I think he just needed to grow enough in some of his technique and strength work to where his game would show. But if you queue up his film at Washington he was doing precisely what he's doing now: stuffing things up but also penetrating and running ball carriers down.
Another thing where he's improved is his consistency. The guy doesn't really have bad snaps. A bad snap for Gaines is him tying up blockers. It's really rare to see him blown off the LOS can't remember the last time I saw that probably his rookie season.
Prior to this season I felt like his weakness was vs zone teams that make him string out laterally. But he's improved a lot in that regard too. The guy is playing great ball right now and it's the kind of boost for a unit that, along with Jones doing the same thing second level, can drive big improvement for the group. Rams are a really tough-nosed team right now to run against. They look like a playoff defense up front.
Now the secondary, well, that's another story. They're gonna need to be able to hold up in games when the front doesn't get the kind of pressure they did vs the Cards. In that game they got 26 pressures I think it was. Given that Murray threw the ball 49 times that's MORE THAN 50% pressure rate which will turn any QB into a bad QB. The top defenses at this level generally pressure the passers on average in the 20s in terms of percentage. Games where it spikes much higher tend to be blowout or big wins which this one very much was for us. But make no mistake: we need better play on the back end if we want to win it all.
