Defensive Change is on the way

PBR549

Ramblin' Wreck
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837
You are missing the point. Its the depth of the cvg sets and the relationship between the secondary and second level. Its one thing to mix up free, cover 3, quarters. That is not what i am talking about. I am talking about the relationship between the levels of defense. Its very loose and too deep providing for big holes between the lb drops ans secondary. Its why we are poor on 3rd down imo.

But of course this is a second level observation when you look at the tape. Its not just simply calling a coverage. Its how you relate between the levels of a d. Mixing up a coverage doesnt improve this. The whole concept on db and s depth and relationship to the lb under covg needs to be changed. This is one of our biggest issues.

We also make very little attempt to disguise. We are very simple. You combine the two and you get our 3rd down results every year, and wide open slot TE. Pass rush is part of it too. But we can immediately improve the secondary scheme by simple adjustments
We got burned more playing cover 0 and bringing blitzes than read and react. Our problem is personnel not scheme.
 

33jacket

Helluva Engineer
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We got burned more playing cover 0 and bringing blitzes than read and react. Our problem is personnel not scheme.

Lol. Neither has to do with what i said. I digress. Actually. We didnt play cover 0 much. We played man free more. Secondly I dont recall ever being burned in cover 0. Since you do and you made this statement can you go back and find that for me? I cant recall when. I don't remember once a big play in cover 0. All the big plays were in zone do to poor third level and second level drop relationships. And specifically zone targeting the slot player.

4 years of roof results and people still want to complain about players. In 2014 we had 4 nfl players on that d. 5 if gamble goes. It was the worse d tech has in 20 years. The issues are far more than players dude. But u will never see that.

If scheme deficincies werent an issue, then why does paul talk about it? Why does paul say publicly we need to do different things? Why are there offseason rumors to tweak scheme? Again. Its more than players
 

PBR549

Ramblin' Wreck
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837
Just about all the long 3rd down throws came on man some man free and some cover 0. The interference call on Austin was cover 0 against GA. We tried every type of coverage configuration, stunt and blitz throughout the season. Roof got as much out of our personnel as he could get. It's not scheme, and philosophy changes to fit your people. We had no one who could consistently beat a one on one matchup on the D line or blitzing lbers. No matter if we brought 4, 5, 6 or 7. There's not a scheme to fix that. Recruiting fixes that.
 

1979jacket

Ramblin' Wreck
Messages
652
I can see this but Groh's 3 mam line was a disaster. You have to stop the run at some point and the 3-4 seems to have trouble.
 

Jerry the Jacket

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Yeah I watched the Clemson VT game last night. VT was super aggressive with blitzes most of the night and yet they still gave up 42 points. Clemson was not much better giving up 35 points playing mostly read and react with very little blitz. I think our defense plays as good as either of these two teams. The facts are, other than Alabama, no body plays great defense. Every game played yesterday teams were scoring in the 30's and 40's. That is just modern day college football. You can argue scheme and personnel until the cows come home but the facts are modern day D1 college football is all about the offense.

Go Jackets!
 

slugboy

Moderator
Staff member
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11,725
I can see this but Groh's 3 mam line was a disaster. You have to stop the run at some point and the 3-4 seems to have trouble.

A 3-4 doesn't have to be weak vs the run or have huge linemen, though that's usually the case. Air Force has had a lot of success with it-- http://www.afcaweekly.com/2015/08/one-gap-3-4-defense-keeps-offenses-on-their-heels/
Groh had some success early on. Partially, he got inflexible and wouldn't believe people were reading tells and stealing signs. When I look at VT, Foster has a scheme, but he's tweaking it all the time. You don't know what Foster is going to bring next week. It seemed like once people got the book on Groh, he was cooked.
FWIW, I'm not arguing for a 3-4--just saying it doesn't have to suck here. I remember us running a 50 D when Roof was a linebacker, and that high school defense worked OK


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smathis30

Ramblin' Wreck
Messages
732
3-4s work nicely because there is the assumption that one lineman is always blitzing, you just don't know which one(s), which can cause mental mistakes on the line. The con is less pressure up front allows guards/tackles that don't block a lineman to more easily get downfield. Should be interesting to see what we do. IMHO i don't think we have the personnel to pull off a 3-4 quite yet, but i would love to see it down the road
 

BigDaddyBuzz

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1,189
People chill out. We aren't moving our base D to a 3-4. What we are doing is being more diverse and going multiple with 3-4, 4-3, 4-2-5. Trying to take advantage of our personnel like playing Freeman and Anree at rush LB. I like it, it shows we are willing to change it up and be more aggressive. We still need to work on secondary playing tighter but some of that is on the players too.
 

bke1984

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3,605
He never said we were moving to a 3-4 guys. He said we are adding 3-4 and 3-3-5 packages to get our best players on the field. We will still probably see a lot of 4-3 and base Nickel.

But honestly, I'm not sold just yet. I mean in the 3-4 all you're really doing is lining up with the same seven guys but shifting Keeshun to LB. Maybe if we change our gap techniques it helps a bit though.

The 3-3-5 is probably better on passing downs though if we sent LBs after the QB. It might help us get more pressure.

Hell, if nothing else, trying something different is great
 

forensicbuzz

21st Century Throwback Dad
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The problem with Groh's 3-4 was he was asking the NG to play a 0-technique. We never had the guy/guys that could do that. If the NG is playing a 1-technique, then the 3-4 can be very successful with the DL we can recruit.
 

scrappy_95

Georgia Tech Fan
Messages
41
The problem with Groh's 3-4 was he was asking the NG to play a 0-technique. We never had the guy/guys that could do that. If the NG is playing a 1-technique, then the 3-4 can be very successful with the DL we can recruit.
Exactly, Groh's scheme was 2 gap responsiblity. 1-gap tech in a 3-4 is like playing a 4-3 with a guys standing up. Very different. Wade Phillips is a great example of this. Phillips has implemented his version of the 3-4 defense in Denver that simplifies the duties. This means the nose tackle and two defensive ends are responsible for the offensive lineman in front of them and one gap, not both sides of that lineman, allowing them to move up the field and attack the the offense instead of waiting for the play to unfold and reacting. His system is very different than Groh's. Groh's was about building a wall with the front 7. Saying all 3-4 are equal is like saying because you are in the shotgun on every snap means your are a passing team. We know that is not true. I would love to see a 3-4 1 gap as our base defense atleast a major sub package. Just my opinion.
 

D-man44

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I think as bad as we are we should try something crazy invintive such as a 1-5-5 a down d-lineman 5 linebackers 3 of which come but the dline wouldn't know where it's coming from I mean our d can't get any worse right?
 
Messages
1,403
Yeah I watched the Clemson VT game last night. VT was super aggressive with blitzes most of the night and yet they still gave up 42 points. Clemson was not much better giving up 35 points playing mostly read and react with very little blitz. I think our defense plays as good as either of these two teams. The facts are, other than Alabama, no body plays great defense. Every game played yesterday teams were scoring in the 30's and 40's. That is just modern day college football. You can argue scheme and personnel until the cows come home but the facts are modern day D1 college football is all about the offense.

Go Jackets!
Jerry I agree with you, but this board is almost split into two camps. Anti Roof and anti Johnson. There is no pleasing anyone. You would think we were ugag by some of the expectations that are being demanded.
 

33jacket

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Just about all the long 3rd down throws came on man some man free and some cover 0. The interference call on Austin was cover 0 against GA. We tried every type of coverage configuration, stunt and blitz throughout the season. Roof got as much out of our personnel as he could get. It's not scheme, and philosophy changes to fit your people. We had no one who could consistently beat a one on one matchup on the D line or blitzing lbers. No matter if we brought 4, 5, 6 or 7. There's not a scheme to fix that. Recruiting fixes that.

So far zero chunk plays in man. Lets see how the season tape plays out. All chunk plays up to now are zone with no blitz basically. So your narrative isnt true through the first two games. We have given up 20+ chunk plays in the first two games. Its actually amazing none are in man. I expect this to change. But it shows a real problem with our zones
 

danny daniel

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Yeah I watched the Clemson VT game last night. VT was super aggressive with blitzes most of the night and yet they still gave up 42 points. Clemson was not much better giving up 35 points playing mostly read and react with very little blitz. I think our defense plays as good as either of these two teams. The facts are, other than Alabama, no body plays great defense. Every game played yesterday teams were scoring in the 30's and 40's. That is just modern day college football. You can argue scheme and personnel until the cows come home but the facts are modern day D1 college football is all about the offense.

Go Jackets!

Some truth here. I went to 8 GT games this year, watched all the games on tape multiple times, and complained about all our D deficiencies constantly. My daughter broke her foot and was put on the couch watching all the big college games on TV. She continually pointed out to me that in spite of my complaints about our D, most other teams (even the good teams) had the same, or worse, problems with tackling, coverage, and pass rush and we were superior in not making bone headed penalties, displaying poor sportmanship, or looking like we aren't coached in basics. I still think we can play much better with our talent level but I must confess that our D is not as bad as most of us pontificate.
 

bke1984

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Yeah I watched the Clemson VT game last night. VT was super aggressive with blitzes most of the night and yet they still gave up 42 points. Clemson was not much better giving up 35 points playing mostly read and react with very little blitz. I think our defense plays as good as either of these two teams. The facts are, other than Alabama, no body plays great defense. Every game played yesterday teams were scoring in the 30's and 40's. That is just modern day college football. You can argue scheme and personnel until the cows come home but the facts are modern day D1 college football is all about the offense.

Go Jackets!

That's fine, but we still need to measure ourselves against the other teams currently playing D1 college football...and if you just look at that, we're not doing so well on the defensive side of the ball. Here are a few issues (https://www.teamrankings.com/college-football/stat/):

#49 in opponent points per game
#64 in opponent yards per game
#78 in opponent yards per play
#53 in opponent points per play
#54 in opponent offensive TD per game

I'll admit, these numbers aren't as bad as I thought they'd be, but they're not exactly good either. It doesn't matter if you slice it by play or game, we haven't been that good on defense compared to our peers. I know we're going to give up yards and points the way football is played today...I'd just like to see these numbers in the 30's rather than the 50's - 70's.

Now, the good news is that we played a TON of young guys this year. I think we can get better just by experience alone. If we bump these up into the 30's I think we have a chance to be really good the way our offense can score at times.
 

Yaller Jacket

Ramblin' Wreck
Messages
991
To danny and bke's point, I looked at the point totals given up and they don't look like a horrid defensive team. 48 to UNC and three in the 30s. One of those counts two scores against the offense. As PJ said early in the season, it looks goshawful but the points given up isn't all that bad.
 
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