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DC Jim Knowles (Official Thread)

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I think it would be interesting to look back to see how the hell Hafley was able to make it all work...

I'm reasonably sure Coombs was doomed (probably at least partially because he and LJ had been on the staff together previously) from the start. That's not to say he might not have had issues anyway, but I don't think there's any way it could have worked.
 
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ochre said:
I think it would be interesting to look back to see how the hell Hafley was able to make it all work...

I'm reasonably sure Coombs was doomed (probably at least partially because he and LJ had been on the staff together previously) from the start. That's not to say he might not have had issues anyway, but I don't think there's any way it could have worked.
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Hafley gets a lot of credit for not crashing the race car. With the best DE/CB combo of the decade, he let the DL do its thing, didn't have to blitz much, and did a great job improving the DBs and mixing in zone. In a cursed game against Clemson, the defense was good 95% of the time, but you started to see some of the holes in the defense. The LBs outside of Werner were a liability, the back 7 took some bad angles and they didn't have an answer for losing Wade and Young being negated (either by double team or egregious hands to the face penalties jamming his head backwards). That happens against elite teams, though. The problem was the other 5% of the game was spent giving up the easiest 95 yard drive I can remember.

What I'm getting at is Hafley was a good DC and teacher that didn't exactly do anything special other than let Chase wreck stuff and keep everything in front of the DBs. If he tried to use that style today without a pressure cheat code, they'd get picked apart.
 
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1926Buckeyes said:
Hafley gets a lot of credit for not crashing the race car. With the best DE/CB combo of the decade, he let the DL do its thing, didn't have to blitz much, and did a great job improving the DBs and mixing in zone. In a cursed game against Clemson, the defense was good 95% of the time, but you started to see some of the holes in the defense. The LBs outside of Werner were a liability, the back 7 took some bad angles and they didn't have an answer for losing Wade and Young being negated (either by double team or egregious hands to the face penalties jamming his head backwards). That happens against elite teams, though. The problem was the other 5% of the game was spent giving up the easiest 95 yard drive I can remember.

What I'm getting at is Hafley was a good DC and teacher that didn't exactly do anything special other than let Chase wreck stuff and keep everything in front of the DBs. If he tried to use that style today without a pressure cheat code, they'd get picked apart.
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Don't you dare call Malik Harrison a liability. Browning was playing a bit out of position though, despite being pretty effective (another one you can thank LJ for btw). Hilliard should have played more in 2019.
 
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Honor&Glory said:
I think Knowles’ scheme and philosophy holds back LJ’s group. Just my opinion. But JK is about as aggressive as a sloth crossing a street.
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RuGettinIt said:
Everything I‘ve read here and elsewhere tells me the exact opposite. I think LJ is holding back Knowles defensive style.
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100%. You’re right.
 
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For some reason they just don't seem to mesh and it seems apparent to me that the rumors of butting heads is correct with Knowles trying to operate a defense while only getting to control seven pieces on the board. Maybe they try to cooperate on the front four and back seven working in unison but it has failed. Possibly in part because the cheated scum losses made Day force a cautious approach in big games on top of the underlying issue. We've been seeing symptoms since at least last year but I would love to know how LJ and JK teamed up to make it work for Missouri and then seemingly went their separate ways again this year. Maybe one of them got sick throughout bowl prep?
 
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the only thing that makes sense is that the line is taking their calls from LJ directly. The infamous clip of the deep TD from last week should be all the evidence anyone needs. Five guys start at the line and drop back into coverage. Only one of those guys does what he is supposed to do, which is engage his blocker before dropping into coverage. It’s not a coincidence that the one man who did his job is the one man not under the thumb of LJ (Ransom).

There’s four possibilities here and two of them are on LJ.

1. Knowles did this by design. Unlikely because why would only Ransom engage.
2. The DL are all just really dumb. Unlikely because they all did the exact same thing.
3. Johnson is a bad teacher who hasn’t properly instructed them to engage first. Doubtful as this is very basic stuff.
4. Johnson is giving them their direct orders and made a stupid call. Most likely option here IMO.

Knowles is getting shredded for this call but it’s actually a good call. If the DL does its job, then the OL is occupied by the four DL and ransom off snap. The remaining blocker picks up either Styles or Downs and the other is free to pressure Gabriel. Because they’re dropping back after engaging, the idea is that you have a tiny QB either blindly throwing to a crosser where the retreating guys can undercut the pass, Gabriel has to rush to the outside receiver before they’re actually open, he scrambles, in which case you have basically the five retreating guys in a line across the field or he takes the sack/throws it away.

Because the DL immediately dropped, both blitzers get swallowed up immediately, Gabriel has all day and Burke is basically having to cover one of the fastest receivers in the country for 7-8 seconds.

You also have the 3rd & 6 play near the end where Knowles makes the exact right call, sending Downs up the right side A gap to push the runner wide, where the LBs and Ransom are waiting to make a tackle behind the line to gain. Everyone did their job except JT, who immediately shoots the A gap, removing Downs from the play and allowing the guys JT should be engaging to move toward the boundary and pick up the guys who did the proper thing but are now outnumbered, giving up the first down.

My guess is that Knowles is making a call over the headset to Simon, who is giving that call to the back 7 while LJ signals in his call to the front four based on whatever Knowles is trying to do. I’d imagine a lot of the LB confusion pre snap is related to them expecting one thing from the DL based on Knowles’ call and LJ calling in something different.
 
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The definition of insanity is doing the exact same thing and expecting a different outcome.

2018. The front 4 were controlled by LJ and the back seven were controlled by Schiano. Result: one of the worst defenses in Ohio State history. They still never really stopped Maryland. They absolutely sucked for the Purdue game that year. They barely got by Nebraska and while the scUM game was well in hand, scUM's offense wasn't the issue.

2021: The front 4 were controlled by LJ and the back seven were controlled by Coombs. Result: Oregon running left all game for one. Not really stopping Purdue. Not stopping Utah in the Rose Bowl. It was clear there was a disconnect all year long.

There's dividing up the territory for planning and game purposes (everyone does it) but ONLY if the styles mesh. In the two examples above, and notice there is a every 3 season lull, the planning and scheme didn't mesh from front to back. We saw the same thing last Saturday.

I really do think it's an LJ problem (pattern above fits), where sometimes the limitations he has as a coach (all coaches have them) are too much to overcome in game.
 
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sg86 said:
Because the DL immediately dropped, both blitzers get swallowed up immediately, Gabriel has all day and Burke is basically having to cover one of the fastest receivers in the country for 7-8 seconds.
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Not to mention being given keys and trends during the week in film study to expect Oregon to throw it short. Yes, there has to be a point where he has to trust the players on the defense to do THEIR jobs so he can do his, but that didn't happen.

The whole play was designed to stop Oregon from throwing the ball short which was their tendency. Oregon did a great job of playing off their own tendencies and Ohio State (coaches and players all) did a bad job of adjusting to it.
 
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So what I'm getting out of this is that LJ has a preference to coach h for a certain type of defensive front, and JK wants to run more odd fronts that heavily involved a 2pt weakside edge for his "base".

Yet somehow there's a conflict here? I'm not quite understanding how LJ would be able to sabotage that unless he struggles to coach foot/hand sync and pass rush technique from a 2pt start?
 
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