When Did Wilson Stop Running?

One good thing to say about Kaepernick (and believe me, I hate saying anything good about that arrogant cocky puss), but the boy can run. Not just when receivers aren't open, but Harbaugh designs plays just for his running.

Russell is great at running too, and not just when he's running for his life 20 yards behind the line of scrimmage. But he never seems to run anymore unless he's in trouble. What happened to the Read-Option, when he would frequently keep the ball? Why don't we have plays designed for him to run?

I get it that Beast Mode is our bread and butter. But we hear that rushing sets up the pass, passing sets up the run. I think it applies equally well to Russell running: Lynch's running attempts sets up favorable conditions for a Wilson attempt, and Wilson's running helps set up Lynch.

So am I thinking wrong or what? I miss those runs.

because aldon smith played a monster game. Wilson could'nt do much when aldon was in his face.

Kaep runs because he can't read his recievers. he looks for his one guy and then runs head down. I think we were more focused on his arm than his legs in the first half.

NFL defenses handle the read-option a lot better now than when teams first started running it. It was never something that was going to work regularly forever, and minimal gains aren't worth QBs taking big hits.

Wilson hasn't run in about a month to answer your question. Maybe once a game he does what all other QBs do and take a nice easy run on the outside but it looks like they've either told him not to or that he chooses not to.

We have simply faced a run of great defenses.

Every one of our last 7 opponents (5 teams) has a legitimate claim to be a top 10 defense. Hell, 3 of them finishes in the top 4 for yards allowed.

I am really looking forward to playing the Broncos, because the only teams we faced with a worse D this year were Minnesota, Atlanta, Jacksonville and Houston, and aside from the Houston game (which we played without Okung, Giacomini AND Unger remember), we completely dismantled all of them.

I'd say Russell had 6-7 chances against the Saints to keep the ball on read option plays and gain big yards, but I didn't see one chance against the Niners.

The downside is I still seeing Russell being overly tentative and cautious with ripping the ball out to a WR or TE, which caused a few of the big sacks and the intentional grounding play. He's gotta trust his reads, his WR's and more than anything his "preparation" and allow his superior athleticism to take over.

I wish there more opportunities for him to run too. But that's not the only thing missing from the repertoire lately either.

Where are the throws to RBs, either straight down the field or on screens? Aren't screens the classic way to bust an over pursuing pass rush? Are they really going to max protect all the time?

And on defense, not one blitz? With our secondary? Good heavens, Dan...

Lastly, can we PLEASE stop the pre-snap penalties. I saw three false starts and a bunch of ugly handoffs.

...And yet somehow they once again did just enough to win. It's a wonder I haven't had a stroke this season....

The read-option hasn't been an option at all because teams have been committing their QB-side DE or OLB to stay at home and keep RW from running it.

That being said, I'd love to seen a designed bootleg for RW every once in a while, particularly in short yardage situations where the Hawks seem content to just run Lynch right up the middle into a large pile of humanity, which more often than not, leads to fourth down. Just once I'd like to see RW keep it and roll back around in the opposite direction on a bootleg, perhaps even with a run/pass option with a releasing TE as a contingency plan.

IMO, I think he's trying to prove to everyone that he's a passer and not a running QB. But he's so much more dynamic as a dual threat

Sgt. Largent":1hw8pfv1 said:

I'd say Russell had 6-7 chances against the Saints to keep the ball on read option plays and gain big yards, but I didn't see one chance against the Niners.

The downside is I still seeing Russell being overly tentative and cautious with ripping the ball out to a WR or TE, which caused a few of the big sacks and the intentional grounding play. He's gotta trust his reads, his WR's and more than anything his "preparation" and allow his superior athleticism to take over.

Click to expand...

Dude PC said mistake free, that is why he will not take chances, that might change in the SB but that is the game plan, add to that they still need to get open.

hoxrox":3qwmvpz3 said:

IMO, I think he's trying to prove to everyone that he's a passer and not a running QB. But he's so much more dynamic as a dual threat

Click to expand...

Umm, I seriously doubt that Russell Wilson is intentionally compromising the offense just for the sake of trying to engineer the public's perception of him as passing QB. C'mon, man.

Teams have been putting a spy out there and we have been unwilling to change the way we run the play so it doesn't work.

On the first play of the game our TE ran right passed Aldon Smith without even attempting to block or chip him. It looked as if Russell was expecting the TE to block smith and was caught off guard when this did not occur. Had that block occurred Russell has both time to throw and plenty of green to run. We could use a similar block on the RO to spring it.

There were a couple of plays where the DE crashed and it looked at first glance like the QB keeper was open. But on replay they showed a LB or Safety was always filling in behind the DE.

I do think there are times when Wilson could have scrambled for good yardage and chose to throw instead. While I appreciate his desire to do that! sometimes those scrambles put enough fear in a defense to alter their plan and open up other options.

Anthony!":2tw2yscl said:

Sgt. Largent":2tw2yscl said:

I'd say Russell had 6-7 chances against the Saints to keep the ball on read option plays and gain big yards, but I didn't see one chance against the Niners.

The downside is I still seeing Russell being overly tentative and cautious with ripping the ball out to a WR or TE, which caused a few of the big sacks and the intentional grounding play. He's gotta trust his reads, his WR's and more than anything his "preparation" and allow his superior athleticism to take over.

Click to expand...

Dude PC said mistake free, that is why he will not take chances, that might change in the SB but that is the game plan, add to that they still need to get open.

Click to expand...

But it wasn't mistake free. The very first play of the game was a huge mistake by Wilson, why didn't he just flip the ball out to Miller when Smith went at him?

That's the indecisiveness I'm talking about.

Don't get me wrong, I love Russell, but you can definitely tell a difference in his play from late last year, to early this year to now. He's being OVERLY cautious and tentative IMO.

I was wondering the same thing. Could it be simply that he couldnt settle down. That was the biggest game of his career. I understand he is like a jedi ( cool,calm and collected) , however he is human ( he isnt a robot after all, lol) and the pressure on him showed. All that said he was still clutch. I think he will deal with the Superbowl a lot more composed. I cant see Denver putting pressure on Wilson like the niners can. I think people have forgotten that Harvin will be back as well.
He will open up the passing game for Doug,Tate and Kearse,Zach and Lynch.

Our teams defense is legendary, speaks for itself
Go Hawks

Largent I went back and watched it again and it looks to me like Russell was expecting Miller to block Aldon Smith and was caught off guard when he ran right passed unimpeded.