Best offense in the country, #100 defense, #22 overall

[GTNavyNuke]

I like your reasoning, and I think that must be it. I had assumed the OE rating had already taken into account the garbage drives based on this quote from the page,

Based on that, I had just assumed the garbage drives were never considered. It would definitely help things make more sense if that were not the case.

There is a lot to how Football Outsiders massages the data. A lot is throwing out garbage time as already pointed out by @AE 87. But there is a lot more. The book "Study Hall" gets into some depth. They also estimate the value of every play by measuring the difference in point value for the starting yard line and ending yard line of each play. (Every yard line has a point value associated with it.)

Given the limited statistics that are collected for college football games, they had to go back and regrade every play for select games. So they do a lot of stuff that we don't see. Better descriptions may be on the Football Study Hall site or the Football Outsiders site, I just haven't looked enough to know.

 

[Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau]

But do you fire a HC who runs the best offense in the nation over it?

You mean the head coach that came to Georgia Tech "to win championships". The disparity between our offense and defense has always been huge, but now is incredible. And it is the defense that has kept us from any chance at those championships. The fact that there has been little or no improvement across nearly seven season says a lot about the capabilities of the man in charge. It speaks to his lack of ability to build and manage a coaching staff and recruit and develop defensive players. The loss of players this past offseason was a factor, but not in the previous six years. You have to consider changing things when your offense and defense are 100 places apart. And you have to measure the "best offense" against the better programs, not just Southern, Tulane, and the so-so teams in our league. That said, I think we will show marked improvement defensively against Virginia. We have to have identified some things that can be fixed.

 

[GT Man]

You mean the head coach that came to Georgia Tech "to win championships". The disparity between our offense and defense has always been huge, but now is incredible. And it is the defense that has kept us from any chance at those championships. The fact that there has been little or no improvement across nearly seven season says a lot about the capabilities of the man in charge. It speaks to his lack of ability to build and manage a coaching staff and recruit and develop defensive players. The loss of players this past offseason was a factor, but not in the previous six years. You have to consider changing things when your offense and defense are 100 places apart. And you have to measure the "best offense" against the better programs, not just Southern, Tulane, and the so-so teams in our league. That said, I think we will show marked improvement defensively against Virginia. We have to have identified some things that can be fixed.

• PJ won a championship, remember? And last I checked we are still in the running for the coastal division this year.
• I disagree that the defense hasn't improved. Under Roof, the defensive players are playing with a more simple, read-and-react approach. They're also opportunistic and create turnovers. A big question mark is whether the off-season attrition on the defensive side of the ball has anything to do with our struggles this year.
• The players are in great condition and I think that's a direct result of PJ's hire of Sisk. Also, special teams play is far improved over recent years past.
• Regarding defensive recruits: Meiko Dotson, Brentavious Glanton, Kyle Henderson, Brant Mitchell, Scott Morgan, Dante Wigley, are all 3-star defensive recruits. Let's not forget the Austin twins and Step Durham (he's got 4 stars according to Rivals).

Bottom line: you don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Sorry, I can't see your logic here.

 

[dressedcheeseside]

A big question mark is whether the off-season attrition on the defensive side of the ball has anything to do with our struggles this year.

I don't think there's any question concerning that, even among CPJ detractors.

 

[Jean-Baptiste Rochambeau]

• PJ won a championship, remember? And last I checked we are still in the running for the coastal division this year.
• I disagree that the defense hasn't improved. Under Roof, the defensive players are playing with a more simple, read-and-react approach. They're also opportunistic and create turnovers. A big question mark is whether the off-season attrition on the defensive side of the ball has anything to do with our struggles this year.
• The players are in great condition and I think that's a direct result of PJ's hire of Sisk. Also, special teams play is far improved over recent years past.
• Regarding defensive recruits: Meiko Dotson, Brentavious Glanton, Kyle Henderson, Brant Mitchell, Scott Morgan, Dante Wigley, are all 3-star defensive recruits. Let's not forget the Austin twins and Step Durham (he's got 4 stars according to Rivals).

Bottom line: you don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Sorry, I can't see your logic here.

I wasn't trying to change your mind or convince you of my logic. If your goal is tops in offense, and nothing else, then we're there. I'd like to win 10 games, not be "right in there" with the service academies; I'd like to beat Georgia more than one out of 13. I'd like to win the division now and then. I'd like to play in and win a bowl more than once in ten years. To do that, means CONSIDERING MAKING A CHANGE, given the plateau we have been on for four years. Our defense had Derrick Morgan, Michael Johnson, Morgan Burnett and we were not appreciably better as a team, than we are now. The baby has already been thrown out with the bath water; the quest for a championship was thrown away in order to lead the world in rushing.

 

[flounder]

Our defense had Derrick Morgan, Michael Johnson, Morgan Burnett and we were not appreciably better as a team, than we are now.

Whut? We won 11 games, the ACC and went to the Orange Bowl with Morgan Burnett and Derrick Morgan.

 

[GTRX7]

You mean the head coach that came to Georgia Tech "to win championships". The disparity between our offense and defense has always been huge, but now is incredible. And it is the defense that has kept us from any chance at those championships. The fact that there has been little or no improvement across nearly seven season says a lot about the capabilities of the man in charge. It speaks to his lack of ability to build and manage a coaching staff and recruit and develop defensive players. The loss of players this past offseason was a factor, but not in the previous six years. You have to consider changing things when your offense and defense are 100 places apart. And you have to measure the "best offense" against the better programs, not just Southern, Tulane, and the so-so teams in our league. That said, I think we will show marked improvement defensively against Virginia. We have to have identified some things that can be fixed.

I get that you are not a fan of the current regime, and have some serious questions about the defense over PJ's tenure, but you lose all credibility with a lot of the stuff you say. You act like our defense has been the same every year as it is this year, but that willfully false. We are 80th this year in scoring defense. Yes, we all agree that is awful. However, just last year, we were 29th, and in 2008, we were 28th. So during one third of his tenure, we have actually been pretty decent. We have generally been around 55-60 the rest of the years. That is certainly not good, but is not record shattering bad either. CPJ has tried to make changes to improve that side of the ball nearly every year, and I do think we would have continued to see improvement had we not lost 5 guys on the D-line before the season started. We are just not deep enough to handle that, nor have we ever been at Tech.

 

[takethepoints]

I think the major premise of

You mean the head coach that came to Georgia Tech "to win championships".

Ah. Here's the rub. Your major premise is wrong.

We hired Coach to come in and give us the best football team we could have, given the recruiting restrictions at Tech. Winning championships is an emergent property; i.e. if we get the best team we can, we'll win some). We aren't Bama (thank Gawd), but our success has been constant and we've never been worse then ok with Coach at the helm. Further, as others have pointed out, we have won an ACC championship and we've won or been in the hunt for the division championship every year. Now, given the new leeway given in recruiting, we bid fair to get over some of our problems and be truly bad.

I can see it coming. What bothers me is not that you can't - opinions differ - but that you seem to be so relentlessly eager to avoid looking at the actual situation of our football program.

 

[ilovetheoption]

But do you fire a HC who runs the best offense in the nation over it?

No, I don't think so, I was just pointing out that it's fair to say responsibility for the defense ultimately rests with him

 

[GT Man]

I wasn't trying to change your mind or convince you of my logic. If your goal is tops in offense, and nothing else, then we're there. I'd like to win 10 games, not be "right in there" with the service academies; I'd like to beat Georgia more than one out of 13. I'd like to win the division now and then. I'd like to play in and win a bowl more than once in ten years. To do that, means CONSIDERING MAKING A CHANGE, given the plateau we have been on for four years. Our defense had Derrick Morgan, Michael Johnson, Morgan Burnett and we were not appreciably better as a team, than we are now. The baby has already been thrown out with the bath water; the quest for a championship was thrown away in order to lead the world in rushing.

If you're waiting for a coach who can consistently beat the mutts, you'll be waiting a long time. They are a factory school and Tech isn't. At least wait for Roof to get some good defensive guys in there and then re-assess.

 

[ilovetheoption]

Including the games from this past weekend, GT still best offense in the country