The Defense

[Knucklehank1]

I mostly took a wait and see approach with Sirmon, but we are far enough in to see that he is not equipped to be a Power 5 defensive coordinator. When Petrino hired him, Petrino primarily lauded him as a "great recruiter". That should have sent warning flares out. When he hired Grantham, he at least said that he always thought a Grantham defense was hard to prepare for.

Anyways, the defense we are running is so simplistic and lacking in talent. Obviously the tackling is atrocious. Rarely does the first defender get down the ball carrier. We have guys out there that are not fast enough in my opinion. BC was getting favorable matchups against the linebacker Stewart because he simply wasn't quick enough to scrape across the line on running plays and couldn't get into proper coverage on pass plays. We weren't playing good assignment football. BC ran a totally basic offense. Unfortunately we consistently left players open in the flat because our guys weren't playing their responsibilities (or don't know them well enough). One play BC ran a simple combo route with a receiver to the flat and one running 20 yard out. Yeast was the corner in that zone and ran up to the flat route while letting the out route run right past him. BC overthrew the play, but the guy was wide open. Just a lack of understanding what to do. I also saw a lack of effort. Guys were loafing to the ball.

Problem is that I don't think most of these issues are fixable. And we might want a new DC but the reality is that Petrino doesn't have a great track record co-existing with DC's. That's why we had to settle for and overpay for someone like Sirmon.

 

[cardinalrod]

Yep

 

[Louisvillian]

Good analysis. And to go along with the poor coaching it also looks like guys such as James Hearns, Trevon Young Drew Bailey and Chucky Williams benefited from playing with DeAngelo Brown, Devonte Fields, Keith Kelsey and Josh Harvey Clemons way more than I thought.

 

[Thecycle27]

I am at a loss for how bad and how little talent they have on defense. The lack of talent is surprising. The lack of speed is evident. I have no idea what happened with recruiting on defense, but they flat missed on guys. The staff completely miss evaluated kids. They have no linebackers, they are having to play smaller guys at the linebacker position that have no idea how to play the position. The DL isn't athletic enough the get off blocks consistently or quick enough to cause problems. The secondary isn't really physical and average to poor cover guys. I think the young guys will be good but man are they going through some growing pains. Whatever any offense does well the defense can't stop.

It just seems like recruiting isn't well thought out. Under Strong the emphasis was defense it showed. Under Petrino the emphasis is offense and it shows. I don't understand why they can't recruit both sides of the ball every year.

 

[CardsFirst]

My concern is the confusion that seems to evident when our D is lining up. Someone called into the post radio show and said we only had 9 defenders on the field when their RB Brock for that 70 yard touchdown run. He also said there was another occasion when we only had 10 on the field. Those were the only ones he caught. If true how the heck does that happen.

I’m beginning to think it’s not a lack of talent as much as a lack of understanding as to what the heck they should be doing. More than likely it’s a combo of both I guess. Either way it’s coaching and I’m beginning to believe Bobby has lost control. I hate to think this but we may need to go in a different direction. He did hire Sirmon. One things for sure Sirmon needs to go. As you may recall I posted last week that Sirmon in an interview said talent wasn’t important in college FB. That’s the thought processes we’re dealing with.

 

[Knucklehank1]

Today was the first time I saw confusion as to where to lineup and in substitutions. This is particularly troubling because 1) you would expect the team to become more familiar with roles halfway thru the season and 2) this was the first game that Sirmon coached from the field and not the box. BC runs such a basic offense it is mind blowing that they'd have trouble with alignment and assignment.

 

[wilkie01]

The defense played like a high school freshman team. So my question is can we beat any of these teams?

FSU
Wake Forest
Syracuse
Virginia
Kentucky

We end the year 3-9.

 

[LouisvilleKid79]

The defense played like a high school freshman team. So my question is can we beat any of these teams?

FSU
Wake Forest
Syracuse
Virginia
Kentucky

We end the year 3-9.

I'm really starting to think they are not going to win another game this season. At best everyone of their remaining games is a toss-up.

They have four wins on the season so would finish 4-8. That is a scary thought.

 

[Louisvillian]

We end the year 3-9.

Giving that win back to Murray St. does seem like the honorable thing to do, IMO.

 

[CardsFirst]

Today was the first time I saw confusion as to where to lineup and in substitutions. This is particularly troubling because 1) you would expect the team to become more familiar with roles halfway thru the season and 2) this was the first game that Sirmon coached from the field and not the box. BC runs such a basic offense it is mind blowing that they'd have trouble with alignment and assignment.

Ironically my wife has been saying for the last several games they seemed to be confused on defense and she’s been correct. But it seemed much worse today.

 

[Cardiac Red]

The defense played like a high school freshman team. So my question is can we beat any of these teams?

FSU
Wake Forest
Syracuse
Virginia
Kentucky

We end the year 4 - 8

Fixed it for ya..

To answer your question, if our D plays like today, and I have no reason to believe otherwise, we'll be lucky to get another win this year..

 

[yum center]

My thing about the defense was that BC ran the same plays over and over and we still couldn't stop them. They literally ran that play action bootleg pass to the tight end every third play and we looked surprised every time.

 

[Louisvillian]

My thing about the defense was that BC ran the same plays over and over and we still couldn't stop them. They literally ran that play action bootleg pass to the tight end every third play and we looked surprised every time.

And our team had no will to stop it. The ‘book’ has been out for awhile on how to attack us.

 

[CardsDan]

There's no live tackling in practice. How do you get better at something in games that you don't practice?

 

[Thecycle27]

They were totally confused at times which is on the coaching staff. They were physically manhandled from the the last part of the 2nd quarter till the end of the game. That is talent and want to which is recruiting the right players for your system. I think Vandy's coach is a really good defensive coach but his defense sucks this year. You can scheme all day long but you have to have players.

What makes this difficult is they have very little experienced talent and they aren't being coached up. I didn't expect this to be a good defense, even with Todd G, however I didn't think they would be atrocious.

If they truly aren't tackling in practice I have no response other than I can't believe head coach allows it. Football is a phyiscal game you better play the game that way. This is not a phyiscal team that is a problem.

 

[Rollem Cards]

Someone called into the post radio show and said we only had 9 defenders on the field when their RB Brock for that 70 yard touchdown run.

He was drunk. I wish we had that excuse.

I just rewound the replay three times and all three times we had 11 on the field

And all three times he scored.

He shook Chucky off like a Gnat

 

[earsky]

Proper tackling is one thing,technique and all.The other thing is toughness.This defense lacks it.It can be instilled or it can come from within that group.Either way.it's not there.If you're not willing to sacrifice it up,you'll get steamrolled.

 

[Ipartiedwithhopgood]

It all starts up front. This is the first UofL defense I've seen in years that has nobody making plays in the backfield.

 

[Knucklehank1]

He was drunk. I wish we had that excuse.

I just rewound the replay three times and all three times we had 11 on the field

And all three times he scored.

He shook Chucky off like a Gnat

Jaire was the first to not get him down on that play. He tried to just throw a shoulder.

 

[nccardfan]

There's no live tackling in practice. How do you get better at something in games that you don't practice?

The answer to that is that it is the same for all teams.

 

[wreckcard#22]

once BC lost their starting QB they essentially ran 2 offensive plays that led to 4 TD's...the off tackle hand off and the play action off the same...their back up QB couldn't complete a down field pass to save his life.

This DC of ours is a complete joke and our kids are absolutely unprepared and incapable, giving up on plays, poor technique combining with bad schemes, this is an unmitigated failure.