The DC Debate

[Skeptic]

I'm not a scout and depend upon the kindness of strangers, so to speak. As a wayfaring football stranger, I would like to know the credentials of the fellow who wrote the critique and broke down the tape. And at the risk of offending those who may know more football than I give them credit for, somehow I have a hard time believing so many people on a football message board know more about talent and scheme than the experienced defensive coordinator who played linebacker at the highest college level. I get really ticked at our D, particularly when we spend six minutes scoring and they give a TD up in two minutes. But with some exceptions, ones on the board that I regard highly, I just don't think most of us know better than the DC. If that be the case, not only should he be fired, but Johnson should get the ax.

 

[ATL1]

Roof IS mediocre and has always been mediocre. Only 1 defense he's coached as been top 25 and that was a defense he inherited at Penn St. and even that was a drop off from the previous year. He's brought his brand of mediocre to GT. My hope is that the new Defensive Coordinator GT hired for it's OLine can give him some new ideas and focus. Who Know? What I do know is that whats going on right now is not working.

 

[dressedcheeseside]

111th in yards per play 2014. 91st in yards per play 2015. If our Jimmies and Joes are really scraping the bottom of FBS football, we have a bigger problem.

It all depends on what stats you (cherry)pick. I think DFEI is more relevant than ypp. DFEI is scoring value per possession adjusted for the strength of opponent offenses faced. We were #65 out of 128 in 2015 and #76 in 2014. Middle of the pack and slightly lower. Not where we need to be, but not "scraping the bottom of FBS football" by any means.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/feidef2014

 

[AE 87]

It all depends on what stats you (cherry)pick. I think DFEI is more relevant than ypp. DFEI is scoring value per possession adjusted for the strength of opponent offenses faced. We were #65 out of 128 in 2015 and #76 in 2014. Middle of the pack and slightly lower. Not where we need to be, but not "scraping the bottom of FBS football" by any means.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/feidef2014

I agree that this stat (besides my DPPD vs Pwr5) is the best for evaluating what we pay Def Coords for. Last year, BC was #5, and they don't recruit that much better than us.

That being said, it should be noted that even though this stat is supposed to account for opposition, here're the rankings for 2015 ACC Coastal D's, with 2014 rankings in parentheses.
43 vpi (3)
56 unc (122)
65 GT (76)
66 d'oh U (40)
68 Pitt (110)
84 uva (22)
97 Duke (69)

It was a weird year. I haven't calculated ppd stats for the end of last season yet. Fwiw, Auburn went 3-9 in the 4th year after hiring Ted as DC (albeit the year after he left).

 

[Ibeeballin]

For

I think as a whole we lack team speed on defense......which is a huge factor......but I think we are recruiting better to compensate for that.....and if you don't have team speed you need to play bend but don't break defense.....

Hasn't the combine/pro day debunk all of this about team speed?

Attaochu-4.5-4.6
Watts- 4.4
TJ 4.9 at 345lbs
LY - 4.4
DJ -4.4
IJ-4.4-4.5
Nealy-4.69
Chris Milton- probably will go 4.3-4.4
Golden- probably 4.5-4.6

Our scheme and lack of pressure has been our downfall not team speed

 

[dressedcheeseside]

Our scheme and lack of pressure has been our downfall not team speed

I'd like to think Ted would adjust our scheme based on personnel. Maybe he can't do what he wants because of it. Maybe he's not so good at scheming around lack of talent? And when I say talent, I mean average talent, not looking exclusively at 2 or 3 NFL'ers sprinkled in and among a bunch of guys that wouldn't start for any good team.

 

[bravejason]

I think the lack if pressure from the front 4 has been the root problem. Moreover, when we have blitzed it seems like we still had trouble getting to the QB. CPJ has said the issue is that we're not winning any one-on-one battles on the line. Meaning our DE and DT are not defeating the blocks of the OT and OG. To me that means it is a skill or talent issue on the DL. Gotsis was really good, but he was just one man and any OC worth his salt can scheme around one man.

I think the unexpected attrition on the DL was a big part of the issue. You have to watch your position numbers, but I wonder if overloading on the DL might be a good idea. Issue with that, of course, is you don't want to be caught short on personnel at a DB or LB and then on the fly during mid-season have to convert linemen to linebacker so a linebacker can convert to defensive back. And overloading itself is no good if the extra players aren't studs. If the extra players are just average, you won't accomplish anything since it is the loss of the really good players that hurt. I feel like those last couple of sentences were stating the blatantly obvious, but they sure sounded intelligent and insightful when I wrote them.

 

[Whiskey_Clear]

Lack of Dline personnel has been our biggest issue for at least the last 4-5 years. Some years we have failed to recruit a single DT. Add on top of that transfers out and disqualifiers....has made for a very shaky Dline. We just haven't been able to get 4 across that played at a high level, together, in any single year. No great D has been such with that kind of handicap. No DC I know of can field a great, or even good D, with that handicap.

 

[AE 87]

Lack of Dline personnel has been our biggest issue for at least the last 4-5 years. Some years we have failed to recruit a single DT. Add on top of that transfers out and disqualifiers....has made for a very shaky Dline. We just haven't been able to get 4 across that played at a high level, together, in any single year. No great D has been such with that kind of handicap. No DC I know of can field a great, or even good D, with that handicap.

We should have played more 3 DL sets, imo. We had guys that knew what they were doing at LB, like Dominique Noble, who didn't play much because of the move to the 4-2-5. If we had played 3 DL, we could've changed where we brought our LB in pass-rush based on how they lined up.

That being said, I think we should be able to field a competitive team this year. I don't think we'll be able to blame/question talent if we're below average in 2016.

 

[Ibeeballin]

I'd like to think Ted would adjust our scheme based on personnel. Maybe he can't do what he wants because of it. Maybe he's not so good at scheming around lack of talent? And when I say talent, I mean average talent, not looking exclusively at 2 or 3 NFL'ers sprinkled in and among a bunch of guys that wouldn't start for any good team.

The only reason I'm not buying that is bc the personnel from the latter half of 2014 & 2015 didn't change much but the approach did.

 

[dressedcheeseside]

We should have played more 3 DL sets, imo. We had guys that knew what they were doing at LB, like Dominique Noble, who didn't play much because of the move to the 4-2-5. If we had played 3 DL, we could've changed where we brought our LB in pass-rush based on how they lined up.

That being said, I think we should be able to field a competitive team this year. I don't think we'll be able to blame/question talent if we're below average in 2016.

We lose our best Dlineman, by far, off a bad Dline. On top of that, we lose our entire starting secondary. How that adds up to an expected good D is beyond me.

 

[Ibeeballin]

Because the cheese metric that you used for offense, those secondary guys are being replaced by experience players (Simmons, Step Durham, Lance Austin, & Corey Griffin)

And as we've seen over the past few years, one guy cannot overcome the 3 other subpar players. So we have to ask is the sum of the DL parts better this season? Remain to be seen

 

[GTHOSCHTON]

Speed..... to understand it you have to bring the 3rd number in................. someone running a 4.47 chasing some one who runs a 4.41 will lose..... but they both run a 4.4.........no scheme can change that, so you need to play the angles...... so could you give me those times from combine again with the third number.

 

[jacketup]

2 of the last 3 years Ted Roof's defense has had a better ranking than Paul Johnson's offense in terms of yards per game.

I'd like to meet Paul Johnson's publicist. There is no other coach in Power 5 who constantly gets a pass--and even lauded-- for turning in mediocre results.

Either his publicist is a genius, or the fans are the NCAA counterpart of the German citizenry in the 1930's.

 

[AE 87]

2 of the last 3 years Ted Roof's defense has had a better ranking than Paul Johnson's offense in terms of yards per game.

I'd like to meet Paul Johnson's publicist. There is no other coach in Power 5 who constantly gets a pass--and even lauded-- for turning in mediocre results.

Either his publicist is a genius, or the fans are the NCAA counterpart of the German citizenry in the 1930's.

LOL

 

[AE 87]

For those who don't follow, let me explain GT's Off quickens the game. Fewer passes mean fewer stopped clocks, and pass plays are quicker anyway.

As a result, we have and defend fewer possessions per game then most teams. This results, obviously, in a lower max yards per game than most teams.

So yards/game ranking is skewed against the O and for the D. The fact that our O was ranked higher than our D one year speaks volumes, but not in Roof's favor.

 

[Skeptic]

2 of the last 3 years Ted Roof's defense has had a better ranking than Paul Johnson's offense in terms of yards per game.

I'd like to meet Paul Johnson's publicist. There is no other coach in Power 5 who constantly gets a pass--and even lauded-- for turning in mediocre results.

Either his publicist is a genius, or the fans are the NCAA counterpart of the German citizenry in the 1930's.

Well. I never thought somebody would go so far with an analogy that is so inappropriate. Because if we are the German citizenry of the '30s, then Paul Johnson must be .... Frankly that is pretty sick.

 

[Ibeeballin]

2 of the last 3 years Ted Roof's defense has had a better ranking than Paul Johnson's offense in terms of yards per game.

I'd like to meet Paul Johnson's publicist. There is no other coach in Power 5 who constantly gets a pass--and even lauded-- for turning in mediocre results.

Either his publicist is a genius, or the fans are the NCAA counterpart of the German citizenry in the 1930's.

A Stretch Armstrong reach.

Only you would come in a DC debate to talk about CPJ

 

[ATL1]

I'm @Ibeeballin & @33jacket dude is mediocre BEST.

I hope the new OLine coach can bring some effective blitz packages to implement. If we can't get it with the front four turn up the blitzes.

When are gonna start looking a Pelton as well.

 

[ilovetheoption]

I'll agree that you guys should probably be scheming to your talent, and perhaps running a Rocky Long style 335 or something because you just don't have enough good DL's, and you've had plenty of good enough DB's.