LunchTime said:

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Bear8 said:

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I was a bit shocked this morning on the ESPN show "Get Up," hosted by Mike Greenberg. Mike was interviewing Paul Finebaum on the game. If you don't know, Finebaum is the sports broadcaster/journalist closest to the Bama football program and something of a rooter for Sabin. Quoting Finebaum as close as I can: "Tosh Lupoi is the worst defensive coordinator that Saban has ever had." He then cited several previous DCs such as Jeremy Pruitt, Kirby Smart and Dabo Swinney.

Us Cal fans knew that Tosh was probably above his pay grade as DC, but to hear it from a knowledgeable insider such as Finebaum was something of a shock. It should also quiet those on this Board who want to bring him back and reward Lupoi with the DC job.

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Worst Saban has had isnt really a great knock. I mean, the poorest billionaire is still a billionaire.


Dabo wasnt DC. Either you are mistaken, I am, or Finebaum is.

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WR/TE coach and not under Saban

MSaviolives said:

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Tosh blew it by not relying on his go-to defensive stopper: instruct his players to fake injuries/leg cramps...

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You mean Tedford's go-to defensive stopper

Bear19 said:

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Here is the comment Saban made about the failed fake field goal. Note that he's unafraid to throw his players under the bus, unlike Wilcox:

"I think it was a poor decision on my part not to kick the field goal the first drive of the second half. We thought we had a really, really good fake, and somebody didn't block the guy they were supposed to block, so it didn't work, so it was a bad call. It's always that way."

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If he thinks that was a good play, he might have hit his head before the game

>Tosh as a DC, with that much talent at his disposal, not an impressive showing.

According to that logic, Bama's OC should also be fired since he only put up 16 pts with an overload of talent.

As someone else mentioned, even if Tosh and Bama do part ways, Cal couldn't afford Tosh, even as a position coach. Georgia, Texas, or some other deep pocketed team would snap him up at his $1 mill salary just as a recruiter. We can't even pay a DC/OC that.

Yogi Bear said:

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LunchTime said:

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Bear8 said:

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I was a bit shocked this morning on the ESPN show "Get Up," hosted by Mike Greenberg. Mike was interviewing Paul Finebaum on the game. If you don't know, Finebaum is the sports broadcaster/journalist closest to the Bama football program and something of a rooter for Sabin. Quoting Finebaum as close as I can: "Tosh Lupoi is the worst defensive coordinator that Saban has ever had." He then cited several previous DCs such as Jeremy Pruitt, Kirby Smart and Dabo Swinney.

Us Cal fans knew that Tosh was probably above his pay grade as DC, but to hear it from a knowledgeable insider such as Finebaum was something of a shock. It should also quiet those on this Board who want to bring him back and reward Lupoi with the DC job.

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Worst Saban has had isnt really a great knock. I mean, the poorest billionaire is still a billionaire.


Dabo wasnt DC. Either you are mistaken, I am, or Finebaum is.

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WR/TE coach and not under Saban

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Dabo is the best example that you don't need to be an amazing coordinator or even position coach to be a great HC.

packawana said:

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Yogi Bear said:

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LunchTime said:

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Bear8 said:

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I was a bit shocked this morning on the ESPN show "Get Up," hosted by Mike Greenberg. Mike was interviewing Paul Finebaum on the game. If you don't know, Finebaum is the sports broadcaster/journalist closest to the Bama football program and something of a rooter for Sabin. Quoting Finebaum as close as I can: "Tosh Lupoi is the worst defensive coordinator that Saban has ever had." He then cited several previous DCs such as Jeremy Pruitt, Kirby Smart and Dabo Swinney.

Us Cal fans knew that Tosh was probably above his pay grade as DC, but to hear it from a knowledgeable insider such as Finebaum was something of a shock. It should also quiet those on this Board who want to bring him back and reward Lupoi with the DC job.

---

Worst Saban has had isnt really a great knock. I mean, the poorest billionaire is still a billionaire.


Dabo wasnt DC. Either you are mistaken, I am, or Finebaum is.

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WR/TE coach and not under Saban

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Dabo is the best example that you don't need to be an amazing coordinator or even position coach to be a great HC.

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He's probably an exception to some sort of rule. What makes him interesting is that he was essentially a Tosh offensive coach before getting a head job, which makes me wonder if Tosh would be capable of doing a good head coaching job despite not being a good X and O guy. In Swinney's favor, he was on the SEC All Academic squad and got an MBA, so he's pretty darn intelligent. I couldn't speak for Tosh in that regard.

Cal84 said:

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>Tosh as a DC, with that much talent at his disposal, not an impressive showing.

According to that logic, Bama's OC should also be fired since he only put up 16 pts with an overload of talent.

As someone else mentioned, even if Tosh and Bama do part ways, Cal couldn't afford Tosh, even as a position coach. Georgia, Texas, or some other deep pocketed team would snap him up at his $1 mill salary just as a recruiter. We can't even pay a DC/OC that.

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Indeed, Clemson's D snuffed them out. Unlike Alabama's D that took a notable step backwards in 2018 under Tosh, Clemson's was the best in the nation - and it showed.

Scoring D = #1
Yards per play allowed = #2

When looking at conference games only, Clemson's D was number one in both.

Tosh's D, as measured by yards per play allowed and scoring, was the worst one for the Crimson Tide in a very long time. I went back to 2009, and the 2018 season was by far the worst. Found another source of data and it looks like this Alabama D was worst since 2007.

There is zero case to be made that Tosh, at this point in his career, is a good DC. His first season with complete control of the Alabama D produced the worst Crimson Tide D in over a decade and an epoch defensive collapse in the national championship game.

Oh, and far as Alabama's OC goes, that maybe he's not so good either... He didn't produce the worst Crimson Tide offense in over a decade. To the contrary, one of the best in the nation:

Scoring = #3
Yards per play = #2

While production in the national championship game sucked, the body of work for the entire season, about as good as it gets. And, that Clemson team on average was giving-up 13 ppg. Alabama's offense did manage a bit more... And did so with a total of 443 yards, crushing the average of what Clemson had been yielding.

The Alabama offense met the best D in the nation and it was very much slowed, but it generated yards and other offensive metrics far above what Clemson's D averages.

This loss is predominantly on the D.

Regarding the Clemson DC...he had his own troubles back in the mid 2000s for OU when USC crushed them in the national title game. You live and learn. Re Tosh, I'd love to get paid $1 million per year to learn my job. On the flip side, I probably can't recruit like Tosh. Heck, I can't even get my own kids let alone random 18 year olds to take my advice.

Cal89 said:

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wifeisafurd said:

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Cal89 said:

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We all realize Clemson has one of the best offenses, but several of their opponents contained them better than Alabama, and not just Notre Dame....

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Versus Notre Dame

523 yards, 30 points scored, Lawrence pulled for most of 4th quarter

Versus Alabama

482 yards, 37 points scored. Lawrence pulled in last set of downs

That really doesn't look like better containment.

I'm not sure what schedule comparisons get you. Cal held WSU to 19 points. Does that mean Colorado, Arizona and UCLA had the better offenses? Too many variables to consider. If you subtract the score for the extra game, Alabama's defense was the 3rd best defense for Bama over the last 5 years in terms of points yielded. Not badwhen you consider how Alabama has played the last 5 years.

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I believe it was passing yards and yards per attempt that I was looking at with respect to ND. More noteworthy were the likes of Ga Tech and Syracuse Ds, with their rosters of top 40 and top 60 classes respectively. Those Ds with much less recruited talent did better than Alabama's against Clemson. The upside of good coaching... and our D is very much in that discussion (over-delivering). Texas A&M's D's also did relatively better.

Alabama's D was not a suffocating one in 2018. Not even top 20 in yards/play allowed (we were top 10). In 2017, Alabama's D was number 1, by far, at less than 4 yards per play! Scoring D, also number 1 in 2017. Nearly a TD worse this year...

The early returns on Tosh as a DC are not very compelling.

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You mean the Notre Dame team that gave up a whole 20 less yards passing? Really?

Again, trying to do schedule match-ups really don't work, unless you really believe the results they achieve, such as WSU was by worse offense then say UCLA or Colorado or other anomalies that arise when looking at a unit based on a single game. You really have to look at the season's body of work and draw comparisons. You want to ignore how this defense stacked-up against other defenses over a season, fine. Saban, like other coaches such as Wilcox, will look at the overall season and who they must beat, and make decisions. That is why Sabsan is where he is, and we are on internet boards.

Yogi Bear said:

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Bear19 said:

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Here is the comment Saban made about the failed fake field goal. Note that he's unafraid to throw his players under the bus, unlike Wilcox:

"I think it was a poor decision on my part not to kick the field goal the first drive of the second half. We thought we had a really, really good fake, and somebody didn't block the guy they were supposed to block, so it didn't work, so it was a bad call. It's always that way."

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If he thinks that was a good play, he might have hit his head before the game

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Maybe the play didn't work because Clemson figured it was going to be a fake, and dropped five defenders off the line before the snap?

There have been well-designed fake punt or FG attempts in the past that included something Bama apparently didn't include in this play: The player who is "in charge" of the fake reads the defense before the play and calls time out (or just punts, if it's the punter) if it looks like the defense isn't fooled.

wifeisafurd said:

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Cal89 said:

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wifeisafurd said:

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Cal89 said:

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We all realize Clemson has one of the best offenses, but several of their opponents contained them better than Alabama, and not just Notre Dame....

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Versus Notre Dame

523 yards, 30 points scored, Lawrence pulled for most of 4th quarter

Versus Alabama

482 yards, 37 points scored. Lawrence pulled in last set of downs

That really doesn't look like better containment.

I'm not sure what schedule comparisons get you. Cal held WSU to 19 points. Does that mean Colorado, Arizona and UCLA had the better offenses? Too many variables to consider. If you subtract the score for the extra game, Alabama's defense was the 3rd best defense for Bama over the last 5 years in terms of points yielded. Not badwhen you consider how Alabama has played the last 5 years.

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I believe it was passing yards and yards per attempt that I was looking at with respect to ND. More noteworthy were the likes of Ga Tech and Syracuse Ds, with their rosters of top 40 and top 60 classes respectively. Those Ds with much less recruited talent did better than Alabama's against Clemson. The upside of good coaching... and our D is very much in that discussion (over-delivering). Texas A&M's D's also did relatively better.

Alabama's D was not a suffocating one in 2018. Not even top 20 in yards/play allowed (we were top 10). In 2017, Alabama's D was number 1, by far, at less than 4 yards per play! Scoring D, also number 1 in 2017. Nearly a TD worse this year...

The early returns on Tosh as a DC are not very compelling.

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You mean the Notre Dame team that gave up a whole 20 less yards passing? Really?

Again, trying to do schedule match-ups really don't work, unless you really believe the results they achieve, such as WSU was by worse offense then say UCLA or Colorado or other anomalies that arise when looking at a unit based on a single game. You really have to look at the season's body of work and draw comparisons. You want to ignore how this defense stacked-up against other defenses over a season, fine. Saban, like other coaches such as Wilcox, will look at the overall season and who they must beat, and make decisions. That is why Sabsan is where he is, and we are on internet boards.

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ND is not the best example (but most recent) and when taking such a game approach, I should have focused on the teams that did better, and with less recruited talent on the roster.

As noted above, when looking at the entire season's defensive results, compared to past ones, indicates that this Alabama D was its worst one in a very long time.

BearSD said:

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Yogi Bear said:

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Bear19 said:

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Here is the comment Saban made about the failed fake field goal. Note that he's unafraid to throw his players under the bus, unlike Wilcox:

"I think it was a poor decision on my part not to kick the field goal the first drive of the second half. We thought we had a really, really good fake, and somebody didn't block the guy they were supposed to block, so it didn't work, so it was a bad call. It's always that way."

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If he thinks that was a good play, he might have hit his head before the game

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Maybe the play didn't work because Clemson figured it was going to be a fake, and dropped five defenders off the line before the snap?

There have been well-designed fake punt or FG attempts in the past that included something Bama apparently didn't include in this play: The player who is "in charge" of the fake reads the defense before the play and calls time out (or just punts, if it's the punter) if it looks like the defense isn't fooled.

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The fake punt was a weird play but a block was definitely missed. Watch the replay: a nice double team block blew a big hold on the run side. But the center and guard sort of half-blocked the guy over center and he got through and made the tackle. The two blockers almost looked like they were expecting some other play. But having your kicker be the lead blocker on a run play on 4th and 6 is a bad call.

When criticizing Saban's defense or its offense be aware that the 2018 NFL draft included 12 Tide players. Both sides of the ball were affected.

ttps://rolltide.com/news/2018/4/28/alabama-football-finishes-with-a-record-12-players-selected-in-2018-nfl-draft.aspx

Meanwhile, Clemson only gave up three players to the 2018 draft and some of its top players committed to return to school.
ttps://www.independentmail.com/story/sports/college/clemson/football/2018/04/27/nfl-draft-2018-breaking-down-former-clemson-players-new-nfl-homes/5452720

Bear8 said:

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When criticizing Saban's defense or its offense be aware that the 2018 NFL draft included 12 Tide players. Both sides of the ball were affected.

ttps://rolltide.com/news/2018/4/28/alabama-football-finishes-with-a-record-12-players-selected-in-2018-nfl-draft.aspx

Meanwhile, Clemson only gave up three players to the 2018 draft and some of its top players committed to return to school.
ttps://www.independentmail.com/story/sports/college/clemson/football/2018/04/27/nfl-draft-2018-breaking-down-former-clemson-players-new-nfl-homes/5452720

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That is VERY compelling and I imagine quite contributory to the team's performance on defense. Looks like eight of those guys from the D too... They had 10 drafted the year earlier, eight of those on D. And the D was still #1 in 2017. We'll see how many this year...

Overall going into 2018, Steele had Alabama at #50 with returning experience...

https://philsteele.com/2018/07/02/2018-experience-chart-pg-29-of-2018-college-magazine/

82gradDLSdad said:

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The fake punt was a weird play but a block was definitely missed. Watch the replay: a nice double team block blew a big hold on the run side. But the center and guard sort of half-blocked the guy over center and he got through and made the tackle. The two blockers almost looked like they were expecting some other play. But having your kicker be the lead blocker on a run play on 4th and 6 is a bad call.

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The Clemson defender went through 3 guys (center, guard, & tackle). Even if he was blocked, I believe the runner would've been stop a yard short. What made it bad call was that Clemson was in a standard defense so there was no element of surprise.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/01/07/alabama-fake-field-goal-fails-spectacularly-in-national-championship/23636737/

If Tosh stays it's for his recruiting, not coaching.

calBlitz said:

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82gradDLSdad said:

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Agree about it being a bad call


The fake punt was a weird play but a block was definitely missed. Watch the replay: a nice double team block blew a big hold on the run side. But the center and guard sort of half-blocked the guy over center and he got through and made the tackle. The two blockers almost looked like they were expecting some other play. But having your kicker be the lead blocker on a run play on 4th and 6 is a bad call.

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The Clemson defender went through 3 guys (center, guard, & tackle). Even if he was blocked, I believe the runner would've been stop a yard short. What made it bad call was that Clemson was in a standard defense so there was no element of surprise.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/01/07/alabama-fake-field-goal-fails-spectacularly-in-national-championship/23636737/

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calBlitz said:

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82gradDLSdad said:

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The fake punt was a weird play but a block was definitely missed. Watch the replay: a nice double team block blew a big hold on the run side. But the center and guard sort of half-blocked the guy over center and he got through and made the tackle. The two blockers almost looked like they were expecting some other play. But having your kicker be the lead blocker on a run play on 4th and 6 is a bad call.

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The Clemson defender went through 3 guys (center, guard, & tackle). Even if he was blocked, I believe the runner would've been stop a yard short. What made it bad call was that Clemson was in a standard defense so there was no element of surprise.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/01/07/alabama-fake-field-goal-fails-spectacularly-in-national-championship/23636737/

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Right. It should have been part of the play that the holder checks the defense, and if Clemson is in a regular defense and not a FG defense, the holder decides to abort the fake, either by calling time out or switching to an actual FG try.

A fun fact...

Lupoi is now the senior assistant on Saban's staff. He is the only assistant coach left from the 2016 group. Saban has now lost 17 assistants since 2015, including four this year (all on the offensive side of the ball).

Many get promoted, some leave for lateral jobs and some are asked to move on. Evidently, he is a very difficult boss......

BearSD said:

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calBlitz said:

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82gradDLSdad said:

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The fake punt was a weird play but a block was definitely missed. Watch the replay: a nice double team block blew a big hold on the run side. But the center and guard sort of half-blocked the guy over center and he got through and made the tackle. The two blockers almost looked like they were expecting some other play. But having your kicker be the lead blocker on a run play on 4th and 6 is a bad call.

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The Clemson defender went through 3 guys (center, guard, & tackle). Even if he was blocked, I believe the runner would've been stop a yard short. What made it bad call was that Clemson was in a standard defense so there was no element of surprise.

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2019/01/07/alabama-fake-field-goal-fails-spectacularly-in-national-championship/23636737/

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Right. It should have been part of the play that the holder checks the defense, and if Clemson is in a regular defense and not a FG defense, the holder decides to abort the fake, either by calling time out or switching to an actual FG try.

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I'm going to take this another direction. If you are ahead two scores, why would you ever not be in standard defense? You rarely block a kick. 3 points doesn't hurt much. Give them the field goal to ensure no touchdown.