The times, they are a-changin’.
“Four years ago, 2011, the defense that was so good against LSU, that season, we had five run-pass option plays throughout the 800 plays. Last year’s had over 120 run-pass option plays,” Smart said. “Obviously, the game has changed, the teams we’re playing changed, and we’ve had to evolve.”
So how have he and Saban adapted?
“That team (in 2011) was a big, physical team that was good at stopping the run, had two first-round corners. In recent years, the run-pass option has evolved to make offensive football better, and we’ve had to change with that,” Smart said. “We’ve got to do more things, we’ve got to play more split-safety coverages, you’ve got to help your corners in a lot of different ways, and we have to continue to grow in that area, so we don’t give up big plays, don’t put those guys in bad situations, which I probably did too often.”
To answer your next question, last season Alabama gave up twice as many plays of 30+ yards as did Georgia and over three times as many plays of 40+ yards. I’m not saying the pupil has surpassed the master here by any means, but it does seem as if Pruitt’s gotten a head start on the learning curve.
Get The Picture 
I’ve never really thought Kirby was the brains behind the defense. I guarantee every call goes through Little Nicky. I just think Kirby is a not-so-young-anymore Neil Calloway except he’s a good recruiter.
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I’m not so sure about that. Why would Bama pay Kirby the most of any asst coach in the country if all he had to do was stand there and be Saban’s puppet? If Saban is the one actually running the defense and Kirby is nothing more than a recruiter, why not go find the best recruiter in the nation, call him as DC and pay him $300,000 a year to do nothing but recruit.
I will say; if the refs start enforcing the linemen downfield rule, the spread as it’s run in college will be a lot less dangerous.
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Why would the best recruiter in the country (probably on staff at UGA making way more than $300k) take a job like that at bama?
Would it hurt Bama’s recruiting if they were only paying their DC $300k when all other DCs are making close to 7 figures?
such a weird line of reasoning.
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Well, if Saban is the “real DC” at Bama, it wouldn’t matter what they paid the guy with the DC title, the results on the field would be the same and so would the recruiting. Point is, everyone loves to say Kirby is doing nothing and all of Bama’s D success is because of Saban. If that’s true, why have the highest paid asst in the country basically doing nothing?
Sorry you don’t get the point.
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Admittedly – it ultimately didn’t matter, but I remember thinking that if Auburn had run that pop-pass play without a penalty called after the BS on the fake punt in our game last year, I would have gone ballistic.
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I don’t believe Kirby is a puppet, and his results as a recruiter are exceptional. But as the highest paid assistant in the country, it would seem logical that with the coaching turnover as it is, someone in the CFB world would have lured him away as a HC by now. Maybe he just wants to stay where is is. Or maybe there’s a disconnect between his perceived value as an assistant and his potential as a HC. And if so, his association with Saban and his not-so-detached management style might have outlived its usefulness. I’m not saying Kirby wouldn’t be a good HC; I just wonder why it hasn’t happened already.
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Y’all, we could recruit kids to play at Bama with the roll they’ve been on lately.
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lol Some truth there. Smart may or may not be a puppet but in my opinion before he steps into a head coaching job at a Top 25 program he needs to prove that he isn’t.
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I seriously doubt he cares what we think, either way. I don’t think he’s a puppet…he works for one of the most demanding HC in the Country…from what you hear anyways. IF he wasn’t doing his job, he would be FIRED… Kudos to Kirby…
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I seriously doubt many coaches or players care much at all about but is written in here but we’re still typing. The question for anyone looking to hire him is, what are the details of the job? I wouldn’t want him as a UGA HC with his current resume, not that anyone making the decision cares.
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Based on what I know, he would not be my first pick either…I think he feels very secure at Bama….
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Could be that he doesnt want to go to Colorado State to coach ball and the top 20 schools dont want an assistant like Muschamp.
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My point is, as others have stated, he’s had the chance to be his own man and has never taken it. All he has done is leverage CMR to get a raise from Little Nicky.
He wants a head coaching job, but he hasn’t proven to the outside world that he even runs the defense at Alabama.
I totally agree with you about the downfield rule …
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I think he’s sort of painted himself in a corner with his salary and his perceived value. No top 25 program is going to hire him because they know they will have to throw huge money at him to get him to leave and to get Bama to let him go. Combine that with the dreadful job Muschamp did at Florida and Strong has done so far at Texas and I think you have a lot of wariness in the college football world about going after highly paid DCs as head coaches.
He isn’t going to be hired away as a DC and not many places are going to want to go after him as a head coach. He really is sort of stuck. Of course, this whole discourse is based on the premise that he wants to be a head coach.
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Well said. The only differing point is that Strong did a solid job at Louisville. Mack Brown left a mess in Austin, and I’m not sure Bulldog Kryptonite has had enough time to fix it.
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He may want to be Chavis Pt. 2. Chief has had good gigs and a lot less pressure.
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Just to clarify, when Kirby says “we” he means “Saban”, right?
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Saban coached the Defensive Backs (5 and 4 star talent 3 deep). The SECc and the OSU game, they got beat deep repeatedly. It was crazy. It looked like Todd Grantham was coaching their defense.
I heard they have a new DB coach this year who is good. I hope he doesn’t have them ready when we play them.
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Could be the bst defensive backfield coach they had is now at UGA after a brief visit to FSU.
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Scrolling through drive charts from last year, Bama has seemed to have moved from ground attack based long clock killing drives on offense to being more big play reliant, and less likely to win the field position battle. A complaint I had with Bobo (and special teams) for years. UGA has seemed to do the inverse. If you do not give the defense some time to catch their breath, you will give up points.
Certainly it isn’t the only factor but Auburn 2010 further shows what a quick strike team will do to defensive stats. Saban has seemed to pick up on this as well with some statements that perhaps they need to slow down on offense.
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Auburn 2010 proved that if you have the best player on the field and he happens to play a position where he touches the ball every play, you’ll be pretty good.
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Speaking of which, whats the deal with all the hype surrounding their QB this year? Dude is practically a Heisman candidate and hasn’t taken a live game snap yet. I keep hearing “Auburn is loaded at QB”…
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The defense gave up lots of yards but the DC is making an improvement at GT. Despite all the other stats, 4th Qtr defense was very solid. Stats in a vacuum only show a small part of the story.
Johnny Football didn’t win championships like the team Cam was part of.
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I believe Cam is on another level than Johnny Foosball.
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Ha. The self-proclaimed “king of College Football”…lol…just mentioned this post on his show. Let me summarize his comment on the 40+ yard stat…look who Georgia played! Lol. Then he decided to throw out the Auburn game because the Tigers were in a “funk”. Stupid is as stupid does.
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Then he’s missed Hale’s methodology. David only used common opponents on the ’13 and ’14 schedules to make his point, so it’s the same teams in both seasons.
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