Safety play

[collegestationhog]

I noticed our corners didn't play as bad as I originally thought.  Most of the big pass plays Auburn had came against our safeties.  Turner and Gaines got abused yesterday. Is Auburn That good or are our safeties that Bad.

[TNRazorbacker]

Auburn is good but we made them look superhuman.  Mostly because we are atrociously bad. This isn't a difficult assessment considering its been the same story for the past several seasons.  Auburn averaged 20 yards a completion. Many of the passes were caught wide open over the center of the field, nobody within 10 yards.

[bennyl08]

We need Coley inserted into the lineup. Turner looked a lot better than I remember him last year, but Gaines stood out on some bad plays.

[ap89]

tigers hit a lot over the middle on 3rd down. and hogs were 20% on third down. to me the biggest difference in the game. and our lousy tackling

[Letsroll1200]

I believe our safety play and our linebacker play is below winning SEC standard. We have to recruit out of it to be able to compete in the SEC. I don't know what happen with Peters but losing him hurt us.

[tophawg19]

4 of the top 13 in tackles are hogs .

[sowmonella]

26 had a rough game yesterday.

[pigskenG]

I thought the DB's looked just like last year. New coaches and still look the same. So I'm guessing it's not coaching, we seriously need to recruit some fast, hard hitting, man to man cover DB's, We need some help at DB and LB. I hope we don't go through this year making the other teams QB look like a Heisman candidate. The LB's played well for a while but no depth, started getting blocked out of the play. Offense . . I like the OL and TE's. We need to throw to the TE's more. Why not try Sprinkle as a WR ? The OL is only going to get better. B Allen reminds me of Casey Dick. No zip on the ball and no passes across the middle. Our WR's have to find a way to get open, catch the ball, and block when needed, that's what WR's do.  I watched part of the Wisc - LSU game. Wisc looked a lot sharper than us. Our time will come, I was hoping it would be this year.

[Quickdraw]

I believe our safety play and our linebacker play is below winning SEC standard. We have to recruit out of it to be able to compete in the SEC. I don't know what happen with Peters but losing him hurt us.

I agree! Steve Spurrier made a statement about Arkansas when they hired CBB. He said the only way Brett gets out of this mess he inherited is to recruit his way out of it. And we see it on the field. CBB says he has a plan and if your paying attention you see in work. Year #4 will be a good year for the hogs, just have to be patient.

[hoghiker]

Coates was covered a few times yesterday. He just went for the ball and got it. Bigger stronger faster.

[The Hogfather]

Coates was covered a few times yesterday. He just went for the ball and got it. Bigger stronger faster.

It was Williams.  Coates had 1 catch.  We did a really good job on Coates.

[hhicNaychaBoi]

Did we have a safety on the field Saturday? Auburn torched the middle of the field at will. Had a ken Hamlin or Kennoy Kennedy been back there it would have been some head ringing going on! Did the safeties make any tackles or deflect any passes? Their play has got to improve, maybe thats the reason the corners continue to play off the los so much. You can't press when you know you don't have immediate help.

[LJHOG]

4 of the top 13 in tackles are hogs .

which means the defense can't get off the field.  how many 3rd and long situtations did Auburn covert.  I quit counting at 4 and was unable to watch the 2nd half.

[onebadrubi]

It was Williams.  Coates had 1 catch.  We did a really good job on Coates.

This is something people aren't mentioning.  We shut down their number 1 receiver.  Just at the cost of opening up their number 1 recruited receiver, who by the way made some good catches and plays of his own. 

The best secondary's will have problems covering Coates, Williams, and that other guy that caught that bad throw, all IF Marshall can throw.  He's not a very good passing QB.

[hoghiker]

It was Williams.  Coates had 1 catch.  We did a really good job on Coates.

mmmh. I stand corrected. Whoever it was. They caught the ball.

[jackflash]

We are going to have to get faster at the Safety position.

[TNRazorbacker]

Did we have a safety on the field Saturday? Auburn torched the middle of the field at will. Had a ken Hamlin or Kennoy Kennedy been back there it would have been some head ringing going on! Did the safeties make any tackles or deflect any passes? Their play has got to improve, maybe thats the reason the corners continue to play off the los so much. You can't press when you know you don't have immediate help.

Add in Steve Atwater

[Cure]

We are going to have to get faster at the Safety position.

You mean safeties that PLAY faster.

[reddogjcss]

Don't for get that Auburns receivers will be playing in the NFL! We played a very good team

[The Hogfather]

I saw all I needed to when Gaines slowed up before hitting their WR on their 1st TD.  Had he run through the receiver, we're talking about, at worst, a medium gain.  Instead, he gave the receiver time to catch the ball, come down, then break the attempted tackle (which was extremely weak).  Good safeties don't do that.  Good safeties are headhunters.

[hawginbigd1]

I believe our safety play and our linebacker play is below winning SEC standard. We have to recruit out of it to be able to compete in the SEC. I don't know what happen with Peters but losing him hurt us.

+10000000

Pathetic safety and LB play is our problem, we are the college version of the cowboys! We suck at those 2 areas and they are just as important as the CB in pass coverage! The CB play is not great but it is light years ahead of the other 2!

[Medic821]

R. Gaines didn't have a good IMO.

[Bacons Rebellion]

4 of the top 13 in tackles are hogs .

Means we have no depth.

[PonderinHog]

I saw all I needed to when Gaines slowed up before hitting their WR on their 1st TD.  Had he run through the receiver, we're talking about, at worst, a medium gain.  Instead, he gave the receiver time to catch the ball, come down, then break the attempted tackle (which was extremely weak).  Good safeties don't do that.  Good safeties are headhunters.

Maybe he didn't want to knock himself out of the game again.

[daprospecta]

I saw all I needed to when Gaines slowed up before hitting their WR on their 1st TD.  Had he run through the receiver, we're talking about, at worst, a medium gain.  Instead, he gave the receiver time to catch the ball, come down, then break the attempted tackle (which was extremely weak).  Good safeties don't do that.  Good safeties are headhunters.

I saw this as well.  The Ken Hamlin's/Tony Bua's aren't a dime a dozen but hard hitting is a lifestyle as in they do it every play.  I can't tell you how many times butu would get yelled at practice for putting teammates on their ass. He only knew one speed and play style.   We have some players on this team that will bring the hat.  Spaights(spelled it right?) was hitting hard all game and while our secondary was beat often, I saw players swarming to the football. 

[The Hogfather]

I keep hearing over and over that Coley lights people up when he gets the chance.  I would love to see him out there.  I will live with some mistakes from guys like him because I know they have the speed and ability to make up for them.  That speed and ability also gives him the chance to make game changing plays, whether it is a big hit that jars a ball loose, a big hit that makes the receivers think again about coming over the middle to catch a ball, an interception, etc.

[dmaxfan]

I'd personally like to see them put Koliss Marshall back on defense. It's beyond idiotic to take personnel from an anemic defense and put them into an area we already have stacked with talent. 

[HawgTide]

I saw all I needed to when Gaines slowed up before hitting their WR on their 1st TD.  Had he run through the receiver, we're talking about, at worst, a medium gain.  Instead, he gave the receiver time to catch the ball, come down, then break the attempted tackle (which was extremely weak).  Good safeties don't do that.  Good safeties are headhunters.

I was expecting a bit hit there, instead he slowed down and whiffed. We need to start playing the younger safeties more.

[azhog10]

I noticed our corners didn't play as bad as I originally thought.  Most of the big pass plays Auburn had came against our safeties.  Turner and Gaines got abused yesterday. Is Auburn That good or are our safeties that Bad.

If we are going to single people out lets be better at it. If you go back and look Collins got picked on and burned more than Turner. The players that killed us on D was Gaines the most. His lack of tackling and coverage skills were absolutely horrendous. Collins got beats moded a few times and Washington had one pretty bad miss tackle. Besides that we were okay. We didn't handle the WR screens well at all IMO and we still played too far back. We had a designed CB blitz and Gaines was late coverting the WR and they got a TD off of it. If you are going to be aggressive then your back end guys have to be solid. Ours aren't which really hurts things.

I was also unimpressed by our DLine. I'm sure that part of what we were doing was playing soft to limit Marshalls running ability. However we weren't good at stopping the run at all. Our DE's still struggled to turn anyone up the middle. Seemed Marshall and the RB's were getting to the outside all day. Flowers may need a game or two to get back into shape. He looked very out of shape Saturday. Didn't look at all like a 1st Team SEC guy and nowhere close to a 1st round draft pick.

[azhog10]

+10000000

Pathetic safety and LB play is our problem, we are the college version of the cowboys! We suck at those 2 areas and they are just as important as the CB in pass coverage! The CB play is not great but it is light years ahead of the other 2!

LB's weren't good. But I will say, I saw on a lot of plays our LB's sitting on the outside and pretty much conceding the middle. I am not sure if that was by design and a Safety was supposed to fill the middle, or if we got mixed up between our LB's. But that really hurt us a few times on those option plays when no one was there to step up and take on the RB or QB.

[Pigdiana Jones]

OP, you say the safeties didn't play as bad as you originally thought, but most of the big pass plays happened against them. Which is it? They aren't bad, or they are bad?

[HF#1]

I say throw the young guys out there and see what happens.  We still have the worst in the country.

[Hog Fan...DOH!]

We don't have a Ken Hamlin or Kenoy Kennedy or even a Randy Kelly on this team.  Let's stop begging for one.  He's not there. 

Tevin Mitchell will add some better depth, and maybe improved play, at CB.  I hope. 

I don't know enough about football to figure out why the middle of the field was wide open for AU receivers.  Other than that we weren't expecting their back-up QB to be that good- or at least thought they would run a lot more rather than pass it 20 times in the first half- so our LBs were playing up, and our safeties are slow. 

Our D had too much to think about when Marshall came in, our O couldn't execute to buy time, and that was the ball game.

Oh, and credit to Auburn for being really good.

[The Hogfather]

I'd personally like to see them put Koliss Marshall back on defense. It's beyond idiotic to take personnel from an anemic defense and put them into an area we already have stacked with talent. 

I'm with you. 

[Hoggish1]

I believe our safety play and our linebacker play is below winning SEC standard.

I would not disagree about safety play (thus far), but our linebacker play is improved.

[HF#1]

I went back 4 years to look at our recruiting at this position..   It's quite pathetic...

2010
Daunte Carr
Darrell Smith
Rohan Gaines - Listed as Ath..  Petrino's favorite

2011
Brett Weir

2012
Defante Lowe

2013
Alex Brignoni (no longer playing)
De-Andre Coley
TQ Coleman

2014
K. Hackett
J. Liddell

We have recruited no talent in recent memory at this position.  This folks, is our last line of defense against the big play. 

[The Hogfather]

I went back 4 years to look at our recruiting at this position..   It's quite pathetic...

2010
Daunte Carr
Darrell Smith
Rohan Gaines - Listed as Ath..  Petrino's favorite

2011
Brett Weir

2012
Defante Lowe

2013
Alex Brignoni (no longer playing)
De-Andre Coley
TQ Coleman

2014
K. Hackett
J. Liddell

We have recruited no talent in recent memory at this position.  This folks, is our last line of defense against the big play. 

Wow....

[Cure]

We don't have a Ken Hamlin or Kenoy Kennedy or even a Randy Kelly on this team.  Let's stop begging for one.  He's not there. 

They do, they're both freshmen and hit harder than our current starters.

[PonderinHog]

They do, they're both freshmen and hit harder than our current starters.

When will we get to see them?

[jm]

Both. Auburn is good and we are that bad. I can't even reember the last time we  successfully defended a pass with tight coverage. It's been like this for atleast 5 years in my opinion.

[HF#1]

And we currently have 0 committed at that position for 2015.  I hope that changes.

[Cure]

When will we get to see them?

You'll see more of them this week I'm sure, no choice at this point. Safety play sunk the ship last weekend.

I haven't seen a team pick on a pair of safeties in the SEC like that in a long while.

[dmaxfan]

I went back 4 years to look at our recruiting at this position..   It's quite pathetic...

2010
Daunte Carr
Darrell Smith
Rohan Gaines - Listed as Ath..  Petrino's favorite

2011
Brett Weir

2012
Defante Lowe

2013
Alex Brignoni (no longer playing)
De-Andre Coley
TQ Coleman

2014
K. Hackett
J. Liddell

We have recruited no talent in recent memory at this position.  This folks, is our last line of defense against the big play. 

Wow....

+1

[Razordiddy]

I went back 4 years to look at our recruiting at this position..   It's quite pathetic...

2010
Daunte Carr
Darrell Smith
Rohan Gaines - Listed as Ath..  Petrino's favorite

2011
Brett Weir

2012
Defante Lowe

2013
Alex Brignoni (no longer playing)
De-Andre Coley
TQ Coleman

2014
K. Hackett
J. Liddell

We have recruited no talent in recent memory at this position.  This folks, is our last line of defense against the big play.

You left a few safety commits off your list:

2010
Eric Bennett
Alan Turner

2011
Kelvin Fisher Jr.
Jashaud Sims
Davyon McKinney

2014
Santos Ramirez

Your point still stands, however.

[HF#1]

You left a few safety commits off your list:

2010
Eric Bennett
Alan Turner

2011
Kelvin Fisher Jr.
Jashaud Sims
Davyon McKinney

2014
Santos Ramirez

Your point still stands, however.

They must have been listed as Athletes. 

[three hog night]

I keep hearing over and over that Coley lights people up when he gets the chance.  I would love to see him out there.  I will live with some mistakes from guys like him because I know they have the speed and ability to make up for them.  That speed and ability also gives him the chance to make game changing plays, whether it is a big hit that jarrs a ball loose, a big hit that makes the receivers think again about coming over the middle to catch a ball, an interception, etc.

Coley and Liddell have to play a lot these next 3 games.  We have fatigue issues that are killing us as much as talent.  Gaines and Turner have their issues but it gets worse when fatigue sets in.   We need a rotation badly before TT and A&M.

[onebadrubi]

Coley and Liddell have to play a lot these next 3 games.  We have fatigue issues that are killing us as much as talent.  Gaines and Turner have their issues but it gets worse when fatigue sets in.   We need a rotation badly before TT and A&M.

Friendly wager as I agree, I think the depth we are wanting comes right in the middle of that time period.  Regardless of safeties, after watching A&M and USC, our game with them will be won or lost on offense for us.  We will have to keep their D on the field for long scoring drives and their O in the sidelines.  A&M is going to score on us, that's all their is to it. 

[immahog]

our safties are that bad they would not start for another sec team (both 2 star players out of high school )

[Josh Goforth]

Did we have a safety on the field Saturday? Auburn torched the middle of the field at will. Had a ken Hamlin or Kennoy Kennedy been back there it would have been some head ringing going on! Did the safeties make any tackles or deflect any passes? Their play has got to improve, maybe thats the reason the corners continue to play off the los so much. You can't press when you know you don't have immediate help.

They cant press because they get manhandled by Sammie Coates, and D Williams and cant run with Louis. The Safetys were too deep because they had to cover the deep outside vertical routes. Put in a bind with the outside threat and a skinny post in the middle. A DC has two options drop linebackers deeper to take away between the hashes and keep the 2 deep safetys (and not be able to rush more than 4 and slower in run fit) or play a single deep safety (which Arkansas did rotate to some) and leave the corners 1 on 1 on the outside.

[jbu5]

What about J. Liddell? In a scrimmage, he made a couple of good breaks on the ball that he almost turned into interceptions. Would like to see him on the field against Nicholls.