The Blueprint (Defense)

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Recruiting is an inexact science. Fans don’t have the answers, but we can try to identify trends both nationally and at Miami. Below is one attempt to collect these trends by position and see how they apply to the Canes. The offensive list is here.

DT

THE TRENDS: Defensive tackle is the ultimate bag position. There are only so many humans with the requisite size, athleticism and attitude walking the Earth. Most live in the South, and they are easy to identify. This leads to massive bidding wars. Over the past two years, seven of the eight (88%) first round DTs were blue-chip prospects from the South. Christian Wilkins (a blue chipper from Connecticut) was the only exception.

HOW DOES MIAMI STACK UP: For a program that lacks cash and cache, Miami is doing pretty well. Manny has landed the three local must-haves in Leonard Taylor, Nesta Silvera and Elijah Roberts. He’s also been creative in building up the unit’s athleticism, landing a former hooper (Jared Harrison-Hunte) and three guys with exceptional testing numbers (Jason Blissett, Jalar Holley and Quentin Williams). There is some lack of size beyond Jon Ford and Jordan Miller, but that is OK in this system.

DE

THE TRENDS: Pass rusher has quietly become the premier position in South Florida. The Bosa Brothers, Brian Burns and Josh Uche followed Jason Pierre-Paul, Olivier Vernon and Jabaal Sheard, all of whom have over 50 sacks in the pros. If a local player has sufficient length (preferably 6’4 and above) and change-of-direction, he should be a Cane. Manny’s system requires less physicality from the position than Golden’s system, so the primary criteria needs to be the ability to get in the backfield and disrupt.

HOW DOES MIAMI STACK UP: Very well. This may be Manny’s best position. We’ve consistently been among the national leaders in sacks with a steady stream of South Florida kids: Greg Rousseau, Chad Thomas, Joe Jackson and Jon Garvin. This year, Jabari Ishmael and Pat Payton both meet the criteria of long pass rushers with enough change of direction to play off-the-ball if necessary.

Miami has the most DEs in the NFL of any college and needs to sell that nationally. As Miami increases its national reach, we need to be sticklers about motor and hand usage. Those are differentiators when you are evaluating elite rush talents.

LB

THE TRENDS: This is a hard position to peg. I watched the HUDLs for the first round picks of the past three drafts and the LBs projected to go in the Top 50 this year. There were:
  • Four RB/LBs (Patrick Queen, Devin White, Roquan Smith and Dylan Moses)
  • Four converted QBs (Tremaine Edmunds, Leighton Vander Esch, Chazz Surratt and Zaven Collins)
  • Three high school edge rushers (Micah Parsons, Kenneth Murray and Rashaan Evans)
  • Three traditional LBs (Jordyn Brooks, Devin Bush and Nick Bolton)
  • Two WR/S (Isaiah Simmons and Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah)
The one common theme is that they all had long TD runs on their clips, whether they were on offense, defense or special teams. You need to run at this position. The average testing profile coming out was bigger than expected: 6’2, 224, 4.70 forty, 4.39 shuttle and 34.1 VJ.

South Florida has been weak at LB for the past decade or so. The truly elite names (Lavonte David, Ryan Shazier, Devin Bush and Anthony Walker) all ended up in the Big 10 for some reason.

HOW DOES MIAMI STACK UP: This position has been a struggle. Miami hasn’t landed a great local LB since Denzel Perryman in 2011, and the unit is currently in disarray. It’s hard to compare our current commits since they don’t have testing numbers. However, you can see comps for Chase Smith (as a WR/DB) and Tyler Johnson (as a twitched-up rusher) in some recent first rounders. Sam Brooks has an almost identical testing and position profile to Kenneth Murray, but he’s been playing with an injured foot all year and looks like a shell of himself. One comparison for Corey Flagg could be Missouri’s Nick Bolton, who has similar testing numbers and was a hyper-productive three star in Texas.

S

THE TRENDS: Locally, the trend is clear: Miami needs to win blue-chip battles. It has won four of those since 2012: Deon Bush, Jamal Carter, Jaquan Johnson and Gurvan Hall. The jury is out on Hall, but the other three made the NFL. However, Miami has lost more battles than it has won lately. Both of Alabama’s starting safeties are from South Florida, as are starters on Georgia and UF.

Nationally, there has been a recent trend toward sleepers. In 2019, only 1 of the 12 safeties drafted in the first four rounds was a blue chipper (former Miami commit Chauncey-Gardner Johnson). In 2020, only 3 of the 12 safeties drafted in the first four rounds was a blue chipper. They are all different sizes and come from all over the country, but the consistent theme is that they also played offense. Despite Coach D’Onofrio’s famous proclamation that he wanted “safeties who play safety,” it appears the NFL disagrees.

HOW DOES MIAMI STACK UP: The 2021 class is a huge step forward. James Williams and Kamren Kinchens are the exact kids Miami has been losing to the SEC. The 2019 class had Avantae Williams (who also played RB) and three local kids who only played safety. However, it is more common for local kids to only play on one side of the ball due to the depth of skill position talent.

CB

THE TRENDS: This position is an arms race. Fifteen of the 20 first rounders since 2016 have been blue chippers. The majority of the 29 DBs drafted in the first four rounds of the ‘19-20 drafts were blue chippers, as well. Teams like Ohio State and LSU dominate. This position is starting to mirror WR in many ways—you need a premium recruiter.

Urban Meyer has a great eye for CBs and says his first priority by far is man-coverage ability. Camp footage is particularly important for CBs, as they compete against comparable talent on every snap. Many of Urban's signees also played offense. In terms of sleeper trends, there have been three recent first rounders from North Carolina (Jaire Alexander, Mike Hughes, soon-to-be Caleb Fairley) who played both ways and flew under the recruiting radar. That may be a trend to keep an eye on. South Florida also produced two 3* first rounders (DeAndre Baker and Damon Arnette), although they did not play both ways due to the local depth at the position.

HOW DOES MIAMI STACK UP: Miami needs to perform better in big-time battles. If you gave us Bama’s corners (Pat Surtain, Jr. and Josh Jobe), we’d have the deepest group in the nation. I don’t want to make this another Mike Rumph thread, but even those of us who have been patient are starting to see the writing on the wall.

In this class, I'd like to see us pick up at least one player with big-time physical upside. It's good to build our floor with quality local cover guys. Shannon and Golden didn't do that and it killed our depth. But we also need someone to emerge as a frontline size/speed guy.
**** dmoney this is a really really good post man.
 
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Once we fix our CB recruiting you'll see Miami playing at a higher level.

The fact is, we just haven't had elite cover corners here in a long long time & it impacts every other aspect of the Defense. It's become more glaring because in the uptempo spread era of football we're in now it's even more imperative that have at least 3-4 CB's that can cover & we sadly haven't had that.

The key to improving this Defense is fixing the backend, once we cover better it will give our DL more time to collapse the pocket & allow those delayed Blitzes more time to get home, obviously most of us would rather we stop running them **** Blitzes altogether but we all know as long as Diaz is here that's not gonna happen lol.

With the rumors that Muschamp could be getting fired soon or at least by season's end, Diaz should seriously consider bringing in T-Rob on this staff, aside from his great recruting resume, he developed Jaycee Horn into one of the best CB's in the nation, that's exactly what we need in a CB coach, someone who can both recruit & develop talent.
 
Can we stop on Reed influence? He is an ambassador with no duties. He can’t recruit and this is a 8 hours a week job.

No.

Nobody asked him to recruit.

He can absolutely evaluate and advise.

What we need to do is stop with the "ambassador with no duties" nonsense. There is a reason he's down on the sidelines. We can and should harness that into a couple of other areas where he can assist.
 
Once we fix our CB recruiting you'll see Miami playing at a higher level.

The fact is, we just haven't had elite cover corners here in a long long time & it impacts every other aspect of the Defense. It's become more glaring because in the uptempo spread era of football we're in now it's even more imperative that have at least 3-4 CB's that can cover & we sadly haven't had that.

The key to improving this Defense is fixing the backend, once we cover better it will give our DL more time to collapse the pocket & allow those delayed Blitzes more time to get home, obviously most of us would rather we stop running them **** Blitzes altogether but we all know as long as Diaz is here that's not gonna happen lol.

With the rumors that Muschamp could be getting fired soon or at least by season's end, Diaz should seriously consider bringing in T-Rob on this staff, aside from his great recruting resume, he developed Jaycee Horn into one of the best CB's in the nation, that's exactly what we need in a CB coach, someone who can both recruit & develop talent.


What about Muschamp himself as DC? If we have been lacking fire on the sidelines, you can't get much more animated than Captain Insane-o.
 
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Wouldn't you place some of this blame on Manny? I would. He's the DC/HC and those positions have been a failure since he's gotten here.
LB wasn’t a failure. We had 3 freshmen that played day 1 until they left. The depth never stayed healthy. CB has been a failure. Development has been a disaster. Defensive coaches need to be replaced last year with offensive staff. We need a new DC, CB, and use Banda to recruit LBs.
 
DMoney, you have identified some very good trend info for LB/CB. I know there was some talk about Ed Reed playing a role in film analysis and recruiting evals. Since Manny has "never played the game", is there any chance that these trends, and the process of talent ID, will be assisted by Ed and/or other former players? It's one thing for Manny to have a defensive "scheme", something that he likes to do as far as his approach to the game, but sometimes any good coach needs another person and/or perspective to monitor something(s) that is not within his skillset.

I'd love to see Ed help us to find the SoFla players with LB/CB skills and demeanor, even if it involves position changes.
If Banda can leave a bartender gig to coach safeties then the goat can leave the hall of fame ceremony to coach them too. Let Banda coach the defense and recruit LB. Tropper Taylor is once again available. I wouldn’t hesitate one sec with him coming in.
 
With the rumors that Muschamp could be getting fired soon or at least by season's end, Diaz should seriously consider bringing in T-Rob on this staff, aside from his great recruting resume, he developed Jaycee Horn into one of the best CB's in the nation, that's exactly what we need in a CB coach, someone who can both recruit & develop talent.
he also developed that freaky mukuamu kid. 6’4 and had three picks off Jake Fromm last year when they upset the puppies
 
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" I don’t want to make this another Mike Rumph thread"

the dark knight joker GIF by hero0fwar
Lasted zero posts...
 
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Funny thing is the 2 guys from Bama (Surtain and Jobe) you said if we had we'd have the deepest group in the nation, were recruited by who? Oh right Banda...

It's honestly hilarious how blind everyone is and just continually puts all the blame on Rumph.
Surtain was not recruited by Banda, Surtain Jr played for Rumph in HS.

Banda is a Safeties coach, he shouldn't have the responsibility of covering for another coaches inability to recruit their position. But aside from that, Banda has redeemed whatever misses he had in previous classes by landing prospects like Tae Williams, Jalen Harrell, Kam Kinchens & James Williams.

No matter how hard yall try, the fact is Rumph has not done his job at a respectable level. Blame Diaz, Blame Banda, Blame God, what cannot be denied by anyone is that the CB's Coach of the Miami Hurricanes has not done a good job recruiting CB's, if your solution to that problem is to have a whole other position coach handle the recruiting of CB's coach, then what is the purpose of having a CB's coach in the first place?

Does Rumph receive criticism he doesn't always deserve? Yes. But that doesn't mean he deserves no criticism at all.
 
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What about Muschamp himself as DC? If we have been lacking fire on the sidelines, you can't get much more animated than Captain Insane-o.
I definitely considered that, I just doubt he would be all too interested in being a DC for Manny.

Their personalities seem like they would clash quite a bit, although if Diaz was serious about improving every aspect of his team he would at the very least need to consider it.
 
Once we fix our CB recruiting you'll see Miami playing at a higher level.

The fact is, we just haven't had elite cover corners here in a long long time & it impacts every other aspect of the Defense. It's become more glaring because in the uptempo spread era of football we're in now it's even more imperative that have at least 3-4 CB's that can cover & we sadly haven't had that.

The key to improving this Defense is fixing the backend, once we cover better it will give our DL more time to collapse the pocket & allow those delayed Blitzes more time to get home, obviously most of us would rather we stop running them **** Blitzes altogether but we all know as long as Diaz is here that's not gonna happen lol.

With the rumors that Muschamp could be getting fired soon or at least by season's end, Diaz should seriously consider bringing in T-Rob on this staff, aside from his great recruting resume, he developed Jaycee Horn into one of the best CB's in the nation, that's exactly what we need in a CB coach, someone who can both recruit & develop talent.
Is there any truth to the rumor that T-Rob has a personal vendetta against Miami? stemming back from his days being recruited and playing in college? Something I read on the board before but not sure how true that is.
 
Once we fix our CB recruiting you'll see Miami playing at a higher level.

The fact is, we just haven't had elite cover corners here in a long long time & it impacts every other aspect of the Defense. It's become more glaring because in the uptempo spread era of football we're in now it's even more imperative that have at least 3-4 CB's that can cover & we sadly haven't had that.

The key to improving this Defense is fixing the backend, once we cover better it will give our DL more time to collapse the pocket & allow those delayed Blitzes more time to get home, obviously most of us would rather we stop running them **** Blitzes altogether but we all know as long as Diaz is here that's not gonna happen lol.

With the rumors that Muschamp could be getting fired soon or at least by season's end, Diaz should seriously consider bringing in T-Rob on this staff, aside from his great recruting resume, he developed Jaycee Horn into one of the best CB's in the nation, that's exactly what we need in a CB coach, someone who can both recruit & develop talent.

my friend LCE brings up a good point.

CB is not only a talent challenge, it's a numbers challenge. With the spread and up tempo offenses, the numbers of CB's you need on the field at any one snap have increased over the past 10-12 years. We've gone from a "base" of 2 CB's for the majority of snaps, to where teams need to be in nickel and dime packages a lot more often as offenses are not only putting the ball in the air 35+ plays a game routinely, they are mostly doing it out of 3 and 4 WR formations. Translation? You need cover corners and not just the starting two. Manny has got this down with the DL, and particularly the DE's as pass rush and rotating guys who can do it is so critical. Now apply the same thesis to the CB's.

ok, but shouldn't that mean LB's are less important? NO.

and that's the irony, for a couple reasons. it means that there is more pressure on LB's in the game's current posture. think about the scope of coverages and techniques a modern day LB needs to play. it's expanded as offenses have evolved. LB's need to be just as strong in run fits and tackling, (more so i would argue), but much faster and twitchier to play in coverage. plus, as everyone knows, LB's are the backbone of your special teams units.

put that all together, and i am 100% on board with LCE: fix the back end, the starting with the CB's and the LB 's, and things start to look a lot different on the field.
 
Is there any truth to the rumor that T-Rob has a personal vendetta against Miami? stemming back from his days being recruited and playing in college? Something I read on the board before but not sure how true that is.
Idk about that, I doubt he'd a hold a grudge for that long, I mean he went to Auburn & had a solid career, Idk what exactly he would need to be still be mad at. But money is the grand equalizer...

Offer him a good contract & I'm sure if he did have any kind of vendetta he'd be able to put it aside.
 
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