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DC Jim Knowles (Official Thread)

I was mulling things over yesterday going back and grading line play from The Game.

This team has lacked a true 'twitchy' edge since Chase went to the NFL. I mean that elite first step, bend-the-corner, type edge rusher. Not that it can't work, there are plenty of ways to get things done. A lot of those defenses under Tressel didn't have one, and yes I'm aware I'm including Big Will (RIP) and Vern. What we have with JT and Sawyer isn't that. Those two are fine players in their own right even though I believe both have room for growth with another year at tOSU.

That said, I'm curious why JT wasn't used in a different way throughout the season to help provide interior pressure when the Bullets were facing obvious passing situations? I say that because, JT's build and playstyle remind me a great deal of Michael Bennett from Seattle. Solid burst, good wingspan, but the biggest attributes were playing with a motor along great hand-feet sync and strike technique. Bennett was also a bit stiff in the hips. He didn't have that elite hip-drop where you could swear he's parallel with the ground like Myles Garrett or TJ Watt are capable of. I see a lot of that mold in J.T.

Seattle, and I believe Tampa? Both coaching staffs responded by kicking him into a more 3 and 4i tech at times to help take advantage of his quickness on guards, his hand usage, strength and motor. I viewed it as the best way to play to strengths and minimizing weaknesses. As a result, the Hawks were really a Dline that got it done across the front. They could pressure the edge and collapse the interior consistently.

I thought this as far back as early as last year. But re-watching The Game only really reaffirms my confusion as to why the currently coaching staff hasn't considered this as a very real and effective approach to solving hit or miss pressures from our 4 man rushes. If this is a "philosophy" or "scheme" thing, then I don't know what to tell the coaches other than that's incredibly stubborn to the detriment of getting the most from your personnel.

I still think Knowles is a quality coach, and he is most certainly an upgrade from what we previously had. That said, it's the game of football, and there are always ways we can find to improve ourselves and our team. Watching the LB play slowly go downhill from mid-season is also a concern. These guys weren't ready for the scUM misdirection game and struggled to adjust the second half. The DL looked tired midway through the 3rd and I'm wondering how much the snap counts from the previous 11 games finally caught up with us.
 
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And OSU has 3 players with that exact skill set...
And they barely played all year.

We rarely use a true rush front on 3rd downs anymore. A very good front would’ve been 97-33-44-92.

I think 33 and 44 should’ve shared a position at times with the other position being 97 and 92. I get on first down to stop the run going with JT and Jack but there just wasn’t very much experimentation there throughout the year.
 
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Wanting Jim Knowles gone is taking the stupid dial to 11. After the Coombs debacle, it took him one transition year to get us to this year where we ended the regular season with the #3 total yards defense and #2 scoring defense. I swear that peoples' brains got broke on Saturday.
Just not thinking anything through at all.

We will be a top 10 defense next year too. The key is to get the offense back to a top 10 level.
 
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Wanting Jim Knowles gone is taking the stupid dial to 11. After the Coombs debacle, it took him one transition year to get us to this year where we ended the regular season with the #3 total yards defense and #2 scoring defense. I swear that peoples' brains got broke on Saturday.
Many OSU fans lost their minds after the last 3 losses to scUM. The fact that I've seen people want an overrated WSU QB, and now some want his twin turnover machine brother KJ Jefferson from Arky is insane! Neither are better than what's on the roster.
Knowles has done an amazing job, and probably the best DC since Hafley's 1 year.
 
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Wanting Jim Knowles gone is taking the stupid dial to 11. After the Coombs debacle, it took him one transition year to get us to this year where we ended the regular season with the #3 total yards defense and #2 scoring defense. I swear that peoples' brains got broke on Saturday.
this plus.. LJSr not implementing the DL front Knowles wants, and I think a lot of people said Knowles D was fairly complicated and would take several years to learn.... which is why they brought in Tanner that first year
 
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Guys, there is something very unique about Michigan, and bc of it, people really should take a deep breath and back off the ledge a bit.

Michigan is projected to have (7) offensive lineman taken in the upcoming draft. That isn’t a typo….its actually LOL funny when u think about it. There’s a reason they trotted out (7) man offensive lines on a regular basis.

This team was designed to be old, tough, physical, and built to wear down good college teams.

The good news is, barring an unforeseen pandemic, we won’t see an offensive line this good in probably forever.

Again, I think people need to take more of a 20,000 foot approach here rather than isolating a single half against an insanely veteran and experienced football team. They’ve won the battle for the last few years, and it sucks, but they aren’t going to win the long term war. The overall health of our programs couldn’t be any more night and day. The pain right now fucking sucks, but all is not lost here. We are in great shape for future….(2) of the current top (4) teams in rankings cannot say same thing.
 
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Guys, there is something very unique about Michigan, and bc of it, people really should take a deep breath and back off the ledge a bit.

Michigan is projected to have (7) offensive lineman taken in the upcoming draft. That isn’t a typo….its actually LOL funny when u think about it. There’s a reason they trotted out (7) man offensive lines on a regular basis.

This team was designed to be old, tough, physical, and built to wear down good college teams.

The good news is, barring an unforeseen pandemic, we won’t see an offensive line this good in probably forever.

Again, I think people need to take more of a 20,000 foot approach here rather than isolating a single half against an insanely veteran and experienced football team. They’ve won the battle for the last few years, and it sucks, but they aren’t going to win the long term war. The overall health of our programs couldn’t be any more night and day. The pain right now fucking sucks, but all is not lost here. We are in great shape for future….(2) of the current top (4) teams in rankings cannot say same thing.

We've been rationalizing why we lost The Game for 3 straight years.
 
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Could very well be true of the defense but I think people need to do the same level of coming to grips with the cold hard fact that we have to keep moving the goal posts like this for every element of this program except WR recruiting and development.

If you keep having to make excuses for failure, you are just going to keep getting failure.

It's not moving goalposts it's judging the cost/benefit. No one moves goalposts for underperforming guys like Fleming or maybe Dennis. People regularly think LJ needs to move to an analyst role or retire. Frye is on the hotseat. There's reasons to think there might be better coaches out there.

Knowles isn't the problem. His unit is on an upward trajectory, and it's a waste of time trying to replace him rather than continuing to refine and find a balance between over aggression and passivity. The odds of blowing up the defense and immediately finding an upgrade is nil.
 
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Wanting Jim Knowles gone is taking the stupid dial to 11. After the Coombs debacle, it took him one transition year to get us to this year where we ended the regular season with the #3 total yards defense and #2 scoring defense. I swear that peoples' brains got broke on Saturday.
Bingo. Knowles had the defense performing at a championship level this season. People need to step back from the ledge and check themselves.
 
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Guys, there is something very unique about Michigan, and bc of it, people really should take a deep breath and back off the ledge a bit.

Michigan is projected to have (7) offensive lineman taken in the upcoming draft. That isn’t a typo….its actually LOL funny when u think about it. There’s a reason they trotted out (7) man offensive lines on a regular basis.

This team was designed to be old, tough, physical, and built to wear down good college teams.

The good news is, barring an unforeseen pandemic, we won’t see an offensive line this good in probably forever.

Again, I think people need to take more of a 20,000 foot approach here rather than isolating a single half against an insanely veteran and experienced football team. They’ve won the battle for the last few years, and it sucks, but they aren’t going to win the long term war. The overall health of our programs couldn’t be any more night and day. The pain right now fucking sucks, but all is not lost here. We are in great shape for future….(2) of the current top (4) teams in rankings cannot say same thing.
I agree with you. I don't like it. But I agree with you.
 
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You may be correct @billmac91 . I don't know. During the broadcast and build up to the game, people said that they thought this year's TCUN line was worse than the previous two.

The only thing that I know, for myself right now, is that I don't believe I'll go into next year's game with any expectation of the Buckeyes winning.
I will be pleasantly surprised, but zero expectation. That's my bag, and I own it. I also recognize that it's because I fully expected a different result this year.
To be clear, it's not apathy. Just a significant lessening of hope that it'll be any different than the last three years.
 
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The fucking cheated for 2 of those years. It's not a rationalization, it happened. People are just mad and want to act like suddenly none of that happened or matters

and they still claim a bad spot in 2016.

Day had his chance at redemption this year. To make it clear that the cheating was the difference. Instead, he stepped on his dick again.

People may not want to admit it but Day isn't ever going to get it done, no matter how many excuses are made and no matter how many "wait 'til next year" he gets.
 
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