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re: Defending the running QB
Posted on 8/20/25 at 8:44 am to Tdubs7
Posted on 8/20/25 at 8:44 am to Tdubs7
quote:
Thoughts on how they addressed the issue? Was it more scheme or personnel? Assume Perkins at Star will shadow the QB more?
Personnel was the biggest issue. We were average at DT, flat-out bad at Safety, and even though Penn was smart and solid, he was too slow for a MLB in today’s college football. That’s a lot of the guys you are trusting to stop a mobile QB. Once a fast QB had a crease, we couldn’t trust the back end to clean it up.
All that said, for all of the talk about mobile QBs, that really just comes down to Milroe and Reed, who both had elite speed. They tore us up.
On the other hand, the defense handed Pavia and Green their respective worst games of the season. They also kept Dart in check and even though they did give up a couple of plays to Sellers, they also caused two turnovers that lead to scores and then knocked his arse out of the game.
So let’s not act like every QB we played with some wheels tore us to shreds. And if you look at that list of guys we contained, they all tore some other good teams (Pavia-Bama, Green-UT, Dart-UGA) apart. That tells me it’s less scheme and more about what we were able to do with the personnel we had and how they executed.
The good news- we have upgraded every one of those question mark spots for this season. The underclassmen who played last year, some of whom had to because we were shorthanded, are all back and most are on the 2 deep. A few like McKinley, Breaux, Reliford and Keys will start or at least get significant reps. And the staff shored up weaknesses and depth with 2 new Safeties and more portal help across the DL.
We do not have the holes and cross our fingers and hope across the defense today. We are now deeper and more athletic across the defense than we’ve been since 2019. The sense from several media outlets following camp is that Baker can now run more of what he wants since he isn’t as limited by our personnel, especially in coverage thanks to the upgrades at CB and Safety. None of that guarantees anything, but it’s a hell of a lot better situation than we had this time last year.
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Posted on 8/20/25 at 8:53 am to shinerfan
I thought you were talking about Bo Nix at first so I was going to say that was more of a tackling problem, the scheme was fine. Then I remembered that Chavis' timeline falls more on Cam Newton, which to be fair, no one stopped.
Who was our DC when Bo Dix did his best Manziel impression as a freshman? That was one of the most frustrating games to watch. We had him contained and just could not wrap him up and get him down
ETA the game I'm thinking of was 2021 when Nix was a Junior. The DC would've been Daronte.
Who was our DC when Bo Dix did his best Manziel impression as a freshman? That was one of the most frustrating games to watch. We had him contained and just could not wrap him up and get him down
ETA the game I'm thinking of was 2021 when Nix was a Junior. The DC would've been Daronte.
This post was edited on 8/20/25 at 9:01 am
Posted on 8/20/25 at 8:54 am to Tdubs7
Improved talent and year two under Baker 
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:01 am to Tdubs7
Success of the D starts up front and definitely with making the spy effective. Perkins was great as a freshman spying Bryce Young. Those guys winning those battles speeds up the clock and will make the secondary look a lot better as well. Not like this is a scorching hot take or anything, but I’m convinced that the D line quality and depth is going to make the LB and DB play exponentially better this year.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:06 am to Tdubs7
There is no one trick to defend mobile QBs. The main thing though is to play assignment football. Do the job that Blake Baker calls. If we do that we will be fine. Last years issue was our DEs were good pass rushers but not very good against the run. Jones specifically got us killed against A&M.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:10 am to Glizzy_gang
quote:
ETA the game I'm thinking of was 2021 when Nix was a Junior. The DC would've been Daronte.
BJ Ojulari specifically couldn't tackle Bo Nix to save his life. (And I love BJ, it was just one of those things, SMH)
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:16 am to xGeauxLSUx
quote:
Both Manziel and Lamar Jackson come to mind as elite and slippery runners at QB that LSU completely shut down
The 2016 defense vs Louisville included John Battle, Duke Riley, Kendell Beckwith, Jamal Adams, Arden Key, Rashard Lawrence, Davon Godchaux, Tashawn Bowers, and Devin White with Dave Aranda as the DC.
In 2012, Manziel had a nightmare named Mingo chasing him down. Manziel ran a 4.68 40 at the Combine, Mingo ran a 4.58.
In 2013, Manziel averaged 4.5 yards per carry vs LSU, 12 carries for 54 yards. That was the best on his team in that game. He averaged 5.3 per carry that season. He had 5 worse games and 7 that were better.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:22 am to Tiger Ryno
quote:
A lot of talk. No visible evidence of improvement.
I agree. Baker was a letdown in a few games last yr. I don't think he is a magician at DC.
The talent will be much better this yr.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:28 am to Tdubs7
quote:
Thoughts on how they addressed the issue? Was it more scheme or personnel?
Biggest issue since our last successes against the run has been lack of edge discipline/containment. Our edge rushers get too far up the field. We have had great pass rushers, but they have not been holding contain on the edge against runs or read-option plays in general.
Add to that poor alignment, and there is nobody at the second level to make up for that.
Kyle Williams was an excellent pass rusher, but also excelled at holding the edge and forcing things back to the middle. I think we will see a very disciplined defensive line this season.
We are all unsure if the DL is just teeing off on a bad OL in camp this year, or if both sides are talented... Week 1 will tell us how the season will go, most likely.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 9:32 am to DByrd2
quote:
Biggest issue since our last successes against the run has been lack of edge discipline/containment.
Bingo.
People complain about our secondary but that was second to the DE play. Horrible at containment. That has to change.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 10:13 am to clamdip
quote:
People complain about our secondary but that was second to the DE play. Horrible at containment. That has to change.
The DEs don't always have "contain". Contain means more of keeping the QB in the pocket. In the run game each player has a gap. DE's usually have outside gaps but not always. Either way our defense has to play assignment football when we go against running QBs. Especially teams that run alot of Zone Read/Power Read.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 10:26 am to Tiger Ryno
quote:
No visible evidence of improvement
Almost as if they haven't played a game yet.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 10:59 am to atxfan
quote:
Success of the D starts up front and definitely with making the spy effective. Perkins was great as a freshman spying Bryce Young. Those guys winning those battles speeds up the clock and will make the secondary look a lot better as well. Not like this is a scorching hot take or anything, but I’m convinced that the D line quality and depth is going to make the LB and DB play exponentially better this year.
Part of keeping Perkins in that role will be the guys around him. People forget how important BJ Oujilari was to how Perkins played his freshman season. There were times, especially earlier in the season when Perk was just BJ’s backup. However, to keep him on the field more, they started playing him more as an OLB by mid-season.
One way they schemed to keep Perkins in the box was to play a lot of zone. Another was to drop BJ into zone coverage from his DE spot so Perkins would be free to spy and blitz. That, or we would do some exchange zone blitzes with BJ and Perk to cause confusion.
BJ was smart and athletic enough to do all of this, but we haven’t really had a guy at DE who could since. I think that’s a big reason why we started to see Perkins pulled into coverage a lot more in year 2 after he moved back to OLB. There wasn’t anyone he could pass the coverage off to.
The key to Perkins’ role this year, especially vs mobile QBs, will be others like Weeks and Keys at LB, the Safeties, and even occasionally Pyburn and Payton (Kelly specifically mentioned him working on coverage drops, which was new to him) handling coverage responsibilities that would normally fall to the Star when Perkins is asked to spy or blitz. We haven’t had the personnel to do this the last two seasons. It looks like we might now. Hopefully that frees him up to wreak the kind of havoc we remember from 3 seasons ago.
This post was edited on 8/20/25 at 11:00 am
Posted on 8/20/25 at 11:05 am to redfishfan
quote:
The DEs don't always have "contain". Contain means more of keeping the QB in the pocket. In the run game each player has a gap. DE's usually have outside gaps but not always. Either way our defense has to play assignment football when we go against running QBs. Especially teams that run alot of Zone Read/Power Read.
There were times when the DEs lost contain, but there were plenty of read option plays where it was pretty clear that the assignment was to attack the mesh point, no matter what. That is a valid strategy and I think it was often mistaken for a bust.
When the DC calls this, it’s someone else’s responsibility to hold the edge. That’s usually going to be the LB on that side or a Safety or Star coming down. Think about who was manning those roles last year. Penn was just too slow. Then you had Ryan and Burns
Gilbert, for all of his flaws, was also playing with a busted shoulder. Then you had Spears, a true freshman learning on the fly. If you want to get onto Baker for playing too aggressive, ok. However, I think the issue was that without creating havoc plays, we weren’t good enough to stop some offenses playing straight up.
Posted on 8/20/25 at 11:26 am to shinerfan
quote:Yeah well I recall he was a true dual threat that could sling it also.
Well, except for one game at Auburn.
A 245lb JD5 with the innovator Gus drawing up plays was a nightmare to defend with a spy.
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