re: Can someone who understands ball better than me explain Perkins shift from Freshman yr on?

Misused but still finished top 10-11 alltime at LSU in sacks and higher in TFLs. Led the team every year in those categories and let the team in INTs last year as well. Guy finished his career with more sacks and TFLs than Glenn Dorsey, KiKi Mingo and many others but Kelly’s teams underperformed after year 1 and fans look for scapegoats, Perkins was scapegoated.

The same people complaining he didn’t get enough sacks were the ones saying he shouldn’t be rushing the QB. It was bizarre.

You have to understand and realize there’s no tape on him at that point. Him moving by to lb and then to star is more of helping him become a lb than a one trick pony and try to avoid teams targeting him. People have to realize playing sec LB it takes realistically 2yrs if they stay at the exact same position ( so 2 yrs at will or 2yrs at mike or 2yrs at will) when they are asked to move consistently and learn something new without having a true base there will be struggles for those 2 yrs, what helped whit is he’s always played the will

Its not some big mystery. If there was a future for him in NFL it was not as a designated pass rusher. He is too small.

For LSU and the future, he needed to be more well rounded, so he probably agreed to move. He seemed to lack the awareness to play offball LB and his tackling wasnt great.

Maybe it can still happen for him.

Jimbo Fisher exposed his deficiencies in 2022. 4-7 A&M game planned and attacked Perkins all game. They ran right at him often. Then ran screens past him when he rushed the passer on the outside. A&M ran the ball 50 times, Perkins had 1 solo tackle and 1 assisted tackle.

Once Jimbo showed teams how to attack Perkins and not avoid him, he was never the same. Some big plays here and there. But overall a consistently under performing player who rarely even touched the ball carrier.

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He was always undersized and a tweener with no true position. He never got past that so it wasn't hard to scheme around his athleticism.

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Initially, teams were not prepared for his athleticism. And he relied on that too much, so what you saw later (and for some reason our fans mostly ignored this) was him being shepherded upfield past the QB and losing containment. Which killed up vs running QBs and on delayed runs. Then he got hurt. He did look much better the second half of 2025, though.

I agree. I think he should have been used like the Honey Badger and I think he most likely would have succeeded. When he was misplaced on the field and teams were able to identify and scheme away from him, it appeared that he lost interest and his desire to perform. After the injury, it appeared he wasn't willing to engage . Just observations. A real mystery for many reasons.

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I think he should have been used like the Honey Badger and I think he most likely would have succeeded.

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The lack of instinctiveness he displayed later in his LSU career when healthy would've kept him from ever being impactful in a role that requires the versatility of Badger.

I’ll explain it.

He’s under-sized. Essentially he was like sending a WR to rush the passer. As long as he’s not blocked he’s a menace.

LSU decided to put him at Mike to have him cover more field with his speed. Instead he just stood there diagnosing while the offense avoided his area. Star position wasn’t much better.

He’s a talent without a natural position. Baseball equivalent of a Utility or DH.

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but I am still perplexed by Perkins massive impact his freshman year and never returning to that type of big play ability

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Perkins was a really good LB for LSU. The issue with Perkins was the rant watched him play against Arkansas his freshman year and then expected that kind of game every single game

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Disagree with that... he wasn't a "really good" linebacker.

He was a tweener, between safety and linebacker. He was big for a safety, but small for a linebacker. He could cover well for a linebacker, but not great for a safety. He was bigger and stronger than a blitzing DB, and faster closing speed than a linebacker rushing the QB.

There were mismatches on both offense and defense, and depending on what role he was playing, and what the offense identified him as, it was an either/or. He could either disrupt the offense, or be a weak link on defense. If and when the offense figured out how we were using him, they would take advantage of his weaknesses. But if they couldn't figure it out, he'd make some big plays against them.

He couldn't play "inside", really other than to be a spy on a mobile QB. Wasn't big enough to be a true LB or they'd run him over. If you could force him to cover true skill players in pass routes he was a potential liability there too.

A few years back, I watched a Saints game, and the Saints had a cornerback get 3 sacks. That scheme, that day, blew up the opponent. But that didn't make that guy on par with a true pass rusher, because if you tried that and they started running at him it would have been just as bad on defense.