“They are not playing great gap-sound defense,” started Chris Cooley.
This was in response to Kevin Sheehan asking Cooley what he has observed regarding why the Commanders might have been giving up so many yards and points to the Eagles offense. Cooley was a guest on the “Kevin Sheehan Show” podcast on Monday.
Buy Commanders TicketsThen Cooley became very direct and simply said, “Chase Young is not playing very well. Chase Young is somewhat of a problem on that side with Jonathan Allen. He seems like he is doing his own thing. To me, that is somewhat of an issue.”
Against the Broncos in Week 2, Young collected 1.5 sacks, and then he also had a sack against the Eagles last week.
In response, Sheehan added, “Yes, at times, he appears to not be doing what they want him to be doing.”
Cooley continued, “It’s really like he’s aloof to what they are doing on the defensive side of the ball. It’s not like he is not a good player. He’s a freak athletically, but he is still not the guy I saw two years ago before the knee surgery.”
Cooley briefly then discussed problems with the linebackers and secondary and voiced that teams will now be targeting Emmanuel Forbes before he circled back to what he feels is the core issue defensively.
“But it also goes hand-in-hand with the fact you are not getting dynamic pressure week in and week out in situations where you should be winning consistently up front.”
“When I mean ‘winning’, I mean kicking the s— out of the offensive line because you’re so good. You’ve paid (Daron) Payne, and you’ve paid (Jonathan) Allen. You’ve drafted first-round picks in (Montez) Sweat and Chase Young. You’ve got so much invested in those four dudes on the defense. You have to dynamically better.”
