Question: Did LSU expose Bama weaknesses or just surprised with how well Mettenburger played?

Stonewall1959

2nd Team
Oct 5, 2005
315
3
0
64
Macon, Georgia
If allowing 14 points on the road to one of the best programs in the country is "exposed", I'll take it.
Agree. How different would that game have been, though, had Bama not fumbled going into the end zone? Bama would have been up 21-3 and playing in a quiet Death Valley.
 

CapstoneTider

Suspended
Dec 6, 2000
7,453
6
0
I believe the two weapons everyone wrote about were both banged up. Any golfer knows that an ailing back can hurt your accuracy, and I think that was the case. The play calling also gave me the impression that they were taking it easy on AJ.
 

EscaTider

Hall of Fame
Oct 2, 2008
6,501
0
55
Flomaton, AL
One thing we should never forget, but we often do is that Bama ALWAYS gets the other teams best shot. Our schedule is full of 12 teams year in and year out whose season is made by beating Bama. Last night was no exception. LSU put everything they had into this game- everything. Onsides kick, fake field goal, and you could tell they spent the last two weeks working on getting the ball out in a hurry. No doubt they worked on their timing with those quick throws.

When you get a team that can match you athlete for athlete that also has the extra motivation (not to mention the extra week and the night game in Death Valley), and yet you're still able to walk out of there with a win, I think it speaks volumes about the heart and character of your team.
 

AlexanderFan

Hall of Fame
Jul 23, 2004
11,076
7,524
187
Birmingham
Anyone who saw the catches made over Belue would understand that it was the perfect game by LSU. Inches were all that seperated completions from incompletions, literally. Missed tackles, a botched handoff, and a muffed punt are more than enough to turn a victory into defeat. We just made one more play than they did.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2
 
I think the only "exposed" part is something that was actually exposed with Western Kentucky. The soft part of our defense is across the middle. Quick slants kill us IF the QB is accurate enough to place perfect passes. My hat goes off to Mettenburger. The corner route he threw for the last touchdown and the sideline pattern to Beckham in the 4th qtr were absolute perfect throws. I was amazed that when we pressured, we could not get to him most of the time. If you send 6 or 7 guys, somebody is gonna be open if you don't get there. LSU's offensive line outplayed my expectations. I expected this to be a good game, but I didn't expect them to be able to punch us in the mouth as often as they did. This was a game for the ages. I'm glad we won, but if LSU would have won, I would definately say that they deserved it. But you can't underestimate the heart of a champion.
 

cuda.1973

Hall of Fame
Dec 6, 2009
8,506
607
137
Allen, Texas
I believe the two weapons everyone wrote about were both banged up. Any golfer knows that an ailing back can hurt your accuracy, and I think that was the case. The play calling also gave me the impression that they were taking it easy on AJ.

That was my impression. AJ was off just enough, to not make completions. Didn't see anything LSWho was doing that would cause that. I just hope he rests this week, and we run the ball 80% of the time, against aTm.
 
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jps1983

Hall of Fame
Aug 30, 2006
7,459
0
0
Read somewhere on ESPN that "privately" we were concerned about our secondary. That might be a bit exaggerated, but this isn't last year's secondary, so in comparison, we might have been concerned.

The best way to counter that is to not go 1 for 9, on 3rd down conversions. And making the defense stay on the field for almost 40 minutes. (Translation: aTm, can you stop the run?)
That's been on tidefans from the mods for a while. Losing 3 draft picks can do that. We really are struggling to find a safety to complement Lester; we're also struggling to find a 3rd corner that is consistent. Ha-Ha, Vinnie, and Perry are good in certain areas, but also have some struggles in others and aren't as rounded as we're used to at safety (we've gotten spoiled with safeties that can blitz and cover a WR). Losing Jarrick has really hurt our depth. A&M will challenge our secondary on Saturday.
 

DocCrimson

All-SEC
Jan 3, 2010
1,731
128
82
East TN
We only gave up 14 points, but for most of the game, we were outplayed. We were "exposed" a little by Mettenberger. They had the right game plan: short, quick throws to take what we give up. The 50% 3rd down success was due in part to consistent gains of 3-4 yards on 1st and 2nd down, and in part due to Mettenberger being in a great rhythm from the easy early throws. Our tackling was off, our pressure was poor, and we still were close late despite playing our worst 58 minutes of the year. We're not the juggernaut we were made out to be, but we'll come back stronger for this game. While I am thrilled with the final result, I was a bit concerned with how it felt like almost every 3-and-out started with a pass play and our sustained drives seemed to be from consistent run plays on 1st down. If someone has numbers that show it differently, I'll gladly concede the point, but it sure seemed like we tried to hard to call passes on 1st and 10, putting ourselves into a hole early in drives, hurting the field-position battle.
 

CapstoneTider

Suspended
Dec 6, 2000
7,453
6
0
It was obvious that LSU was picking on a DB, who came through with a huge tackle at the end. Very few quarterback are capable of trying to exploit us in any way, and they will also have to be playing at their peak.
 

rgw

Suspended
Sep 15, 2003
20,852
1,351
232
Tuscaloosa
LSU had an excellent gameplan for us. It was apparent that they spent a lot time - well before the bye week - planning for our defense. The biggest problem was that their interior OL was winning their share of battles and keeping them on schedule offensively. They're really the first team in a long time that has at least had a "draw" on the battle up front. The second problem they presented is that their simplicity offensively actually made it difficult for us to affect the passer without creating liabilities on the backend. Yes, they called plenty of 2-man and 3-man patterns which should be easy to cover but the max protection made it impossible to force a pass without leaving the backend in a lot of one-on-one situations. Their level of preparedness showed in they often had the exact routes called to find the soft spots in any blitz package we executed.

They knew all our blitzes seemingly. By playing a lot of 22 personnel (2 back, 2 tight) and max protection, they limited what we could execute which certainly helped their seemingly "being in our headsets" like playcalling. I told people that Mettenburger was closer to being the QB they need than many gave credit. They gave him a lot of simple reads, the coaches kept him safe but effective playcalls, and he was mostly given the protection needed to play pitch and catch with those short stick routes and button hitches on the outside.

This was probably the finest offensive gameplan I've seen against us since the 2009 UT game - which we also won - in terms of seemingly being in Saban/Smart's heads. Other teams have been more explosive but none of them were as well prepared for blitz packages and flat out consistently finding the soft spot as last night.
 

37bamagreats55

All-American
Apr 1, 2003
2,324
46
67
46
Gardendale, AL
Mettenberger played the game of his life.

With this play, in addition to the LSU's running attack, it gave them a balance that is almost impossible to defend effectively.
It's much like our offense - when it's clicking -- it's pick your poison and teams don't stand a chance.

Our bread and butter is making teams one dimensional. If we can do this, we ratchet up the pressure and can be dominating. However, LSU's play and balance last night gave us fits and we could never get off the field.
 

CapstoneTider

Suspended
Dec 6, 2000
7,453
6
0
LSU had an excellent gameplan for us. It was apparent that they spent a lot time - well before the bye week - planning for our defense.
Good points. Early in the game I think a lot of it came down to their quick play calling after player substitutions and us not being able to get the correct personnel in the game. Coach Saban complained about late substitutions and it seemed to slow down after that.
 
Exposed? Eeeeeh, hard to say. We had tackles for loss we didn't come up with. We played uncharacteristically all night, especially while up 14-3. Sure we can clean some things up. But the way LSU played, well, you've gotta take your hat off to that. Metty got hot at the right time. But we handled it thankfully! I believe we just had a bad game but stood up at the right time.
 

CoastGhost

Suspended
Sep 5, 2009
5,650
80
67
North Carolina
I give LSU a lot of credit. I'm not trying to make any excuses here...but don't you think Mettenburger's performance came out of no where?

So my question is: Did LSU expose some weaknesses or was Mettenburger's performance so unexpected that we didn't expect him to be able to do what he did?
I have to think the Hat has been sandbagging with Mettenberger this season. I don't see how the kid goes from poop to burgers overnight. I would like to compare LSU's play calling up to last night with that of last night and see if they were holding that close to their vest to open up the can on us.
 

TheRealPokeChop

Hall of Fame
Jul 7, 2010
5,970
3,149
187
Hueytown, Al
he had a ridiculously good game a lot of it was him making really good throws that we couldn't do much about. The TD over belue was perfectly thrown and a perfect catch. He had a very similar game to what AJ had in New Orleans last year or Tebow against us in 08. Nothing we could do about those. Most of the throws he has missed all year long or his WR's have dropped they made them last night.


What really hurt us was the combo of Copeland and Hill, Copeland killed Jesse or any linebacker that found the running lane last night and gave Hill an easy 5 yards every time out of the I formation, it doesnt hurt that Copeland is HUGE and an NFL FB. We won't see another Oline or FB that good the rest of the year, or even a similar offense.

Also cant discount that LSU has been working towards this game all year, reportedly at the expense of a few of their other opponents, Maybe explaining the AU game.

Also despite 400 yards of offense, they only scored 17. D did a better job than the stats show.

Also we won, they lost, they can go cry themselves to sleep at Krystals.
 

CapstoneTider

Suspended
Dec 6, 2000
7,453
6
0
One aspect that I believe the press missed this week was how bad LSU wanted to win this game. Cecil Hurt didn't change his mind over to Bama squeaking by until Friday and I know he thought he were much better on paper. In any close game there is going to be areas where the other team played well, but considering nothing was glaring, LSU's motivation trumps everything. Nothing redeeming to others teams came out of this game besides Bama winning the most difficult game of the year.
 

davefrat

Hall of Fame
Jun 4, 2002
5,166
3,878
282
Hopewell, VA
i think some weaknesses were exposed. or at least some things that we need to get better at. In particular (and most dont agree with me and i've been saying it since about the 2nd or 3rd game) is our run defense up the middle. it needs to get stronger if we are to win it all again.
i agree. it seems the best way to attack our defense is to run right into it. but there aren't many teams capable of doing that consistently.
 

Tidetwin

All-American
May 15, 2006
2,020
290
107
Northeast Georgia
If we execute a couple of relatively simple pass plays on 3rd down on our first two drives of the 2nd Half, maybe, just maybe we would have taken control of the game thus saving us all the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

And who would have thought that Mettenberger would have outplayed AJ for most of the second whenquarterback was unanimously considered the position of greatest advantage.

What a victory for us and such a terrible loss for a pretty valiant LSU team.
 
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davefrat

Hall of Fame
Jun 4, 2002
5,166
3,878
282
Hopewell, VA
my wife kept complaining that saban was not is usual self on the sidelines either. she was concerned that he was not screaming and yelling at everyone and tearing his hair out like he normally does. we were giving off an odd vibe last night, but we were still able to get out of the funk in time to win.
 

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