Fair question. I don't know to what extent they tried to simplify it. We knew the deal when we hired him. My bigger problem was Searels. I'm glad that dude is gone. Straight up grifter. I don't know what UGA saw in him..maybe they think he can recruit.
VT play-calling looked predictable, zero eye-candy, and we didn't really look super disruptive. Like not many TFL or sacks... But maybe that is a factor of Chizik's bendy nature.
After seeing our softness this yr, and our LB's forgetting about ND TE, or not filling right gaps, i'm not sure I blame Bateman's scheme. Something was wrong, but it might've been something unrelated to scheme.
It's been said in interviews by players that they didn't care for the scheme. I don't think it's just about that, though. It was probably several things and since Bateman was in charge, then he's ultimately responsible. Right or wrong. I was personally ok with giving him one more year, but something was obviously off on that side of the ball.
Don't think the coaching changed. They just had the pleasure of playing Virginia Tech. Hard to believe that the once powerful VT football program is now so pathetic. And new coach is in a spot. Previous coach didn't recruit well at all, and now he is stuck with that talent. Probably an easier task playing them than some non Power 5 schools
Bateman’s scheme requires more thinking. His players at Army were smart enough to handle it, ours weren’t.
Players also said we'd have the #1 defense in CFB this yr, lol
I don't buy into the "thinking" part, remember the regression? Apparently the safeties had to do more thinking in his D than LBs, but did players lose IQ tween yr 2 and 3?
2019 team lost Strowbridge, Crawford, Dorn, and i think Wolfolk & Rene, but 2020 didn't really fall all that much, especially compared to the 2021 regression.
If you're looking for one person, that's not going to happen. It's never one reason. I think it was pretty obvious that the players and Mack lost confidence in him. Fair or not. That was the biggest issue at the end. You can't have a coach around that people don't want.
There wasn't a huge regression from 2020 to 2021 statistically. We were actually slightly better against the pass. Run defense wasn't quite as good. And we gave up about a FG more every game. I think it seemed that way because expectations were so high, but really it only amounted to about 10 yards per game.
2020 2021
You're looking at rankings (coming off Covid season). What I'm saying is if you look at what we actually gave up, there really wasn't much of a difference. Some things we were better at and some areas we took a step back. But that wasn't just the defense. Mediocre OL would've made things easier for our defense and probably gives us a couple more wins.
Defensive efficiency was dramatically down from 2019 —> 2020
Not quite sure why you added me, because you basically agreed with me for the most part. I will say that it doesn't make sense to say Batman needed more time, but then judge Chizik after five games. I understand you've liked Bateman from day one, but you need to have a little objectivity. As far as the coastal goes, you're right, it's the worst. But it's always been the worst, so we haven't even been able to be the tallest midget.
Because Chiz is running an extremely simplified version of what Bateman wanted to run. We have assistants that cannot coach at this level. You can have very few weak spots from the coaching perspective at the D1 level. Our players continue to get worse the longer they are in the defensive system. we should have made significant strides givrn our talent, new coaching, and schedule. That we haven’t is indicative of a coaching failure.
All of that was true under the guy who had three years (except maybe talent). Why don't you give Chizik at least one year if you were willing to give Bateman four?
Good point about rankings vs raw stats, but the D just looked worse that last yr. Bias of expectations could hurt opinions though.
I still think there is a prob beyond his assistants (or scheme) -> Softness culture or whatever. Offense can get away with more softness, via amazing qb/receiving, but a D can't.
He's no doubt pointing to anyone but Bateman. He's a huge fan of his and it's hard for him to admit that Batman played a part. It's like a mom who can't admit her baby is ugly. He can't even recognize that I'm not putting everything on Bateman and even saying that I would have been ok with keeping him. It's all about protecting his baby.
Oh, right. That rockstar O (regardless of OL) probably helped improvement field position, ability to gamble, plenty other stuff. Good point.
It ultimately falls on the DC. Bateman had to go because he wasn’t put in a position where he could succeed and Mack wasn’t going to change that. I’m not calling for Gene’s head. I’m curious to see what happens after the season if we are sitting in the same spot as last year. Will Gene get to make some changes? Will he walk away?
couldn't agree more about Fedora, but Mack had Carl Torbush as DC for his entire first stint with us, and I'd about give my left gonad to have the kind of kickass defenses he managed before he became head coach.
You (presumably) have two. No need to hesitate giving one up. Go ahead and go balls out for the team.
funny, I deleted the last from the previous post that I would in fact definitely give one up, and so who wants one? Looks like I have a taker.
For a minute I wondered if your right gonad was swapped for all those extra ass-kickings we gave dook on hoops last yr.
I said the same thing during 2021: that is looked like 1 or or even 3 of the D position coaches were undercutting Bateman. It's possible they assumes that Mack would name one of them DC if Batmen got fired.
CBs 8 yards back of the LOS when it is 1st and 10 on the offense's 25 is one thing, usually a smart thing. Before this year, have you ever seen Chizik's CBs line up 8-10 yards away from the LOs when it is 3rd down and 3? Of course not. Then perhaps we should wonder why for the first time ever that is happening on a Chizik D?
I'm not sure if it was the DL. FEI has a "DL" rating, and both 2015, 2022 were 113th. The D overall was 52nd though because the 2015 had a much better sack rate and their Redzone D (touchdowns given up) was fantastic.
