His defenses were 22nd, 25th, 16th, and 12th and then he got fired. Par for the course for him: mediocre.
He took the 8th ranked defense and dropped to 31st and then in the 70s and back to the thirties at ND.
His one season at AU is excusible, but nonetheless it was wretched.
I feel like I'm talking to two guys on opposite ends of the table here, but I'll repeat what I noted to Kc:
Mediocre NFL defensive coordinator should not be something that keeps him from being great here. He dropped the ND defense because he changed everything they did. Like, the opposite defense. He's gotten better now.
In any case, I'm projecting what he'd do with our current and future athletes. I think he can lead a top unit. And, his style (more than anything) fits. Just needs to slow his roll on complicated blitz packages in college.
Again, he's in his third year there. If your defense cannot turn around after 3 years, then you aren't a very good coach.
He was in the 30s his first year, and then got worse, so it's misleading to say "he's gotten better".....he's back where he was the first year.
I think we have all learned that if a guy has a history of doing one thing his entire career, it is very unlikely that he is going to suddenly change and be better b/c he wears orange and green. There is nothing in this man's last 10 years of coaching to indicate he will lead a top unit. It's no different from assuming Charlie Strong would be elite here. Every shred of evidence says otherwise.
We're not going to agree on this one, so I'll let it go. This isn't like hoping D'ono turns into a guy who runs a scheme founded on an aggressive mentality. This is projecting a guy - whose Xs and Os even
you generally agree with - who ran the 12th ranked defense in the NFL as someone who can have a great defense here. There is sufficient evidence for me to project he'd make our unit look great: (1) Xs and Os match our athletes, (2) has transitioned back to college and even dealt with transitioning a 2-gap defense to his style, and (3) aggressive philosophy.
But, yes, I get it. You want all of that + recent results. Aranda fits that, but there are also questions around him as well.
But what you are saying is not at all true. The 12th ranked defense in the NFL is slightly above average. One season out of 4, the rest were below average.
His X's and O's can be as flashy and fancy as you want: they don't work that well though, as evidenced by not a single top 10 defense since 2001. Not in the NFL, not in college.
Thirdly, if your defense at a major brand program, who btw recently had several top ten defenses, after 3 years is still in the thirties, that means you are not a very good coach. How many years does he need to install his system? Perhaps if it was less complex it wouldn't take a minimum of four years?
Miami runs a 2-gap 3-4. Extremely similar to th Diaco defense, both came from Groh. Since we know it takes BVG a minimum of at least 4 years to improve his defense coming from a 2-gap 3-4, are you willing to wait 4 years for him to
maybe have a top 25 defense at Miami?
