Clint Ingram: Boom or Bust?

more important than he didn’t fit in the 3-4 scheme is that Mangini didn’t like him. Vilma could have been fine in a 3-4. For whatever reason Mangini didn’t like him and it had a big effect. I guess that was a harbinger to what kind of coach Mangini was going to be.

The Saints go back and forth between a 3-4 and a 4-3 as well. If he can’t play one of those, that’s a problem. And its not just that he can’t play 3-4. From the reports I’ve seen, when Jax went to a 4-3 he looked just as bad.
With that said, I don’t think he’s that bad of a linebacker. Only time will tell if he is better than Fujita, but he is cheaper, and that’s a big selling point. I don’t expect him to play lights out, but if he can play up to his salary level, then I think the improvements in the D-Line and secondary can carry the defense.

…right from the get-go. He appears to me to be no less than a lateral move when compared to Fujita in that he’s almost as big as Scott was and he is hopefully still faster than Fuji was.

The big question here is “if” he recoups from knee surgery well enough to maintain his past speed for size ratio, his pass-rush abilities and his coverage skills on TE’s, RB’s out of the backfield and bigger WR’s across the middle.

Let’s just hope that he is near to 100% ready come training camp time so that he can truly compete with these even younger guys that we already have waiting in the wings, huh?

IF his injury problems were his real problems last year, and IF he can recover for this year, then maybe he’ll turn out OK after all.

I’m not holding my breath.

I think he will be fine and an upgrade over Fujita (even tho I really liked Fuji). Walter football has Ingram listed as the 7th best free agent OLB and Fujita was ranked 17th. Of course that is all speculation but that’s all any of us have right now.

here he is…stuck somewhere in the middle with you

we’ll see

Stu’s Brian Simmons comment might be truer than we think…

boom rec you for the Simmons, Stu

i have attempted to pound some points about the skill needs for our LBs for years seem like, mostly on nola.com..
he’ we go again.. the LBs on a typical 43 only got one primary job.. shed blocks & make tackles.. that’s it.. in most circumstances it’s a safety that covers man-2-man the TE.. the LB may be asked to zone the RB out of the backfield.. occasional blitz (from the LB position, mostly.. meaning, behind the D-line, ergo.. hard to get home unless you really got blazing speed). so that’s it.. we got a good player in shanle, who does his job.. we might have just found us the “sam” (ingram) if he does his job.. i voted boom..

I’ll wait to see if there is any improvement in his abilities once he’s paired again with Gregg Williams and joins the Saints D. If he’s willing to put forth some effort and becomes familiar with our schemes, he might just prove to be yet another “diamond” in the rough for the Saints. As you may recall, they’ve had some sucess in that area…

I think we have one of the smartest groups of LBs in the league. And when Fujita and Simoneau played, they were very smart too. That only gets you so far, though and then you have to be tough, fast, and fundamentally sound. Fujita was very smart and that will be hard to replace. I think playing LB in the NFL, a lot of that “smarts” comes with experience. Vilma and Shanle have that experience too. But it is a great asset to start out with a good brain as a basis and also to be very dedicated to film study.

and I totally disagree. Lbs in a 4-3 have tremendous pass defense responsibilities. And, with so many teams passing more these days, that explains why LBs have to be faster and more mobile (i.e. smaller) especially Ols to cover RBs, TEs and even wideouts coming across the middle. Most teams nowadays have AT LEAST one wide receiver who requires a double team – a CB and Safety usually- sometimes 2 players deep (Henderson- Colston) . OLs have to be very versatile- they cover the middle of the field usually and their level of pass defense can often decide the game. If the opposing offense (such as the NO Saints) knows they can complete passes in the middle of the field at will (to players such as Colston, Shockey, F Thomas, Bush, P Thomas, Evans) they can have their way with defenses and we did. That’s been the biggest key to our offense’s success- a QB and other personnel that can outplay the opposition’s defense in the middle of the field consistently- for first downs especially. The responsilbility of LBs is way more than shedding blocks and making tackles. If that was so, Jeremiah Trotter would still be playing. If LBs show they cannot cover, you better believe an offensive coordinator will find a way to cause a match up to exploit. They’ll never run the ball if a LB can’t cover the pass. It’s just too easy to exploit for a short pass in the West Coast offense. And that’s exactly why you see Payton get so pass happy at times.