Missed Tackles

[slugboy]

All 11 players on defense have to be able to tackle, and safeties have to be especially good at it.

All things being equal, the more tackles made by your front 6 (or 7), the better.

 

[Heisman's Ghost]

Just watch the replay. You can clearly see the missed OPEN FIELD ONE ON ONE tackles. Trying to statistically account for all missed tackles, including more than one tacker is futile.

I did not keep up with the number but after watching the game twice, I came away with the conviction that our defense in general and our secondary in particular needs a lot of improvement in tackling fundamentals. I do not believe that there were only 14 missed tackles.

 

[AugustaSwarm]

Tomorrow's game will show us a lot. We'll see if the tackling gets addressed or not. It will be impossible to know if it was "fixed" by the coaches or if the game 1 disaster was an outlier. Either way, we'll know tomorrow if the D can tackle or not.

 

[GTNavyNuke]

..... In any case, I don't think we can put too much stock in it one way or another. We tackled poorly against UL to say the least. If we tackle to that level throughout the year then it will be a big issue no matter how you want to parse it. If it is limited to those three players but it's having as big as an impact as it did against UL, then you can't really write it off as being a limited issue. But, overall, it was one game, and it's possible that it was an outlier. We very well could be a better tackling team than we showed against UL, and it's also possible that we have weaknesses defensively that UL wasn't able to exploit.

If we had tackled half of the missed one on ones, I think we would have won.

At some point you have to play guys that will tackle with physicality. There is a tradeoff for pass coverage and speed but DB's are often tackling one on one in space. Have to do both. The really good ones do both.

Agree entirely. Replacing the DBs is more important than replacing the QB based on the one game sample.

Tomorrow's game will show us a lot. We'll see if the tackling gets addressed or not. It will be impossible to know if it was "fixed" by the coaches or if the game 1 disaster was an outlier. Either way, we'll know tomorrow if the D can tackle or not.

Agree tomorrow's game will show us how we tackle against less talented opposition.

I think we have good coaches and they have emphasized tackling skills throughout camp. So I'm not optimistic that the DBs will show that much improvement after a week of additional coaching. Replacing DBs with guys who can tackle is what I expect the coaches will do. But as @g0lftime said it's a balancing act.

 

[jacket_fan]

I would like to know if the defensive backs are actually coached to wrap up? Or to grab anything with their hands? It would seem with the new rules about targeting and hitting with your helmet, the idea of grabbing something would be preferable to just throwing at the feet. If someone knows what technique is taught today, I would very much like to know.

Us old guys were taught to see the numbers of the player, hit with your facemask, and grab something. Did not matter what, but you had something in your hand(s) when you tackled. Then the other 10 guys would eventually show up like Key said.

Replacing DBs with guys who can tackle is what I expect the coaches will do. But as @g0lftime said it's a balancing act.

Will be interesting to see if any changes happen. The second half had many missed tackles by the DBs.