Has he let it slide? They have had some pretty significant concentration on recruiting the D Line. Now they have missed on some of their top targets this year, but they are still always going after top talented players
Some of the D lineman they brought in had to be switched over to the Oline (Julian Pearl and Verdis Brown)
Some with a lot of talent haven't put it together yet (Calvin Avery), been kicked off the team (Lere Oladipo) or cant stay healthy (Jamal Woods)
The older players on the DE have not stepped up and reached their potential (Gay, Carney)
They brought in a DE from the transfer market and supposedly are looking to do that again.
He lost his NFL caliber D line coach to the NFL
Our best player happened to be the pass rush we need, got paralyzed
Not really sure that is letting it slide as much as it is having some really sheety luck.
Dude, it's not that they're not trying to get great DLs, it's just that our recruiting and position coaches are just so much weaker than the competition for top players.
Think about it....a DL coach comes in who'd been a successful P5 DL coach for a decade and teaches you more about playing the position than you learned from all your playing time, and he's an excellent, experienced salesman for the program. I remember hearing quotes from recruits like that when we had Ed Warriner and Harry Hiestand as OL coaches. Our last DL coach also had those bonafides, but Lovie downgraded rather than upgraded the staff at that position.
So a top recruit visits with an outstanding coach who's developed talent to NFL and AA levels and gives a clinic in playing the position, and then an Illinois coach comes in who looks like a grad assistant and clearly a novice at developing players. Where do you think the top recruit goes?
I really don't know what Lovie's goals for the program are. He was supposed to have tremendous contacts with assistants to attract the top coaches with both P5 college and pro experience. I don't know if it hasn't happened because they don't want to work for Lovie or he thinks he doesn't need top staff to make the program championship competitive.
I hate to say this, but it looks like Lovie just wants a mediocre team and just keep collecting that $5 million per year until he's milked all he can get out of the job. If he was serious as are PJ Fleck and coach Allen at Indiana, we'd have a much better staff and recruiting results....