Yeah, thanks, but I disagree with the criticism of the LB and DL play. You seem to be really down on these groups this year. They played very well against an offense that they had never seen before, and that Ole Miss had not shown them in previous weeks film. These kids were in HS last year. I consider their play to have been exceptional given the circumstances. You will not play a team that will throw that kind of garbage at them again this year, but they learned from the struggle. They are getting better, and playing faster, every week.
Well, you can disagree with it all you like, but respectfully, what are you looking at?
How many times did Harris have coverage responsibility for the outside receiver and not know it until one of the corners all but grabbed him by the belt and walked him over to his position? That's what got him pulled against South Carolina earlier in the year, and he was doing it again Saturday. Kaho knows where to be, so I'm assuming Golding is teaching the entire unit at once, but Harris -- who played safety in high school on top of it all -- doesn't seem to be able to pick this up. Then there were bad angles from the SLBs (mostly Allen; Lewis played well overall but they're managing his snaps closely). Corners and/or the responsible safety vacating the backside of the play because they're peaking in. This is the kind of thing young teams do ... in
spring ball. When they have coaches the caliber of what Alabama has, usually they're out of this phase by this point in the season, especially when some of the busts were coming from upperclassmen. Lee overcommitted inside a few times but I have less of a problem with that, especially given we couldn't pull him for the much quicker Markail Benton (has missed two straight games with an undisclosed injury; he was in warmup pants this Saturday and last) like we did a couple of times vs. USC.
The DL is a different story. It's less about performance and more about green-ness. Dale started the game at about 75 percent and got gassed pretty quickly. That put Mathis in the middle but he was pulling double-duty in Ray's position (talk about a guy we miss). Young would have to play when this happened, and he's not ready yet. Davis had to play more than he wanted to and I'm sure he slept in Sunday morning. I mentioned I liked what I saw out of Musika (after the first 2-3 snaps he was in). He probably knows where to be better than most, and he's only been here a year (JUCO). He doesn't look like he fits in with this team/scheme (too short) but I bet he gets more opportunities, especially if Dale gets dinged up again. Eboigbe has shocked me by the opposite --
not having an impact. We needed two of the freshmen to be real difference-makers and so far it's just been one (Dale). After the spring I would have bet hard cash on Eboigbe but that hasn't happened.
Regardless, let's talk Ole Miss for a second. Comparing scores is dangerous, but we're talking 10 points against Memphis, 31 against a terrible Arkansas defense, 20 against Can and just 40 against a SeLa team they should have hung 60 on. You could say "well, they changed QBs" and while true, Corral at least gives them a passing threat. There's a reason most of Plumlee's offers were as a safety. He cannot make even all of the most basic throws with regularity and has below-average arm strength on all routes. Ole Miss basically ran a single-wing and veer playbook at Alabama and got to 24 (last TD came against the 3s). Take Plumlee out of there and put Mond in and what happens next? I would say we'll find out in two weeks but I don't think Jimbo can stand to run that sugar offense -- thankfully.
I mean, we could just say "all is well" right now as long as the team is winning, but I've watched folks do that each of the last several years only to get tripped up eventually (by AU twice, by OSU, by Ole Miss a couple of times, etc.) and then folks get mad because they forget there was evidence already out there. The real problem is that, to an extent, it's endemic to the way Saban designs his defense (especially ILB issues in coverage of a TE).
The one thing I give absolutely zero credence to is "we're Bama, we get everyone's best shot." When you see the same stuff year after year from those same programs and you still let it happen, that means they've got you figured out a little. And I will remind everyone that what we saw from Clemson last year was very similar to how Arkansas ran up a bunch of supposedly meaningless points early in the year, and then Swinney's former OC gave him the roadmap when Bama got to a game that actually mattered.