USC's Poor Defense Boils Down To Four Players Not in Trojan Uniforms

USC’s defensive woes are not a surprise to anyone who has watched the Trojans this year.

Discussion revolves around who or what is responsible for a USC defense that is No. 100 in total defense in FBS football.

Is it Monte Kiffin and the Tampa-2 defense?

Are the coaches not putting the players in the right spots?

Did Pete Carroll and his staff in his later years at USC leave the cupboard bare as Paul Peszko states in his article http://is.gd/g1gcf?

Or have the NCAA-imposed sanctions already reared its ugly head and hurt USC’s depth, especially on the defensive side of the ball?

Many clearly believe Assistant Head Coach Monte Kiffin’s defense is ill-equipped to deal with spread offenses (or offenses that use spread principles) as fans have seen against Hawaii and Washington. I myself have made that same point in http://is.gd/g1f79.

What college football fans however, and Trojan fans in particular saw last week against Stanford were starters, highly ranked as recruits, who were not performing equal to the number of stars next to their name.

Starting defensive ends Nick Perry and Armond Armstead have the potential to be dominant lineman. How often though did it seem like both Perry and Armstead were trying to take direct routes to attack Andrew Luck, while ignoring their responsibility to contain, thus allowing Luck to roll out and either run or pass the ball without pressure?

One day Jawanza Starling may be a star safety

That day has not arrived however.

The glaring hole in the USC defense is the play of its starting linebackers.

Devon Kennard, the sophomore middle linebacker, has all the physical gifts to be a dominant player at that position. He is learning the position though which means he needs to be bracketed by outstanding outside backers

Unfortunately, Malcolm Smith and especially Michael Morgan have failed in that regard.

Smith seems to be improving, but Morgan is a different story. 

If it seemed like every play Jim Harbaugh ran in the second half was run directly at Morgan, that’s because it was. Twice his penalties in pass coverage hurt the Trojans. One on pass interference near the goal line and another on a defensive holding that nullified a sack.

Even more disturbing was Morgan’s seeming inability to shed a simple block

How is it a USC-level starting linebacker cannot get rid of a solo blocker to come up and stop the run?

One unnamed former Trojan player informed me Morgan might possibly be the worst player he has ever seen for a USC defense.

Obviously Lane Kiffin and staff have to deal with the players they have, but USC fans should know that Morgan would not even be seeing the field had not the history of even one, let alone all of the following four players be different.

Jarvis Jones – This 6’3” outside linebacker was just starting to earn his stripes as a freshman at USC when he was hurt playing against Oregon. USC’s medical staff refused to clear him and was prepared to offer him a medical redshirt and thus retire him.

Jones of course wanted nothing to do with that and has since transferred to Georgia where either the humidity has healed him or the medical staff places a higher priority on protecting Mark Richt’s job status rather than the player’s health.

Frankie Telfort – Telfort was the eighth rated linebacker in his class, choosing the Trojans over Florida. He was also expected to play as a freshman last year but unfortunately for him, and the Trojans, it was detected he had the same heart condition that caused the premature deaths of both Loyola Marymount star basketball player Hank Gathers and Boston Celtics forward Reggie Lewis.

Thus it is that two linebackers, signed, sealed and delivered as Trojans, are helpless to be of benefit to the 2010 USC defense.

But there are two more linebackers playing today who would be stars for Monte Kiffin but chose to follow their college dreams elsewhere.

Vontaze Burfict – Burfict is widely regarded as the best linebacker in the Pac-10. And the Corona Centennial graduate would have stayed in southern California but his grades would not get him admitted to USC. Had the verbally-committed Burfict remained with the Trojans (and of course had he got his grades up), he would be dominating the middle of the Trojan defense and allow Kennard to remain a stud defensive end.

It was to Burfict’s benefit however that Arizona State is the junior college of the Pac-10 and just about anyone can gain admission.

Manti Te’o – Te’o, who plays for Notre Dame and has 20 more tackles than any other Irish defender, was also widely-believed to favor the Trojans at the end of his recruiting. USC however had zero interest in his best friend, wide receiver and high school teammate Roby Toma. Toma, who is 5’9” on a good day and weighs 175 lbs sopping wet, would never have seen the field as a USC receiver so Pete Carroll never recruited him. Both Notre Dame and UCLA however were very eager to offer Toma a scholarship in an attempt to lure Te’o away from USC

Notre Dame succeeded.

Had Pete Carroll known the medical issues that would have developed with Jones and Telfort, maybe he would have bit the bullet and given Toma a scholarship. As it was, he did not and the two Hawaiians are enjoying the balmy Indiana winters.

Toma coincidentally does not have a catch this season, playing in an offense that typically employs four and five wide receiver sets.

It is easy to blame the scheme, the coaches or the sanctions, but USC fans need to face the cold fact that its defensive talent is not what it should be

The depth-lacking USC defense sure would look significantly different with starting linebackers of Burfict, Te’o and Chris Galippo, twin hard-hitting safeties in Telfort (he is 5’11/195) and T.J. McDonald, and a line featuring Armstead, Perry, and Kennard back at end.

But those are the cards that are dealt in college football and now it's up to head coach Lane Kiffin to somehow rebuild this defense in the face of the brutal sanctions.

But can someone please teach Michael Morgan how to shed a block?

My thoughts on college football and sports in general can be followed on Twitter at @plh55.