Fixing The Secondary

[Suhrthing]

Going into the season, I don’t think there’s a single reasonable person who didn’t see our secondary being the glaring weakness of this team. The problem is, I don’t think any of us saw it being THIS bad. For someone who eats, sleeps, and breathes recruiting like Mario it’s crazy that he let the talent level, or lack thereof, get to this point in the secondary. Many of us thought we would hit the portal hard for that position in the off-season and it just never happened. For this year, there’s not much we can do other than give these younger guys some playing time.

LB play has been subpar as of late as well, and exacerbated the problem.

 

[bobbydigius]

Going into the season, I don’t think there’s a single reasonable person who didn’t see our secondary being the glaring weakness of this team. The problem is, I don’t think any of us saw it being THIS bad. For someone who eats, sleeps, and breathes recruiting like Mario it’s crazy that he let the talent level, or lack thereof, get to this point in the secondary. Many of us thought we would hit the portal hard for that position in the off-season and it just never happened. For this year, there’s not much we can do other than give these younger guys some playing time.

Mario hit it out the park this last portal cycle, well except at DB. Stil knocked it out the park and made people forget just how mid the first two portal cycles were for him here. Also, I see people conflate recruiting prowess with eval prowess too much and attribute that to Mario. We have had a bunch of misses that led us here eval wise. Sure we have had some major hits but going into year 3, this team is just average if you take Cam away. That said, he did get Cam and we are 7-0 and I’m happy like a pig in ****.

 

[flips]

Strong glue

 

[Suhrthing]

This is what we have this season.

There is no fixing it.

It's not going to get better.

Bes bet is to embrace the team's offensive identity and become this year's Washington.

I'd settle for ACC champs, and not getting blown out of the playoffs at this point.

 

[bobbydigius]

I'd settle for ACC champs, and not getting blown out of the playoffs at this point.

Quite the settle. That is a monumental success based on where this program has been for two decades.

 

[dycane]

I'd settle for ACC champs, and not getting blown out of the playoffs at this point.

For that to happen, we need to run the ball better — this week was a nice start. Saban mentioned it last week. I hate to say it after bemoaning bro ball for years, but ball control is the hedge. Need to keep our defense off the field.

 

[Suhrthing]

For that to happen, we need to run the ball better — this week was a nice start. Saban mentioned it last week. I hate to say it after bemoaning bro ball for years, but ball control is the hedge. Need to keep our defense off the field.

With #64 back we looked a bit better today, especially when he slid inside. #4 is playing his best ball of his career, and we have 3 more horses in the stable that can absolutely contribute. ACC champs or bust... a playoff win would be gravy at this point.

 

[Jedi Master Cane]

With the O-line fully healthy and the offense humming this team needs to take the Cobra Kai approach.

The best defense is more offense. I have no issue with hurrying to the line to keep the D from substituting between plays but we should be milking the play clock a **** of a lot more than we currently are before every snap. Doing that consistently throughout the game can easily cut the opponents possessions by 1 or 2 per game.

And another thing....somebody call Guidry and tell him to STOP F'ING BLITZING SO MUCH. The one thing we do actually have on defense is a **** of a defensive line. Over the course of the game we'll get pressure just sending 4. We need that extra defender in coverage. Leverage your strength and do everything possible to mask that secondary.

 

[305407cane]

Play markeith and pattern. Doesn’t matter that Williams is small. Harris is big and he can’t tackle

 

[Suhrthing]

Play markeith and pattern. Doesn’t matter that Williams is small. Harris is big and he can’t tackle

Nor is he fast enough to hawk down a ball-carrier after he gets juked. He's got zero game-speed.

 

[E1k]

Maybe we need all22 film to see every rep but i can’t understand why Richards is playing the most snaps at cb and oj is splitting snaps with hill. Is it a trust thing?

 

[ssvir]

He had

Herbert and Nike

 

[Squid Bumciorek]

Get better players.

Big problem with evals. Year 3 with NIL means team should overall have a decent roster. But if we had any in the country other than Ward, we are 4-3, maybe 3-4 as UF game is potentially different without Ward.

UF- W
Ball st- W
uSF- w
FAMU- W
VT-L
Cal L
Louisville L

I have zero doubt that we would be 0-3 in ACC play without Ward. He covers up the dumb penalties, lack of discipline, and poor talent. If Ward had decided to go the NFL , and we had Poff or Williams at QB, we would objectively be one of the worst teams in the ACC. To be honest, I think we’d be almost as bad as FSU without Ward.

UM has had good recruiting classes , but not getting the results. I don’t think people can say “we need more talent” and not blame coaching when the coaches recruited that talent. Either they ARE talented players but not getting good coaching or they aren’t talented players and we had awful evals from the coaches. Has to be one of the other.

I can applaud Cristobal for what he’s doing this season but also scratch my head at the overall lack of talent in year 3.

 

[GojiraCane]

Big problem with evals. Year 3 with NIL means team should overall have a decent roster. But if we had any in the country other than Ward, we are 4-3, maybe 3-4 as UF game is potentially different without Ward.

UF- W
Ball st- W
uSF- w
FAMU- W
VT-L
Cal L
Louisville L

I have zero doubt that we would be 0-3 in ACC play without Ward. He covers up the dumb penalties, lack of discipline, and poor talent. If Ward had decided to go the NFL , and we had Poff or Williams at QB, we would objectively be one of the worst teams in the ACC. To be honest, I think we’d be almost as bad as FSU without Ward.

UM has had good recruiting classes , but not getting the results. I don’t think people can say “we need more talent” and not blame coaching when the coaches recruited that talent. Either they ARE talented players but not getting good coaching or they aren’t talented players and we had awful evals from the coaches. Has to be one of the other.

Miami has had misses in the secondary, and that is the one position that Mario’s recruiting hasn’t drastically picked up from Manny’s. Hopefully next class solves that.

 

[Brains]

Big problem with evals. Year 3 with NIL means team should overall have a decent roster. But if we had any in the country other than Ward, we are 4-3, maybe 3-4 as UF game is potentially different without Ward.

UF- W
Ball st- W
uSF- w
FAMU- W
VT-L
Cal L
Louisville L

I have zero doubt that we would be 0-3 in ACC play without Ward. He covers up the dumb penalties, lack of discipline, and poor talent. If Ward had decided to go the NFL , and we had Poff or Williams at QB, we would objectively be one of the worst teams in the ACC. To be honest, I think we’d be almost as bad as FSU without Ward.

UM has had good recruiting classes , but not getting the results. I don’t think people can say “we need more talent” and not blame coaching when the coaches recruited that talent. Either they ARE talented players but not getting good coaching or they aren’t talented players and we had awful evals from the coaches. Has to be one of the other.

I can applaud Cristobal for what he’s doing this season but also scratch my head at the overall lack of talent in year 3.

Most of our secondary rotation are transfers. Do you really believe all these players were the coaches' first choice at the position? I think that's laughable, and I'm sure you do as well.

I think it's 100% fair to criticize staff priorities and/or salesmanship to close deals. I suspect they haven't allocated funding for the position at nearly the same clip as for this offense, and it shows. That's fair critique.

But there seems to be this mythology developing on the board that every player is here due to "evaluations" first and foremost, which I find to be absolutely ridiculous.

 

[mirasuegui]

I don't know what we are doing in the secondary. We give free releases, never try to re route receivers or throw off the timing of the passing game. When we play zone, DBs aren't watching the QB. Louisville qb was staring his guys down and we still couldn't get in the passing lanes.

Good observation, even the analyst they had in the studio at halftime said, Miami gives up the middle of the field, they need to take this away, and force throws outside, lower % passes. I know we don't have 5-star talent, but it can't be this bad. The free releases blow my mind, then we take away the outside, receivers go inside, and we vacate the middle of the field. I once heard a season coach say, 90% of the time on defense you are beat on your alignment. obviously miss tackles don't help, amazing we can't improve our tackling.

 

[Brooklyndee]

 

[mirasuegui]

With the O-line fully healthy and the offense humming this team needs to take the Cobra Kai approach.

The best defense is more offense. I have no issue with hurrying to the line to keep the D from substituting between plays but we should be milking the play clock a **** of a lot more than we currently are before every snap. Doing that consistently throughout the game can easily cut the opponents possessions by 1 or 2 per game.

And another thing....somebody call Guidry and tell him to STOP F'ING BLITZING SO MUCH. The one thing we do actually have on defense is a **** of a defensive line. Over the course of the game we'll get pressure just sending 4. We need that extra defender in coverage. Leverage your strength and do everything possible to mask that secondary.

Just love it when Guidry puts our best pass rushers in coverage, they look totally lost in space. Agree, quit blitzing, you got the horses to rush the passer.

 

[mirasuegui]

I like toast and jam

Jamming seems to be a technique that is not known to our coaches. I love the way other corners just seen to manhandle Restrepo. Passing is timing, heaven forbid we would upset that timing. To top of the free releases, then we can't come up and tackle anyone. Perfect.

 

[mirasuegui]

Even bad players should be able to know their assignments, know how to take good angles, and be able to tackle.

The back seven can’t even do that. It’s COACHING.

Teams like Virginia look way better on defense vs Louisville than we do. And I don’t care how bad recruiting has been, letting up 40+ is not acceptable.

Nobody thinks this back 7 is talented or that they should be winning us games. But it’s not unreasonable to expect them to play a lot more solid than they are, be serviceable, and not blow games for us.

It’s coaching.

Virginia, with more limited players then us, actually played better defense, then we did. Agree we aren't asking these guys to cover Jerry Rice, just line up, and be able to tackle. This doesn't take 5 stars.