Alabama’s defense brings down Texas A&M’s Johnny Manziel. (Copyright photo by Gary Cosby Jr.)
Today, he emphasized his point again that Alabama’s defense is “massively overrated” partly because the Tide’s pass rush is “non-existent.” If you listen to Cowherd, too, I thought you might appreciate us touching on the issue.
Alabama is 20th nationally with 2.70 sacks a game, compared to 29th last season with 2.31 sacks.
This is what Nick Saban said Monday when asked if the Tide pass rush wasn’t productive. This comment appeared on the blog Monday as part of Saban’s news conference comments, but it’s worth pulling out again today:
“I don’t necessarily think that’s accurate,” he said. “I don’t think we have a dominant rusher like we had a year ago. I think we have guys that as a unit and as a group can be effective. I think it’s a combination of not rushing on a consistent basis and not covering on a consistent basis that has been one of the problems that we’ve had.
“Because the last two weeks again, lots of issues not getting off the field on third down — which hasn’t been a real factor all year long. But in the last two weeks, we gave up 14 points in the second half at LSU, going 0-for-7 on third downs during that time and we started this game (against Texas A&M) 0-for-7 on third down and got behind in the game because of it. When you create those situations you’ve got to get off the field.
“It’s not just the pass rush. It contributes to it to some degree, sometimes. But it’s also the discipline of everybody doing what they’re supposed to do in rush as well as coverage. And when we pressure, people have to do what they’re supposed to do. To me, I would say it’s more of a team thing than it is any specific group problem.”
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