Jamoris Slaughter

[EifertPower]

What do you all think is his best position? Safety or linebacker? Against Air Force and Navy he's played linebacker and done a great job. His strengths are that he's a ferocious tackler and pretty darn good in coverage, too. Our main problem with a lot of our current linebackers are that they are not good at both tackling and coverage.

What are your thoughts on moving him to an outside linebacker position next year? Would this help or hurt the team? I think if we do then we have one of the best linebacking units in the country.

My concern is our secondary will be very suspect next year as is. We might have to rely on 1 or 2 true freshman to play a lot and a lot of other guys who get time virtually will have no game experience prior to next year.

The scariest part is Zeke Motta is one of those guys who does have experience and he drives me crazy because i always see him as slow and missing tackles. Do we think Collingsworth will be ready to be a big time safety next year?

 

[tommyIRISH23]

Safety. Way too small for LB, plus he's going to anchor our secondary next year

 

[tommyIRISH23]

What do you all think is his best position? Safety or linebacker? Against Air Force and Navy he's played linebacker and done a great job. His strengths are that he's a ferocious tackler and pretty darn good in coverage, too. Our main problem with a lot of our current linebackers are that they are not good at both tackling and coverage.

What are your thoughts on moving him to an outside linebacker position next year? Would this help or hurt the team? I think if we do then we have one of the best linebacking units in the country.

My concern is our secondary will be very suspect next year as is. We might have to rely on 1 or 2 true freshman to play a lot and a lot of other guys who get time virtually will have no game experience prior to next year.

The scariest part is Zeke Motta is one of those guys who does have experience and he drives me crazy because i always see him as slow and missing tackles. Do we think Collingsworth will be ready to be a big time safety next year?

Also, the move to outside LB was tried with Harrison Smith, and it failed miserably. Total different responcibilities.

 

[Irishman77]

Jamoris has been very impressive IMO. Fast,aggressive and good tackler. Love this guy.

 

[kmoose]

What do you all think is his best position? Safety or linebacker? Against Air Force and Navy he's played linebacker and done a great job. His strengths are that he's a ferocious tackler and pretty darn good in coverage, too. Our main problem with a lot of our current linebackers are that they are not good at both tackling and coverage.

What are your thoughts on moving him to an outside linebacker position next year? Would this help or hurt the team? I think if we do then we have one of the best linebacking units in the country.

My concern is our secondary will be very suspect next year as is. We might have to rely on 1 or 2 true freshman to play a lot and a lot of other guys who get time virtually will have no game experience prior to next year.

The scariest part is Zeke Motta is one of those guys who does have experience and he drives me crazy because i always see him as slow and missing tackles. Do we think Collingsworth will be ready to be a big time safety next year?

My thoughts? Playing linebacker against the undersized academy teams is NOTHING like playing linebacker against the normal quality teams that ND has on their schedule, year after year.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

He needs to play safety. There is no other option at safety this year and next year. There are options at LB though

 

[johnnyoooo]

Slaughter

Slaughter

Suspect Kelly put Slaughter in as linebacker to pressure quarterbacks when they roll out. Barkley, USC had no trouble sidestepping Fleming and Shembo they simply cannot manever in open space while Slaughter can. As we seen yesterday Slaughter can chase down halfbacks too on the edge.

 

[johnnyoooo]

Need Speed

Need Speed

One thing that impressed me as a big contrast was the great speed S. Cal has compared to Notre Dame. In fact almost every college game we watch on Saturday the teams has speed all over the place. Fast halfbacks, receivers, secondary and linebackers. Clearly Notre Dame has trouble defending in space and lacks speed on both sides of the ball. Guess part of their recruiting problem is many of the potential speed recruits have difficulty meeting Notre Dame's academic standards.

 

[johnnyoooo]

Speed

Speed

Lou Holtz often said All good things flow off speed. Give me a kid with speed and I will teach him the fundamentals.

 

[jason_h537]

Lou Holtz often said All good things flow off speed. Give me a kid with speed and I will teach him the fundamentals.

Lou Holtz also said that he would take a football player over a track star because you can be the fastest guy on the field but if you don't know what you're doing. It doesn't matter.

 

[TerryTate]

He will play FS next year. He's got speed. Against Air Force & Navy, the size difference isn't as bad and he's got the quickness to protect the edge. That's why he played LB.

Future is at safety.

Hope Collinsworth gets in the mix. Got some tenacity to him.

 

[jason_h537]

ND runs a 3-4 not a Tampa 2. What LB position would he play?

 

[EifertPower]

I love Slaughter and i do agree we need him more at safety next year. I just started drooling thinking of him at linebacker making those same types of hits AND being great in coverage.

Cornerback seems to be the position of most concern for us next season but i think we at least will have a lot of capable bodies to put in the mix and no one with any allegiance to so everyone will have to prove themselves. I think we will be able to live with Atkinson, Bennett Jackson, Lo Wood, and some of the stud freshman (like Tee Sheppard and Darby). It might be a struggle at times and a bit of a learning curve but i think we'll find 2 guys who step up to the challenge next year.

I'm more worried about safety because a good safety can also cover-up a weak defensive backfield. Slaughter will be reliable but Zeke Motta I don't trust. And if Motta isn't the answer i don't really know what else we have except for Collingsworth, so i'm really hoping Collingsworth breaks out.

 

[irishff1014]

I think i would much rather see Austin get time at saftey then Motta. He hits some what hard other then that his less then average.

 

[NDIrishlover3]

Just remembered we get Badger back next year so don't forget about him. He is a monster hitter but we don't totally know how he will do

 

[IrishLax]

Just remembered we get Badger back next year so don't forget about him. He is a monster hitter but we don't totally know how he will do

Get lots of personal fouls?

 

[ND_HAS_RISEN]

The types of tackles and TE's that ND see's on a normal basis (outside of the service acadamies) would use Slaughter like a rag doll.

To clairfy... Slaughter played like a champ against Navy, but there is no way that he could (or even should for that matter) be able to stand ground and shed blocks like an OLB is required to. Even the worse tackle/TE combo in the nation would be able to consistantly handle him at OLB. Slaughter is a SPACE player. He is ferocious and outstanding at finishing, but finishing with a 300+ lbs tackle on you is a different story.

He will play safety next year. NO DOUBT ABOUT IT!

 

[WhoDeyIrish]

The types of tackles and TE's that ND see's on a normal basis (outside of the service acadamies) would use Slaughter like a rag doll.

To clairfy... Slaughter played like a champ against Navy, but there is no way that he could (or even should for that matter) be able to stand ground and shed blocks like an OLB is required to. Even the worse tackle/TE combo in the nation would be able to consistantly handle him at OLB. Slaughter is a SPACE player. He is ferocious and outstanding at finishing, but finishing with a 300+ pd tackle on you is a different story.

He will play safety next year. NO DOUBT ABOUT IT!

Thank you! I was about to post something similar.

 

[Old Man Mike]

A couple of comments:

1). This scheme was Diaco's doing, and it shows how much upside potential Diaco has as a defensive coordinator. He was able to see how miserable we were along the outside edges against the triple option and thought outside the box to correct that;

2). This also demonstrates that the staff believes what some of us have been going on about for a year: we are neither fast nor maneuverable enough on the outside edge at linebacker. Speed is very important. Change of direction likewise. Against the academies using safety-sized players there is OK. For that reason we will see Slaughter there again next year as a specialized defense against the triple option; not otherwise. The only way that such will not be true is if people like Ben Councell come in and solve the speed/maneuverability-in-space issue without having to use safeties;

3). Everybody's correct in that Jamoris, tough guy that he is, is too light to play 3-4 [or 4-3] OLB against teams exhibiting greater power on the average down. We have an overabundance of people who can "theoretically" do that [IWilliams, Niklas, Councell, Spond --- I'd really like to see Shembo go into the middle --- and Perkins coming], so we might be able to put better coverage and rapid-change-in-space guys out there, if a couple of folks just step up.

 

[dublinirish]

√ Jamoris Slaughter™ @J_Slaughter26 1h Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
Just for the record (yes) I am coming back for my 5th year at ND for those who don't know