Are coaches Saban and Smart outsmarting themselves on defense?

MOAN · Jan 3, 2015

Haven't read all the comments since last night, been in mourning as most Bama fans have, but I have been thinking, recalling the past several years and comparing those Bama teams to this one. Did this team underachieve or just a product of coach Saban and coach Smart outwitting themselves? That question has been dogging me ever since the final seconds clicked off last night.

Don't get me wrong! Winning the SEC championship is not underachieving ever!!!

But I am sorry I am just not used to Bama's defense giving up those kind of points in a game. 42 against Ohio State, 44 against Auburn, 45 against Oklahoma in last years Sugar bowl just to name three! Something is wrong here folks and I am having a hard time pin pointing what that is.

In '09 when Bama went undefeated and won the SEC and BCS national championships the most points that defense allowed was 24 points in the first game of the season against Virginia Tech. In '11 the most points that team gave up all year was 21 to Georgia Southern. Yes Bama lost to LSU but only gave up 9 points including overtime! In '12 the most points Bama gave up was 29 in a loss to Texas A&M! Bama won the BCS national championship in each of those three seasons.

How about '10 when Auburn wins the BCS and Bama has a down year losing three games? The most points Bama gave up that year was 35 to South Carolina and only 28 to Auburn and Gus Mahlzon's offense. '08 the most points allowed was 31 twice at the end of the year in losses to Florida and Utah. In '07 Bama gave up 41 in a loss to LSU, the eventual BCS champions and 38 to Arkansas but that was a 7-6 team, coach Saban's first and worst year at Bama.

Did coach Saban and coaches forget how to recruit defensive players or how to coach defense? I don't think so but what I do think maybe is that they have seen all this HUNH offense and all these video game scores being put up by those teams and have been charmed by them the past few years into thinking they got to reinvent the wheel so to speak when it comes to college football.

Now this is not all about Bama's defense, the offense has changed too and not for the better in my mind. Check out the defensive stats for any HUNH high scoring offensive team and see how they compare to Bama's most dominating defensive teams the past 6 or 7 years. They don't come close!

To me when it comes to college football I am old school I reckon, running game, defense and kicking game wins championships. That defense against Ohio State was not winning defense without a doubt and I am sure more than one on here besides myself was screaming, "run the ball" when we had the ball!!! We had the kicking game down though!!! Man!!!

It seems to me that what Auburn, Gus Mahlzon and Cam Newton, Texas A&M, Kevin Sumlin and Johnny Manziel did was effectively get into coach Saban and coach Smart heads, causing them to go away from the perfect design of the wheel so to speak!!! Power football, heavy on the run on offense and stopping the run on defense!! A power running offense with a strong offensive line along with a physical defense has been the recipe for championships for as long as I can remember! Why change now?

I know I am probably so far off base that most of you will still be laughing at this post on into A-Day and beyond lol!! Who the heck am I to question championship coaches?

I just do not like shootouts in college football, never have. A great running pound'n'ground offensive attack run to perfection is a thing of beauty to me. Yeah i love seeing a play action pass or two going deep for 6 mixed in, but this dink and dunk sideline to sideline passing attack does nothing for me. At least as many times than not if you get intercepted on a long ball it turns out to be more like a punt instead of a pick 6.

Scoring quickly on offense as we all know puts the defense back on the field quicker and allows the opposing offenses who thrive on the type of offense popular today to score more often just for the simple fact they get more opportunities. Reminds me of the time back in the '90's when my young son was into those Madden football video games and was scoring over a hundred points against the computer. He kept challenging me to play him knowing I didn't care for video games. I told my cousin about it at work as he liked playing them too and he told me two simple words, "Tic Tock", in other words let the clock run down to 1 or 2 seconds before I hiked the ball and run the ball every down, even if I only gained a few yards. He beat me in overtime 27-21 because he would not tell me how to call a time out on my controller as I was running the clock out to kick a winning field goal lol! Of course it being Madden football and pro rules he got the ball first in overtime and scored.

It just seems to me in an attempt to keep up with the Jones' we are playing into their hands/game which they are better at doing at the moment. I am sure coach Saban and Smart are 100 times smarter than I am when it comes to football. But as a fan for over 4 decades I am not enjoying what I am seeing these days and that by no means says I want a new coach or think our coaches are washed up lol!! I am sure they will perfect this video game like football in time better than anyone does it today!!! Just don't like it!

Sorry for the long post but I figured I would get all my thoughts in one post so ya'll won't have to wade through my ignorance everywhere! I will always be a Bama fan but I just hate college football at least what it is becoming now. I hate the playoff and know it is only going to get worse! But as always ROLL TIDE ROLL!!!

Loam · Jan 3, 2015

Re: Is coach Saban and Smart outsmarting themselves on defense?

I think part of the problem on defense, and I don't mean to simplify it, but I think our defense is slower than its been in the past. I think part of the problem is our Linebackers. Trey DePriest is a hell of a down hill run stuffer, but he lacks that elite sideline to sideline speed that the Mosley's of the world had for us in the past. This also hurt us in pass defense too. I remember a time when our LB's would gobble up pick sixes at times (RE: Mosley etc) - DePriest gets exposed in pass defense too. We need a LB or two with elite speed to roam our middle.

We need more CJ Mosley's.

Getting faster at LB would cure a lot of what ails our defense. We need to stop recruiting these huge 250-260 pound LB's and go back to those 220-230 pound LB's that can run offenders down and defend the pass. You rarely see College teams use those huge down hill thumper LB's anymore. In fact, what I am seeing, is College defenses going to LB's that resemble Safeties.

Our DL will always be huge and elite here. So us sacrificing beef for speed at LB wont hurt us.

bamanut_aj · Jan 3, 2015

Not our season. It happens

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Con · Jan 3, 2015

When you talk about reducing the size of our defenders we will get gashed by the Arkansas' of football. We play a variety of teams and to be successful ALL of our recruits have to pan out it seems.

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AgentAntiOrange · Jan 3, 2015

I don't know that they're outsmarting themselves.....that would imply they were making foolish mistakes by trying to be deceptive/unpredictable when simplicity would work just fine. I don't think it's that. Part of it, IMHO, is offense. In getting away from a power run game we have a lot more 3 and outs and our defense stays on the field too much. Had we fed Henry all game like we did early, our defense rests, and their defense runs the rick of getting gassed. The other issue that I see is DB/LB play. We got better on the DLine but all of our DB's had issues playing the ball in the air and our LB's consistently left huge gaps between the hashes in the 10-25 yard range.

Also, please don't forget just how tough it is to win a NC and consistently beat other elite teams. We've been so lucky to have had the success that we've had that I think we've lost sight of this. tOSU is a very good football team. Auburn has had a very high octane offense the past couple of years so of course they're gonna score points on just about everybody, and Ole Miss-at the time we played them (on the road, mind you)- was as complete a football as there was in the country.

Mainly, though, I think we just need to keep in mind that football at the college level is cyclical. Your best teams are your JR/SR heavy teams and your weakest are your FR/SO heavy teams. We had a young team this year and they delivered an SEC title. Alabama football is fine. We're not going to win it all every year. We won't have a defense for the ages every year by default just because CNS is our coach. We're fine.

CrimsonEyeshade · Jan 3, 2015

Re: Is coach Saban and Smart outsmarting themselves on defense?

Loam said:
I think part of the problem on defense, and I don't mean to simplify it, but I think our defense is slower than its been in the past. I think part of the problem is our Linebackers. Trey DePriest is a hell of a down hill run stuffer, but he lacks that elite sideline to sideline speed that the Mosley's of the world had for us in the past. This also hurt us in pass defense too. I remember a time when our LB's would gobble up pick sixes at times (RE: Mosley etc) - DePriest gets exposed in pass defense too. We need a LB or two with elite speed to roam our middle.

We need more CJ Mosley's.

Getting faster at LB would cure a lot of what ails our defense. We need to stop recruiting these huge 250-260 pound LB's and go back to those 220-230 pound LB's that can run offenders down and defend the pass. You rarely see College teams use those huge down hill thumper LB's anymore. In fact, what I am seeing, is College defenses going to LB's that resemble Safeties.

Our DL will always be huge and elite here. So us sacrificing beef for speed at LB wont hurt us.

Good post. There's always been this notion that the bigger linebackers were necessary to stop the run. CJ proved that his speed could get him into passing lanes AND make it almost impossible for linemen to block him. Ohio State showed us some of the same thing with similarly sized linebackers.

The ability to drop in coverage and explode to the ball are not mutually exclusive. Finding some more CJs or Rolandos -- now there's the trick.

ALA2262 · Jan 3, 2015

There is a lot of food for thought in your question. I loved the 2008 squad. Never did think they were all that great, but, with Cody, played what amounted to a legal 12 man defense. Don't need to be cute nor great with that. Just knock 'em in the mouth and make 'em quit.

GreatDanish · Jan 3, 2015

In 2011, we had Mosley, Nico Johnson, Milliner, Hightower, Upshaw, Kirkpatrick, Menzie, and Barron. I just don't see that kind of talent on this team. It's like all of our major recruiting hits have been at WR, RB, and DL.

AlexanderFan · Jan 3, 2015

Read Jess article, the best recruiter in college football will have to take it up a notch? Legal changes in the schemes of Saban's defense week have to be made to combat the illegal allowances in the offense of college football. One legged man in a you know what contest.

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CrimSonami · Jan 3, 2015

No. Not for a minute. Recruiting the right "fast twitch" personnel has already been addressed by CNS and CKS. But even when you get the right personnel on campus and they can't grasp the system you're in the hole. Take Reuben Foster as example. Has the right physical attributes and skills but sees the field primarily on special teams then in mop up duty. Not kicking at him particularly but it's a very difficult defensive system to learn much less consistently execute. The defense ain't broke. To have accomplished a 12-2 season with a conference championship and a shot at #16 with this years team is nothing short of fantastic. We're good.

RTR!!!

92tide · Jan 3, 2015

GreatDanish said:
In 2011, we had Mosley, Nico Johnson, Milliner, Hightower, Upshaw, Kirkpatrick, Menzie, and Barron. I just don't see that kind of talent on this team. It's like all of our major recruiting hits have been at WR, RB, and DL.

someone did a post on this a while back, but iirc, we have had a few major "busts" in the d backfield (players not here anymore) in recent years.

92tide · Jan 3, 2015

CrimSonami said:
No. Not for a minute. Recruiting the right "fast twitch" personnel has already been addressed by CNS and CKS. But even when you get the right personnel on campus and they can't grasp the system you're in the hole. Take Reuben Foster as example. Has the right physical attributes and skills but sees the field primarily on special teams then in mop up duty. Not kicking at him particularly but it's a very difficult defensive system to learn much less consistently execute. The defense ain't broke. To have accomplished a 12-2 season with a conference championship and a shot at #16 with this years team is nothing short of fantastic. We're good.

RTR!!!

i think re. foster's issue is tackling technique, he won't stop leading with his head

JTBama · Jan 3, 2015

It will be interesting to see how long the fast paced offenses stay around...could be a phase but how defenses defend it will certainly play a role . I don't think it's going away anytime soon. However I look to Georgia tech and see an old fashion option offense with some occasional wrinkles and it takes an extremely disciplined defense to defend it and even then it takes a toll on your defense. The ever changing chess match between defense and offense is and will be certainly entertaining to watch. The offenses have a leg up right now but I think as history has shown, the defenses will catch up. At this point it's just a matter of adapt and overcome which I certainly think ours will.

PA Tide Fan · Jan 3, 2015

I agree that there are major issues that need to be addressed on defense. As far as the offense goes we may see a more run oriented style next season because of personnel. I can't really fault the staff for passing a lot this season. With a guy like Coop they would be wasting his talent to try to pound the ball on first and second down and hope he gets open on third down. Also running a lot would have put a lot more pressure on Blake in the more obvious passing situations where pinpoint passes are required. He was not nearly as accurate as AJ was so I think first down was probably the best time for Blake to throw.

IBUY · Jan 3, 2015

CrimSonami said:
No. Not for a minute. Recruiting the right "fast twitch" personnel has already been addressed by CNS and CKS. But even when you get the right personnel on campus and they can't grasp the system you're in the hole. Take Reuben Foster as example. Has the right physical attributes and skills but sees the field primarily on special teams then in mop up duty. Not kicking at him particularly but it's a very difficult defensive system to learn much less consistently execute. The defense ain't broke. To have accomplished a 12-2 season with a conference championship and a shot at #16 with this years team is nothing short of fantastic. We're good.

RTR!!!

^^^This. Rueben was running down 5* athletes in the back field in his HS days. One of the most amazing linebackers I had ever seen play. Just seems he can't grasp the D at Bama, yet....I hope he can get it together and get on the field more in his time left. He is a force that hits like a bull and runs like a deer....

Bamaro · Jan 3, 2015

MOAN said:
But I am sorry I am just not used to Bama's defense giving up those kind of points in a game. 42 against Ohio State, 44 against Auburn, 45 against Oklahoma in last years Sugar bowl just to name three! Something is wrong here folks and I am having a hard time pin pointing what that is.

Also yardage:
OSU 537 yds
Aub 630
MSST 428

gamersfuel · Jan 3, 2015

as far as the offense goes i think it comes down to having great players and getting them the ball. you get a guy like Cooper you have/want to get him the ball as much as possible. Even if it means getting cute from time to time. on defense it's another story. i've been thinking it for the past 2 years but i think we need some new blood on that side. Coach has been coaching for years. He has a philosophy that has worked way more times than not. Which means, it's not as easy as you think when you want him to try something different. Our scheme is going to be our scheme unless we bring in someone else with new ideas. we may change the type of player for the scheme but what we have on defense as far as scheme goes is what we will continue to have.

GreatDanish · Jan 3, 2015

92tide said:
someone did a post on this a while back, but iirc, we have had a few major "busts" in the d backfield (players not here anymore) in recent years.

2011 - We signed 4. Two went pro early (Sunseri and Clinton-Dix). Another one changed positions (Christion Jones). Jabriel Washington has stuck around and played some. Only Clinton-Dix was a top 100 recruit. So, in 2014, we were down to 1 out of the 4 from this class, but none of the 3 "defections" were due to poor evaluation or being "busts."

2012 - We signed 6. Two were JUCOs and wouldn't be on the team anyway (Belue and Travell Dixon, who transferred anyway). One played WR for a full season before moving to CB (Cyrus Jones). Another was a bust because he was stupid (Eddie Williams). Landon Collins was a big hit, and Geno Smith has played. Basically, all of these guys were top 100 recruits. In 2014, we were down to three of these six. Of the three that departed, only one was a "bust" and that was behavior instead of performance.

2013 - We signed four. Eddie Jackson appears to be a hit, especially for a player who wasn't really super-highly regarded as a recruit. Maurice Smith was the highest rated recruit, and our only top 100 recruit of the bunch. Anthony Averett and Jonathan Cook haven't played much at all. So, all four of these guys were on the team. None were really blue chip recruits.

2014 - We signed three - all highly regarded. It's too soon to see if Brown, Humphrey, or Jones will become elite players.

I don't really see a lot of busts as much as I just don't see anyone that exceeded expectations except maybe Eddie Jackson. It's like we have a bunch of good recruits who have become good. But no one that became great from those four classes except for Collins and Clinton-Dix.

Just in the 2008 - 2010 classes we had Mark Barron, Robert Lester, Dre Kirkpatrick, Dee Milliner, and Dequan Menzie. Those were 5 All-American caliber defensive backs.

In the 2011 - 2013 classes, our only All-American caliber DBs that we signed were Landon Collins and Ha-Ha Clinton-Dix. Honestly, no one else is even close.

Hopefully Tony Brown and Marlon Humphrey will begin the new era of All-American corners.

Moro Creek · Jan 3, 2015

I just think the D is too complicated. Free 'em up and turn 'em loose.

hotwillz33 · Jan 3, 2015

Re: Is coach Saban and Smart outsmarting themselves on defense?

If you look at the roster, I believe we are looking at the last of the hybrid DE/LB with Depriest leaving.

Are coaches Saban and Smart outsmarting themselves on defense?

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