What will our defense be good at this season?

Undone said:
I think I see where a distinction needs to be made: A lot on this forum are hesitant to blame Chinander for poor play because of the dynamic of Year 1 changes and all of that. To an extent that is perfectly fair. Where I blame Chinander is for scheme issues that he is directly responsible for.
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A lot of these go hand in hand. Injuries played their part, too. You can only do what your players are capable of doing, and with the transition the number of guys capable of executing any particular call wasn’t always where Chins wanted. For instance, he wanted to play a lot more man coverage, which would have allowed him to be far more aggressive up front. 

Sometimes there are bad decisions that can be corrected. One I pointed out at the time last year was the decision to come out in 2 high versus Illinois. No reason to against that passing attack and that decision often left us minus 2 in the box. This was corrected in game. 

 
I mean, I don't think it'll be anywhere close to top 20-ish.  So in the traditional sense, no.  I just don't see it.

Good enough to ride the offense's coattails against a very weak schedule? Maybe.  Maybe even probably. 

 
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I think we'll be pleasantly surprised with the defense.

I look for the Davis twins to be more disruptive this season.  Their development and strength training under Riley's leadership was worse than a joke.

By the end of the season, a couple members of the secondary were consistently grading high at a league level.

If one or two of the newbie LBs can make a difference in the pass rush, we'll be good.  

I'm interested to see if Ty Robinson and Jackson Hannah are ready to go.

 
I'm not sure if the D will be "good" at anything yet this year. But I do expect great improvement and I do think they will be improved enough to give us a chance in every game we play. I'll be happy if we're more stout on the line, stop the run better, get more pressure on opposing QB's, cause/get more turnovers and get off the field more in 3rd down situations. We could do all of those things and still not be exceptionally good.

 
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I've been playing around with Football Outsiders website since I find their stuff generally to be pretty interesting.  I think we can all agree that traditional counting stats are mostly useless especially when it comes to a high tempo offense like Scott Frost runs.  That being said, I do tend to put a lot of faith in Net Yards Per Play.

Here's a link to FO's FEI ratings for defensive efficiency for 2018.  Not surprisingly, NU ranked towards the bottom---#98 to be exact.  I'd love it if NU could jump up to around 50 or so (fwiw Ohio State was #52 last year).  I do think the defense should be better, it's hard to predict turnovers since those tend to just boil down to luck.

https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/feidef

 
Xmas32 said:
I've been playing around with Football Outsiders website since I find their stuff generally to be pretty interesting.  I think we can all agree that traditional counting stats are mostly useless especially when it comes to a high tempo offense like Scott Frost runs.  That being said, I do tend to put a lot of faith in Net Yards Per Play.

Here's a link to FO's FEI ratings for defensive efficiency for 2018.  Not surprisingly, NU ranked towards the bottom---#98 to be exact.  I'd love it if NU could jump up to around 50 or so (fwiw Ohio State was #52 last year).  I do think the defense should be better, it's hard to predict turnovers since those tend to just boil down to luck.

https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/feidef
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I agree TO are hard to predict but if a team focuses on them and then regularly ranks high in that category, there’s more to it than luck. 

Another possible factor (besides luck) is how good your offense is. If your offense is good and the other tem is regularly coming from behind, I would guess they’d be more prone to mistakes. Especially if they’re a running team that has to pass more. It’d be an interesting stat to look into.

 
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Jeez I totally misread the topic title.  

If I had to guess I would say the defense will be better at creating turnovers this year.  Which would be huge.

 
Moiraine said:
I agree TO are hard to predict but if a team focuses on them and then regularly ranks high in that category, there’s more to it than luck. 
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I stopped participating in this conversation years ago because people are, as a generality, not comfortable with luck as a significant contributing factor. 

Moiraine said:
Another possible factor (besides luck) is how good your offense is. If your offense is good and the other tem is regularly coming from behind, I would guess they’d be more prone to mistakes. Especially if they’re a running team that has to pass more. It’d be an interesting stat to look into.
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Then let’s use Alabama and Clemson as examples because of their high scoring margins and top tier defensive talent. This is where they rank in takeaways per game these last four years (newest first):

Alabama 79, 54, 19, 31

Clemson 56, 76, 42, 23

Some teams with not good scoring margins were in the top 10 in takeaways per game this past season:

Kansas

California

Boston College 

Indiana

Some teams with good scoring margins were in the top 10 in takeaways per game this past season:

Utah St

Ohio

Central Florida

 
brophog said:
I stopped participating in this conversation years ago because people are, as a generality, not comfortable with luck as a significant contributing factor. 

Then let’s use Alabama and Clemson as examples because of their high scoring margins and top tier defensive talent. This is where they rank in takeaways per game these last four years (newest first):

Alabama 79, 54, 19, 31

Clemson 56, 76, 42, 23

Some teams with not good scoring margins were in the top 10 in takeaways per game this past season:

Kansas

California

Boston College 

Indiana

Some teams with good scoring margins were in the top 10 in takeaways per game this past season:

Utah St

Ohio

Central Florida
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I wouldn't know whether any of those are outliers without looking at all the teams and whether they were winning during the takeaways. It could be a minor factor. Or the opposite of my guess could be true. I do think luck is a major factor.

One thing that'd have to be taken into account is that the increase in takeaways usually leads to a bigger margin of victory, so I'd probably just look at the margin at the time the takeaway occurred.

 
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My feeling is the offense improves leaps and bounds and the D reacts more then thinks. Step quicker. I hope the conditioning leads to better tackling. Just want to see NU hit QBs but doubt it happens. 

 
BigRedN said:
For me, the fan who believes :bigredn:  will be 9-3 or better believe our defense will be good to great. 
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There are some scenarios that allow for a poor defense to hit that mark, but highly improbable.

I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s the defense carrying the offense early. It may take a bit for this young offense to sort out some positions and this defense is hungry. Their effort and toughness this spring completely overshadowed anything they did from last year. I believe this freshman class is very special, and many of those guys (in particular non-lineman) could find themselves playing a lot by season’s end.

 
I’m afraid the Defense will be good at giving up points in bunches...again.  

No reason to think the Dline will improve with another coaching change.

I don’t think there is any way we hold OSU under 40 pts. (See Justin Fields and the Illinois game last year)

8 wins tops.  

 
SFW said:
I’m afraid the Defense will be good at giving up points in bunches...again.  

No reason to think the Dline will improve with another coaching change.

I don’t think there is any way we hold OSU under 40 pts. (See Justin Fields and the Illinois game last year)

8 wins tops.  
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Aren't you a bowl of sunshine :o

 
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