We Need to Go Back to Being a Defense-first Team Again

[Gismo]

5 turnovers.... what do you expect the defense to do when the offense keeps giving the opponent the ball. I think the defense played well enough against Rutgers... turnovers is what really killed us.

[BullsOnThaRize8]

well enough is not making nova look like tom brady.

[SANJAY]

This might be the slowest Bulls defense ever. No swarming, takes forever to close on the ball. Bad scheme? There is some talent, maybe not as much as we think.

[Orlando Bull]

This might be the slowest Bulls defense ever. No swarming, takes forever to close on the ball. Bad scheme? There is some talent, maybe not as much as we think.

I think its mostly scheme... under Leavitt, it was sink or swim for the corners. Sometimes that led to the blatant exploitation of a Tyller Roberts, sometimes it lead to the development of Ant Henry, Jenks, Trade Williams, Jerome Murphy, Skinny Raymond, etc...

Those guys getting it done also made for some fierce pass rushers. Those corners were all leaders too. Not sure why, but, they were the type of guys that the team looked to for direction. My guess is because they were put in the position to be a hero at any given moment. Gotta give some props to Nate Allen and jerelle young back there too.

Lastly, I think Leavitt was a much better judge of defensive talent, and he was a good teacher (or at least surrounded himself with good teachers).

I got back to a Selvie or Nate Allen story, and I think I can sum it up pretty well here... Leavitt took those 2 offensive guys, moved them to D, and made them coveted NFL talents.

Skip on he other hand has done the opposite with someone like T-Rex... he may have been a stud lock-down corner with Leavitt, but, Skip would rather use his athleticism on offense for a handful of touches per game.

How excited was Leavitt to pull in Kavon Webster? Who thinks that kid is living up to his potential?

[SANJAY]

Orlando, you're right that leavitt always got the best athletes on defense. Sometimes to the detriment of the offense. But without turning this into yet another leavitt-Holtz thread I just don't understand how all the linebackers and secondary look slow. Dede was a stud, so was Sam but so disappointing so fa this year.

Too much thinking? Too many reads? Maybe Wally will want to come back.

[Orlando Bull]

Orlando, you're right that leavitt always got the best athletes on defense. Sometimes to the detriment of the offense. But without turning this into yet another leavitt-Holtz thread I just don't understand how all the linebackers and secondary look slow. Dede was a stud, so was Sam but so disappointing so fa this year.

Too much thinking? Too many reads? Maybe Wally will want to come back.

Too much thinking, and too much ground to cover making up for the great white hope in Lanaris. If one LB is weak, it pulls the whole unit down. Sam needs to be in the middle and Juene needs to be at Sam, or play a nickel with Lejiste as a hybrid type run-stopping safety. I think lanaris probably works as hard as anyone and I like the kid, he plays hard, he's just not that good at what he needs to be doing in this defense.

I hate to single out one guy, but, to me it look like offenses are picking on him as evident by his team leading tackles against Nevada... they were running right at him. Rutgers found the guy in the middle that he was supposed to cover and threw the ball there on third downs.

[BullsOnThaRize8]

HE IS ATROCIOUS, I have been saying it. Our LB's play pretty far back and they are constantly out of position. We need to do what rutgers does and put tons of guys near the line of scrimmage and make it confusing for the qb. Not knowing where its coming from and creating a sense of uncertainty to a offense instead of being so laid back and vanilla. Me personally, Im okay with getting beat deep every once in awhile. Im okay giving up big plays gambling but when you gamble it gives you a chance to get it right. If you get it right you get turnovers and tackles for a loss. We use to have corners who gambled. We had safeties who ran across the field to go with our lb's who found themselves in the right spot more times than not.

[wjdiamantas]

I really thought Giddins would make a bigger impact than he has.