Alabama Football: Rebuilt Defense may have some growing pains

Alabama football is rebuilding its defense for 2019. Departing players mean replacing considerable 2018 production in tackles, tackles for a loss and sacks.

Almost every Alabama football fan and a large majority of college football experts believe the 2019 Crimson Tide defense will better than last season. Such optimism is warranted but must tack against some statistical headwind.

An old college football axiom is that experience counts more than talent. Over the last decade or so, college football rosters have trended younger for a variety of reasons. Weight training at the high school level has so advanced, many players arrive on campus, physically capable of competing as true freshmen.

Couple that trend with the expanding exit of players after their third college season and youth-filled rosters abound. Maybe the old axiom of experience counting more than talent is no longer valid. That does not mean experience has no value.

Check out a source like Phil Steele for careful analysis through annual experience charts for every team. Broadly summarizing Steele’s conclusions – more experienced teams win more games, much more often than less experienced teams.

For the 2019 season, Steele calculates the Alabama Crimson Tide as No. 86 on his experience chart of the 130 FBS teams. Based on Steele’s calculations, seven of the Crimson Tide’s 11, FBS, regular-season opponents return more experienced rosters. In the SEC, only Texas A&M, Kentucky, Ole Miss, Vandy and Arkansas return less experience.

There is an easy way to review the starting point for the 2019 Crimson Tide defense. Due to roster exits, it must replace 418 of 941 tackles; 56.5 of 107 tackles for a loss, 27 of 45 sacks and seven of 14 interceptions. That is a considerable amount of defensive production to replace.

Combining the experience rating analysis and the need to replace lost defensive production – and optimism for defensive improvement appears less sound.

A perspective the glass is more than half full is in order. Don’t forget the other major component of success – talent, and the Crimson Tide is loaded with it. Even better, that talent provides some defensive depth that did not exist last season.

Though impossible to define in advance, the 2019 Crimson Tide coaching staff should be another plus. Last season, the defensive staff stumbled and never regained solid ground after Tosh Lupoi had to be effectively demoted during the season. Nick Saban is all-in with Pete Golding and he has surrounded the young coach with strong defensive assistants.

Will there be some growing pains with a relatively new Alabama football defense? Probably so, and fortunately the early season schedule affords time to do it.