The CheckerBoard

I just had some thoughts I wanted to share and that thread has kind of died down so I started this one to get your attention.

I've got no solutions for what to do with these players and these coaches to improve this defense. I think it's simply beyond saving at this point. We are just terrible and that's all there is too it.

However, I wanted to express my disagreement with your OP. We were a much better defense last year than we are this year and I believe we would have absolutely been even better this year with Wilcox than we were last year, and therefore exponentially better than we are this year with Sal. Here's why:

First of all, Wilcox improved our total defense from 69th in 2010 to 27th in 2011 and our scoring defense from 56th in 2010 to 36th in 2011. That is significant improvement in one year.

Secondly, your stats in the OP focus on only SEC opponents, and specifically, only the elite ones. I thought it fair to compare non-conference stats between Wilcox's defenses versus Sunseri's defense this year because maybe some of the most embarrassing moments from our defense this year have been against opponents that talent wise, should never dream of being able to compete with us. I'm thinking of teams such as Akron, or, I don't know, maybe Troy. Here's some non-conference (NC) stats:
2010 NC ypg: 365.2
2011 NC ypg: 309
2012 NC ypg: 433.8

2010 NC ppg: 24.2
2011 NC ppg: 12.3
2012 NC ppg: 27

Again, Wilcox significantly improved our defense from his first to second year and had our defense defending NC opponents in a fashion that we would all expect a UT defense to defend them. Sunseri has absolutely blown Wilcox's stats out of the water. We can't even keep it respectable with Sal's defense this year.

And finally, my ultimate argument to your original thread. I think you are gravely underestimating the difference another year would have made under Wilcox's leadership. Out of the 22 starters that were listed on our opening day depth chart for 2012, 12 would have been in their 3rd year in Wilcox's system (4 starters), 6 would have been in their 2nd year in the system (5 starters), and only 4 would have been in their first year in the system (2 JUCO's, 1 switch over, and 1 freshman; 2 starters, both JUCO's). Wilcox was figuring out how to make our defense work with the talent that we had and not asking our guys to do things that they are physically incapable of doing. Instead, all 22 players on the depth chart, and subsequently all 11 starters, are in their first year in Sal's extremely complex defense and they are clearly lost out there.

Our experience coming into this year would have been significant and I believe based off of my previous stats given, Wilcox had already proven that he was capable of improving our defense over time and most importantly, Wilcox never sniffed lows as low as what Sunseri has given us this year.

So to sum it all up, I disagree that we would have found ourselves in the position that we are in if we had been able to retain Wilcox. He showed significant improvement from year one to year two and had significant experience returning to this year's team.

One stat I will throw out there in Sal's defense is time of possession. Our offensive philosophy is making a historically bad defense even worse than it really is.

2010 TOP (AVG): 97th-28:30
2011 TOP (AVG): 44th- 30:20
2012 TOP (AVG): 115th- 27:05

We are simply putting our defense on the field too much this year.

Take all this for what it's worth. I just don't agree that we would be in this position with Wilcox. I think there's a valid argument to us probably being 6-3, maybe 7-2 this year with this offense and Wilcox's defense. But at the end of the day, it's all a moot point right?