Mark Bradley, bless his heart, tries to help the genius sell his newest, latest, greatest defense. It’s pretty heavy lifting.
“This defense is set up to make some negative plays,” Johnson said Friday. Indeed, the first three snaps of Tech’s spring game – with the No. 1 offense, minus quarterback TaQuon Marshall, who had strep throat, working against the No. 1 defense – went thusly: touch-sack (no hitting the QB this night), fumble in the backfield, interception. There’s your third-down stop plus a takeaway on the opening series of this defense’s public debut. Can world domination be far off?
That being said, linebacker Brant Mitchell finished the game with five tackles for loss, contributing to eight total for the Blue-team (first-string) defense…
Time for grains of salt: The first-string defense had nine tackles for loss in last year’s spring game and went on to record 4.3 per game last season, lowest in the ACC. Also, the first-string offensive line was absent its two best players and was using a center (Jahaziel Lee) who had never played the position before this week.
Yes, that smells like dominance. And it wouldn’t be a Tech spring game without a touch of comedic relief.
One is sophomore-to-be Jaquan Henderson of Covington’s Newton High. Asked what he liked about Woody’s defense, Henderson said: “There’s no thinking. We’re trying to make plays. I don’t like to think out there.”
That explains a lot.
Mark has his work cut out for him.
Get The Picture 
Tech’s defense sees more 3-O in practice than anyone in the country, particularly in the spring. Not surprising that their linebackers could end up with high TFL numbers in their spring games.
Translating that to TFLs against non-option teams is a very different story.
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Maybe Turkeyneck Fish Fry doesn’t allow his OL to cut his defensive line in the scrimmage. Maybe that’s why they make so many TFLs in a spring game … someone could ask 1 of the 100 or so in attendance.
Does anyone agree with me that StinGTalk will obsess more about G-Day than they discuss their own game? Over/under in the comments there hoping Jake Fromm blows out his knees or Uga dies on the sideline? I say 100.
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I’m not sure an aggressive style of defense is the way to go for yech. I think it’s great for your high scoring offenses that just want an extra possession or 2 but for a team that can’t play catch up because they’re one dimensional, “bend don’t break” and playing for FG attempts seems a better strategy.
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Yes, a college defense typically looks good against a high school offense
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“D-linemen tend to be precious commodities in recruiting, something at which Tech has seldom excelled. Switching to the 3-4 could turn that failure into something approaching success. One thing the Jackets can find is smallish linebackers, the kind that aren’t apt to be 5-star guys.”
True words right there!
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I don’t see how you can play a 3-4 with smallish LBs and without elite DLs. You get steamrolled by teams with a good offensive line and can’t set the edge against the run game. For instance, Rennie Curran is a DGD but no way he could have held up in a 3-4 scheme without a big time NT and DE keeping offensive linemen off him.
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You can play a one gap 3-4 with smaller guys shooting gaps and bringing extra rushers. That’s what CTG runs. It’s meant to physically disrupt the pass game but it is susceptible to the power run game.
The 3-4 that Saban and CKS run requires the guys up front to play 2-gap and the primary purpose is to stop the run completely and then take the pass away with tight coverage and confusion rather than a lot of blitzing. The weakness is if you face a team with big, fast athletic wide outs and a qb who can deliver it downfield you get burned.
Im guessing that you’re seeing a lot less power run offenses in the ACC, but good luck against ND playing that way.
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“One thing the Jackets can find is smallish linebackers, the kind that aren’t apt to be 5-foot tall guys.”
Fixed it.
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For a guy Tech fans insist is a UGA shill, Mark sure has been working overtime lately to convince people that the bees really are going to make the COFH series competitive.
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They actually call him “Barks Madly”.
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“Georgia Tech’s new defense is not discouraging.”
Damning with some faint praise, there. Especially considering Taquon Marshall didn’t play. Doesn’t sound like he has a woody for Coach Woody.
For a Kentucky guy, he does a good job trolling the bees.
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Every team looks great in their Spring game on some level.
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From the end of the column, did Virginia fire their coach this year? Also, Bradley has it completely backwards about the D-linemen in a 3-4. It’s harder to find 3 quality linemen than the 2 you need in a 4-3. Tech has had problems for years getting enough good D-tackles, but has done a fairly good job with the tweener-type 4-3 DE’s in the 240-50 lb range. Now they will need 3 big guys inside and the long, highly athletic guys needed at OLB. The exact types they have problems recruiting. Everything I just listed was stated by Fish Fry when they fired Groh, considered a 3-4 guru before his stint at Tech, and hired Roof.
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UVA didn’t fire their head coach. No clue where Bradley got that from. The ‘Hoos actually made it to a bowl last year, which is more than you can say for GT.
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How do we know any of this actually happened? The game was neither televised, streamed or broadcast on the radio. Maybe this is all some Mark Bradley fever dream.
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So they had a triple option offense and if the QB is touched he is considered down. We’re supposed to be impressed by the defense in that scenario? The QB is generally running right at the defense.
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