The OFFICIAL 2017 College football RANDOM THOUGHTS thread

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a lifetime of losing...
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Billy Hoyle said:
This game is gonna be so lit :whew:

Here's a breakdown of our offensive and defensive numbers. It's incredible how closely matched this game is going to be.

Alabama wins the stat comparisons...on both offense and defense. That's pretty much always the case with them, yet Saban's FIVE national titles have come with only a single undefeated season.

In other words, they still lose games to good teams occasionally, even when superior on paper. And as far as "on paper" goes, I think we have the best equipped team we've had since Saban got there. We had the best players in 2010 (Cam and Fairley). And we probably had the most overall dynamic offense in 2013 and 2014. Our best defense was certainly last year's.

But this is the first year that we don't seem to be at a big disadvantage on either side of the ball. In fact, when you dig deeper, we're not at a disadvantage at all in some regards. Along with some overall numbers, I've added some categories where it's even closer or where we slightly lead. There's a lot listed, enjoy.

DEFENSE
Here are some overall defensive numbers for comparison: All 11 games vs all opponents:

Scoring defense: points allowed:
10.20 - Alabama (#1)
16.60 - Auburn (#8)

Total Defense: yards allowed per play:
3.90 - Alabama (#1)
4.37 - Auburn (#4)

Rushing defense: yards allowed per rush:
2.67 - Alabama (#1)
3.14 - Auburn (#8)

Passing defense: yards allowed per pass:
5.3 - Alabama (#1)
5.9 - Auburn (#5)

Sacks per game:
32 - Auburn (#14)
30 - Alabama (#19)

Tackles for a loss per game:
75 - Alabama (#29)
73 - Auburn (#38)

So Alabama is ahead in almost every category. However, slightly ahead in most cases, with Auburn being Top 10 or even Top 5 in most of the same categories.

And while stats don't tell the whole story, overall stats tell even less of the whole story sometimes. Here are some of those same stats, but broken down by different opponent categories.

Total defense: yards per play vs FBS WINNING TEAMS:
4.52 - Alabama (in 5 games)
4.62 - Auburn (in 6 games)

Points allowed: vs FBS WINNING TEAMS:
17.2 - Alabama
18.2 - Auburn

Points allowed: VS RANKED TEAMS:
17.0 - Auburn (4 games)
17.0 - Alabama (2 games)

Rushing defense: yards allowed per rush: VS RANKED TEAMS
3.20 - Auburn
3.55 - Alabama

And here are some miscellaneous but important things like quarterback hurries, passes broken up, and forced fumbles.

Misc. defense: QB hurries + passes broken up + forced fumbles:
112 - Auburn (56 QBH + 43 PBU + 13 FF)
105 - Alabama (46 QBH + 51 PBU + 8 FF)

The defenses are probably closer than their reputations would have most of us believe. I know we think our defense is pretty good, and I think it is. That isn't to say a good offense can't get on a roll and hurt us. But no more likely than any other good defense it seems. And the ESPN defensive efficiency ratings would reflect that:

ESPN Defensive efficiency
90.1 - Alabama (#1)
88.2 - Auburn (#3)

OFFENSE

Offense....where to begin with offense? This is the most maddening side of the ball for us, obviously. So much potential when the game plan and play calling has confidence in the players and gets the offensive coaches into a groove. When the opposite happens....it's maddening and we lose all creativity and become a relatively easy offense to stop (LSU).

Scoring offense: points per game: all 11 games:
41.4 - Alabama (#7)
37.6 - Auburn (#17)

But again, breaking it down, things change a bit....

Scoring offense: Points per game VS FBS POWER FIVE:
39.6 - Alabama (#7)
38.4 - Auburn (#8)

Scoring offense: Points per game VS FBS POWER FIVE WINNING TEAMS:
35.2 - Auburn
32.8 - Alabama

Scoring offense: Points per game VS RANKED TEAMS:
29.5 - Auburn
27.5 - Alabama

Total offense: yards per play:
7.07 - Alabama (#9)
6.58 - Auburn (#20)

Total offense: yards per play VS FBS POWER FIVE:
6.71 - Alabama (#10)
6.44 - Auburn (#16)

RUSHING OFFENSE

Rushing offense: yards per carry:
6.03 - Alabama (#7)
5.18 - Auburn (#26)

Rushing offense: yards per carry VS RANKED TEAMS
4.30 - Alabama
4.14 - Auburn

PASSING OFFENSE

Passing offense: yards per attempt:
9.2 - Auburn (#8)
9.1 - Alabama (#9)

Passing offense: yards per attempt VS FBS POWER FIVE:
9.3 - Auburn (#7)
8.5 - Alabama (#11)

Passing offense: Passer rating:
165.87 - Alabama (#4)
163.56 - Auburn (#8)

Passing offense: Passer rating: VS FBS POWER FIVE
165.82 - Auburn (#5)
149.96 - Alabama (#14)

Passing offense: QBR rating:
84.1 - Alabama
73.0 - Auburn

One key for us will be what kind of big plays we can get in the passing game. Alabama actually hits on more pass plays of 10+ yards than we do, and about the same 20+ (against FBS Power Five teams). But when you get to 30+ and 40+, you can see we rely on that more.

Passing offense: Long pass plays 20+ VS FBS POWER FIVE TEAMS:
28 - Auburn
27 - Alabama

Passing offense: Long pass plays 30+ VS FBS POWER FIVE TEAMS:
20 - Auburn
11 - Alabama

Passing offense: Long pass plays 40+ VS FBS POWER FIVE TEAMS:
16 - Auburn
6 - Alabama

That 16 on the 40+ yard plays is two per game vs FBS Power 5 teams. Two plays that size is a big deal.

And the final comparison is offense and defense vs our 5 SEC West common opponents. Both teams have exploded for big offense at times (Alabama 613 yards vs Ole Miss, Auburn 629 yards vs Arkansas), and both teams have struggled at times (Alabama 299 vs LSU and 355 vs A&M, and Auburn 354 vs LSU).

And both teams have shut teams down, Alabama more often, for sure.

So here are some offensive and defensive numbers to compare:

OFFENSE

Points per game
42 - Auburn
38 - Alabama

Yards per game
510 - Auburn
441 - Alabama

Yards per play
7.29 - Auburn
6.84 - Alabama

Yards per carry
5.73 - Auburn
5.63 - Alabama

Total QBR
82.70 - Auburn
75.68 - Alabama

DEFENSE

Points allowed per game
13 - Alabama
21 - Auburn

Yards allowed per game
285 - Alabama
364 - Auburn

Yards per play allowed
4.18 - Alabama
5.03 - Auburn

Yards per carry allowed
2.64 - Alabama
3.84 - Auburn

Opponents QBR
73.02 - Alabama
73.98 - Auburn

So there's a bunch of stuff to wade through. On paper, this team should be more competitive than either the 2010 or 2013 teams that won the Iron Bowl. Will it play out that way? Who knows. But it's nice to finally feel like we EXPECT to compete, not just HOPE we do.
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Probably the first defense I felt that can contain an unflappable QB like Spurts for four quarters. I know last years D did they thang but got worn out at the end.
 
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Cwilk02 said:
Who do ya'll think have the best in state rivalry when it comes to overall success between the two teams?
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The only statistic you need is Auburn and that other school having every conference championship win since 09 other than the bougie tigers in 11. Could’ve been a lot more IB conference semifinals if we didn’t have to play fukking Georgia right before. Easily the worst scheduling when it comes to rivalries for anybody ever
 
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