I agree if we are talking about John Brady. You haven't come close to giving CLM and staff a shot for this season.
Our defense has improved every single game this year. The players have been getting the chance to iron out the execution problems and unfamiliarity with the scheme against inferior opponents, something they did not have the chance to do before playing two of the tougher teams on the schedule. Now the players know how it is supposed to work, have a feel for the scheme, and are undoubtedly more comfortable with it. That sort of confidence is crucial for improvement. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I'm willing to bet that we stifled Vandy a lot more this year than last year, and last year we had a more veteran D.
With God himself coaching us last year we allowed Vanderbilt to gain 286 total yards, that is more than double what we allowed them this year with the worst coaching staff in LSU history. They ran for 103 yards and passed for 183 yards against one of the best defenses we've ever had. We also only beat them 24-7 at Tiger Stadium. Our offense only gained 375 yards against a team that was 2-6 at the time. "So Justin, you mean to tell me that LSU played a better game against a 4-1 Vanderbilt team on the road than with God coaching LSU last year at Tiger Stadium?" "Why yes that's exactly what i'm saying, so all of you people bitching about a lower level of talent causing LSU to win these games STFU." 2004 stats edit: LSU only had 5 sacks in 2004 but this year we had 6. Wow, yet another defensive category the horrible coaches and underperforming D did better than in 2004 with the greatest coach to ever live. 2005 Stats
Passing yardage stats do not mean squat when it all hashes out. The only stat that really means anything is scoring defense and how we end up after all the games have been played will tell the story. And if you have a need to look at other stats, pass effeciency defense is much more accurate of a barometer then yards allowed. LSU has moved up to 22nd in that category. Some notable programs that are doing worse than us in that category are Tenn, FSU, tOSU, Mich, Neb., Notre Dame, Boston College, UCLA and of course USC. People dismiss our defense getting better when comparing the worthless yardage stats because we played 2 inferior teams in a row, but the fact is that every decent team in the country has played at least 2 of their OOC cupcakes by now as well as bad conference teams and LSU hasn't.