Improved Defense - Coaching + Talent + Scheme

[BrunswickDawg]

In the A&M re-watch thread - Coach34 brought up a good point:
"While Grantham and English being on the defensive side are huge upgrades- its not just coaching.

We added Sweat and Abram
Cleveland returned
Bryant, Mac, Simmons, Leo, Spencer, Hoyett, Green, and the rest are a year older. Maturity helps
We have more depth"

Obviously, he is right on all three points.

One criticism of Dan had been that from 2011-2015, our defense was "Dan's System". Dan has consistently said he want's a disruptive, aggressive, defense but we always seemed to be bend don't break. . We had an aggressive, disruptive D with Manny in 2010 - no doubt. Collins had it in spurts, but seemed to fall back into bend don't break for big games. Manny didn't bring it in 2015 (and neither his Texas D's nor his Miami D's seem to be bringing heat either). I will not mention the other 2 guys who were totally worthless.

My question is this: Was a system like Granthams' what Dan was looking for all along, but his hires had tendencies to fall back to a conservative position in big games (thus the Dan chewing their asses all the time, meddling in the defense, and "running them off") or has Dan backed completely away because of Grantham being a known quantity and scrapped "His System"?

I'm interested in opinions that are out there - (but not a discussion of how Dan turtles in big games, that's a separate issue).

[Martianlander]

Grantham is what he wants. He'll let him run the show and concentrate on the offense. Translation-wins!

[Prediction? Pain.]

I think added depth definitely helps. No matter what the system is, I assume that having more experienced players running that system is always a good thing.

That said, if your coach sucks, experience isn't going to save you. The Sirmon-Grantham swap provides a great example.

Last year, Louisville's defense was outstanding. Best scoring defense and total defense in the ACC, top 5 in the ACC in sacks, TFLs, passes defended, 3rd down D, and ranked 19th nationally in defensive S&P+.

Last year, MSU's defense was awful. At everything. Ranked 10th in the SEC in scoring D, 12th in total D, 11th in 3rd down D, and bottom half in everything else. 73rd nationally in defensive S&P+, which I believe is the lowest of any Mullen D.

Louisville returned 80% of its defensive production (https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2017/1/31/14451014/2017-ncaa-football-returning-starters-experience-oregon-tcu-texas) from last year's defense. That's the 15th most in the country. MSU returned 59% of its defensive production. That's good for 85th nationally.

So Louisville returned most of its play makers on defense and MSU did not.

Right now, Louisville has the 106th ranked defense in the S&P+ rankings, is 92nd in scoring defense, and 97th in total defense. MSU is 11th nationally in the S&P+ defense rankings, has the 12th best scoring defense in the country, and the 22nd best total defense. (I use yards per play in total D, by the way.)

So yeah, experience is big. But not big enough to overcome one of a bad DC.

[Sort-of-but-not-really-related aside: When looking this stuff up, I came across Phil Steele's annual ranking (http://plus.philsteele.com/Blogs/2017/JUNE17/DBJune13.html) for returning starts among offensive lines. Out of 130 FBS teams, State is ranked 120th. That's last in the SEC and is the second lowest among all Power 5 schools. That really puts the line's performance into perspective, doesn't it?]

As for style of D under Mullen, we've discussed the topic before without making much headway. Some seasons the defense is aggressive and disruptive, and other seasons it's not. In 2014, for instance, in SEC play we were 3rd in sacks, 1st in 3rd down conversion D, 3rd in interceptions, and 1st in PBUs. Those are not the numbers of a "bend but don't break," passive defense. And in 2010 under Diaz, we were 5th in sacks, 4th in TFLs, and 4th in PBUs. But in 2012 under Chris Wilson, we were 11th in the conference in sacks and TFLs, and seemed to waste our two NFL-caliber corners by playing off coverage for huge swaths of the season (though we did have ok overall INT numbers that year). And if you look at advanced stats, there are similar swings. In 2014 and 2015, our "Havoc rate" ranks were top 20 and top 35 nationally, showing a penchant for a fairly disruptive style of defense. ("Havoc" rate is "a team's total tackles for loss, passes defensed, and forced fumbles divided by total plays." Right now out defense is 21st nationally in total "havoc.")

All that said, I believe Mullen when he said on Monday (or maybe it was Saturday after the game or last week?) that Grantham and he meshed very well philosophically re: style of play. Grantham actually had an interesting comment on the topic as well in an interview this week. Go to the 7:02 mark in this video:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMiEku6cyqg

[Johnson85]

In the A&M re-watch thread - Coach34 brought up a good point:
"While Grantham and English being on the defensive side are huge upgrades- its not just coaching.

We added Sweat and Abram
Cleveland returned
Bryant, Mac, Simmons, Leo, Spencer, Hoyett, Green, and the rest are a year older. Maturity helps
We have more depth"

Obviously, he is right on all three points.

One criticism of Dan had been that from 2011-2015, our defense was "Dan's System". Dan has consistently said he want's a disruptive, aggressive, defense but we always seemed to be bend don't break. . We had an aggressive, disruptive D with Manny in 2010 - no doubt. Collins had it in spurts, but seemed to fall back into bend don't break for big games. Manny didn't bring it in 2015 (and neither his Texas D's nor his Miami D's seem to be bringing heat either). I will not mention the other 2 guys who were totally worthless.

My question is this: Was a system like Granthams' what Dan was looking for all along, but his hires had tendencies to fall back to a conservative position in big games (thus the Dan chewing their asses all the time, meddling in the defense, and "running them off") or has Dan backed completely away because of Grantham being a known quantity and scrapped "His System"?

I'm interested in opinions that are out there - (but not a discussion of how Dan turtles in big games, that's a separate issue).

I think Dan's meddling in the defense may be overstated by some, but I do think Grantham is the first coordinator Mullen has had that he has enough respect for and trust in that he is willing to be completely hands off. I think Mullen is also happy enough to have somebody he can trust that even if/when he disagrees with some of his choices, he's not going to risk running him off over it.

[TrapGame]

I think Dan's meddling in the defense may be overstated by some, but I do think Grantham is the first coordinator Mullen has had that he has enough respect for and trust in that he is willing to be completely hands off. I think Mullen is also happy enough to have somebody he can trust that even if/when he disagrees with some of his choices, he's not going to risk running him off over it.

I think Dan's meddling in the defense means he had harsh words with Wilson and Mr. Lateral Move when their defenses were sucking ass. And when he shut Sirmon out of the Egg Bowl prep.