Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Jordan Jefferson GOT PAID

I hope it was worth it!

Congrats to the Bama Tide for capturing their 2nd National Championship in the last 3 years. Was it the most exciting or electrifying BCS title game ever? Hecks no! Was it an SEC game at it's best? Not really? Then what exactly did we witness in Alabama's 21-0 woodshed beat down of the LSU Tigers? I honestly can say that we may have seen the best defense in college football history - EVER. Throw out the statistical facts of leading the country in the four major statistical categories. I don't want to hear about some 1950's Notre Dame team that played against wing-T teams. Maybe the Miami and Florida State teams of the 90's can compare, but this Bama D is on a whole different level with respects to speed and sheer desire to hit any fool carrying a football - or even a fool who looks like they want to carry the football. We witnessed what is termed a swarming defense - no inside runs, no outside runs, no bubble screens, no QB draws, no nothing. LSU couldn't manage jack. Holding the number one team to less than 100 yards of offense is just pure insane. No one except this Tide defense could do that. How do I know? Because LSU has laid, on average, 39 points a game during the year. And that includes the lowly 9 they scored against Bama in the first game. Take away that game and LSU was averaging almost 42 points a game. This from a power running offense. Ive told people this today and I truly believe it: if LSU played Oklahoma State in the title game, they would have won by a score of at least 42-14.

So what went wrong with the LSU offense?

Just plain SEC hard

The picture above is of Dont'a Hightower of Alabama. The photo isn't from last nights game, but it is meant to illustrate the relentlessness of the BCS title game defensive MVP. First of all, dude looks as though he has no desire to slow down and will, if necessary put his head right through the ball carrier without any care in the world. This is what LSU's offense had to deal with all night plus 10 more dudes who were flying to the ball with bad intentions.

Now as lets flip the script a little. As good as Bama was on defense, Jordan Jefferson was just as bad. Not just bad, but 'I got paid to lose this game' bad. Don't lie! You were thinking it also. This dude looked uninspired and drugged. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Not only that, every time they showed him on the sidelines he looked like he was on the synthetic marijuana that the Honey Badger was suspended for taking. You have to wonder if this dude even knew the plays he was running - which brings me to another point. LSU's had no offensive game plan - I'm sure they had plays which were on a sheet but there was nothing that showed they were setting up something, attempting to get in a rhythm or even trying to compete. It seems like they were trying to not to lose, or like they thought that at some time our defense or special teams will make a play and turn the tide. While Saban was dialing up the D, it looked as if they were playing against their own 'look squad'. These are the guys who run the other teams offense during the week leading up to a game. They are told by the coaches to not go hard and give the defense a good look so that they can get to their spots. In addition, the scout team QB is told to throw up a couple of passes so that the DB's can get some work at intercepting some balls. This is what Jordon Jefferson and LSU's offense looked like - A scout team. Every time they ran a play, it looked like Bama was there before they were.

This leads me to the main reason LSU loss. Preparation. One of the players remarked after the game that they won because of the Saban Factor. The player said that if you give Coach Saban 45 days to prepare, it's a done deal. Saban hit trumps early (if you don't play spades, forget about this reference) and went for the win. Les Miles looked as though they were uninspired and had no pop to them, and that's on the the Mad Hatter. I don't know what went on for the month leading up to the game but Les didn't do it right. It may have worked against any other team with lesser talent, but not Nick Saban and Alabama. I've been fortunate to be involved in championship games as a player and a coach and the one thing you need to do as a coach is to know that you need to be mentally peaking at game time so that the players can be physically unleashed when the ball is kicked off for the first time.

Miles didn't do it and it seemed that LSU, as a whole, was caught off guard in all facets of the game:

Offense - LSU never got in a rhythm of running the ball and seemed to just be out played and out smarted by Bama

Defense - Never got comfortable with the play action passes and the different formations of the Tide's offense

Special Teams - The LSU kick return team had 6 opportunities to make a momentum changing play before Bama put the game way away. Even after 5 field goals as well as the opening kick, LSU never had a return that gave them any good field position. In addition, the Honey Badger had no room to make a decent return. When your starting defense is playing special teams and covering kicks, then tells you how serious Saban and the team thought winning EVERY part of the game was.


From what I hear, Les Miles is getting it bad from the LSU fans via the airwaves. That is understandable. Once thing that the LSU faithful must realize is that, Miles was matching wits against possibly the best coach, motivator, recruiter and college football CFO EVER - yes ever. And not only that, Bama fielded, in my mind, the most athletically, and physically dominating defense ever. Could Les have had a better game plan? Yes. But in hindsight, neither he nor his players had a chance last night.

Looking good Bama! Looking good! ROLL TIDE




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