Andrew Thacker

[UgaBlows]

OMG! Just think if Blackburn had played in the Pitt game! 2 more touchdowns for us no doubt! /s

We BEAT them, quit trying to come up with excuses for Pitt.

 

[forensicbuzz]

OMG! Just think if Blackburn had played in the Pitt game! 2 more touchdowns for us no doubt! /s

We BEAT them, quit trying to come up with excuses for Pitt.

Think about if Blackburn would have caught the two TD passes he dropped in the Duke game. He needs to knock off that rust and catch the balls that he has two hands on.

 

[slugboy]

Abanikanda didn't come out because of a turf monster. He came out because he was getting hit by our defense. On one hand, some people are arguing that our defense deserves less credit because he went out, but our defense is one of the reasons he went out.

Yes, if he ran over us the way he ran over VT, we would have lost. That didn't happen.

If we had played against UCF like we played against Pitt, we would have won against UCF. We didn't.

 

[WreckinGT]

OMG! Just think if Blackburn had played in the Pitt game! 2 more touchdowns for us no doubt! /s

We BEAT them, quit trying to come up with excuses for Pitt.

Good grief. One person made a comment about Pitts running back being hurt possibly affecting our defensive stats and half the people on here go ape**** and turn into trolls. Stop being little snowflakes about everything. It wasn't that crazy of a statement.

 

[fairweatherhater]

My favorite part about this thread is the people that are making each other’s arguments for them while getting agitated with each other. This is closing in on locked thread territory. Some valid points could have potentially been made on both sides but this is getting way out of hand.

I keep opening this thread looking for analysis on Thacker as I am also revisiting my opinion of him at the moment. The sooner we can get back to that the better.

 

[iceeater1969]

My favorite part about this thread is the people that are making each other’s arguments for them while getting agitated with each other. This is closing in on locked thread territory. Some valid points could have potentially been made on both sides but this is getting way out of hand.

I keep opening this thread looking for analysis on Thacker as I am also revisiting my opinion of him at the moment. The sooner we can get back to that the better.

Amen!
Back to Thack Attack.

 

[JacketFan137]

My favorite part about this thread is the people that are making each other’s arguments for them while getting agitated with each other. This is closing in on locked thread territory. Some valid points could have potentially been made on both sides but this is getting way out of hand.

I keep opening this thread looking for analysis on Thacker as I am also revisiting my opinion of him at the moment. The sooner we can get back to that the better.

the past two games are the best our defense has looked in so long. paul with this defensive play the whole time would have been smoking the acc coastal every year.

whether thacker will be retained or not is another discussion but this man has earned another p5 shot minimum going forward

 

[bobongo]

I guess this observation has been made before, but since his only other stint as DC was 2018 at Temple, these last two games are the first games Thacker has been a DC without Collins as head coach.
Probably his two best games.

 

[slugboy]

My favorite part about this thread is the people that are making each other’s arguments for them while getting agitated with each other. This is closing in on locked thread territory. Some valid points could have potentially been made on both sides but this is getting way out of hand.

I keep opening this thread looking for analysis on Thacker as I am also revisiting my opinion of him at the moment. The sooner we can get back to that the better.

I don’t know if it’s Thacker or if it’s the massive overhaul of the assistant coaches.

The defense looks different. Last year against UGA, their defensive line would shift and slant and stunt. Our defensive line lined up and didn’t move.

This year, we slant and stunt. There is coordinated movement on the DL and they’re doing interesting things as a unit.

Last year, our CBs and our safeties were on a different page. Our CB would release a man and the safety would be going to a different spot on the field. The coordination between the secondary and the LBs was even worse.

Now, there are no gaping holes in coverage.

We’ve had decent blitzes, especially from the LB position (and Eley looks much better this year than last).

How much of this is Collins being gone and Thacker being freer to set the defense vs how much is the change in other coaches vs how much is different players on the field is anyone’s guess.

 

[takethepoints]

This is a silly argument. We can only go by the data in front of us. He was having an ineffective game. He could have gotten better, but, as engineers, we're taught to evaluate based on the evidence in front of us, not speculation. Your evidence was his book to date, mine was his performance during the game. One does not necessarily trump the other, so...who knows. We won because we scored more points that they did. In addition to the turnovers, we dominated their offense. Don't think you can just point to turnovers as the reason we won.

Well … yes it does and it is my evidence that trumps yours. That's because it is based on a larger sample size and greater variation in conditions. If the evidence before your eyes is at variance with the evidence built up by prior experience, the first thing you should do is check your eyes. Provided, of course, that the existing evidence is valid and conditions are roughly the same as is the case here. If engineers don't do it that way, they need to get a lot more careful at once.

And we won because of the turnovers. You don't turn the ball over 4 times and win. Usually.

 

[slugboy]

Well … yes it does and it is my evidence that trumps yours. That's because it is based on a larger sample size and greater variation in conditions. If the evidence before your eyes is at variance with the evidence built up by prior experience, the first thing you should do is check your eyes. Provided, of course, that the existing evidence is valid and conditions are roughly the same as is the case here. If engineers don't do it that way, they need to get a lot more careful at once.

And we won because of the turnovers. You don't turn the ball over 4 times and win. Usually.

Look at the turnovers, though—those were great defensive plays. One way a defense makes plays is in turnovers, and ours did.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

I don’t know if it’s Thacker or if it’s the massive overhaul of the assistant coaches.

The defense looks different. Last year against UGA, their defensive line would shift and slant and stunt. Our defensive line lined up and didn’t move.

This year, we slant and stunt. There is coordinated movement on the DL and they’re doing interesting things as a unit.

Last year, our CBs and our safeties were on a different page. Our CB would release a man and the safety would be going to a different spot on the field. The coordination between the secondary and the LBs was even worse.

Now, there are no gaping holes in coverage.

We’ve had decent blitzes, especially from the LB position (and Eley looks much better this year than last).

How much of this is Collins being gone and Thacker being freer to set the defense vs how much is the change in other coaches vs how much is different players on the field is anyone’s guess.

The work that Travares Tillman has done with the DBs is incredible and cannot be understated. He needs to be on staff next year regardless of who is head coach or DC.

 

[85Escape]

The work that Travares Tillman has done with the DBs is incredible and cannot be understated. He needs to be on staff next year regardless of who is head coach or DC.

I agree...it's probably the biggest reason for overall improvement. No one is open, the QBs hold the ball longer and OC's aren't trying to stretch the field as much.

 

[CEB]

Look at the turnovers, though—those were great defensive plays. One way a defense makes plays is in turnovers, and ours did.

With all the stat happiness these days, I’m surprised standard convention hasn’t become tracking turnovers vs takeaways.
Bad snap, fumbled hand off or ill-advised throw aren’t the same as what you see in that video. CT just absolutely made a play on a decent ball to a receiver who could’ve and probably would’ve made the first down catch.

 

[roadkill]

I don’t know if it’s Thacker or if it’s the massive overhaul of the assistant coaches.

The defense looks different. Last year against UGA, their defensive line would shift and slant and stunt. Our defensive line lined up and didn’t move.

This year, we slant and stunt. There is coordinated movement on the DL and they’re doing interesting things as a unit.

Last year, our CBs and our safeties were on a different page. Our CB would release a man and the safety would be going to a different spot on the field. The coordination between the secondary and the LBs was even worse.

Now, there are no gaping holes in coverage.

We’ve had decent blitzes, especially from the LB position (and Eley looks much better this year than last).

How much of this is Collins being gone and Thacker being freer to set the defense vs how much is the change in other coaches vs how much is different players on the field is anyone’s guess.

I don't know the answer, but I do think our D has shown flashes of improvement every game this year with the exception of the Ole Miss disaster. They were solid for 2.5 quarters vs Clemson, decent in the UCF game despite not getting any help from special teams and some late 3-and-outs from our offense, and then showed more improvement at Pitt and against Duke. Last year many of us thought we had turned the corner after the UNC game only to be let down. This year there have been signs of systemic improvements beyond just the occasional good game. Hope I'm not jinxing them lol.

 

[ibeattetris]

an interception returned for a touchdown was correlated with more than 7 points for the final score. Why? The explanation they had was that there actually was some momentum to it—you got the 6 for the TD and the defensive team shifted the overall course of the game by a few more points from the interception

Very specifically. EPA is what your team ADDED to what was expected. To make a contrived example, if the offense has the ball on the opponent 1 yard line on first down, they have an expected point total of about 6.5. So if they scored a TD on the first play, they will have added .5 to the projected points.

Conversely, if the defense gets a pick six, they will have removed the 6.5 from the offense and added 7 more their team resulting is a -13.5 epa.

So the “momentum” that they described, is really the subtracted expected points from the expected offenses points that drive.

 

[UgaBlows]

Good grief. One person made a comment about Pitts running back being hurt possibly affecting our defensive stats and half the people on here go ape**** and turn into trolls. Stop being little snowflakes about everything. It wasn't that crazy of a statement.

this is his actual quote-

“I think if Pitt had had Israel Abanikanda our D performance would have been avbout the same as for Ole Miss and we would have lost the game.”

pretty ridiculous statement imo, Ole Miss killed us on the ground right from the get-go. Our guys were very obviously zero‘d in on shutting down Pitt’s running game and did it. Thacker had a great gameplan for this game and it shows vs. how incredible inept we looked against Ole Miss

 

[roadkill]

this is his actual quote-

“I think if Pitt had had Israel Abanikanda our D performance would have been avbout the same as for Ole Miss and we would have lost the game.”

pretty ridiculous statement imo, Ole Miss killed us on the ground right from the get-go. Our guys were very obviously zero‘d in on shutting down Pitt’s running game and did it. Thacker had a great gameplan for this game and it shows vs. how incredible inept we looked against Ole Miss

Agreed. If any comment could be called trollish it would be the quoted statement. It deserved to be countered.

 

[forensicbuzz]

Well … yes it does and it is my evidence that trumps yours. That's because it is based on a larger sample size and greater variation in conditions. If the evidence before your eyes is at variance with the evidence built up by prior experience, the first thing you should do is check your eyes. Provided, of course, that the existing evidence is valid and conditions are roughly the same as is the case here. If engineers don't do it that way, they need to get a lot more careful at once.

And we won because of the turnovers. You don't turn the ball over 4 times and win. Usually.

And we can agree to disagree. LOL, I tried to give you an out, but you doubled down on a bad position.

To say your evidence trumps how he was playing that day is beyond silly. He was shut down and knocked out of the game. There is no empirical evidence to support your assertion that his performance would have all-of-a-sudden changed in the middle of the game. Your assumption is based on how you feel he would have done had we not knocked him out of the game. To me, that is very weak. But, you can try to make that argument if you want. Don't think it's going to convince many, but it might.

 

[85Escape]

And we can agree to disagree.

To say your evidence trumps how he was playing that day is beyond silly. He was shut down and knocked out of the game. There is no empirical evidence to support your assertion that his performance would all-of-a-sudden change in the middle of the game. Your assumption is based on how you feel he would have done had we not knocked him out of the game. To me, that is very weak. But, you can try to make that argument if you want. Don't think it's going to convince many, but it might.

Exactly. By that argument (that he would have hit season average performance) then Duke's QB should have had an accuracy of ~73% instead of the 49% he had for the game.