Watching the playoffs it’s obvious we lack dynamic defensive players

We made USC, Bama, and A&M look really good offensively. Of course we lack real talent on defense. But don’t worry. BK has said he will see us at the Natty next year!

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You watch OSU, Texas, Penn State, UGA and ND and 7 or 8 guys on defense Jump out to you with how athletic and fast they are. How they dominate the space they are in and explode the ball. Physical. They have them at every level. They all seem to have safeties who fly up at good angles and make sure tackles.

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Yup. Biggest difference in LSU and those teams sure as hell isn't on the offensive side of ball. It's on defense. But it does look like we are definitely improving in that area.

YES!!!

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Not many on the Dline, either. OP has a solid point.

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Nope. They were serviceable. McKinley looks the part and might be a guy who can develop into one of those guys.

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Not many on the Dline, either. OP has a solid point

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I wouldn’t say that. Swinson, Jones, Perkins and Weeks are all future NFL players. You can also add Reliford, Breaux, Guidry and McKinnley to that list. The problem is that Perkins was out of position and once he got to the star position, he got hurt. Guidry got hurt in game 2 and then Breaux, Reliford and McKinnley were all true freshmen. The lack of NFL talent is on the back end of the defense. The front 7 just suffered from youth, inexperience, a coaching carousel for the past 5 years and injuries. Look at Maason Smith as an example of this. Also look at what Bo Davis and Peoples did with the young guys and injuries. All things considering, they did a great job.
The talent is there in the front 7 and it’s getting better. What we lacked was elite talent in the secondary, depth and experience in the front 7. I expect those freshmen to play a hell of a lot better next season and they’ll have depth with what we brought in from the portal and high school ranks. The secondary should see a big jump next year as well just due to having elite guys finally, and some elite guys with experience when you add what we have in the transfer portal.

A lack of high end defensive talent has been obvious throughout Kelly’s reign. The defense has been a season to season patchwork of subpar to mediocre transfer candidates in the defensive backfield.

Yeah, we could have definitely used Simmons this year from Texas. Getting Jordan Burch to transfer from South Carolina would have been good too. We really need some corners and safeties, but sack artists help too.

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Fortunately, Kelly seems to be doing something about it.

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This heavy portal class is a quick fix... but it's not sustainable. Building most of his 2-deep through the portal finally caught up with Mike Norvell. BK has to start developing and getting more out of his HS recruits to build some consistency on defense year to year.

Hopefully guys like Pickett, McKinley, and these in-state Safeties over the next 2 cycles will be the building blocks to creating that old LSU style of play on defense.

That majority homegrown Louisiana talent with a sprinkle of out-of-state guys (Mainly TX & FL) is what made LSU so special. This roster looks like it's venturing away from that.

Either he's not developing these guys or he has poor HS evaluation.

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Not many on the Dline, either. OP has a solid point


I wouldn’t say that. Swinson, Jones, Perkins and Weeks are all future NFL players. You can also add Reliford, Breaux, Guidry and McKinnley to that list. The problem is that Perkins was out of position and once he got to the star position, he got hurt. Guidry got hurt in game 2 and then Breaux, Reliford and McKinnley were all true freshmen. The lack of NFL talent is on the back end of the defense.
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Jones had so much promise, but never set the edge his entire time here. Wish him well, but just wasn't good enough here. We have some young talent, but have on!y been adequate at best on the Dline. Swinson is the only one that played like a future nfler from the ones you mention. Perkins flashed greatness in a few games 2 years ago. How long has it been since we were good against the run? Poor play from other positions are a huge part of this, but people are acting like we excelled at Dline. Other than spurts of good pass rushing, mainly from Swinson, I haven't seen it. I like our recent high school haul and think it is trending up. I very much hope McKinley becomes a star. Just hasn't happened yet.

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Of course we lack real talent on defense. But don’t worry. BK has said he will see us at the Natty next year!

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CB DJ Pickett
CB Mansoor Delane (VA Tech)
CB Ja'Keem Jackson (Florida)
DE Jimari Butler (Nebraska)
DE Jack Pyburn (Florida)
DE Patrick Payton (FSU)
DL Sydir Mitchell (Texas)

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& he’s not done yet