Fixing the Defense for next year

[wmcovol]

If Warrior had corner skills don't you think he'd been given a shot last season?

If Tennessee don't do something to improve speed in the secondary, it doesn't matter a whole lot what they do elsewhere. Big plays will continue. Stopping those is Job 1

 

[jakez4ut]

If Warrior had corner skills don't you think he'd been given a shot last season?

If Tennessee don't do something to improve speed in the secondary, it doesn't matter a whole lot what they do elsewhere. Big plays will continue. Stopping those is Job 1

I'd be amazing how many fewer big plays there'd be if we could stop the run and pressure a qb on 2nd & 3rd and long.

It's not ALL on the secondary. And yes they were not good. So I'm not disputing that.

 

[CashvilleVols]

I don’t.

I agree with 3-4 :good!:

 

[butchna]

UT has pretty much nothing at WR... and folks want to see Byrd and Jennings moved to the secondary?

I think Jennings is cemented at #1 WR for us...don't see the same for Byrd.

 

[LittleVol]

That's 1-deep. You need 3 deep... and that's before you consider that Jones has had above average injury rates at UT.

Sure. At least two deep.

But not even Bama runs 3- 4 all game.

Back to your point though. We still have to recruit more impact players.

There's some guys... taken up spots.

 

[VolDaddy61]

UT has pretty much nothing at WR... and folks want to see Byrd and Jennings moved to the secondary?

I said "if we had depth at the wr position", I'd like to see Jennings there. I wouldn't be opposed to Jennings seeing time on both sides of the ball. I think has the "stones" to pull that off.

 

[dan4vols]

Suprising how well anyone can coach when the players have position integrity and execution discipline. Missed tackles, slow lateral quickness to sidelines, not playin the ball deep.

 

[TNJOKER]

What do you think will be the best way to improve the D? I understand the upgrade at secondary coach, do you think Thigpen and Stripling survive? I may be alone in my thinking that it wasn't the pass D that was the problem last year but rather the Run Defense. I do think health will help but the rushing D was bad way before the injury bug. Heck, gave up 100 yd rushers to Appy St and VT. In the SEC, gave up almost 37 ppg, 280+ yds rushing per game.

Fixes? Maybe recruiting might help on the front 7? I do like Ignont at LB, think he will do well, perhaps all-SEC level. I think Tuttle being healthy would be a huge boost, if he is 100%, he didn't look it even before he got hurt again. I expect BIG things from McKenzie and Kongbo, expect them to step up.

Think recruiting fixes it, coaching changes fixes it, or just maturation from younger players can fix it? Either way, it starts next year in the front 7 on D if Tn is to win the East.

I think the biggest issues we had was not necessarily the play calling but the execution.. the fundamentals were off enough to cost us games.. S & C was a huuuge factor on both sides of the ball.

 

[Remy]

Suprising how well anyone can coach when the players have position integrity and execution discipline. Missed tackles, slow lateral quickness to sidelines, not playin the ball deep.

THIS!!! "not playin the ball deep" I was astounded throughout the last season to see our safeties trailing receivers or worse without even blitzing them not even see them in the tv picture as a receiver was going downfield.

THEY ARE CALLED "safeties" for a reason. Nobody is supposed to ever get deeper than at least one of your safeties, yet it was routine against our D last year. We have to get that cleaned up IMO.