Yeah that crossed my mind as I posted it. I should have said you rarely want that out of your defense, unless you have a special special player at that position. LL was obviously a freakishly good player. I like Coleman a lot, but many his tackles were 10-15 yards down the field. I don't think our defensive scheme was geared towards him making many plays, whereas in 03 our system called for the S being tight on the LOS. It seemed like his tackles were just a product of him being the last line of defense for us, whereas LaRon was flying around the field. Not knocking Coleman as much as lamenting our LBs inability to wrap up and fill gaps this season.
Yes, Coleman did make a ton of tackles, but it shouldn't come down to him to make the "saving" tackles so often. We knew going into the season that LB was going to be a work in progress. I like Coleman very much and I think he has the ability to be a real force. All in all, as far as our defense goes, I was shocked to see such poor tackling technique from just about everyone. That was an ongoing problem for the entire season, though it MIGHT have been a bit better toward the end of the year. :geaux:
very, very, very, very, very simple here... safeties are not supposed to be covering wrs all game, one on one... the dumbass dcs at lsu put these guys (a fast safety runs a 4.5) on wrs (fast ones run a 4.4, a full step ahead) and wonder why they get burned all game... Mccray is a good safety.. he is not A NICKEL BACK... nickel backs are supposed to be a 3rd corner... someone with coverage skills...
you must not have watched much of the second half of the yearbecause C. Jones was our nickel for most of the time, but I agree that safeties should not be asked to cover WRs. Sometimes a formation shift or motion will get you stuck in a bad match up, but it seemed to happen to us a lot the last 2 years. Maybe our corners were just that bad that the 3rd one couldn't play nickel?
Re: Safey Yep, because if you do, then Jacob Hester was below average, and Sean Taylor was average. And Brock Berlin and Drew Weatherford are HOFers.
Harry Coleman made a lot of tackles, but he was very disappointing overall. He tries to go for the big hit rather than just wrap up a guy. I've never seen more attempts at shoulder tackling from an LSU defense. Remember, Jason David had 51 tackles with the Saints last year, and he sucked. Just because someone has a lot of tackles doesn't mean they're all that. If the team he belongs to has a good rush and pass defense, it means the safety was effective in stopping the run and stopping long passes for long gains. Safeties that belong to a team with a bad rush and pass defense (LSU) have lots of tackles because they are the last line of defense/are getting burned. He was lost in coverage a lot too. Got burned quite a bit. Curtis Taylor was just bad all season.
Re: Safey Anecdote != trend Try to keep up, fellas. The players on defense that everyone seems to be complaining about are not coincidentally the ones that were lower rated in recruiting (Coleman, Taylor, McCray, Riley, Sheppard, Cutrera, Favorite, Tyson Jackson) You never hear anyone point fingers at Hawkins, Eugene, Peterson, RJF, Alem, Baker, and a healthy Beckwith.
