Yes, the biggest bust ND had on defense yesterday was the wheel route to Jones for the TD. PSU runs more wheel concepts than anyone I have watched in recent memory. Andy K’s offense is way too cute and gadgety for my taste, but finding and exploiting matchups against LBs and safeties is one of the his staples. ND’s aggressiveness and man/cover 1 base is probably the exact matchup they are looking to go against from a scheme perspective. Allar’s ability to scramble and improvise is something to watch as well with all the man coverage Golden runs.
Best LB group in ND history
- Thread starter graceh90
- Start date
Nope. 24 hour rule isn't in play here since the game got delayed 19 hours ha. Celebration was for last night, back to work analyzing next opponent today!
We were lazy in coverage at times against their TEs, and georgia really does have a good group. Warren if you don't lose him shouldn't get much YAC, he just makes tough catches. But PSU constantly tries to scheme him to get him open in space and their RBs. They really believe in passes to their rbs, warren, and a few deep shots (to evans).
we did a lot of spying on stockton and the rbs well at times last night. We had one really bad series with like 3 or 4 busted plays. No clue what was going on. Georgia didn't do anything fancy.
But yes, our Lbs will have to cover swing passes really well
Evans being isolated on Gray is a big concern of mine. Allar has a strong enough arm to make deep throws to the wide side of the field and take advantage of Evans matching up with Gray or a slot defender in space.
evans isn't a good route runner, or getting off press, so he does most of his damage from the slot. But yeah, you can guarantee a shot or two deep to him. Allar throws a very high deep ball, hopefully it gives our safeties time. The big play vs boise was a bust by boise.
88 was the only team I could think of at the same level. I dont know if 24 is better than 88, but they are not worse.....
I just laughed when one GA player got in Bowens face after his tackle, then an OL said something to Drayk. Bowen is from Gary Andrean, nothing will faze him!
Such hypotheticals are fun. But I agree you really cannot compare eras. The only thing I will say with some conviction...in the modern era you minimally have to be a top athlete. Back in the day, you could compensate for some lack of speed, agility, and strength with sports IQ and team schema.
Some argue what if players back then had modern sport science. Yes, the top athletes would realize gains. But not the marginal athletes.
One more point: not every top player today would hang in the conditions of yesteryear. Some top players today are more athletic due to sports science they wouldn't have back then. I also think the game meted out more punishment back then, where some today wouldn't hang.
If you magically transported a peak 1970 vs peak 2024 team, the latter would easily win. But if you transport each to the era of the other with 1 year to practice and play as the other...the verdict is out.
Except when we were in a 5-1-5 with Bob Crable as the sole linebacker. Overall, Irish tackling has been stellar lately and has reminded me of Crable's sure tackling.
Best LB corp in a long time? Well sure. Best ever, no chance. Bolcar, Pritchett, and Stonebreaker in 88, along with Frank Stams, with 5 top 10 wins on the way to the Natty in 88.
Born in 1993 so didn’t get to see these guys. I read Lou Holtz’s book in reference to this season and I wish I could have seen these guys. I remember Stonebreaker being mentioned countless times.
Do you think this an all time LB core in CFB history?
They are definitely up there. Played a brutally hard schedule and won a natty
Totally agree. I immediately thought of Bowen when reading first paragraph. Some here have criticized his so-called lack of speed, but his football IQ and instincts get him to the ball carrier exceptionally quick, and crushing hits have him playing at an exceptionally high level. In my mind, he is the perfect blend of the characteristics of the two eras as you described them.
Soccer is where this really resonates.
Pele was a top athlete in the 60s and 70s. Could run 100 meters in 10 seconds. He'd reap modern gains.
Franz Beckenbauer a great defender of the same era said he would probably be much less competitive in the modern era...as even the best sports science would not improve his slow speed.
Modern day Messi, considered the best after Pele and Maradona, needed hormone treatments to build up a skinny body...and would have been brutally hacked to death back in their day, as he lacks their toughness.
Modern soccer has lighter balls, cleats, aerodynamically tuned to produce more goals...refs DEFINITELY protect players from violence now. I played at semipro with a lot of pros growing up...these guys drank, smoke, and had no special diets for the most part. The ones who focused on fitness really stood out...but not all were as talented.
I have seen that many times as a coach. You got one guy with high football IQ, understands assignment football, uses strong fundamental technique, but just an average athlete. Then you got another guy, great athlete/explosive, No understanding of what his assignment is, lost on every play. I would always play the former.
Who's the other guy, Jaylen Sneed? He's made some plays this year. Maybe his PFF grade isn't the highest.
Soccer doesn't resonate with me in any way, so when you mention soccer I don't bother reading.
If you read my post, you'd know that Sneed had nothing to do with my comment.
Oh shit, I'm sorry. I guess that must have been earlier in the thread. I thought maybe you didn't want to say, because you didn't want to talk shit about some ND player, but apparently you're quite happy to, I just missed it. Anyway, Sneed has come in for some scorn, but he seems to playing pretty good of late!
Yeah, it is difficult to compare players across rather large swathes of time, in fact it's purely imaginary. To the point of beyond even futility, just silliness. The best way to imagine it, perhaps, on the purely hypothetical plane, is to imagine some time warp or whatnot, that you travel to in an Einstein spaceship, and there's a football field, and a stadium all ready and waiting, or a basketball court, or a soccer field, and both sets of players, even though the guys from a previous generation are still alive in the form of like, 60 year old men or something, and then they just square off, and you really don't know what would happen, one just assumes the more modern players would win. Jordan vs Lebron is the most frequent example of this sort of thought exercise, even though basketball hasn't really changed that much at all. And I don't see any reason why prime Lebron kicks prime Jordan's ass.
The big thing that stands out is just a higher skill level, simply from practicing more, and in soccer players just have more ball skill now. The bar is higher. Like if you took Maradona vs Messi, which is about as perfect a hypothetical matchup with a pretty wide gulf of time separating them, Maradona to me looks more naturally gifted with just some special god given talent more than Messi, but Messi is technically better. And while he's gifted too, he's a more a product of his circumstances and development, is what I might guess, but who the F knows. The entire ambient world you grew up in, even outside their respective training regimens and regimes, is simply different, in ways that are impossible to quantify, but do of course define you as a living person. So like you say, older players would need some time adjust to the more highly practiced modern players. But they're not genetically superior, not enough time passed for that. If of course, you could suspend the constraints of existential reality and do something like that.
Soccer remains my #1 sport. Nothing compares.
It's a total game. Accommodates a range of heights and athletic abilities. At a minimum you need endurance. Some players now cover 14km a match. With a lot of sprints.
You need I guess sub 13 second 100M speed. But this is debatable. Because ultimately IQ & skill mean the ball moves faster and decisively than anybody can run. Some sports like basketball and hockey, with teams scoring shots, approximate soccer...but don't push the physical and coordination limits.
I obviously respect and like American football. But you're talking set plays with minor improvisation from a static position. Soccer is pretty continuous and free form, requiring 90 minute game focus and discipline.
I did say if you magically teleport them together, of course the modern players would win. In most sports. Football too.
I think Maradona could play and thrive in the Messi era. He had incredible speed, was much stronger, and, as you noted, more talented. I don't believe Messi on contract would have survived the brutal hacking of the Maradona era.
Maradona was built like a tank. Modern sports science would have made him a more awesome specimen. Messi back in the day wouldn't have the hormone therapy that got him bigger and stronger. A few tackles, he's out of the game...and I doubt he had the psyche of Maradona to persist in the face of blatant hacking.
Diego also might have gotten better substance treatment...cocaine did him in.
You're being pedantic. At least my intent was 10 seconds. If I said 11, you'd say 11 flat?
Fine...between 10 and 11.
Im a Real Madrid fan, Ramos, Pepe, Alonso, were very physical with Messi. I would still take CR7 (his Champ's League KO performances were unreal) over Messi but Messi took some physical beatings in El Clasico. The height of the rivalry back when Mourhino was coaching was peak hatred. I remember that 4 game stretch where RM & Barca played in a 3 week stretch (La Liga, Copa Del Rey, 2 Champ's League Semi games) that was peak futbol.
Indeed, great minds think alike. Only thing that frustrates me, when people starting ranking on Pele, of all people, is the talent part. Everyone's a product of their environment, and Pele would not suck if he played today. It would only seem like he sucks, if he didn't have a chance to catch up or whatever. It's so hypothetical that it's pointless, but it does allow for legends of the sport, whatever sport, to just being casually dismissed. And players of less talent, today, are way better than Pele, according to this logic.
I also follow RM because of Modric. And I followed Barca for Messi...and Rakitic.
But no way in hell did Messi get hacked like Diego. Don't get me wrong, as I appreciate and laud Messi as 1 of history's big 3 with Pele and Diego vying for #1.
Check this out.
Kung-fu kicks and riot police: the day Maradona got Barça brawling
With Barcelona facing Athletic Bilbao in the Copa del Rey final on Saturday, we look back at the same fixture in 1984
When Andoni Goikoetxea broke Diego Maradona’s ankle in 1983, it gave the Argentinian plenty of time to think as he plotted his revenge on the Butcher of Bilbao. Maradona returned after months out before Barcelona’s Copa del Rey final with Athletic Bilbao at the Santiago Bernabéu in 1984.
