The amount of money he was paid and if he did a half-way decent job of making adjustments the season might have played more favorably.
The only thing I'm certain of is he needs to go!
The only thing I'm certain of is he needs to go!
Still puzzled by Jim Knowles...
- Thread starter Mr. Potter
- Start date
It would be more important to get a stouter front 7. You can't hide that deficiency.
OBVIOUSLY. 
, sent by T
osu to sabotage our program. His arrival in a buckeye horse should have been a clue.
, sent by Tosu to sabotage our program. His arrival in a buckeye horse should have been a clue.I think the lack of talent is glaring.
Really the wrong personnel, but you need to adapt to what you have.
Everyone looks like Lombardi when you have 20 NFL guys running your defense.
He hasn’t been great and maybe there is some truth that it takes a while to implement his defense?
But the talent disparity between this defense and last year’s is significant.
The second defensive end spot has been bad with an absent Abdul Carter. DT has no depth vs the veterans we lost to graduation and portal. With no King/Rojas, the LB position is horrific vs the run. And opposite safety to Wheatley has been a significant drop off from Jaylen Reed.
Franklin simply did not have the shelves restocked.
I said this a few weeks back. This roster was really good, but not a true natty contender. With the benefit of hindsight, last year was the year not this year.
But the talent disparity between this defense and last year’s is significant.
The second defensive end spot has been bad with an absent Abdul Carter. DT has no depth vs the veterans we lost to graduation and portal. With no King/Rojas, the LB position is horrific vs the run. And opposite safety to Wheatley has been a significant drop off from Jaylen Reed.
Franklin simply did not have the shelves restocked.
I said this a few weeks back. This roster was really good, but not a true natty contender. With the benefit of hindsight, last year was the year not this year.
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Agreed he hasn't had a lot to work with. We're so think at LB. The DL seems to take plays (and games) off. It's a little hard to judge things right now.
You make some good points. Knowles needs to share the blame though. Talent is not where it needs to be but teams like UCLA and Rutgers can't have field days against us. They don't out talent us.
In hindsight we were totally rounding up every where with this defense....
Durant and DDS will be first team B10....nope
Fisher will be solid as a vet....nope
Ford will have a breakout year....nope
Young linemen will step up, Harvey, Kemajou, Gilliam, Coleman, Wafle. Coleman got hurt and none of the others seem to do anything.
Rojas played well then got hurt
Deluca a walk-on and not good
Campbell okay
No depth beyond that at LB, none. Tatsch okay and then nada
AJ Harris...way overrated
Besides Wheatley no one that great but all were overrated ...Mack, Washington, Tracy, Collins.
Dixon shows promise
Pretty much nothing panned out like we thought, all negative.
Hasn't it always been it takes a couple yrs for Knowles D to kick in? Dudes been a stud everywhere he's been, so I don't think he forgot how to coach in a year.
You know who wasn’t puzzled by Knowles? UCLA and their 4-day old staff.
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Knowles is not puzzling at all. His defense is so complicated that it takes awhile for the players to learn and execute it. In the meantime, he doesn't do a very good job with making adjustments. Either in game situations nor to the personnel available to him. And what's up with the walkie talkie?
You know how much pressure Franklin was under after the Oregon game. You also know from past experience that Franklin was masterful at shedding blame on coordinators. When the whole story is written it will come out that Franklin was not happy with the defensive performance at UCLA and my guess is that Jim and his agent have been fishing around for the next gig since that game
Does his style work in today’s climate. This year is nothing like just two years ago. If it takes two years at least to get his system are players coming in and going out even around that long? 11-20 players all on the same page in a complex system with portal and injuries etc?
With the playoffs these days we still could have made it after Oregon and even ucla. Franklin though did not manage his coordinators to change. Last 4-6 weeks smith had them change slowly each week. Rutgers defensive plan though took a major step back and Knowles for some reason cannot adjust in the second half.
Our D was very good at turnovers and sacks the past few years. 44 sacks, 20 Int, 6 Fumble recoveries last year (in a full season), I know we lost Carter and some others but what has happened that they cant get those this year? I really think last year was an overachievement due to Carter and Warren being once in a lifetime type players
IMO, Saturday was a combination of things.
1. We have never had the players this year that truly fit his system.
2. In the past our players were allowed to do whatever they could to make plays, this year relied on them being disciplined. And saturday looked like people just doing their own things.
3. Going in to that game, Terry was told, and told the team he would not be the guy. Motivation became an issue that led to an effort issue.
1. We have never had the players this year that truly fit his system.
2. In the past our players were allowed to do whatever they could to make plays, this year relied on them being disciplined. And saturday looked like people just doing their own things.
3. Going in to that game, Terry was told, and told the team he would not be the guy. Motivation became an issue that led to an effort issue.
This is really what it looked like. That game was almost as bad as one of those middle finger efforts they had at UCLA and Northwestern where it appeared they tried to lose.
How bad will the bowl game be with this and with a bunch of players sitting it out?
If you have 5-8 guys that return from the prior year it's easy to slot 3-6 guys into it. The issue is an entire team learning it BUT it's his job to simplify it until they grasp it.
Who would tell their interim coach before a game that he isn’t getting the job and if Terry had told the team it would have leaked all over.
if the story that Terry Smith told him to blitz more and use more pressure and implement Mannies prowler package are true, kind of makes one questions just how good/ useful Knowles really was if head coach over ruling him led to success.
Said this year 27 times before and during the season. We lost 3k in offensive yard production because we lost players and had to have more yards this year cause defense would be worse. Those facts came true!!
Common Sense tells everyone that is what happened. Look at the difference in celebrations from Nebraska to Rutgers. Someone told somebody something. Only hire Terry sign was from a family member, the post game hug between terry and kraft was luke-warm at best.
They were gonna lose to O-State either way so that's 3 losses (and not even factoring IU loss) and they don't make the playoffs at 9-3 esp if they don't get a B1G title game shot to get the auto bid. They just end up with a better bowl game and Franklin probably sticks around another year
Everyone that knew Knowles said his defenses take a handful of years to install including getting the personnel right. Franklin’s biggest character flaw was his hubris; he thought it could be different here, perhaps because our Offense was supposed to be dominant. We were warned by OSU fans. Many of us didn’t listen.
I thought Ford and Gilliam played well.
Campbell is my MVP for defense I thought he was very good.
Secondary much like the DL was way overrated. Safeties took a big step back.
Psu priority has been on the secondary it seems rather than Linebacker U and the trenches. It always seems like 1 out of every 3 recruits is a DB.
So in the age of the portal, with 1 year mercenaries, we have a defense that takes 2 or more years to master.
I don't know if I would use the word "master" JMO but I think it's more, he needs a different type of player or body than we have.
IMO both the OC and DC hires were odd fits. The OC because of the type of QB Drew is and Knowles because the players we have on defense, specifically the DL, dont or didn't mesh with his style and yes it might have been a little too complicated to start with and losing our best LB didn't help.
You did? I was watching Ford on a lot of plays, and it was not pretty. Ty Blanding? YEEEESH!
Our defensive tackles were abysmal on Saturday.