Defense is now totally optional.

Heisman's Ghost

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Jerry the Jacket said:
Here I was thinking we were one of the worst defensive teams playing out there but the more I watch the more I see that we are not alone. What the hell has happened to defensive football? You know we could really distinguish ourselves if we could just improve a little bit. We seem to be pretty inept, especially when it comes to stopping someone on third and or fourth down. In fact, it seems that whatever our opponent needs to gain to advance toward scoring, we figure out a way to give it to them. It makes me wonder when our coaches and players will get feed up and do something about it.

Clemson appears to be one of the few teams that actually has a pretty good defense. It is shaping up to be a long day next Saturday. I am thinking about driving up to the mountains to watch the leaves turn.

Go Jackets!
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Defense is what separates the elite teams from the wannabes. UGA and Clemson are two examples. My Florida friends have nicknamed Grantham "3rd and " One receiver for Texas A&M repeatedly shreded the Gator man to man defense for about 200 yards receiving. Many of them are saying this is the worst Florida defense in 50 years. Trask played an almost perfect game for the Gators but one turnover on a fumble by a running back and it went down the tubes.
 
DeepSnap

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The ACC is turning into the Big12(minus Two).

As great as the offenses for LSU & tOSU were last year, their defenses were outstanding, too.

Agree UGAG & Clem's Son's D's appear to be big separators this year.
 
dressedcheeseside

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AlabamaBuzz said:
Defense is not optional, in my opinion, but it is true very few teams, even some that have perennially great D's, have looked good this year. UGAG, to my chagrin, has a top notch D with NFL guys everywhere. Obviously, Bama's D is way, way down. Clem's son appears to have a very good D - if they hold ND to less than 24, I think that will seal the deal about their D. Miami's O is not terrible, and Clem's son held them to less than 20.

I would like to think Kirby "fake a punt for no reason" Smart will blow it somehow, but right now, it would be intellectually hard to pick against them making the playoffs and possibly the championship game. In today's more offense-centric big boy football, a team that can get a few 3 and outs every game is going to be considered stellar. The rules are definitely skewed for the offenses, and the RPO has made playing D even more difficult.
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They also allow picks (offensive interference) near the goal line.
 
Pointer

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slugboy said:
Kentucky held Miss State and Mike Leach to 2 points. I guess it depends what games you were looking at.

With Bama-Ole Miss, I think the score says more about Lane Kiffin’s offensive ability than about Saban losing his abilities on defense. Kiffin knew where to hit Bama, but he couldn’t stop them.
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As many like to point out with it offense, they had lots of yards, it was the turnovers that got them lol. My god int 2 points though.
 
HurricaneJacket

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It always has been. That's why defense wins championships, and why in the NFL the team with the better defensive statistics iver the course of the season usually wins the Super Bowl.
 
ibeattetris

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So the Ohio State team got 97% on 9 drives, Alabama got their 94.7% on 11. Being able to maintain that is so ridiculous.

Just for fun, I decided to look at all the available data for GT(2003 to present, though realistically 2005 as I was getting negative numbers at times for 2003 and 2004). Here is our top 6.
1602576945276.png
 

bke1984

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Well, most of it is rule changes. In the early days of football it was really, really hard to score. Over time this has changed quite a bit. Most of the rule changes in the past 30 years have made it much easier to score. A few examples:
  1. Can't hit a QB high
  2. Can't hit a QB low
  3. Can't touch a QB's helmet
  4. DB's basically can't touch receivers
  5. Back shoulder throw PI (this results in some of the dumbest calls I've ever seen...a QB can basically force PI by underthrowing a pass)
  6. Throw away passes past the LOS to avoid intentional grounding when outside the pocket (also a stupid rule...)
  7. Refs helping to facilitate no huddle hurry up offense when time is not an issue
  8. Holding calls on the D line to prevent O linemen from blocking LB's
  9. Defenses "forcing o linemen to jump" and getting called offside (this one cracks me up when they fake it)
Any more that anyone wants to add?

The defense is already at a severe disadvantage in that they don't know the play. Yet all rule changes basically make it ever harder for them to do their job. It's no wonder defenses aren't good...
 

RamblinRed

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I think it is a combination of rule changes that favor the offense and this season having no spring training for some schools, and limited practicing in the summer and fall. I expected a fairly ragged season nationally in terms of performance and that is what we have seen.

If I had to pick 2 teams right now to make it to the NC game it would probably be Clemson and UGA (though we haven't seen any B10 teams yet so maybe a tOSU could get in the conversation) as they both seem to have legit defenses when few else do. I'd give Clemson an edge as their offense looks better than UGA's.
 
smokey_wasp

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RamblinRed said:
I think it is a combination of rule changes that favor the offense and this season having no spring training for some schools, and limited practicing in the summer and fall. I expected a fairly ragged season nationally in terms of performance and that is what we have seen.

If I had to pick 2 teams right now to make it to the NC game it would probably be Clemson and UGA (though we haven't seen any B10 teams yet so maybe a tOSU could get in the conversation) as they both seem to have legit defenses when few else do. I'd give Clemson an edge as their offense looks better than UGA's.
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The uga/bama game will be telling, as to how far a really great defense can take you in today's game.
 
Milwaukee

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Joel Klatt mentioned today on cfb radio that the Cornerback position is now the new Defensive Tackle. You can’t stop these spread offenses nowadays with corners that get beat even if you have the best DL in the nation. You have to have shutdown guys and your DT’s can be just serviceable.
Food for thought.
 

Lee

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Milwaukee said:
Joel Klatt mentioned today on cfb radio that the Cornerback position is now the new Defensive Tackle. You can’t stop these spread offenses nowadays with corners that get beat even if you have the best DL in the nation. You have to have shutdown guys and your DT’s can be just serviceable.
Food for thought.
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If true, this bodes well for us based on how we’ve been recruiting and Collin’s rep getting DBs to the league.
 
forensicbuzz

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RamblinRed said:
I think it is a combination of rule changes that favor the offense and this season having no spring training for some schools, and limited practicing in the summer and fall. I expected a fairly ragged season nationally in terms of performance and that is what we have seen.

If I had to pick 2 teams right now to make it to the NC game it would probably be Clemson and UGA (though we haven't seen any B10 teams yet so maybe a tOSU could get in the conversation) as they both seem to have legit defenses when few else do. I'd give Clemson an edge as their offense looks better than UGA's.
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Any team playing less than 10 games should have no chance to play for the championship. The B1G screwed themselves. Too bad. You don't play a full schedule, you don't get a chance at the end. PERIOD!
 

RamblinRed

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forensicbuzz said:
Any team playing less than 10 games should have no chance to play for the championship. The B1G screwed themselves. Too bad. You don't play a full schedule, you don't get a chance at the end. PERIOD!
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That was never going to be the case this year and was talked about back in the summer. It was always assumed that different teams would play different number of games due to the pandemic and the goal of the CFP is going to be to pick the best 4 teams regardless of how many games they played.

A team may miss 2-3 games due to having COVID.
 
forensicbuzz

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RamblinRed said:
That was never going to be the case this year and was talked about back in the summer. It was always assumed that different teams would play different number of games due to the pandemic and the goal of the CFP is going to be to pick the best 4 teams regardless of how many games they played.

A team may miss 2-3 games due to having COVID.
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Best 4 teams? How is that decided? There's no inter-conference games. If Pac-12 doesn't play, best team from each conference? Otherwise that's a joke. A 10-1 ACC team gets left out while an 8-0 B1G team gets in? Yeah, right. That's crap. Sorry, if it's not won on the field, it isn't real. B1G decided they weren't going to play, then they realized everyone else wasn't following their lead. Now they're coming back and playing their 1st game while everyone else is on their 5th or 6th game? Crap!

If a team loses games due to CoViD, fine. But B1G blew their opportunity to represent when they decided they weren't going to play.
 
ibeattetris

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forensicbuzz said:
Best 4 teams? How is that decided? There's no inter-conference games. If Pac-12 doesn't play, best team from each conference? Otherwise that's a joke. A 10-1 ACC team gets left out while an 8-0 B1G team gets in? Yeah, right. That's crap. Sorry, if it's not won on the field, it isn't real. B1G decided they weren't going to play, then they realized everyone else wasn't following their lead. Now they're coming back and playing their 1st game while everyone else is on their 5th or 6th game? Crap!

If a team loses games due to CoViD, fine. But B1G blew their opportunity to represent when they decided they weren't going to play.
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if an 8-0 b1g team makes it and then wins both playoff games, it's hard to realistically argue against the results. until there are more spots, there will always be deserving teams left out.
 
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