Question: Which problems are correctable soon?

[fralo4tide]

One thing that makes me optimistic in the wake of the defeat is that the problems, at least some of them, can potentially be fixed soon. Of course I could be corrected by those of you who are more knowledgeable than myself.

I made this little list of the immediate problems I see with the team. They of course could be organized differently. But which of our problems do you see as something that can be fixed in the next few weeks? Feel free to add to them if you desire.

1.Penalties
2.Turnovers
3.Pass defense/blown coverages
4.Special Teams
5.QB Mental errors

And lastly #6. I think there may be a problem with motivation, atleast by some.

I'm hopeful that penalties, turnovers, and mental errors by the QB will be fixed. Special Teams and Pass defense, not so much.

 

[runtheoption22]

1. Pre-snap penalties- yes. And I think a personnel change may take care of 1 of those.
2. Turnovers- for whatever reason, fumbles are killing us. That's mental discipline more than doing wet-ball drills every day.
3. Yes, because our best athlete on the team was responsible for 2 or 3 of the busts.
4. New coach needed.
5. Blake really only made 3 real mistakes and thats about 2 more than he's made all year.

 

[JBama_in_PCOLA]

I think all are correctable, but this is do they want to corect them?

 

[bamafan_bdb]

I agree with RTO, mainly, but I'd add another two more:

1) Linebacker play. We are just too slow in coverage and too slow getting to plays. I don't think this is fixable this year.
2) Getting set on both sides of the ball. I know the defensive confusion has been talked about, but not many are mentioning the offensive side. It's astounding how many times we were right at the play clock in the second half. It obviously cost us 2 timeouts and at least one delay of game, but there are other effects of that as well. When you're not set physically and mentally, there are all sorts of things that go wrong. Maybe this can be fixed, but I'd love to hear suggestions on how.

 

[RobK]

In my mind, if problems 1-3 listed above are corrected, then we will win most if not all remaining games by a margin large enough that we don't need to rely our kicker for a clutch FG or on Blake to execute a perfect game-winning drive. Doing away with those first three correctable issue will get this team where it needs to go and prevent other weaknesses from being exposed.

 

[uaintn]

1. Penalties can and should be corrected. But I expected a lot of improvement after Florida, which didn't happen. So, it is quickly capable of being fixed. Will it is another question.

2. Agree with RTO22. This is a mental thing. All that could be done in practice has probably been done. It goes hand in hand with your #1. Easy to fix, seemingly. CNS teams have historically had low penalties and turnovers. I do not know what is different about this team, but I think it is mostly between their ears.

3. "Fixing" our safety issue is a tall order. But if we want to stay on the field with A&M/Clanga/Barn, we have got to figure something out. I'm just going to have to trust Saban and Smart on that. Not like they are unaware. I think this is the hardest one on your list.

4. We have cycled a lot of players through our special teams to still be seeing this stuff. I think it is a coaching issue because, with respect, he's the only common denominator. So that's not so easily fixed mid season. Guess we'll do what we've done for about four years now, which is take a deep breath and hold it every kickoff. Wish we'd just try to kick the darn thing out of the end zone on every kickoff.... Seems like an easy fix to me, most everyone else does it.

5. I can live with Blake's level of play and I think we can win with it. I think learning when and how to throw it away (or take off when there is a lot of green grass in front of him) is something you really have to learn in live action. I expect him to improve just by playing.

 

[twofbyc]

I think if just the first two are fixed Bama doesn't lose again.

 

[RedStar]

Our 2 biggest weaknesses the past 3-4 years have been special teams and secondary. They've never been corrected. I don't have a lot of faith that either will get better by the end of this year either.

 

[CoachJeff]

Bama is 58th in penalties right now. The average in the 3 BCS title years was 8th.

Bama is 106th (!!!) in turnover margin. In the title years the average was 14th.

 

[theBIGyowski]

CNS has addressed special teams errors in the past.

Basically...on kickoffs you have 2 main factors:
1) how/where the kicker kicks the ball
2) how well the other 10 players stay in their lanes

Every kickoff is designed to limit what the return man is able to do. If the kicker is supposed to put the ball between the 5 yard line and the goal line...and on the left side of the field...the other 10 guys have specific lanes they are supposed to run in order to pin the return man. If the kicker kicks it too short or to the wrong place...the lanes the other guys are running in may very well be incorrect. If one or more of the coverage guys get out of their lanes...even a good kick can result in a big return.

We clearly botched the opening kickoff, probably due to the wind and the fact we needed a holder. That bad kickoff...which was a line drive short kick...made it easy for the return man to take advantage of the lack of established coverage.

As far as missing FGs...it's hard to correct that other than practice. You would hope the guy going out there has his kick down enough that he doesn't even have to think...just go through the motions.

Penalties are mental errors that can be fixed immediately. Fixing them long term is just a matter of discipline.

Fixing the problems in pass coverage again comes down to discipline. We've all heard that it's all about practice, practice, practice...and it's true. You have to get to the point where you don't think...you react. All of the former Alabama players who play on Sunday today know this and that's why they are there. I also think that people are figuring out how to remove our safeties from pass coverage...and that makes it even more difficult on our corners. I hope we can get this corrected before we play A&M because their whole game plan is to attack you on the edges.

As for Sims...I think he's doing just fine. He clearly had his worst game, but the other 10 on the field weren't doing everything they could to give him a chance to be successful. My hope is that we will be able to run the ball well enough in Fayetteville that Blake won't have to win the game for us. We'll also have to do a better job of calling plays to exploit defenses when we are in 3rd and long. We had a few good plays in Oxford but didn't execute them...and they were sadly enough in number to affect the final outcome.

 

[Rolltide_PA]

of that list i think only penalties is easily correctable. fumbles from tj yeldon and christion jones have been an issue since they hit campus so you can't expect that to go away overnight.

as far as the secondary....dunno. is it a scheme thing, a talent thing, is the defense too complicated, etc? figure that part out then maybe some correction can be made

btw penalties have very little correlation to wins. i believe we were/are the only team in top 5 in SEC penalties last 5 years that is worth a damn. all our major competitors for sec over that period (lsu, barn, gators, uga) are the most penalized teams in the conference

as far as special teams...as i said in another thread...1 or 2 years of the same thing is a trend...8 years is a problem. we can't cover kicks (haven't been in top 50 in 8 years), can't kick FG (last 5 losses are 5/16 in FG from what i read...hadn't kicked a road 40 yarder in over 2 years before saturday), and turn the ball over on too many returns

mental errors by qb are not something we've seen much of in last several years but they're bound to happen with first year starter in first road game. maybe corrected with experience?

 

[JDCrimson]

As far as the DBs are concerned, I think we are going to see more back shoulder throws in the future. Those type throws are incredibly difficult to defend even for the best of DBs. BSTs to a really big receiver versus an average size DB is a real mismatch. My friends and I have discussed that it is really the DL's responsibility to create pressure to make the BST more difficult to execute. We didnt create enough pressure to consistently affect his throws last weekend.