This season has had moments of extremely heated debate, regarding the performance of the defense. The schism in views is based on two views:

1. GERG is a bad coach 

2. Our talent level is severely depleted

I decided to look at tackling technique of our defense, more specifically on the bad technique aspect of it. This particular point of emphasis is almost consistently attributed to coaching, as good technique usually only transfers to the game field when it is instilled upon repeated coaching and re-coaching in situations where poor technique is used. 

This season, time and again, we have the ball player wrapped up, and then 3 yards later they have picked up the 1st down on 3rd and forever. I thought it was about time to look at tackling, both who is making/missing them and why.

About the analysis:

1. I regarded made tackles as anytime a player made contact with the ballcarrier and that ballcarrier ended up down by contact using solid tackling technique. I did not look at technique of made tackles, as after 1/2 of tape review most of the tackles that were made were of good technique. Any tackle that forced the ball-carrier out of bounds was counted as a made tackle.

2. I designated missed tackles as failing to make a tackle in space, taking an extremely bad angle on a tackle that should have been made, or simply just getting the hit but not bringing down the ballcarrier.

4. Bad Form takes into account any missed tackle that used any of the following:

•        Head on the upfield side
•        Arm/Jersey tackling
•        Any hit at or above the numbers
•        Getting "shook" in open field due to not breaking down or overpursuit.

The difference here is missed tackles in my mind sometimes come from being literally overpowered or stiff-armed, not a technique avenue. If the UM defender made the hit with the head on the right side and attempted to wrap up but the ballcarrier just slipped through, I counted this as a missed tackle only. If, however, the same play happened with the UM defender coming in high and behind, this was counted as both a missed and bad form tackle.

To derive the "Tackling Efficiency" I used the following formulas as necessary (feel free to critique or ask me to add things, as I am not a math whiz)

•  Player Tackling Technique: (Made Tackles - Missed Tackles)/(Bad Form Missed Tackles+1)
• Team Tackling Technique: (Made tackles - (Missed Tackles+ TDs))/(Bad Form Missed Tackles)

Results:

Individual Players Tackling Efficiency:

	UConn	Notre Dame	MSU	IOWA	Season Ave
Roh	0.66	1	0.5	0.5	0.66
Banks	1	-1.5	-0.33	3.5	0.66
Sageese	2	0	-0.5	0	0.375
Martin	0.25	2	2.5	N	1.58
Van Bergen	2.5	-0.66	1	3	1.45
Demens	N	N	1	6	3.5
Mouton	6.5	0.5	2.25	0.13	2.35
Gordon #4	0.25	6	-0.1	0.33	1.62
Gordon #15	0	2.5	1.75	1.5	1.91
Rogers	0	2.5	-0.33	0	0.54
Kovacs	1.25	4	3.5	6	3.70
Ezeh	0.84	-0.5	0.5	-0.25	0.15
Floyd	3	0	2.33	0.63	1.49
Talbot	N	1	-0.17	1	0.61
Black	N	N	-0.5	-1	-0.75
Johnson	3.5	N	N	1	2.25
Patterson	N	N	N	-0.5	-0.5
Herron	0	1	N	N	0.5
Christian	N	1	N	N	1

* N denotes games where player did not participate or had no made or missed tackles

A few notes from the individual analysis:

• Kovacs is by far our best tackler, with Mouton, Johnson and surprisingly Gordon #15 as the 2,3,4 respectively. 
• Of the guys on this list, the biggest suprise was Martin, however I think it is important to remeber that this tackling eff. calculation puts weight on total tackles made, and Martin gets doubled. A lot. (in review of my stats, Martin only missed 3 tackles total, with 2 by bad form)
• In the two games Demens played, he was an absolute tackling machine.
• Ezeh really cannot tackle.

Team Tackling Technique:

	UConn	Notre Dame	MSU	Iowa	Season Ave.
UM	2.78	1.28	1.14	1.83	1.75
Opp.	3.21	2.17	7.4	5.7	4.62

We were much better at tackling UConn in space than anyone else, not suprisingly this was the team with the least athletic roster.Notes from the team portion:

• MSU was an absolutely terrible day, with almost a missed tackle per made tackle, and lots of bad form tackles all over
• We are consistently worse at tackling with good technique than all 4 of the opponents analyzed, two B10 "good" defenses and 2 middle of the pack to bad defenses
• On the season for these 4 games we are averaging about 2 missed tackles with 1 missed tackle by bad form every 3 tackles made

Conclusions:

These statistics correlate with what I have been seeing every week. Mouton is great at times and inconsistent at times, and Kovacs is a stud at bringing down the ball carrier. Ezeh was a sub-par MLB and Martin gets doubled. I have high hopes for Demens, Johnson and Gordon (both of them).

Surprises for me came with the discovery of Gordon (not Cam), that dude was all over the place when he was in/not getting blown off the ball by a OT. Secondly, I think Floyd has the potential (if he develops his man coverage) to be an absolute terror on the corner. He can and will tackle in space. 

As a team, I think the debate as to what this attributes to is still open for debate. Does this attribute to talent? Possibly. Is this more attributable to the coaching/GERG? Yes. However, with the limited bodies he has on his side of the ball, it might be due to the fact that live tackling is just not an option with this lineup. 
Regardless of the cause, the tackling is terrible, and is apparently getting worse through the season. This attributes in my mind to the coaching, specifically the D-Coordinator. 

I can only hope the tackling technique is going to get better, because as it stands through these 4 games it cannot get much worse. I will do my best to analyze Indiana, PSU and Illinois when I get some more time, to give a more all encompassing picture of our D (takes a significantly longer time because I have to watch the whole game).