What's Your Confidence Level For Parys Haralson?

smileyman I agree the OLB is a position of need.

I think Haralson, Lawson and Brooks will play well. Haralson was playing injured most of the season so his dip in sacks isn’t that huge. I think it’s possible that all three guys get 7 plus sacks. Brooks, as good as he has been in spurts isn’t better than either starter in terms of all-round play. Haralson is a good pass-rusher,very solid in coverage and good vs. the run. Brooks is very disruptive vs. the pass as a rusher and vs. the run but shaky in coverage. Manny is easy a top 3 coverage LB in the league and he holds the edge in the run game as well as any of the top guys. Not to mention even though he only had 6.5 sacks he also had a ton of QB pressures which is a overlooked stat but a very important one. I’m my opinion Manny is the fourth most important defender on this team behind Willis, Franklin and Smith. None of the those four guys can be easily replaced for the long term. Besides we know Sing would play the best players and that hasn’t happened yet so…….Haralson and Lawson will start be Brooks will get his playtime. I still think Brooks could be a great ILB next to Willis. That would be an scary starting group!

For the last few weeks we have been reading in this blog about how bad Sopoaga and Balmer are at DE….whose major responsibility is holding the blockers at the line of scrimmage so the OLBs can get loose to rush or close off the line of scrimmage on runs and force RBs to the middle of the field. If the DEs are truly that bad, how can we criticize the guys behind them who are left exposed????
Now we are on Haralson’s case because he does not look like Patrick Willis out there. I think the only legitimate criticism of Haralson is that his zone has been too susceptible to screen passes and speed running backs like Chris Johnson. And that may be partially Justin Smith’s fault as he is constantly rushing the passer all out and can lose contain at that side of the field and partially the price we pay for having a slow SS (Lewis). And partially the fault of the defensive scheme as a whole.
Let’s enjoy the successes more and stop whining that there are not 22 all-Pros starting for the 49ers.

a LB corps of Haralson playing on the right and Brooks playing on the left with PW in the middle along with a front line of Aubrayo plugging up the middle with a desire to show (if not to the Niners then to another team) that he can play the NT position quite well and Justin doing his usually at DE, and hopefully Balmer or RJF coming in and showing some athleticism at the other DE position, along with Goldson and Lewis/Mays being a safety threat to pounce as well. Then we should have a pretty fearsome defense not even taking into consideration the CB corps.

That being said I am voting for Medium on Haralson (didn’t even look at the rating system) because if he does what he did last year to a bit better I’ll be pleased.

I’d love to and looking for growth this year not only from our rooks but from our reasonably young guys as well. If we get a bit of elevation from Brooks and Balmer/RJF and Goldson (or even him just maintaining) along with some good plays coming in from the rooks Mays and Bowmann that would be so freaking sweet to me. I guess what I’m saying is that I want to see progress and continuity as much as wanting the playoffs.

As has been presented here at NN by some of our great contributors we are a reasonably young team with some great players (Gore, VD, Pwilly, Justin Smith, Lee, Crabs, Heitmann, etc.) and some pretty dang good players (Staley, Morgan, Aubrayo, Spencer, Haralson Goldson) and some up and comers on both the rookie and just reaching their grasp and working in (Brooks, RJF, Smith, Brown, Rookies: Davis, Iupati, Mays, Bowmann, Dixon, Williams). That is a pretty darn good team there fellow NN-ers. :-)

Just because he is a good player worthy of the starting role but he hasn’t shown he can be any better than occasionally making a great play, sometimes getting burned by speedy players. He’s a good player, nothing more.