a complete idiot for trying so hard to get that one extra pick precisely because picks are extremely low probability events. You let the picks "come to you" and catch those picks(Stonehands could not, nor was his coverage that good). You don't chase them at the expense of coverage because there's going to be MANY, MANY more "no attempts" or incompletions if you cover well.

Wait, what? Cornerbacks shouldn't take gambles on picks because of cost-benefit analysis and the low probability of yielding results? Seriously?

Wait, what? Cornerbacks shouldn't take gambles on picks because of cost-benefit analysis and the low probability of yielding results? Seriously?

Yeah I don't get this.

I'm I the only one that missed the part where most NFL CB's are apparently great at tackling?

95 tackles by Dhall is nothing to scoff at. I'm sure he whiffed on a few but I'm sure CB's around the league whiffed on as many if not more than he did.

No it's not. Asomugha only had 19. I wonder if that's because teams try to avoid Asomugha and game plan around him? Just saying... I love when D. Hall gets turnovers. They're game changers and they fire the team up. I think a lot of us just think he gives up a lot more plays than he needs to by trying for the big play. I'd like to see him cover a little better. Hope that's not too much to ask out of a corner. Shut your man down first...look for the TO second....not the other way around.

What I hate about this whole Hall bashing/praise argument is that people disregard the overall communication problem that exists among the defensive backs. People have such a hard on hatred for Hall, that all they see are his faults and proceed to b*tch and whine about it to the point that it takes over threads. Then you have people that proceed to argue back, making Hall sound like he's the best ever.

Our defensive backs as a group have problems and they do not begin or end with Halls flaws. For many years we've seen all of our secondary get beat deep, screw up assignments, and completely botch the zone coverage. This offseason having our starting safeties (Atogwe and Landry) and a new starting corner (Wilson) out with injury during training camp and preaseason games did not help.

I hope that Haslett, the DB coaches, and the secondary gets their act together on this overall problem. Unfortunately, this adjustment will need to happen during the regular season.

You very succinctly put the whole Hall argument into perspective. Good post.

Wait, what? Cornerbacks shouldn't take gambles on picks because of cost-benefit analysis and the low probability of yielding results? Seriously?

Yea, love that playing corner turned into playing poker

Good corners do not make 95 tackles because such a high number of tackles means that corner is giving up away too many completions and thus is not feared by QBs.

Asomugha and Revis both have a far lower amount of tackles and NOBODY would argue that they're even on par with Hall; both are better. The reason why? Testing them usually results in a play that gains 0 yards(incompletions) or worse.
They do not sacrifice coverage for a small marginal gain in INTs. Breaking 10 picks in a season is a difficult task, and converting picks into points is hardly a guaranteed matter. The point differential between a successful INT by Hall and failed attempt by Hall must be a positive value, otherwise, he's likely hurting the team. Yes, you want guys who can grab picks when the situation DOES present itself(which Stonehands could not do), at the same time, you don't want them to take too much risk and then give up points.

Hell, Hall has never had more than 6 picks in a season. Thus, AT MOST, he would fetch 42 points based on "successful" picks. Since not every pick results in points, that number is far lower. But his number of UNSUCCESSFUL picks gives the opponent points. Since he is such a habitual gambler, I believe assuming he attempts at least 16 times a season to grab those picks is not out of the question. Heck, if his failed gambles led to a field goal every time, the points he snatch for the team and the points he helped cough up would be equal.

Are wide receivers the only players on the field that get tackled? Is Hall supposed to cover every receiver on the field as well as disrupt handoffs so a rb can't run the ball?

First it was he can't tackle now it's he's giving up so many completions that he has more chances to tackle than anyone else.

D-Hall is a playmaking corner that gives up a few more than we would like to see but let's give credit where it's due. He did well when it came to tackling last year and that was one point of his game he really worked on.

Nice post Ruhskins. We've had a problem back there for years. Hopefully the play of this front 7 will help out until we get some chemistry back there. Sure wish ST was here to enjoy this lineup.

I think you're missing the point or I'm not be entirely clear. I never put Hall in Asomugha and Revis' class, I'm not crazy. I also pointed out there are a couple of ways you could read Hall having 95 tackles. I suppose you could also reason away his ints and 16 defended passes. What's not really up for debate is that Hall is one helluva playmaker. And given the talent he's been playing with for the past three seasons and changing systems, I'm pretty satisfied with his production as a Redskin. Actually I'm very satisfied with his play as a Redskin.

As far as the aforementioned corners, frankly I don't see them play every week. So I don't know how many tackles they miss, how many coverages they blow, and how many ints they drop. By the way, of the top corners in the league Charles Woodson happens to be my favorite.This is totally separate from my criticism of Hall in the rest of the thread. And I may be the only guy who thinks this. But I think there's 20 corners in the league I'd take over Hall simply in terms of making big plays.

What he did to Flacco in the first quarter against Baltimore on Thursday was a big time defensive play. He drove on that route, had good position settled underneath, broke aggressively on the football making a great play on the ball, and then took it the distance. That's what playmakers do.

But I only get 4, maybe 5 of those plays out of Hall a season. I get twice that out of Ed Reed and Troy Polamalu and even LaRon Landry every 8 games. During Hall's best games, where he's running step for step with receivers and not giving up the big play, you rarely hear about him.

To me, Hall isn't much of a playmaker, at least how I'd define it: being consistently around the football so that good things happen. When Hall gets the ball in his hands: there's a good chance he's making a play. But between fumble recoveries and INTs, thats 5, maybe 6 times a season. And Hall is just not a "nose for the football" guy. You'll get a few INTs in any season, but how often is he amongst the league leaders in INTs?

I suppose he's pretty consistently in the top 20 NFL players in INTs, but I'm not sure thats all being a playmaker entails. Stripping Tashard Choice was a big-time play, but that was his last play on a ball carrier of the season. In the second half of last season, I don't think he made a play. Not one.

Again, this has nothing to do with my criticism of Hall's selfishness in the rest of the thread. Totally separate issue.