Wolverine In Exile

December 29th, 2009 at 1:06 PM ^

Zimmer writes: "He's never been a mike [middle linebacker] before, but he's a pretty darn good mike." I know they played a 3-4 in '97, and I'm pretty sure Dhani was the ILB with Sam Sword. In 98 I think he played ILB also (didn't they play a base 4-3 that year?), and then in 99 moved outside to strong side LB.

Joined: 11/08/2008

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rugbypike11

December 29th, 2009 at 7:24 PM ^

They ran a sort of hybrid defense that leaned a little more towards 4-3 than 3-4. The rush linebacker was the weakside OLB, but James Hall was really more of a smallish DE than a a true 3-4 OLB or a Quick like Roh. Sword played inside with Jones, with a heavy mixture of Ian Gold, especially in passing situations. I think Jones played Will, so he was kind of an ILB but really played more like a 4-3 OLB. In '97, Copenhaven started at OLB with Rob Swett spelling him. But I think you're right in that Jones later moved to that Sam OLB position. That '97 defense was really just loaded with NFL guys.

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