Things To Freak Out About for 2010: The Kicking Team
by kleph on May 12, 2010 8:00 AM CDT
in Football
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PrintIn January 2008, Alabama's special teams coach Ron Middleton announced he was leaving The Capstone to join David Cutcliffe's staff at Duke University (the pair previously worked together at Ole Miss). Crimson Tide Head Coach Nick Saban promptly brought Bobby Williams - a veteran of his staffs at Michigan State, LSU and at the Miami Dolphins - on board to fill the vacancy.
Since then, things on special teams haven't been quite the same. Last season our own outsidethesidelines provided an excellent dissection of on particularly horrible example of kick coverage against North Texas in an early game that was, thankfully, called back by a flag. We weren't always that lucky.
For the most part, the concerns with the kicking game tend to focus on the the guy who puts his foot onto the football (and this is certainly going to be concern breaking in a new kicker next season). But while Leigh Tiffin's ability to put the pigskin into the opposing team's end zone increased, the efforts to stymie the returners seems to have stalled.
In 2008 Alabama was reasonably stingy with the average yards allowed on kick returns, coming in 82nd out of 120 FBS teams. Last year only 31 teams were worse in the same category. Not what you'd expect from one of the elite teams in the land.
Worse, the ability of the squad to react to onside kicks has been almost completely non existent. Out of five onside kicks attempted against the Crimson Tide during the last two seasons only one was recovered by Alabama - the second one tried by Georgia during the notorious "blackout" game in 2008.
Here are Alabama's kicking team numbers under Coach William's tenure (from the University of Alabama athletics department website RollTide.com):
Alabama Kicking Stats 2008-2009 |
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By contrast the numbers in 2007, Coach Saban's first year but the last under Coach Middleton:
Alabama Kicking Stats 2007 |
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And that doesn't even include all the yellow flags we seemed to collect every time there was a solid return by one of our guys or a dominating stop of theirs. Is all this Williams fault? Probably not, but he is the person who needs to solve it. And with a brand new $15,000 raise it's unlikely he's going anywhere soon.
So while there's a lot of concern right now over who is going to be handling the kicking duties for us in 2010, I'm also really wondering if the rest of the special teams - particularly the kick off coverage and return teams - is going finally take a step forward or continue this unpleasant trend.
*the numbers in this category were incorrect in the first version of this story; showing the totals for interception returns instead of kick off returns. they have been edited to reflect the correct information. - kleph
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probably the only thing about this team i really dislike
is our ineptitude on special teams.
bobby williams needs to step it up, pronto, because a-day didn’t endear him anymore to us.
Counter Point
The counter point to that is of course the special teams also encases the punting, field goal kicking, and punt returning as well. Last year those three aspects of the special teams were honestly as good as I can remember them being at Alabama in a long time.
Also, having heard Saban talk about this previously, he seems to put a lot of emphasis on special teams being a coaching staff issue, as opposed to a single coach. It is also worth mentioninig that Bobby Williams may be the best recruiter on the staff and has been instrumental in sealing several recruits the last couple of years.
In the end though, I will definitely agree that kick coverage has to improve. There are way too many world class future NFL players on special teams for that not to at least be above average.
i agree this is a pretty isolated slice of the special teams...
and i’m not completely convinced that the coaching change is the cause of the problem. but it seems clear this has got to improve and the logical person to address it is coach williams.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
Did we not....
contain one of the nations top returner in Shipley? Look at the games after Saban addressed this problem by putting Trent and other ball seeking tacklers in the kick coverage team in respect to long returns not onside kicks. If onside kicks didn’t work sometime, teams would use them.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
excuse please...
teams would not use them.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
Look at the games after Saban addressed this problem
11/14/09 @ Mississippi St. 6 returns 212 yards 35.33 average
11/21/09 Chattanooga 6 returns 144 yards 24.00 average
11/27/09 @ Auburn 4 returns 99 yards 24.75 average
12/05/09 Florida 6 returns 161 yards 26.83 average
01/07/10 Texas 6 returns 106 yards 17.67 average
Those are the last 5 games of the season, outside of the Texas game, not much improvement was really made. It is important to rember that 20 yards a return would be considered merely average. Alabama rarely held any opponent to less than 20 yards a return.
And
Even though the BCS Championship game was a statistical improvement, let’s remember the on-side kick shown above (and our own bungled fake punt)
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
by billycthulhu on May 12, 2010 11:56 AM CDT up reply actions
I loved that fake punt call.
Not the greatest execution, though.
by crimsontsunami on May 12, 2010 2:13 PM CDT up reply actions
I was NOT a fan of that call
4th and 23 in our own territory…
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
by billycthulhu on May 12, 2010 2:58 PM CDT up reply actions
I don't...
…think it was a called play. It looked like PJ thought he had no coverage on one of the gunners, so he audibled to a pass. We call agree that it was terrible play though.
bingo
Coach Saban even said it after the game……..this was an automatic audible called on the field by the upman when a certain formation was seen……….I’ve watched the game about ten times since January 7, and as much as I hate faking a punt on 4th and 23 from inside our own 20 on our first possession with the National Championship on the line, it must be said that if P.J. makes a decent throw, it is a huge gain, and maybe a touchdown……..the throw was at least ten yards short, which allowed the Texas player to catch up to Dre and knock it away………
Haha, I understand your point but...
…I liked the insanity of it. It was a relentless play call, and if it had worked, it could’ve destroyed Texas right there in the beginning of the game.
I do understand your not being a fan, though. I just remember standing in the Texas section, feeling so good, despite the result, about how we were willing to take big risks early on with the stakes so high.
by crimsontsunami on May 12, 2010 8:59 PM CDT up reply actions
Yeah, execution poor, idea good.
I said then, ok, we’ve gotten past the “who’s gonna f*#&up first?” worry, now let’s settle down, take a breath, and do what we know how to do. And they did it.
Look for a lot more of them this year...
P.J.’s throw went farther than several of the punts on A-day, and so it may be our best option!
"Let's go be champions, boys!" - Greg McElroy
(Formerly SugarBowl93)
by RememberTheRoseBowl on May 13, 2010 4:52 AM CDT up reply actions
I hope you're right, and hope they get it straightened out.
I know BW is a good recruiter and CNS is happy to have him on staff. But I don’t think he had ever coached ST before, and I think he’s learning on the job. I’m just glad it hasn’t cost us a game, so far.
I am concerned with the special teams...
To me, it’s a bigger issue that we’re replacing a long-time starter at long snapper. I think Fitzgerald punted better as the season wore on (and he stopped James from breaking one in the SECCG). With Tiffin, he kicked pretty well overall this season.
I think CNS said something after A-Day that he wasn’t worried too much about the kicking game because of the two freshmen were coming in. He made it sound like that he expected those guys to get the kicking and punting duties.
Coverage needs to get a lot better as well. I don’t think I cringed as much everytime this season except when we kicked off.
IIRC
Saban is pretty confident in our new long snapper
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
by billycthulhu on May 12, 2010 10:53 AM CDT up reply actions
I don't think his comment was that he wasn't worried.
His comment was that you couldn’t base anything off what you saw this spring because those guys weren’t here yet. He definitely expects the freshmen to take the job, but that’s by default, not because they’re sure fire, can’t miss guys.
Dadgum it, Kleph...
…and I was trying so hard to have a happy Wednesday. It’s too EARLY for this much foreboding.
I’m just going to put on my cute little rose colored glasses and pretend we’re going to be FINE.
by Queen of the Universe on May 12, 2010 9:02 AM CDT reply actions
the one thing i'm sure of...
is coach saban is aware of the problem and working on finding a solution.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
Simple Solution!
Cade Foster just needs to put every KO through the uprights and be done with it. I’d rather give the opposing team the ball on the 20 than have an urban attack every KO.
Auburn fans are like slinkys... not really good for anything but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs.
You nailed it Kleph.
And for those who think Cade Foster will solve this problem you must not have watched A-Day. He was worse than Tiffin.
This one area could really hurt us in 2010. We survived some bad field position last year becasue we had a strong defense. Furthermore, I feel like we were extremly lucky not to have lost to UT after blowing the onside kick. In close games, and we will have many close games in 2010, you must recovere onside kicks everytime!!
I don’t want to lose/fire Coach Williams, but maybe we need to shift coaching assignments a bit. Sunseri has some special teams experience.
I hate the NCAA more than UT & AU combined. At least with UT & AU you got a fighting chance.
I sure hope your wrong about Foster...
Have you ever hear of nerves?? Towards the end of A-day scrimmage, he put one thru the endzone. He couldn’t have received all those accolades to be an average kicker.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
I think that's sort of the thing
Looking back to the end of that infamous Arkansas game, Tiffin was put in a really tough situation that tested his nerves, and he wasn’t able to handle it. Obviously he got a lot better, but it took some time to get over those nerves. I’m afraid Foster is pretty much our only choice on long FGs, and I hope a game doesn’t come down to him the way it did to Tiffin a few times last year.
"You know, we had a lot of fun tonight. But there's nothing funny about vapor lock! It's the third most common cause of cars stalling. So please, take care of your car and get it checked!" -Joe Namath
by billycthulhu on May 12, 2010 10:56 AM CDT up reply actions
Foster's
one end zone kick on A Day was a line drive. Most high school kickers can line drive the ball into the end zone. The problem with the line drive is that it is easily returned for big yards and it can easily go out of bounds. If you line dirve it you better kick it away from the receivers.
I hate the NCAA more than UT & AU combined. At least with UT & AU you got a fighting chance.
Kleph, those vids were pre-Oct. 2009...
save for Tenn. where if you noticed they kicked the opposite way of the good-hands people. With Trent, Rodgers and Foster covering returns, we should be fine.
My concern is still the offensive line!!
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
there wasn't a video of the auburn onside kick
but there really is no reason opponents should have the amount of success with the onside kick they’ve had on us in the past two years. our defense has been good enough to pull our fat out of the fire but counting on that is clearly a disaster waiting to happen. if we can get back to 50% recovery on onside kicks, i’ll be happy.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
We must give Smelley some slack....
Try fielding a kickoff 10 yards from the kicker’s foot coming staight at you. It was a brilliant play by Texas.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
maybe...
and tennessee did a great job blocking julio…
and auburn did a great job disguising the kick…
and eventually we’re gonna have to step up and make some great plays ourselves.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
Based on the explosive plays...
they didn’t show during the A-Day game, I’m hoping we will make some great plays this Fall.
Oh by the way, the teams you listed all lost. Tenn has always been a tough game and Auburn was playing like they had nothing to lose.
We must believe that Saban will have the Tide ready…that means the kicking game, DBs and the offensive line.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
i understand we won these particular games...
that’s no excuse to have a sub-standard phase of our game.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
agreed...
but I also saw a sub-standard phase of our game in the NC game, that of our offensive line. If our passing game is to materialize, we need to give the QB two to three more seconds to make some explosive plays.
"We all look at it not so much as a rebuilding year, but more as a reloading year.." - Greg McElroy
i wasn't planning on making this a series...
but it might be worth the effort.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
It would also be a nice counterpoint...
to all the “zOMG REP3ATZ!” we’ve been accused of lately.
we could call it
“Poor Mouthing Through the Offseason” and appease the football gods with our humility. i like it.
The beauty of The Process is that you have never arrived, so you get to continue being perpetually awesome... -Espyonage
by tempebamafan on May 13, 2010 2:12 PM CDT up reply actions
Yeah, it's youth soccer, but...
… we’ve had success at my kids’ school with a similar process: be strong in the fundamentals, and keep working, keep improving, etc. You reach a point where someone asks, “who do we play this Saturday?” and you say, “It really doesn’t matter — if we do what we know how to do, we’ll win.”
Offseason humility = good karma. Amen.
ADay was encouraging in many ways, but we’ve got realistic concerns in numerous areas. The biggest one to me is mental — this team is 2010’s Crimson Tide, and 2009 is history. There’s a huge difference between expecting to win and expecting to win easily based on what happened last year.
I'm not sure Williams is the problem or not
While he did fill the spot opened when Middleton left, I’m not sure he replaced him as special teams coach. I don’t think he’s ever been listed as such, and in fact I seem to remember several Saban comments that special teams responsibility is shared among the coaches (I could be wrong, please correct me if so). And I wonder if therein lies the problem: since Middleton left we’ve had a bunch of coaches who regard special teams as a side duty rather than one guy taking ownership of it.
Whatever the source of the problem, it’s hard to imagine Saban letting it continue to be so when it’s been such an obvious weakness the past couple of years. And kick coverage did seem to get addressed over the course of last season. As for the onside kick recovery stat, 5 is a small enough sample size that it could just be a random string of bad luck, though the appearance of not being ready on a couple of them is troubling.
Bobby Williams
Tight Ends/Special Teams
http://www.rolltide.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/m-footbl-coaches.html
I knew I was taking a chance not looking it up
Still, I could swear I’ve seen several Saban quotes that special teams is handled by multiple coaches.
Also, I’m not sure that Williams is not the problem either. It’s just that for a while I was pretty sure that we needed to replace him, but since Saban obviously doesn’t agree I started trying to figure out why I was wrong.
In the media guide Williams
is listed as Tight Ends and Special Teams. Williams coaching specialty is running backs, and wide receivers. He did once coach DB’s at Ball St for a year or two. He was a head coach at Mich. St.
To me the guy is really an offensive backfield coach. I’m not sure he ever coached special teams before Alabama.
We don’t need to lose him because he is a good coach and recruiter. But a reassingment might help. Special teams are just that special. It takes a special coach to get them going.
I hate the NCAA more than UT & AU combined. At least with UT & AU you got a fighting chance.
we need to find the man who is the coaching equivalent for special teams...
that we have in coach cochran for conditioning and then throw bags of money at that person.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
I wish we'd have thrown those money bags at Middleton
Though his wife’s health may have had something to do with the decision.
Fuzzy math
Is it just me or are these stats not right listed above. In 2007 our opponents only had 12 kickoff returns for 267 yards? And then from 2008-2009 they had 161 returns for over 3000 yards. The average per return does not match these numbers either for 2007. I am fairly certain that is incorrect.
Agree that we need to get better though.
Montoya
Hey, what’s up, killer? How you been? I haven’t seen you since ‘98! What’s new?
www.totteringworld.com
Ha!
Still waiting for that elusive NFL contract so I can run over everything in my path.
Really, he was one of my favorite players that most people don’t remember too much. When he wasn’t hurt, he was the ultimate goal line back. He was so short and you couldn’t find him and when you did, he would run your ass over.
by montoyamadden on May 12, 2010 5:19 PM CDT up reply actions
the number of returns and yardage in 2008-2009
is immense compared to 2007. i assume this can be accounted for by a difference in scoring (or some other factor i don’t have the expertise to divine) so my comparisons in terms of this piece are more of the averages than the overall numbers.
but yeah, that struck me as odd as well and i’d love to hear anyone’s theories concerning it.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
OOPS!
That number is for INT returns, not kick returns. 2007 kick return yardage for opponents is 64-1148, and for UA was 48-1014. The averages you listed are correct though.
http://www.rolltide.com/sports/m-footbl/stats/2007-2008/teamcume.html
that makes a LOT more sense
i’ve updated the numbers to reflect the correct figures.
as i just mentioned, i was more interested in comparing the averages since i’m holding two years versus one year. i didn’t concentrate when inputing the actual numbers of returns and yardage.
i should also note that i considered looking at years before that but i thought i was pushing my apples and oranges about as far as they could go – expecting the comparison to hold up for another head coach’s regimen seemed to be asking too much.
bottom line, something like special teams is extremely hard to gauge statistically because the sample size is so damned small. i only put the numbers up there to flesh out the general impression of the unit after watching a few games. i’m hoping like all hell everything is okey dokey and what we need is for the law of averages to kick in… but the timing with the special teams coaching change makes me very skeptical on that count.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
Good deal
I had no idea we hadn’t kicked an onside kick since 2007. I guess we really had no need to, but I am fairly certain that the one we did get in 2007 was the Tennessee ass kicking.
by montoyamadden on May 12, 2010 5:28 PM CDT up reply actions
I've been meaning to post this for a while, and I guess this is as good a place as any
Thanks for these kinds of posts you do Kleph — many of your posts pull in a lot of statistics which leads to the inevitable occasional error and public correction by someone in the comments. I’ve pointed out an error or two myself, but these posts are so full of good information that I can see myself using them as a reference in the future whenever a given topic comes up. And of course, we all want our reference material to be correct.
I just wish we had
another Lane Bearden punting. Thinking back it just brings a tear to a glass eye.
Amen
to that bro….Lane Bearden was tough as nails and wasn’t afraid to hit someone. We probably won’t ever see another Lane Bearden.
A picture says a thousand words unless it is a picture of the Alabama football team then it only says one word.........CHAMPION!
by AlabamaTitans2009 on May 12, 2010 8:33 PM CDT up reply actions
To quote the great Oddball (Donald Sutherland) from Kelly's Heroes
Why don’t you knock it off with them negative waves Moriarty? Why don’t you dig how beautiful it is out here? Why don’t you say something righteous and hopeful for a change?
because we spent far far to long having people blow sunshine up our ass.
one of the things i love about the process is that you can put it under this kind of scrutiny and it holds up quite well. if we have to fill our time finding fault in one aspect of one part of phase of the game, then things are pretty good overall. and i feel completely comfortable in the belief my dimestore analysis isn’t even in the same area code as what coach saban knows about this issue.
Roll 'Bama Roll: The Champagne of 'Bama Blogs.
The special teams under Coach Middleton
were the best I have ever seen at Alabama (short of Coach Stallings putting the whole starting defense out there in ‘92)……….It seemed like in 2007, anytime we kicked off to a team, they would just hit a wall at about the 17 yard line……….and it seemed like our return guys in ’07 would always have room to make the catch and get going before meeting resistance……….since Bobby Williams took over, the kick coverage has been among the worst I have ever seen at Alabama………..If this is not a coaching issue, I can’t understand why we went from being great to being shitiful in one year……….I know Coach Saban thinks alot of Coach Williams, and there is little doubt that I can’t question CNS’s evaluations, but it has been very noticeable to me in the stands, that our special teams, far from giving us a significant advantage in games, has been an outright liability especially in regards to kickoff coverage………and this is with a senior punter, kicker, and the best return man we have had since the deuce……..maybe this is a result of us using a ton of freshmen and sophomores on our kick coverage unit (at least I hope this is the case)………and if what I saw in the A day game was any indication, we have nobody at the punter position, and placekicking is shaky at best………regardless, if we aren’t significantly better in kick coverage this year with a shaky kicking game, we are in a world of shit if we let opponents start at midfield and give them a chance to take shots at our young secondary……….
You are correct.
And it is not because a lot of freshmen, soph. etc. played
I hate the NCAA more than UT & AU combined. At least with UT & AU you got a fighting chance.
"Meet ya at the 30..."
That’s what some of us have been saying for awhile now, every time we kick off. I suppose containment is better than gambling and giving up a long return, but still…
The AU onside kick? I predicted it was coming for 2-3 weeks before the game. Was stunned at how shocked we looked.
If we have to do a FG kicker rotation this year (one for distance, one for shorter accuracy), so be it. It gets them both experience. But we got to find a punter who can get some hang time and distance. Nobody at ADay had it. Supposedly the kid from Thomasville is coming in the fall.
Something from ADay I really want to see in the fall: Julio and Richardson returning kickoffs together. I predict Richardson breaks one in the first 3 games, whereupon everyone starts kicking to Julio, or just squib/caroming it TX-style off someone’s leg…
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