The 2010 version of the Yellow Jackets has doubters. This should come as no surprise. Georgia Tech usually has doubters. Paul Johnson, at least to date, has always had doubters.
“That offense won’t work in a BCS conference”. I hope, after leading the conference in total yards each of Coach Johnson’s first two seasons, and leading the conference in points scored last year, that criticism has been put to rest permanently.
“He won’t be able to recruit for that offense well enough to compete on a national level”. Well, so far, he has recruited better than Gailey ever did. At least if you put any stock in espn.com’s individual player ratings. Gailey, of course, was not competing at a “national level”, but then again, nobody was claiming he “couldn’t recruit well enough in that offense to do so”.
“He can’t win a bowl game because the opposing defense gets 5 weeks to prepare, and then the offense no longer works”. Well, Cincinnati runs a spread based passing attack. Florida smothered that pretty well in the bowl game. I guess that offense just won’t work if the opposing team gets 5 weeks to prepare. Somebody get a memo out to all the teams that run a spread based passing attack. In other news, Missouri had 5 weeks before their bowl game to get ready for Navy last year. Navy liked Coach Johnson’s offense enough to keep it after he left for GT, so they run the same thing we do. All they did against Missouri was run for 385 yards, gain 515 yards total, and win 35-13. But, you know, I am sure Navy, as a military academy, is able to recruit better athletes than Missouri, a big public state university that competes in the Big 12.
Another flaw in the “5 week” criticism, as Paul Johnson has pointed out, is that Chan Gailey was 0 for his last 3 bowl games at GT. Does that mean his pro style offense doesn’t work if they get 5 weeks to prepare? And Paul Johnson lost to LSU in the Chick-Fil-A bowl and Iowa in the Orange Bowl. He wasn’t losing (badly) to Fresno in Boise, or Utah (badly) in the Emerald Bowl.
The latest doubts center around the talent we lost from last year’s team. Demaryius Thomas and Derrick Morgan in the first round. Morgan Burnett a couple rounds later. Dwyer fell all the way to the 6th (which will go down as the biggest steal of this draft in my humble opinion) but he is still a big loss. Surely now that “Gailey’s talent is all gone”, the world will finally see that this offense just doesn’t work. Nevermind the fact that, by the numbers, Paul’s 2008 class was arguably better than any class Gailey ever signed, and his 2009 class was even better. Almost as good as his 2010 class. On paper we are more talented now than we have been in years, but the critics ignore this fact and instead insist that “Gailey’s talent” is really why we have been successful.
Hopefully, even the doubters can at least agree that Paul is right about one thing; as long as he is coaching GT and running the flexbone spread, the critics will find something to doubt.
So what does all this mean for the 2010 season? Most importantly, we will be better than last year. It’s true. And I will tell you why in a minute. But first, lets not get ahead of ourselves. We will be better, but that does not guarantee we will win another conference title. It does not even guarantee we will win 10 games. Other teams in the league may get better as well. And last year, we won several games that could have gone either way. Part of that is Paul Johnson instilling toughness in his players, and making the right calls and adjustments late in the game. But part of it is luck. Even the most optimistic fan has to admit that we could have lost either game to Clemson, and that we could have lost to Florida State, and shockingly that we should have lost to Wake Forest. Well, maybe not should. With only slightly better execution on any of about 10 plays in that game, we could have won by 3 touchdowns. But as it was played, we could have easily lost. Wake would have had a good shot at a winning field goal if Derrick Morgan doesn’t make an ACC-defensive-player-of-the-year caliber play to get that sack on third down. I’m really
going to miss him.
Anyway, moving on to this year, why are we going to be better? There are four primary reasons:
1 – The best, and deepest, offensive line CPJ has had.
2 – Better talent across the board
3 – A third year starter, and proven winner, at quarterback
4 – A much improved defense
1 – The O – Line
Don’t be fooled by our gaudy running stats the last two years. We really haven’t been very good up front. The reason we can run anyway is that Paul Johnson has transformed the traditional option to make it into a spread based attack that relies on speed instead of power. There are three speedy running backs instead of one, there is no tight tend or fullback (the traditional big, slow positions), the pitch man is in motion before the snap, and the formation is symmetrical, so the defense cannot key on a “strong side”. The end result is that our offense, if executed property, is more like blocking for a punt return than blocking for a traditional running attack. At least in terms of spacing. The opposing defense must defend the entire width of the field, to either side, on every play.
These factors largely explain why Navy under Johnson – and now his successor who runs the same offense – can beat Notre Dame twice in the last three years (after winning zero of the previous 43), Missouri in a bowl game, and take Ohio St. in the horseshoe down to the wire. Because the offensive line does not have to win the battle against the defensive line in order to gain yards. In fact, they don’t even have to tie. Don’t believe me? Go look at the tape and tell me how many games either of the last two years where you can really make an argument that our offensive line outplayed their defensive line. Or even played them to a draw. One game quickly comes to mind – Vanderbilt. And that performance netted us 56 points and about 600 yards of offense. But for the most part, we could run for nearly 300 yards behind poor blocking, so long as your defensive line does not completely dominate us.
Almost all of our bad offensive performances were caused by a defensive line dominating the line of scrimmage. UNC both of the last two years. Don’t be fooled by the 24-7 win last year. They dominated us. Twice we failed to punch it in from inside the 5 yard line. We scored a touchdown in the first quarter and only had 10 points at the start of the 4th quarter. AND that happened even though UNC put up one of the worst offensive performances of the season by any FBS team, scoring only 7 points against our atrocious defense. They spent most of the game going three and out or close to it, and we still couldn’t score any more points. And obviously the LSU and Iowa games fit this category. Particularly Iowa, who’s defensive line was able to clog up any potential hole for Dwyer so badly that after the first couple of series, the linebackers spent the rest of the first half not even looking at the dive play. And their D linemen often chased down Nesbitt or even the pitch man. That was one of the best Defensive line performances that I have ever seen, albeit greatly aided by the fact that we somehow made it to the Orange Bowl with a bad offensive line.
As a side note, the only poor offensive performance that we have had under CPJ where this did not occur was this year at Miami. Their D line outplayed us, but not significantly worse than most every team we play does. For some reason, our A backs and Wide Receivers spent that game blocking basically nobody, which killed any big plays we might have hit on the edge, allowing their D line and linebackers to focus mostly on the interior running plays. I counted no less than 5 plays in the first half alone where we had either one blocker on the edge trying to block one defender, or two trying to block two, and if they had been successful, we would have hit a 20 or 30 yard gain or maybe even a touchdown. But instead they missed, and in a few cases, missed so badly that not only did we not hit a big gain, but the two guys were so unimpeded they were able to swarm to the pitch man and hit him at almost the same time he caught the ball, burying him for a big loss. If we block well and hit those 5 plays, or perhaps even 3 of those 5, then that game could have started to look a lot more like the 2008 game in Atlanta.
Why our blocking on the edge was so poor is the interesting question. Maybe Miami is too athletic for us to block. Or perhaps we were fatigued due to that game being our third in 12 days, whereas Miami had 11 days off. Maybe the humidity left us gasping for air and too tired to block well. Maybe we just had a bad game. Who knows? But it was terrible blocking on the edge that doomed us that game.
But back to the main point, there have been many games where we have been successful offensively despite the opposing defensive line winning the battle up front. Mississippi St., both years, VT last year, and UGA both years to name a few. By the way, don’t let the Dawgs convince you that they stopped our offense last year. 24 points on 9 possessions, particularly when two of those possessions you are without your injured first string QB, is a good day offensively. (We only had 9 possessions because the game was dramatically shortened by both teams running so well and eating up clock). AND our possessions at the end of the first half and the end of the game appear to have been stopped moreso by the clock forcing us to throw – when UGA knew we had to throw – than by their defense. We were moving the ball fine both times and only stalled when the clock began to get away from us. In any case, I think its pretty clear that the defense lost that game for us, not the offense.
So what has made our offensive line so bad, and why will it be better this year?
The patchwork nature of our 2008 offensive line under Paul Johnson has been well documented. Simply put, Gailey’s offensive linemen were not well suited to running Johnson’s offense. First and foremost, Johnson needs linemen who can move. They have to get downfield and block linebackers, and often safeties, to make this offense go. Chan’s linemen were suited to his offense, which emphasizes controlling the line of scrimmage. As a result, our 2008 offensive line was cobbled together with some players who were not really intended to be offensive linemen. In particular, two players who turned out to be key linemen for us initially tried out for Johnson at running back, and another had been a walk on defensive linemen. Obviously, it would be best to have guys that can move, and that are big and strong and recruited to be offensive linemen. However, when you cant have everything you want, and you have to choose, Gailey would prefer big strong guys who aren’t the most athletic. So that is what we had, and Johnson couldn’t use them.
The 2009 version of the offensive line did not change much. It is simply very difficult to make wholesale offensive line changes in a single season. Probably the biggest difference is that the players from 2008 had a year of experience with the new blocking schemes. The only other significant change was that the line, which had several players playing pretty significantly under weight, had a year to add bulk. These changes produced a better performance in the offensive line in 2009 than in 2008, but the improvement was slight.
So what has changed heading into 2010? Well, we will have our most talented unit under Johnson. This is true only if you believe the recruiting rankings. The recruiting rankings certainly have their flaws (which will be discussed further below). However, I know of no better way to judge the “talent” that a coach has to work with, so I will proceed under the assumption that the recruiting rankings at least provide some approximately reliable measure.
- Side Note Explaining Why I Use ESPN.com for my recruiting numbers -
I will be using the ratings of espn.com mostly because I prefer their numbering system. I think it allows for more accurate comparisons. A “two-star” recruit on other sites roughly translates into a 70-74 on espn.com, while a “four-star” recruit is about an 79-84. In my opinion, those numbers more accurately represent the relative talents of two recruits. Reasonable minds can differ on how to quantify talent, but I think most would agree that a four star guy is not twice as good as a two star guy. Additionally, this system allows you to better evaluate the relative talent of multiple two star players, or even a three star player against a two star player. I think its obvious enough that all players listed as a two star recruit on scout or rivals are not exactly equal. Some are good two stars, and in fact almost three stars, while others are bad and could have almost been a one star. Espn’s system shows this, where an 84 would be a four star, you can see that he is a very highly rated four star and was almost a five star, whereas a guy who was rated 80 is just barely better than a really good three star.
Some other sites that use the star rating system now also use a numbering system as well, but I have become accustomed to espn and think they do a good job.
As for our offensive line talent, Johnson has been recruiting linemen that are slightly more highly rated than those Gailey recruited to the flats. Unfortunately, espn.com’s archives only go back to 2006, which leaves us with a very small sample size of only four linemen. (statistically, analysis of a football team will never be able to have an ideal sample size, because there just aren’t that many players or games. Anyway, Gailey probably recruited about 20 offensive linemen while at Tech. 20 would be a much more representative sample of GT’s typical O line talent than 4.) However, three of those linemen entered in the much heralded class of 2007, which is widely regarded as clearly Gailey’s best class at Tech. Thus, we can probably safely assume that these four linemen are at least as good as Gailey’s average linemen. And they averaged 76.25, while the 8 offensive linemen that Johnson has signed in his first three classes average to a 77 (and three more coming in so far in the 2011 class that also average exactly to a 77). So, it appears that Johnson has done no worse than maintain the talent level while restocking our offensive line unit with players suited to his offense.
Thus, the talent level of the guys we recruited to play O line has stayed relatively constant. But remember, that 2008 offensive line wasn’t made up of very many players who were recruited to play offensive line. Athlon, in its 2008 preseason magazine, listed a first and second string offensive line, and their collective espn.com recruiting rating average came to a 73 for the first team and a 73.2 for the second team, both substantially lower than the 76 or 77 average of Gailey’s and Johnson’s recruits.
Now, here is the tricky part. Some of those players didn’t end up playing very much. I would assume what happened is that Athlon, which like most magazines puts out its preseason edition after spring practice, had a hard time figuring out who would play in Johnson’s offense after only a month of spring practice. I bet Johnson had a hard time figuring that out as well, and I bet a lot changed in the summer workouts and the august two a days. I would assume that Athlon used the first and second strings from the spring game which were probably made up largely of the offensive linemen existing on the roster who happened to fit best into Johnson’s system. In reality, some of our key linemen in 2008 were on the roster when Johnson arrived, but were listed as fullbacks or tight ends. I know of no good way to judge the offensive line talent of a guy who was evaluated by the recruiting services for a different position. However, I would say it is safe to assume its substantially lower than a 77, and probably even lower than a 73.
The 2009 group, again according to Athlon’s preseason depth charts (which were much more accurate given that Johnson had been there for a year and half) listed a first string that averaged 75 and a second string that averaged 74.67. This year, according to Athlon and espn.com, our first string offensive line will average a 76. So our first string will again have made a slight talent improvement, and presumably will also have benefited from an extra year of learning the system and hitting the weight room. I am excited to see the improvement that I expect from this unit, but I am probably most excited about the second string, because its talent level is a 78. However, they are young. Four of them are redshirt freshmen. The reason this excites me is that it means we can expect our offensive line to continue improving for the next year or two. Paul likes to redshirt O linemen, and you have to remember that the guys he has recruited, if redshirted, would only be sophomores now. The line should continue to improve until the players in this group are seniors, at least if you accept that they are the most talented class yet. At that time, assuming that Coach Johnson continues to recruit at about the same level, and coaches at about the same level, our offensive line play should remain relatively constant. So, not only should our line be better this year, but we should be even better next year, and maybe even better the year after that.
By the way, the offensive line’s improvement is, in my opinion, the key to beating this whole “5 weeks” thing with the bowl game. As it stands now, the 5 weeks that the defense gets to prepare helps them because they are much better prepared for our speed and much better prepared to decipher where we are going. So their defenders spend less time hesitating or running the wrong way. Taking advantage of such mistakes that defenders make when they only get 1 week to prepare is how we typically beat defenses, and often beat them badly, even though we cannot block them very well. If we cannot block them, and we cannot fool them, we are in trouble.
However, if our offensive line becomes good enough that it can have some success against any defensive line, then we will not have to rely so much on defenders mistakes. Using the Iowa game as an example, even with their preparation, and even given how badly they beat us up front, there were a couple of drives in the second half where we managed marginally better blocking and we moved the ball pretty well. I believe that if we develop an offensive line that can at least compete (ie even if they lose the battle, its close) with any defensive line, then we won’t struggle in bowl games nearly as much, and in fact will be able to move the ball and score on pretty much anybody. In my opinion, this phenomenon explains why Navy can beat Missouri in a bowl game. They have been running this offense for years, and have thus recruited and developed a proper offensive line.
Side note – the fact that we not “have” to rely on defenders making mistakes does not prevent us from taking advantage of those mistakes anyway. Our offense puts a lot of pressure on defenders to move the right direction very quickly. Executing
your defense properly against us is extremely difficult. When defenders inevitably make mistakes, they may not need to be blocked very well in order for us to run a good play. As a result, often times we only need two or three good blocks on a given play to gain 6 yards. Defenders make mistakes against any offense, but I believe our scheme forces more mistakes and does a better job capitalizing on them. Thus, Navy can use this offense to accomplish all that they have with what everyone agrees are lesser athletes. Remember, Paul Johnson won a national title the last time he was in a situation where he was competing on a level playing field in terms of talent (Georgia Southern). He was not able to do that at Navy. Georgia Tech may not get talent as good as Florida, Texas and USC, but we are much closer to those teams than Navy was to many of the teams Johnson beat while he was there. I don’t know how high the ceiling for our offense is, but I feel confident it is much higher than most of our opponents fans realize.
We will not be the best that we are going to get on the offensive line this year, at least I don’t think, but we will be better.
And being better on the offensive line almost always equals being better on offense. The obvious exception is when you have a young quarterback, which obviously does not apply to us. But much too much is made about skill players. Dwyer and Thomas were great players, but the guys we will plug in behind them will still be good. After analyzing this offense for two years, I have concluded that the skill position players occasionally make plays out of nowhere, and often turn good plays into great plays, but the offensive line, and the quarterback making reads, are what make the good plays. Thus, in at least one regard, it is essentially like any other offense. A good line and mediocre skill players will be a better offense than good skill players and a mediocre line. Paul Johnson’s coaching and system squeeze more out of whatever players you give him, but he cannot magically make the offensive line insignificant.
2 – Better talent across the board
You won’t find any preseason articles discussing GT football that don’t focus on the “big four” that we lost to the draft last year. You also won’t hear me say a negative thing about any of them, or downplay their contributions. They will be missed. However, in terms of the overall talent level of a football team, people tend to give too much weight to the 3 or 4 most visible players. Everyone notices that Dwyer, the 2008 player of the year and one of the best running backs in the country the past two years, is gone. Few people probably notice that Orwin Smith and B.J. Bostic may get significant playing time at A back this year, and may be the most talented A backs that we have had under Johnson. Bostic may in fact play at a number of positions. He is listed as a CB, but has apparently turned some heads with his athleticism at A back. Of course, we are deep enough at both of those positions that he may actually be redshirted. Orwin Smith is going to be a really good player for us. More on him in a later blog entry. For now, the point is that lots of players on the field make a difference, and most are not noticed when you talk about a teams “overall talent level”.
Additionally, whenever you lose a very talented player, people often overlook the players you have behind them. Anthony Allen (replacing Dwyer) and Stephen Hill (replacing Thomas) are both very talented. Allen will be a good running back for us. He is not just as good, or “even better than” Dwyer, as some optimistic GT fans have been saying this offseason. But Allen is a very good running back and there will not be a huge drop-off. Similarly, Stephen Hill is not as good Thomas (at least not yet, but he has flashed enough potential that with a year or two more of development, he could possibly reach that level). But he is plenty athletic, talented, big and strong enough to make plays for us.
You may rightly be asking “but who then will replace Stephen Hill?” First, it should be noted that Hill did not technically start for much of last season. And secondly, as well as we run the ball and as rarely as we pass, we really only need one receiver to make plays in the passing game. Our receivers almost always receive man coverage with little or no deep help from a safety. And finally, we may well have an improved supporting cast of receivers this year. The most difficult thing to replace may be Thomas’ blocking ability on the edge, but Hill has similar size and athleticism, so lets give him a chance.
As for the guys on the defensive side of the ball, individual players are simply not as important. It is too easy to double team a guy like Derrick Morgan and to throw the ball to a part of the field not currently being covered by Morgan Burnett. Obviously, both of those players made countless plays for us, but with the extra year of experience and development for the other players on the DL and in the secondary, both of those units could easily get better even taking the loss of those two great players into consideration. Thus, I would argue that if (big IF) the overall talent level on the team is higher this year, and many players improve with an extra year of experience and development, then we could easily improve as a team even though we lost more to the draft than any GT team in recent memory.
Any improvement due to experience and development can generally be presumed, but we won’t know for sure until we see the games this year. What about the overall talent level? Well, that is very difficult to judge, but let’s try anyway. I will begin this analysis by returning for a moment to the idea that preseason magazines and the prediction experts tend to overrate the importance of the most visible players.
For example, according to Athlon’s preseason magazine, GT’s units were ranked like this entering 2009 and 2010.
| Year | QB | RB | WR | OL |
| 2009 | 6 | 1 | 8 | 9 |
| 2010 | 2 | 2 | 12 | 5 |
Thus, if we assume these rankings are correct, then relative to the rest of the conference, we are better at QB, a little worse at running back, significantly worse at WR and significantly better at OL. And yet, this very same magazine picks us 4th in the Coastal, when we have finished first and tied for first the last 2 years. The media and the other magazines have picked us either third or fourth in the Coastal. Most of the experts do so for the stated reason of the four players we lost, and how it will be difficult to repeat as ACC champs with less talent. Well, maybe the talent loss was on defense? Athlon ranks our units like this:
| Year | DL | LB | DB |
| 2009 | 10 | 9 | 3 |
| 2010 | 10 | 9 | 6 |
Well, there you have it. Our DB’s are supposedly a little worse, so we won’t be able to do it this year.
Up to this point, my discussion of our talent has been written with a touch of sarcasm and it has relied largely upon one preseason magazines opinion, and which is actually ranking how good the units will be. But those rankings should reflect talent, coaching, experience and possibly other factors, not just talent alone. However, trying to decipher exactly how much talent a football team has in comparison to its conference and the rest of the nation is a very imperfect science. I think most would agree its largely impossible, and any such analysis will be impossible to separate from subjective opinions and bias towards certain teams.
Nevertheless, I think it is useful to try to discuss a team’s talent level. Just as most everyone would agree it is very difficult to do so, I think most would agree it is important. Sure, a good coach can win with lesser talent, and a bad coach can waste really good talent, but all else being equal, the more talented team will be more successful, and having a lot of talent definitely seems to increase your margin for error.
So what is GT’s talent level this season? To begin an answer to that question, I must first discuss how I arrived at my opinion. I know of no better way to evaluate the talent of an entire team than by looking at the recruiting rankings, even given all their flaws. And they are many. For starters, one need only look to GT’s roster last year, and find Demaryius Thomas, who came in rated by espn’s system as a 73. Which, if true, would make him only the 4th or 5th highest rated receiver currently on our team, and maybe the 40th or 50th most talented player. In fact, possibly even lower than that. So, good news, clearly our roster is now stocked with nothing but first round draft picks, as they are all more talented than Thomas.
Obviously, that was a bit of a miss. Thomas may have dramatically increased his size, speed and strength by working hard throughout college, but I think its clear he had a good deal of talent.
The main problem with recruiting rankings is that they are so likely to be inaccurate. First of all, you are talking about evaluating the physical ability of a large collection of 17-18 year old males, most of whom still have significant physical development to do as they grow to be men. On top of that, all of these kids compete in high school football systems that vary dramatically in the level of competition. A kid that is largely an afterthought if he plays in the Atlanta area, at least in theory, may get a serious look from some big programs if he plays in, say, rural West Virginia. This theory can cut the other way too, as a legitimate recruit with gaudy stats from Montana may be largely ignored. Additionally, many believe there is a bias in the recruiting rankings in favor of the big programs. The big programs respond that they are simply more attractive to high school recruits and thus they have the ability to select better talent. But that accusation, in my opinion, is not simply the product of the imagination of a bunch of fans of the smaller schools.
As Stewart Mandel (and probably many others have explained) imagine if you were sitting down to do your own recruiting rankings. Let’s even assume that you have enough time to go see all the relevant players. You have 6 wide receivers who are all about 6-2 to 6-4, 200 – 220 pounds, appear to have good speed and all make plays on the ball in the air. They play in Atlanta, Chicago, two small towns in Texas, and two other small towns you previously didn’t know existed. Two of them have offers from Texas, Alabama, Florida and USC. Two others have offers from GT, Indiana, Auburn and Ole Miss. The other two have offers from Memphis, Middle Tennessee State, Ohio, and Central Michigan. My suspicion is that the two that have the offers from the "elite” programs are going to be the highest rated on your board, followed by the two from the lesser BCS schools, followed by the two that only have offers from the small programs.
To the extent that this effect actually occurs, all recruiting rankings are really doing then is ranking players based upon what the big time programs think. Is that fair? Well, maybe it is and maybe it isn’t. If the big time programs truly can pick and choose the players they want (and to some extent, surely they can) then maybe this is the best way to rank players. But its clear then that Alabama, Florida, Texas and the like will always have the highest rated recruiting classes, even if one day they bring in a class that in fact isn’t actually that good. How can we tell to what extent these big programs are actually bringing in the best talent, and to what extent the rankings are simply biased towards whomever they sign? I don’t believe we can. We can look to what happens on the field, but then you can argue that coaching and other factors are coming into play. I think it is clear that any such analysis is, in the end, simply going to be someone’s opinion.
Flawed though they are, the recruiting rankings at least do provide us two things. First, they are compiled by people who usually are pretty intelligent, they certainly spend a lot of time doing their homework, and they are at least trying to be objective. Second, they do allow us to compare how one specific team has performed in terms of recruiting in successive years, since at least in theory, GT in 2006 should not be treated significantly differently in the rankings from GT in 2009. Any big program bias should be the same with respect to the same program in different years. Some players will slip through the cracks, and others will be over-hyped, but on the whole, when you are talking about a good size sample like 20 or 30, or 40 or 50 players, the rankings should give you at least a decent general idea of the overall talent.
Finally, and perhaps the most important thing in favor of the recruiting rankings, is that they are pretty much all we have. You could use the NFL scouts rankings, but the media coverage of those really only looks at the best college players, which for most teams means only 3 or 4 if they are lucky. Of course, you could always form your own opinions based upon your own observation. But, unless you have much more time than I do, if you want to compare a team’s talent across the board to other teams in the country and/or to that same teams level from recent years, you basically have to look at the flawed recruiting rankings.
So here we go with a look at the recruiting rankings.
I will begin with a quick explanation of how espn does their rankings. They start with a watch list for the “ESPN 150”, which is a list of the top 150 recruits in the country regardless of position. The watch list typically starts with over 2000 players, and as ESPN’s experts being evaluating and ranking players, they weed the list down until there are only, you guessed it, 150 left. In the process, they assign all these players a number. Then, they proceed to rank the other players in the country. They usually rank pretty much every player in the country. However, there are always a handful of players they don’t get around to ranking. These players keep the default initial ranking of “40”. In my averages and analysis I ignore these players, because I do not know of anything better to do with them. (its definitely possible that these players are not ranked because they are not as good as the other players and espn didn’t have time to get to them. However, its also possible that they developed late, and only became a real prospect as a high school senior, and thus may actually be good or very good. As just one example, consider how Dwyer, a college junior who NFL scouts have two years of tape on, can fall from a first round pick in August to a 6th round pick come draft day. Imagine how much more pronounced that effect can be for a generally unknown high school player, since Dwyer was the reigning ACC player of the year and considered to be one of the best RB’s in the country).
Here is a list of what espn.com’s recruiting numbers mean:
100 – 85 (roughly correlates to a 5 star on other sites)
“Potential immediate game changer at the major college level who could push for all conference recognition as a true freshman. Enters college with the elite skills necessary to create mismatches against top level competition. Future All American candidate.”
84.99 – 79.5 (roughly a 4 star on other sites)
“Potential 3 to 4 year starter at major college level with superior skills needed to see early play time and make significant impact during college career.”
75 – 79.49 (roughly a 3 star on other sites)
“Player with skills to develop into solid starter at major college level. Potential high ceiling with ability to make impact during career.”
68 – 74.99 (roughly a 2 star on other sites)
“Player flashes developable major college talent. Could be a late bloomer. Potential solid starter at major college level.”
55 – 67.99 (roughly a 1 star on other sites)
“Player does not show physical tools or skill set at this point to project at the major college level, but could contribute at mid major or FCS level.”
Here is a look at Georgia Tech’s recruiting the past 5 seasons.
| 2010 | 16 players | 77.06 |
| 2009 | 21 players | 76.85 |
| 2008 | 15 players | 76.53 |
| 2007 | 20 players | 75.65 |
| 2006 | 11 players | 73.36 |
There you see a pretty clear trend upwards. Every year, the average rank of all players in our classes gets better. Lets look at it from a slightly different angle. You may argue, and make a good point, that if you bring in 10 or 15 really good players, you shouldn’t care if there are 5 other recruits who are rated very poorly and who drag the ranking down. Thus, for example, its possible that the best 10 players of 2007 are in fact rated much higher than the best ten players of 2010, even though the 2010 class has an overall better average. Let’s see:
Total = the average of all.
Best ten = average of the best ten.
Best five = average of the best five.
Best = number ranking of the top player.
| Year | Total | Best Ten | Best five | Best |
| 2010 | 77.06 | 78.2 | 79 | 80 |
| 2009 | 76.85 | 78.8 | 79.4 | 80 |
| 2008 | 76.53 | 77.3 | 78 | 80 |
| 2007 | 75.65 | 78.5 | 79.4 | 81 |
| 2006 | 73.36 | 73.9 | 76.4 | 77 |
Now the trend is not so clear. I would rank the 2009 class as the best of the bunch, since it is very close to the highest overall average, it has 21 players, and it has the highest “best ten” and “best five”. However, now the 2007 class, Gailey’s best class and previously the 4th best of the last five by overall average, looks much better. In fact, it is challenging 2009 for the top spot, with a tie in the best five and a slightly better top player. However, I would rank it clearly behind 2009 because it has a lower best ten and a significantly lower overall average. It does come in second though, signifying that the conclusion that Johnson has brought in three classes that “are all better” than Gailey’s best class ever was a bit premature.
2010 beats out 2008 for third, because it beats it in every category except “best”, which is a tie. Both of these classes are somewhat small, at 15 and 16 players respectively, but that is likely due only to the fact that Johnson’s first few teams had few seniors, and thus we did not have many roster spots freeing up from year to year.
It should be noted though that it is easier to bring in a class with a high average if you bring in a small class. When you are trying to sign 25 players, you have to take some that you would not take were you only signing 15. I do find it significant, when trying to compare the average talent that Gailey was working with and left for Johnson with the average talent that Johnson is bringing in on his own, that Johnson has brought in two classes that are very close to Gailey’s best class, and one that beats it. Furthermore, Johnson’s “worst” two classes soundly beat Gailey’s 2006 class, which was probably more representative of Gailey’s recruiting level at GT than his 2007 class. I think even a cursory glance at the numbers above clearly reveals that the 2006 was significantly worse than the others.
Let’s take a look at the classes by position:
Offense:
| Year | QB | RB | WR | OL |
| 2010 | 74 (1) | 77 (1) | None | 76.5 (2) |
| 2009 | 79.5 (2) | 78.5 (2) | 76 (2) | 77.75 (4) |
| 2008 | 74 (1) | 77 (3) | None | 76.2 (2) |
| 2007 | 76 (2) | 77 (2) | 76 (3) | 76.33 (3) |
| 2006 | 72 (1) | 70 (2) | 71 (3) | 76.1 (1) |
Defense:
| Year | DL | LB | DB |
| 2010 | 78.66 (3) | 76.5 (2) | 78.4 (5) |
| 2009 | 77 (5) | 75.5 (2) | 74.75 (4) |
| 2008 | 77 (1) | 77.66 (3) | 76.2 (5) |
| 2007 | 77.75 (4) | 70.5 (2) | 74.5 (4) |
| 2006 | 77 (2) | 75 (1) | 77 (1) |
Remember that we sign a handful (maybe 1 or 2, maybe 4 or 5) most years who are never evaluated by espn, and are left off these rankings. Thus, just because it says none under WR for 2008 and 2010, that does not necessarily mean that we did not sign any receivers.
These trends vary a little more than the overall average, which I think is to be expected.
My rundown:
DB – up and down by class, with the best and deepest coming in 2008 and 2010.
LB – pretty steady, with one noticeably down crop in 2007.
DL – very steady, and very good, with a deeper than usual groups in 2007 and 2009, and a slightly better than usual group in 2010.
OL – very steady and pretty good overall, with the 2009 group standing out for both depth and talent.
WR – only 8 total signed the last 5 years makes this group hard to judge.
RB – another very good group overall, only the 2006 class lags behind.
QB – very up and down by year. The 2009 group stands out for depth and talent.
I think I have made the point clear by now, but I’ll say it again. Bringing in Johnson and this offense was supposed to hurt recruiting, and instead it appears to have done the opposite. In particular, we were supposed to have a real hard time recruiting QB’s. Well, Johnson has brought in a couple who are a little lower than usual (2008 and 2010) but then again the two highest individually rated QB’s GT has signed the past 5 years were both signed by Johnson, both in 2009.
Let’s take a look at how that recruiting translates to position groups that are actually on the field. Here are the recruiting averages for the first and second string, again according to how Athlon lists our depth chart in its preseason magazine:
| Year/String | QB | OL | RB | WR | | DL | LB | DB |
| | | | | | | | | |
| 2010 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 76* | 74.67 | 73.5 | | 79 | 76.33 | 75 |
| 2nd String | N/A | 78 | 77.5 | 76 | | 77.3 | 75.5 | 77 |
| 2009 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 75 | 76.33 | 72 | | 77.5 | 70.5 | 76 |
| 2nd String | 74 | 74.67* | 76.5 | 76 | | 77 | 79.33 | 74.67* |
| 2008 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 73 | 75.33 | 72.5 | | 78.25 | 76 | 76.75 |
| 2nd String | N/A | 73.2 | 74.5 | 68 | | 77.5 | 70* | 73.75 |
Bold – one player in the group was never evaluated by espn (either because he was one of the recruits they did not get to, or because he was a walk on, etc)
Bold* - more than one of the players in the group was never evaluated by espn.
Note – I have ignored players who were not evaluated in calculating these averages.
Like the rest of the analysis above, there are flaws here. Each individual group is a very small sample size, so if only one or two players were miss evaluated by the experts, that could have a huge affect on the accuracy. Additionally, you can see from all the bold that many players were simply not evaluated. Calvin Booker and Tevin Washington are two such players, so our backup QB in 2008 and 2010 is listed simply as “N/A”. Finally, there undoubtedly are some players who the experts simply missed on. For example, Demaryius Thomas was a 73. We have signed two receivers in the last couple of years who were both 76’s, and neither guy have I heard of yet in practice, a scrimmage, on the field, etc. I highly doubt they will end up being better than Thomas. Hill, in case anyone is wondering, was also a 76, and he may end up being better than Thomas, but given how good Thomas was, I think that is unlikely.
The above analysis, albeit flawed, is nevertheless the strongest evidence that the talent of our first two strings will be better this year than it has been in 2008 or 2009. We will be better than ever at DL and LB (with the exception of the young but very talented 2009 second string at LB). We only drop off slightly at DB, but our second string is the most talented of all. We remain the same at QB, get better at OL, but we do lose a little at RB and WR (for WR I am ignoring the numbers and counting the loss of Thomas as “losing a little”).
However, I think it is not as useful as it could be to look at only talent when trying to predict the ability of the players who will be on the field. Obviously experience matters. More experienced players tend to understand the game better. They also have had the benefit of 2 or 3 extra years of weight training, conditioning and natural physical growth and development. So a senior who was rated as a 73 or 74 will typically be a better player for that year than a freshman or sophomore who was rated as a 77 or 78. There are cases where the best player is the high rated true freshman (Calvin Johnson comes to mind. I would also argue that Dwyer may have been another case, even though Choice was very good as a senior and in fact got the majority of the snaps, I think a case could be made that Dwyer as a true freshman was actually the better RB).
So let’s take a look at the same chart as above, except showing average experience this time rather than talent. A “4” represents a senior, a “3” is a junior, and so forth:
| Year/String | QB | OL | RB | WR | | DL | LB | DB |
| | | | | | | | | |
| 2010 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 4 | 2.8 | 3.33 | 2.5 | | 2.67 | 3.75 | 3.75 |
| 2nd String | 2 | 1.4 | 3 | 1.5 | | 1.33 | 2.5 | 2.5 |
| 2009 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 3 | 3 | 2.67 | 2.5 | | 2.5 | 3 | 2.75 |
| 2nd String | 2 | 2 | 2.33 | 1.5 | | 2.5 | 2 | 2.75 |
| 2008 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 2 | 3.6 | 2 | 2.5 | | 3.5 | 2.33 | 2.25 |
| 2nd String | 4 | 2.4 | 2 | 2.5 | | 1.75 | 2.67 | 2.25 |
So you can see that generally, we have been getting more experienced every year since Johnson started. That makes sense, because we were so young his first year.
The most notable exception is the offensive line, where both the first and second string have gotten younger every year. I don’t find that to be very troubling, since the offensive line has also been getting more talented, and they have more experience in this system than their older predecessors did. Remember that the offensive line techniques and blocking responsibilities are substantially different from our old system. Thus, any linemen that had experience blocking in Gailey’s offense would not have much of an advantage based on experience. The only factor of experience that would matter is that the older linemen of 2008 would have benefited from the extra years of growing, and adding weight and muscle. But, as we established earlier, many of those players were undersized and were not recruited to play O line anyway. At worst, I would call the loss of experience on the O line a small loss, but it may in fact be a wash.
The quarterbacks have been getting more experienced each year, which should be obvious since Nesbitt has been the starter since day one. The backups have been about the same level, particularly when you remember that Shaw won the job away from Booker immediately, so the “4” listed for the 2008 second string isn’t actually accurate. The running backs have similarly been more experienced each year, and the receivers level of experience has remained about the same.
On defense, the only significant hit we took in experience was the DL from 2008 to 2009. Everywhere else, our experience has been increasing. Most notably, and what should be pretty exciting for this year, we are significantly more experienced at every position on defense this season. The exceptions are that second string DB’s are a little less experienced, and the second string DL will be significantly less experienced. The first string units are all more experienced.
So there it is. You can do what you want with the numbers above. There is, at the very least, some objective evidence that we will be more talented and more experienced. The players still have to be motivated, and Coach Johnson has to do a good job coaching, and they have to go out on the field and execute. Which is just to say that being more talented and more experienced guarantees nothing. But it sure doesn’t hurt.
3 – A third year starter and proven winner at quarterback
It is this author’s official position that the most important part of our offense is the O line. However, the QB is a close second. The quarterback has to make the correct reads in the various options that we run. Based on what the defense does, any one of up to three players (some options only have two players, like the midline option where Nesbitt either gives to Dwyer or follows him into the same hole right up the middle) could and should get the ball. Who ends up with the ball is almost entirely the quarterback’s responsibility. The QB running the system smoothly can literally be the difference between having a good offense and scoring only ten points against Gardner Webb. If you doubt that statement, I invite you to come up with a better explanation as to why we only scored ten points that game. Remember to take into account that the slow footed Calvin Booker, who was recruited by Gailey to run a pro style offense, played that entire game, which accounted for all the meaningful snaps that Booker ever took for Coach Johnson. I think its clear that the execution by the quarterback is essential to the success of this offense.
Secondly, the quarterback has to be a real threat to run the ball. If the defense does not have to account for the quarterback, then several of our option plays are not nearly as effective. The defense can key on the running back, or running backs, who may get the ball, and the purpose of our offense is frustrated. The offense is designed to be difficult to defend primarily because the defense has to stop three runners on a given play (if we are running the triple option) rather than simply stopping one. If the quarterback can be ignored, or at least given less attention, the defense’s job becomes much easier. Nesbitt is the leading rusher for a QB in GT history, with a touch over 2000 yards, and on pace to surpass Woody Dantlzer as the leading QB rusher in ACC history (2700 yards roughly), and is third leading returning rusher in the ACC this season, with over 1000 yards in 2009. To put it mildly, Nesbitt is a real threat to run the ball.
In most offenses, the QB position is one of the most complex, and the most important. Due to its complexity, playing QB often takes longer to learn and for this reason QB’s routinely show improvement each year during their entire careers. At other positions that is not necessarily always true. For this reason, having an experienced QB is often essential to being successful on offense, and thus successful as a team.
Let’s take a look at Nesbitt’s numbers directing the offense in his first and second years as a starter under Johnson:
Passing
| Year | CMP | ATT | % | yards | yards per attempt | TD’s | INT’s | QB Rating |
| 2008 | 54 | 123 | 43.9 | 808 | 6.57 | 2 | 5 | 96.32 |
| 2009 | 75 | 162 | 46.3 | 1701 | 10.5 | 10 | 5 | 148.69 |
Rushing
| Year | ATT | YDS | AVG | LNG | TD |
| 2008 | 172 | 693 | 4.0 | 54 | 7 |
| 2009 | 279 | 1037 | 3.7 | 39 | 18 |
Team Offense (conference ranking in parentheses)
| Year | Points | Rushing Yards | Passing Yards | Total |
| 2008 | 24.4 (6th) | 273.1 (1st) | 99.2 (12th) | 372.5 (1st) |
| 2009 | 33.8 (1st) | 295.4 (1st) | 126.7 (12th) | 422.1 (1st) |
I think the numbers above clearly show steady improvement from Nesbitt, and in turn steady improvement in the offense. Nesbitt has progressed from a QB who was good enough in this system to make us one of the ACC’s better offenses in 08 to a QB who was good enough in this system to make us one of the nation’s best offenses in 09. Having a quarterback who is athletically suited to your system, with the experience to know the offense very well, is invaluable. GT is very fortunate in 2010 to have Joshua Nesbitt, who not only is athletic and experienced, but is also tough and makes plays like in the FSU game where he famously ripped the ball back from FSU’s defense after we had lost a fumble. He just does whatever it takes to win.
So, we know that Nesbitt has achieved a certain level, and that is very good for our chances of success this season. Can we expect him to get any better? Well, he has had another year to get better. Players generally improve in two ways with an extra year. One is mental, learning how to play better, and the other is growing physically bigger, faster and stronger. Let’s look first at possible mental improvement.
The most significant improvement in 09, reflected both in Nesbitt’s numbers and team performance, is the only stat that really matters offensively – points. Nesbitt personally more than tripled his total touchdowns from 08 to 09, and the team averaged a little over 9 more points per game.
As a team gets more experienced running a new offense, you would expect an increase in efficiency. The substantial increase in points (38.5% more), especially considering the lack of a similar increase in yards (only 13.3% more), shows how much more efficient we performed offensively. Most likely, the cause is either an improvement in red zone execution (more touchdowns instead of field goals) or fewer turnovers. Our red zone efficiency was probably better last season, but the turnover differential stands out. In 2008, we lost 27 turnovers (7 interceptions and 20 fumbles). In 2009, we lost only 18 (6 interceptions and 12 fumbles). Such a result is expected in year 2 when a team changes offensive schemes completely. Since our offense is run based, and involves a lot of pitching and last second decision making as to who gets the ball in a hand off, we will likely always turn the ball over more with fumbles than interceptions.
Unlike in a traditional offense, where the QB is really only responsible for interceptions, Nesbitt is ultimately responsible for essentially every turnover. He gets more blame than he really deserves for two reasons. First, any fumble on the B-back QB exchange could be the fault of either Nesbitt or the B-back, since in our offense they both make the read, rather than just the QB. If Nesbitt correctly tries to keep when Dwyer misreads the play and also tries to keep, that’s Dwyer’s fault. But the fans and commentators will usually blame Nesbitt no matter what. Secondly, the A-backs could be at least partially at fault for a fumble on the pitch if they do not time their runs so that they are where Nesbitt expects them to be. Nesbitt should adjust his pitch, but that can be difficult when you are making a split second decision and are about to get flattened by a 285 pound defensive end. He glances right before he pitches, and if the A-back is out of place, that’s a problem. However, the main point is that the responsibility of taking care of the ball belongs to Nesbitt much, much more than anyone else. As his understanding of the offense improves, and he thus makes his reads faster and better, our execution will improve and we will turn the ball over less. The dramatic improvement we made in total turnovers last year, in my opinion, further indicates that Nesbitt was much improved.
How much more improvement can we expect this year? The short answer is that it is basically impossible to know. The safe bet is not a whole lot, if for no other reason than because we were so good last year. Certainly, I would think his numbers will not improve this year by as much as they did last year. But another year of coaching, reviewing film, and practicing can’t hurt. However, when you start a new offense, you have the most room to improve at the beginning. After two years of running this offense, its unlikely that Nesbitt is making very many major mistakes that could be corrected, and thus any improvement will likely be slight. But it may well happen, and could be a factor in our offense performing slightly better this year.
What about physical improvement? The short answer here is very similar. Nesbitt is unlikely to improve much this year simply because he was so good last year. He already owns several GT QB records in the weight room, which explains why he is so hard to tackle. Furthermore, he is growing from a college junior to a college senior. As a 21 or 22 year old male, your typical college junior may not be full grown, but he is much closer than your average 18 year old. Nesbitt has appeared, at least in my opinion, to get significantly bigger and stronger from freshman year. Thus he may not have much more room to develop.
However, Nesbitt’s ankle is another factor. He has suffered from injured ankles in 2008 and 2009 that kept him out of parts of games and presumably hampered his play in others. In the offseason this year, he underwent surgery and sat out spring practice. He now claims to feel 100% healthy and the quickest he has felt in years, and was quoted as saying its nice to be able to run without worrying about your ankles.
The only evidence I have of this improvement, besides what Nesbitt himself is saying, is the reaction of newspapers and fans comments on the internet to the first scrimmage of August. The general consensus that I have read is that Nesbitt looks a half step faster, and on the first play of the scrimmage sprinted left for 30 yards and looked like he was shot out of a cannon.
As I discussed much earlier, our offense is based on speed. Nesbitt has served us well as largely a power runner, but generally is a little slower than the QB’s that Paul Johnson has typically used, and that Navy uses now under Coach Johnson’s successor in the same offense. Any added speed for Nesbitt, even if only slight, could be huge. If Nesbitt gets the corner a little faster, then that could dramatically increase the pressure on the linebackers as they wait to see if Allen has the ball or not on the dive. After a big run or two by Nesbitt the linebackers may be leaving their area to pursue Nesbitt before they know for sure if Allen has the ball. This phenomenon has lead to big runs in the past, most notably Dwyer against FSU in 2008. Here is the youtube link of that play - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMKQJR-iXuo. By my count there are two guys clearly over pursuing Nesbitt, the safety and the middle linebacker. The safety goes straight for him, while the middle linebacker moves that direction early and thus makes himself easier to block. If Nesbitt gets much faster, you will see a lot more of these kind of plays, with space opening up for Allen for no reason other than the defenders in the middle are respecting Nesbitt’s speed.
My conclusion for Nesbitt’s improvement is that he may be slightly better at making reads, he may be slightly stronger, but look for him to move a little better, which will be the biggest improvement. The bottom line though, is that what is most important is Nesbitt simply staying as good as he was. We do not need him to get any better in order for him to be a big advantage for us.
Given how important the QB is to our offense, we could really benefit from getting Tevin Washington, David Sims, and maybe even Synjyn Days some snaps this season. They will have all been in the offense for at least two years, but you can only gain so much valuable experience from practice, film and the spring game. These backups need live game action. So we will need some games to be comfortable wins, not shootouts. Which brings me to reason number four that we will be improved this season…
4 – A Much Improved Defense
The defense will improve for two reasons. First, Al Groh is a better defensive coordinator than Dave Wommack. Secondly, as shown earlier, our defense across the board will be more talented and more experienced. Neither the increase in talent nor experience is great, but small increases in both should make for a noticeable improvement.
Let me begin by saying I have nothing against Dave Wommack. I know very little about him, besides the quality of the GT defenses he put on the field in 2008 and 2009. I was not impressed by either defense. I was especially not impressed by our defense in 2008, since all 4 members of our starting defensive lines would go on to make NFL rosters, at least initially. Having 4 defensive linemen in college who each get a serious look from the NFL, particularly when 3 of those are seniors in the same year, should be a big advantage. To be fair, GT did rank 22nd in points allowed and 23rd in yards allowed in the country in 2008. But we ranked 6th in the ACC in both those categories, suggesting that perhaps the ACC simply wasn’t very good at offense that year. A look over our schedule reveals only a handful of teams I would call “good” offensively. We held Miami and FSU 4 and 5 points below their season averages, respectively. But we gave UNC one point more than their average, and yielded a full 10 points and 8 points over the season averages of UGA and LSU. We may have won 3 out of 5 of those games, but I don’t consider it important in a discussion of the defense whether or not the offense was able to make up for mediocre or in some cases bad defensive performances. The bottom line is that we had a great defensive line, which should lead to at least a good defense, and I thought we were no better than average.
The statistical data may not conclusively prove my assertion that we were only average on defense in 2008. My opinion is based on the fact that I don’t think we played very good offenses, and also that simply when I watched us play, our defense never gave me much confidence. However, reasonably minds can differ on this point. Reasonable minds cannot differ on 2009. We were flat out terrible. We were 58th in points given up, and that is with an offense that was very good at holding the ball.
Here is a look at our stats on defense the past 7 years:
| Year | National Rank: | Points/game: | Sacks: | Plays: | Yards/play: |
| 2003 | 34th | 21.3 | 34 | 877 | 4.8* |
| 2004 | 24th | 19.4 | 40 | 799 | 4.5 |
| 2005 | 23rd | 20.1 | 24 | 793 | 4.8 |
| 2006 | 27th | 18.4 | 34 | 906 | 4.6 |
| 2007 | 21st | 20.8 | 51 | 861 | 5.0 |
| 2008 | 28th | 20.3 | 26 | 847 | 4.8 |
| 2009 | 56th | 24.8 | 25 | 831 | 6.1 |
* - could not find the UGA GT box score for 2003. I found their total yards and then divided by the average number of plays our opponents ran in our 12 other games. This is obviously imperfect but should be a reasonable estimate and should not cause much inaccuracy.
The above numbers are not kind to Wommack. His 2008 defense managed to maintain about GT’s normal yards per play allowed, yet somehow gave up roughly a full point more than our normal average. However, in 2009 there is a clear drop off as Wommack fielded the worst Tech defense by far in any of the last 7 years. It would be one thing if he could argue that he inherited less talented players, but the above analysis of the recruiting ratings actually shows the opposite. Wommack inherited more talented players than the typical GT teams have had over the last few years. Additionally, as I have mentioned several times already, the 2008 defense benefited from an unusually good defensive line, which Wommack used to make us only almost as good as we normally are.
To be fair, the defensive coordinator for GT in all five of the years we are comparing Wommack to was Jon Tenuta, who is well respected and generally regarded as a good defensive coordinator. However, he is not that good (he hasn’t exactly blown away Notre Dame fans since he left GT) and in any case I don’t think Tenuta is so good that at GT we should be satisfied with defenses much below his level.
So we have established that Wommack wasn’t very good. Is Groh any better? Put simply, yes, much better. Let me begin by telling you what Groh is not. He is not a very good head coach. He is not as bad as some think (he was 2007 ACC coach of the year, and last I checked, outside of a couple years during the George Welsh era, UVA has not achieved much as a program) but he is not very good. He went 59 – 53 in 9 seasons at UVA. That information alone is far from conclusive that he is a bad head coach, since UVA as a program has gone 599 and 520 in their history, which is pretty close to the same winning percentage as 59 and 53. However, his record is slightly worse than the historical average of a program that has never been very good, and he was fired by a program that doesn’t have tremendously high expectations (ie has never been very good). So, I think its safe to say he is not a real good head coach.
Some lesser informed fans of some of our rivals have used Groh’s head coaching ability as a point against us for this season, which makes no sense. Being a head coach is a significantly different job from being a defensive coordinator. As a head coach you have responsibility to manage all the other coaches on the team, and handle pre-game and halftime speeches. Additionally, you run all of the “non football” stuff, such as talking to the media, talking to fans, doing radio and coaches shows, managing the other coaches in the recruiting efforts, and managing the players and the team’s schedules on a day to day basis. As a defensive coordinator, you have some responsibility in recruiting and to the media, but not as much. And you only have to manage the coaches on the defensive side of the ball. Essentially, upon moving from being a head coach into being a defensive coordinator, Groh will now be able to relax and just coach the defense.
Furthermore, Groh typically had good defenses at UVA. He did not serve as his own defensive coordinator, so it is difficult to know how much influence he really had over the defense. However, UVA ran his 3-4 scheme, and he came to UVA after 10 years of coaching defense in the NFL, 5 of those as defensive coordinator. I think its safe to assume he spent most of his time on the defense, and was probably the de facto defensive coordinator himself. I would be willing to bet he is now very happy to be at GT with more time to focus on the defense.
Did Groh have better defenses at UVA than we did at GT? Well, let’s take a look:
| | | GT | | | | UVA | |
| Year | Pts/gm | Nat’l rank | Yards/play | | Pts/gm | Nat’l rank | Yards/play |
| 2009 | 24.8 | 56 | 6.1 | | 26.3 | 65 | 5.0 |
| 2008 | 20.3 | 28 | 4.8 | | 21.7 | 38 | 4.9 |
| 2007 | 20.8 | 21 | 5.0 | | 19.7 | 16 | 4.7 |
| 2006 | 18.4 | 27 | 4.6 | | 17.8 | 22 | 4.8 |
| 2005 | 20.1 | 23 | 4.8 | | 23.3 | 40 | 5.3 |
Well, that looks pretty even, back and forth. Lets take a look at the average for those years:
| | GT | | | | UVA | |
| Pts/gm | Nat’l rank | Yds/play | | pts/gm | Nat’l rank | yds/play |
| 20.88 | 31 | 5.06 | | 21.76 | 36.2 | 4.94 |
That makes it pretty clear that Groh’s defenses at UVA have been about the same as the defenses we have had at GT the last five years. It also appears that Groh’s defenses at UVA were about the same as Wommack’s at GT, which would not be good. However, there are two key points that should be included. One is talent, the other is the quality of the offense. The talent that Groh was working with is obviously relevant. The quality of the offense affects the defense because if the offense is good, and thus keeps the ball, the defense will be on the field less. It will be more rested, and even if its terrible and allows the opponent to score every time it gets the ball, its total yards allowed and points allowed will be lower simply because the offense holds the ball longer and thus the other team has fewer possessions and less total time with the ball.
The quality of the offense is the easiest to judge. GT was 1st in the conference in total yards and 6th in points scored in 2008. UVA was 12th in both. In 2009, GT improved to 1st in both, while UVA improved to 8th in scoring and 6th in yards. Clearly then, GT had the better offense both years, which helps the defense.
As for talent, here is the average recruiting ranking of the defensive players brought in since 2006 for both schools.
| Year | | GT | | UVA |
| | | | | |
| 2009 | | 75.91 (11 players) | | 76.71 (7 players) |
| 2008 | | 76.77 (9 players) | | 74 (3 players) |
| 2007 | | 75 (10 players) | | 72.66 (6 players) |
| 2006 | | 76.5 (4 players) | | 71 (5 players) |
This analysis is frustrated somewhat because UVA brings in more players than GT every year who get espn’s rating of “40”, which means they were never evaluated. I ignore these players in figuring averages because I don’t know what else to do with them. So, from the best evidence we have, I think its clear from the above that the talent we have now is substantially better than the talent that Groh had at UVA. Additionally, Groh put together a defense that was statistically about as good as Wommack’s defense at GT with that lesser talent, AND Groh’s stats were hurt by the fact that he never had a good offense. Something tells me Groh won’t have that problem at GT.
So our defense should be better under Groh. If the above analysis isn’t enough proof, then just look at the fact that he has worked as a defensive coach in the NFL for 10 years, and the Dolphins wanted to hire him this year, but he chose to come to GT instead. I am willing to bet that he knows what he is doing, he will upgrade the defense at GT considerably, and he will give us an X and O guy who, like Paul Johnson, will usually be able to out adjust the other team at halftime.
The other reason our defense will be better this year is an improvement in talent and experience as compared to GT in previous years. Copied below are the charts from earlier that show this fact:
TALENT:
| Year/String | QB | OL | RB | WR | | DL | LB | DB |
| | | | | | | | | |
| 2010 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 76* | 74.67 | 73.5 | | 79 | 76.33 | 75 |
| 2nd String | N/A | 78 | 77.5 | 76 | | 77.3 | 75.5 | 77 |
| 2009 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 75 | 76.33 | 72 | | 77.5 | 70.5 | 76 |
| 2nd String | 74 | 74.67* | 76.5 | 76 | | 77 | 79.33 | 74.67* |
| 2008 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 77 | 73 | 75.33 | 72.5 | | 78.25 | 76 | 76.75 |
| 2nd String | N/A | 73.2 | 74.5 | 68 | | 77.5 | 70* | 73.75 |
EXPERIENCE:
| Year/String | QB | OL | RB | WR | | DL | LB | DB |
| | | | | | | | | |
| 2010 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 4 | 2.8 | 3.33 | 2.5 | | 2.67 | 3.75 | 3.75 |
| 2nd String | 2 | 1.4 | 3 | 1.5 | | 1.33 | 2.5 | 2.5 |
| 2009 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 3 | 3 | 2.67 | 2.5 | | 2.5 | 3 | 2.75 |
| 2nd String | 2 | 2 | 2.33 | 1.5 | | 2.5 | 2 | 2.75 |
| 2008 | | | | | | | | |
| 1st String | 2 | 3.6 | 2 | 2.5 | | 3.5 | 2.33 | 2.25 |
| 2nd String | 4 | 2.4 | 2 | 2.5 | | 1.75 | 2.67 | 2.25 |
If you look at the above charts and focus on the defense only, you can see that we generally get more experienced and more talented. That, along with a better coach, should make for a significant improvement on defense this year.
Conclusion:
We are losing four very talented players who represented GT extremely well in the NFL draft. All four were playmakers who could, and often did, make something great happen without much help. Nothing I have written above was meant to diminish the impact that they had during their careers, or the void their early departures have created.
With that said, four players are not a football team. We should have improved depth and talent. We should have a very good crop of young, talented players who have had the time to learn the system and are ready to step up and contribute. We should have a more well coached defense. We should have a quarterback capable of leading his team as well as any in the country. We should be better up front on both sides of the ball.
Of course, it is August. Right now, everything “should” be something. We don’t find out what it will be or what it is until next month. But there are many reasons to be very optimistic if you are a GT fan in 2010.
Go Jackets!
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