Can we find two-deep SEC corner/safeties out of 17 prospects?

[JIHawg]

from last year's roster and our two new guys:

DJ Dean, Henre' Tolliver, Nate Dalton, Santos Ramirez, Ryan Pulley, Willie Sykes, Cornelius Floyd, Ryder Lucas, Matt Dodson, Josh Liddell, Jared Collins, De'Andre Coley, Kevin Richardson, Scotty Thurmon, Reid Miller, Byron Keaton, Deon Edwards, Micahh Smith

Pulley and Sykes from last year's recruiting class were highly rated.  Will they prove to be as advertised to go with our starters from last year?  Can we find eight SEC caliber players in this group?

[bigdaddyhawg]

Maybe.  Coaches have got to earn their pay now, though.  No plug and play types came in this round.

[bigdaddyhawg]

IMO the defense is going to rest on whether they get it or not.

[onebadrubi]

Well, you will have two corners with three years experience and have shown to be above average in coverage skills with Collins and Dean.  You have Toliver who has shown he also has well above average coverage skills and great tackling abilities.  You saw Richardson and Liddell really come on strong as safeties last year. 

We also saw anothery guy start getting his head involved in plays late in the year, I can't remember who it was.  Pulley or Sykes I believe.  His play in practice was so good they couldn't keep him off the field. 

Floyd is suppose to be a good one as well but didn't get to see anything from him last year because of injury I believe.  We are ok as far as numbers next year, but we really needed another one or two in this class for after the 2016 season.  This will be the position of concern like LB was this previous year.  Between the below list we should be able to have a 2 deep competition that gives us a more than serviceable starting line up.

Dean
Collins
Toliver
PUlley
Sykes
Ramirez
Liddell
Richardson

The rest are really going to have to step up to crack the two deep, and this would be very beneficial if they did.   

[Bacon_Bitz]

I love all these guys for being hogs and think there's some potential here but it's amazing that Toliver is the only high 3-star/4-star DB we have signed in the past three years.

[Tim Harris]

CB we look to be ok as long as no one gets hurts.  We have 4 guys with experience and all have played well at times.

S we have Liddell, Ramirez, and Richardson with experience.  They each have things they do good and bad.  We need at least 1 other guy to step up to have an actual 2 deep.

[Hogsolo]

You don't have to have five stars everywhere to have good defensive backs.

Once again check out the number of DB's Boise State has put into the NFL.  None were four stars at all.

[buldozer]

We are not OK in the defensive backfield unless a complete makeover happens in the off season some how. Last year, other than the occasional exception, our group lost the battle every time they faced an accurate qb with decent receivers. This was our single biggest weakness on the team and was the area that would have most easily prevented each of our losses. Not picking up any blue chip talent in this area in this recruiting class seems to be our biggest deficiency. Hopefully the coach can yet pick up a couple of players in this area of need before fall to add to our maturing group...

[DeltaBoy]

The Staff got to Coach those boys up bottom line.

[ricepig]

We are not OK in the defensive backfield unless a complete makeover happens in the off season some how. Last year, other than the occasional exception, our group lost the battle every time they faced an accurate qb with decent receivers. This was our single biggest weakness on the team and was the area that would have most easily prevented each of our losses. Not picking up any blue chip talent in this area in this recruiting class seems to be our biggest deficiency. Hopefully the coach can yet pick up a couple of players in this area of need before fall to add to our maturing group...

Very doubtful, any graduate DB would be applying himself for the draft. I'm sure Putu caught them off guard, but I doubt Fulton did.

[Tim Harris]

The Staff got to Coach those boys up bottom line.

After reading this thread my biggest question is out of Delta's 60,000+ posts has he ever had one that was more than sentence?

[BigD94]

I think a lot of it had to do with a lack of pass rush last year, that made our secondary look worse than they really are. Granted, these guys are not all world players, but with a hopefully improved pass rush next year, it will make things better all around.

[onebadrubi]

We are not OK in the defensive backfield unless a complete makeover happens in the off season some how. Last year, other than the occasional exception, our group lost the battle every time they faced an accurate qb with decent receivers. This was our single biggest weakness on the team and was the area that would have most easily prevented each of our losses. Not picking up any blue chip talent in this area in this recruiting class seems to be our biggest deficiency. Hopefully the coach can yet pick up a couple of players in this area of need before fall to add to our maturing group...

We were not picked apart outside the numbers.  We were gashed up the seams and right over the LB'ers heads.  You can't just lay the blame at the DB's feet for all of that.  Early on we had ZERO pash rush.  You can not give teh likes of Chad Kelly and other SEC QB's 5 seconds to find future first and second round wr's.  That's not entirely on the DB's. 

A collective part of better rush with Wise, johnson, and the rest of the dline with hopefully Greenlaw taking a huge step forward in coverage will help the DB's.  You might often here of a coverage sack, well it goes the other way too.  You can't expect DB's to keep their guys covered for 10 seconds.

[RaisinHog]

I think a lot of it had to do with a lack of pass rush last year, that made our secondary look worse than they really are. Granted, these guys are not all world players, but with a hopefully improved pass rush next year, it will make things better all around.

This!! It was the same group plus Allen Turner that was prolly the best our secondary has been in my lifetime in 2014 the lack of pass rush made them look terrible in 15 ... No one can cover someone for 10 freaking seconds

[ballinhog]

I think we need to take a page from Alabama and put some corner type guys at safety. With all the passing these days you need cover guys back there almost as much as you need them at corner

[passinghog]

The secondary has the talent. CBB and CRS must find a way to get more aggressive with our pass rush. Gotta find 2 edge rushers. I thought our DEs were too heavy and slow this year, aside from Deatrich. Wouldn't mind everyone on the D-line losing 10-15 pounds to regain some quickness.

[Sir Oinksalot]

from last year's roster and our two new guys:

DJ Dean, Henre' Tolliver, Nate Dalton, Santos Ramirez, Ryan Pulley, Willie Sykes, Cornelius Floyd, Ryder Lucas, Matt Dodson, Josh Liddell, Jared Collins, De'Andre Coley, Kevin Richardson, Scotty Thurmon, Reid Miller, Byron Keaton, Deon Edwards, Micahh Smith

Pulley and Sykes from last year's recruiting class were highly rated.  Will they prove to be as advertised to go with our starters from last year?  Can we find eight SEC caliber players in this group?

...it's the real question to be answered as it pertains to whether we survive

or we get eaten...my bet is that as we look right now,

we get eaten in this area...but, not as much

As last year...

[Cinco de Hogo]

Ya'll need to let each unit stand on its own and quit defending it by blame another unit.  Each unit has its pluses and minuses.  Secondary players are left on an island by themselves a lot.  They must have the athletic ability and skills to handle the job.  Even with a decent pass rush a good QB can find a reciever.  That is when the rubber meets the road.  Is the DB good enough to be "there" when the ball arrives.  The second part of the season our own offense made teams pay with a great passing offense.  It's a tough position to play.  Putting players at a disadvantage by laying five to ten yards off is conceding too much ground.  It's very hard to win the battles that way.  Regardless of any other unit you only give up that much if you don't have confidence in your players abilities.  That tells me something right there.

[Pig In The City]

I was impressed with Richardson and not so much with the rest that played.

[afhogfan1980]

Pully got beat multiple times in the Toledo game on slants and curls worst part it was obvious they were going to his wideout every time don't believe me go back and rematch the game

[ballhogger]

Our secondary is no Alabama, or Florida but I think the best Secondary is a great pass rush.  Look at what happened the other night in the super bowl.  Denver brought some serious gas on Cam and it affected him when they sacked him and when they didn't sack him.  If you are able to bring that much pressure on a passer then it can cause him to make bad decisions.  We are not an attacking defense and we do not blitz that much.  This means the QB is going to have a little more time to throw the ball typically But it also means that we are going to be in position to play sound gap football.  This is probably why we are better at stopping the run than most.

[cardinalandwhite]

Ya'll need to let each unit stand on its own and quit defending it by blame another unit.  Each unit has its pluses and minuses.  Secondary players are left on an island by themselves a lot.  They must have the athletic ability and skills to handle the job.  Even with a decent pass rush a good QB can find a reciever.  That is when the rubber meets the road.  Is the DB good enough to be "there" when the ball arrives.  The second part of the season our own offense made teams pay with a great passing offense.  It's a tough position to play.  Putting players at a disadvantage by laying five to ten yards off is conceding too much ground.  It's very hard to win the battles that way.  Regardless of any other unit you only give up that much if you don't have confidence in your players abilities.  That tells me something right there.

It looked like we had a secondary that wasn't especially good, and compounded that with a weak pass rush. That'll kill you. And, without a good passes rush you have to give a cushion or it's only a matter of time until you give up a 60 yard bomb.

[Oklahawg]

Injuries mattered a lot last year. DJ Dean was barely healthy the last 2/3rds of the year. Floyd was counted on heavily and was out for the year. Others had dings from time to time.

They had bodies to rotate so they used DB to cover scheme-wise for the lack of LB bodies. Ellis and Greenlaw were gassed playing every play and were much more limited in coverage than they would be if there was a replacement for them. Even for a few plays.

The biggest addition to the DB room is...Sosa Agim. A legit speed rush threat that was missing last year. Guidry and Capps add bull rush DT help also. Again, a missing threat from last year.

The calculation by the staff is obvious: we have a limited number of scholies (looks like 22 or 23 max was right after all) and they invested in DL and LB first. Swung and missed on a couple of high-end DBs who they'd have taken if it worked out.

There are bodies and there is talent. Not sure they are optimized for what we have to do but they are there. Optimized: some tweeners. Ramirez might be a hybrid OLB/S (ah, a Zac Painter or Ross Rasner or Jerico Nelson moment). Richardson in particular seems caught halfway between safety and corner. Curious is we see some flipping of spots, or if we'll deal with that schematically.

[a0ashle]

What changed between 2014 and 2015, we really kept most our defensive backfield, but lost big on our front 7. Knowing that, we have our answers.

[bigdaddyhawg]

What changed between 2014 and 2015, we really kept most our defensive backfield, but lost big on our front 7. Knowing that, we have our answers.

We also lost Alan Turner, a guy who was not given much respect by most on here, but whose absence played a part in the demise of our pass defense last fall.

[RaisinHog]

Pully got beat multiple times in the Toledo game on slants and curls worst part it was obvious they were going to his wideout every time don't believe me go back and rematch the game

No thanks I wana block that game out of my memory

[nwahogfan1]

CB we look to be ok as long as no one gets hurts.  We have 4 guys with experience and all have played well at times.

S we have Liddell, Ramirez, and Richardson with experience.  They each have things they do good and bad.  We need at least 1 other guy to step up to have an actual 2 deep.

Tim, our DBs and specifically our CBs have played good at times but also bad at times especially tackling in space.  But tackling at times is not good enough.  All it takes is one miss tackle out on the edge and you give up a score.  So we need very high consistency on the back end.   We are recruiting better at S and CB but we are not bring in 4/5 star kids so we have to develop kids and coach them up.  We now have a very good core group but are they good enough.  I hope Smith does not have to play his give, give and give some more defenses last year hoping our guys will force a TO.  I want our Defense to get in their faces of our opponent and force them to make mistakes and not hope in a 15 play drive the offense will self destruct.