Give Willie Martinez credit for this: He's not shying away from the criticism.
Martinez spent about 15 minutes with reporters Tuesday night and didn't duck any questions -- even if he didn't exactly give the most specific of responses to all of them. Here's a taste of what Martinez had to say about the team's recent defensive struggles.
On why his D can stop the run, but not follow through on slowing the pass...
“You go into a football game and you’re trying to make an offense be one-dimensional. The offenses are so good now, there’s different variations of spread, and they’re different than some others. But if you do a good job as far as trying to make them one-dimensional, now you’ve got to gear in and do a better job in pass coverage, putting more pressure on the quarterback in the passing game and execute and make plays.”
On why the team performed so badly against Arkansas' passing game...
“They threw the ball very well, and obviously he’s an outstanding quarterback. They caught the ball well. And as a defensive back, if they’re going to throw the ball deep and you’re there, you’ve got to make a play. They made the plays and we didn’t. They were in position to at times to do it, and we didn’t do it. Bottom line – they executed and we didn’t. Those are the kind of things – sometimes you want that. You want the ball to be thrown deep and just chunk it where it’s 50-50, and hopefully your kid is going to be in position to make a play. They made them and we didn’t. That’s the price you pay when you’re playing man coverage. We’ve got to get better pressure on the quarterback when those times do come. But there are some times, too, where even if you brought pressure, they’re just chunking it and throwing it and the timing is there and they made the plays and we didn’t.”
On how to improve the secondary...
“Everything is tied in together. You cannot have good pass coverage if you don’t have good pass rush and vice versa. You just have to concentrate on the total package of being more effective of pushing pressure on the quarterback with our front four and be more disciplined in coverage.”
On how to handle the play-action...
“We’ve just got to be more disciplined. I’ve got to do a better job as a coach and continue to coach it and put our guys in position to make plays, and we’ve got to execute better, when you go against a team that’s good. The good teams will make you pay, and we’ve got to clean it up. I’ve got to do a better job of coaching it, and we’ve got to do a better job of executing it. There’s no excuses other than to just play better.”
On whether he is frustrated with the poor fundamentals for the second straight year...
“We just have to keep working. At the end of the day, you’ve got to tackle better, you’ve got to make plays in space, and execute the defense and play better on a consistent basis.”
On whether he thinks this has the potential to be a championship-caliber defense…
“Again, we haven’t played our best. I can tell you that much. We are not even close. We’ve got to keep working, and that’s what we’re doing right now. We’re trying to get better in everything we’re doing. Get better fundamentally, and it’s got to be the whole group. You’ve got to have 11 guys on the same page and executing all at the same time. It doesn’t really matter if there are three or four guys doing it. The thing about it is, when it happens in the secondary, everybody knows. When you’re out in space, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who messed up. So you just can’t do it. We’ve got to be more disciplined.”
On how he handles all the criticism…
“I don’t pay attention to it, but obviously it’s not fun playing the kind of defense that’s not what we’re accustomed to playing around here. I’m very happy that we won. Bottom line, that’s what it is. It doesn’t really matter if one side of the ball played well or this group played well, at the end of the day you want to win. You want to do whatever you can to help the team win, and we want to play better defense. So yeah, we’re not happy about it.”
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
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15 comments:
You ask Willie what time it is and he tells you how to build a watch.
Sounded like a lot of coach speak to me. I read one blog where a fan (obviously a student of the game) reviewed the pass D this year. His conclusion, based on play-action, shotgun, etc is that offensive coordinators are countering our scheme to keep us from getting pressure on the QB. Well, no duh, it seems everyone but CWM knows that's what coordinators do- study film, make changes and adapt. The O coordinators in the SEC understand CWM's D and use 3 step drops, etc. while CWM continues to do the same old thing. To make matters worse, he leaves certain players (see UGA safeties) in the game despite their having been beaten, fooled and out of position for the past 2 yrs. Put in Commings, Rambo, Pugh, etc. Sit somebody down, hold somebody accountable. That and adaptation set good coaches apart from bad coaches. Does anyone really think Saban would put the same guys back on the field after what we've witnessed? NO, those guys would have to buy a ticket to get in the game. But CWM sends the boys back out there to do the same junk over and over. He may not be dodging criticism but words are cheap. Let's see what he does for the rest of the season. I'd love to be dead wrong, eating crow at year end but I doubt having anything to worry about.
I know the Einstien answer,"doing the same thing over and over and hoping for a different result is stupid." probaby applies to CWM and I know he reads offensive film just as OCs read his defensive schemes...it's tactics vs counter-tactics and someone will get burnt..the other will win. Thus far, Okie State being the one breaddwon, UGA has won. It's like a chess match: you play one step ahead, knowing if you make a critical mistake you will lose. As CWM says: we have to execute..we have the players, two deep in most cases but the total schem has to work..no quick fixes..and I truly think we'll come out on top.
Does anyone else think that CWM answered these questions much like a politician answers questions? There's a lot of 'we need to do this, this, and this better' and 'it's all about execution', etc, etc. He's saying a whole lot of nothing. Yes Coach, we know your guys didn't execute, we know they got burned, we know we know we know!
My question is what are you doing about it? Let's get some verbs in there, tell us HOW you plan on making the D better rather than saying that they just need to get better. I want to hear how Bryan Evans had to run sprints and watch extra film after getting burned deep in practice. I want to see you, from my seat in the stands, getting in your guys' faces when they make a mistake. These players can take criticism and if they can't then they have no business playing college football for UGA.
Bottom line: You are not their friend, you are their coach and it's time to act like one. Let's stick it to ASU this weekend!
Where have we heard this before,"we're working hard to get butter" Willie is the Ray Goff of DC's. nuff said.
Sarcastic guy says:
"You go into a football game and you’re trying to make an offense be one-dimensional."
Then why aren't we playing 11 men in the box!?!?!? Dang it...I knew there was something wrong with our Defense.
And why is it so 'obvious' that Mallet is an outstanding quarterback? This is his first SEC start.
Because he torched our pass coverage and we couldn't get anyone near him on the rush he is obviously great...
of course, using that same logic because we can't stop anyone from passing and running in the same game, can't rush the QB, can't get the ball back, and because we can't keep the other team out of the end zone...is our defense obviously crappy?
It's at least encouraging that he's going to try some of the younger guys like Rambo and Commings. Make Bryan Evans earn his spot and if he doesn't, there are two talented younger guys waiting to take it.
I'll say this at least about Willie...when you actually listen to him talk, you're dead certain he's a guy who knows exactly what he's doing.
Whatever talents he may lack, he's got that one nailed.
After reading his comments all I can say is I hope his players are more inspired by his words than I am..............
Making a team one dimensional doesn't do a lot of good when that one dimension is able to rack up over 400 yards.
UGA69 said what I was thinking as I was reading the answers. I thought "he sounds like Coach Goff shortly before his time ended."
Jay
Reading these comments makes me realize how horrible I've been to you great fans. From now on, you're the first to know what I'm thinking and what we're going to do to "get butter".
So here goes..
On the first play of the game, we're putting eight in the box to stuff the run.
Next we're going to bring Boykin from the blindside.
Then we're going to rush our DTs and Curran and drop CW and Houston into the passing lanes.
And I'm putting a freshman in whenever an upperclassmen does something wrong. Change and punishment are paramount even if those guys don't get it done in practice.
Should I keep going? I didn't realize that y'all wanted to know all of the details of my gameplan. I guess it could hurt if I make specific adjustments public but screw it - the only important thing is that you guys believe in me! Go Dawgs!
I can't wait to see the younger guys get in the game.
I'm not going to sit here and complain about Willie. What is it going to do for us? I hope the younger guys come in, raise eyebrows and bust heads.
Go Dawgs!!
Some of you guys are ridiculous. Not a one of you have spent one minute breaking down film, coaching a position or evaluating a player, yet, you are ready to give a “professional” college football coach advice and criticism. Do you honestly think Willie is not busting his tail off trying to get results? Willie only coaches the secondary, not the defensive linemen who continue to fail to get consistent pressure (why not give CRG hell). Not the Linebackers who consistently fail to get pressure when blitzed or fail to cover the short and middle routes or the DE,s who fail to get a pass rush (why not raise he!! with CJF). These guys evaluate everyday and put the players on the field that give us the best chance to win. Believe me, they are all scheming together to win. I get aggravated, and at times want to question the scheme, but I think a minute and remember back when an old bald head coach from past days played an old split six defense and said “if we have to change defenses and schemes every game to win, then, we ain’t real good”. Game experience will get us better.
I was going to post some sarcastic comment about letting the fan base know EVERYTHING im going to do to correct our defensive short comings...im glad others beat me to the punch.
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