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Date Title Body
About Stability

Just look at Texas right now.

Last year in Muschamp's 1st year they were ranked in the 80's in total defense although they were top 5 in sacks and top 25 in scoring defense. Now look at them (in year 2) and they are top 5 in everything. Stability means a lot for a coaching staff and for the players and a good defensive coordinator can work wonders.

I think next year we will be a lot more stable on defense. We lose Graham and maybe Warren, but we have a lot of guys coming back and another year in the system will only help.

* Yes, I know Texas has better recruits on defense. It's only an example.

It's Simple

ESPN owns Scout and ESPN always has an agenda, even in recruiting. Rivals reports what it sees and hears, but ESPN manipulates its rankings to make the season ending recruiting races more dramatic. It's the same as all the meaningless preseason rankings talk they shove down our throats for 3 months before a game has even been played.

No Doubt

No doubt RR is recruiting better athletes (or at least higher rated) at UM than he did at WVU, but the Big Ten is not the Big East. USF & Cincinnati do not pull in the same kind of talent that Ohio State & Penn State do. It's a double-edged sword. On one hand, he is getting more athletes than he's ever had before. On the other hand, he is facing tougher teams than he has in the past. It all comes back to coaching. That's the central thesis with recruiting. You have to develop talent and coach it up or it is useless.

Still haven't stopped it

This may have been mentioned earlier, but I can't be the only one who notices that opposing defenses have a tough time stopping the Denard led run game.

When we line up in the 1 back with Denard and either Brown or Minor and run the read, zone, & especially the QB power we move the ball. If he didn't have that recent stretch of fumbles then he would be getting major snaps right now.

Tate is obviously the better QB right now, but when Denard is in the game we move the ball on the ground. We know were running, the defense knows were running, even the commentators know were running and we still get 4-5 yds a pop.

We don't need to start him or do it all game, but get him in there and commit to the run game. I'm tired of seeing us throw the ball so much when this is obviously a running offense.

DB's

Floyd was an athlete as a recruit to my knowledge (Rivals), but I'm pretty sure he has practiced exclusively at CB since arriving on campus. He is only a (RS) Freshman though.

Best case scenario next year (IMO) would be . . .

CB 1: Warren
CB 2: Floyd/Turner
FS: Woolfolk
SS: Williams/Kovacs

1. Warren comes back

2. Floyd & Turner both have another year under their belt to develop. Cullen Christian pushes for playing time (fingers crossed).

3. Woolfolk moves back to FS or deep safety, which would be an infinite upgrade over Kovacs at deep safety.

4. Williams would stay in his current role as we seemingly have nobody else behind him unless we move Kovacs there.

5. If he doesn't move to SS then Kovacs gets moved to S/LB to compete for playing time since Brown graduates.

I agree

I agree with this analysis wholeheartedly. Good stuff S.G.

On the UFR Leach seems to take the brunt of the hit on what was an epic fail by at least 3 defenders. That play was just a firesale by the defense and it would probably be better rated as -1's or 2's for 3 or 4 different players.

RPS

Also, about the RPS. It is unfair in many situations to throw -1 at Robinson, but when he makes ridiculously obvious or poor calls (redzone blitzes) then I see no problem with throwing a -1 his way. He may not have much to work with, but the calls on the 2 TD passes to Zug against Brown were just dumb. He not only tipped a blitz, but also tipped man coverage. Brown can't win that battle.

Vlad Emilien

Vlad is a true freshman. True freshman do not play in the secondary unless they are exceptionally gifted (Warren, Eric Berry). The college game is infinitely more complex than high school and DB's have one of the biggest learning curves when making the transition. It is very rare for a DB to have that type of ability.