Very similar stats......however Ryan had way more toys to play with as well.
Most of them were injured though. When we got Brandon Carr, we had to play him at safety which he hadn't played since high school because we had so many injuries. We were bringing guys out of retirement and trying to get whomever we could just to fill a roster.
I am more indifferent about Rob. He had some brilliant schematics, but he also had the tendency to put the cart before the horse in some of his coverages for his blitzes. I had more of an issue with him struggling to get the right people on the field which would cause 12-men on the field penalties and even worse, blown assignments.
But it wasn't like he had no competency as a D-Coordinator.
I was for the switch because offenses were changing and I felt (and still feel) that the 4-3 is likely the better way to defend the shotgun 00, 10, and 11 personnel with quick passes as well as defending RPO's/read option looks. I'd basically rather have my best 4 pass rushers going after the QB almost every snap than have 1 of my 2 best pass rushers in coverage 30-40% of the time. I also feel that the college game is more geared towards producing 4-3 talent
As far as Marinelli goes...he and Kiffin were brought in because Garrett wanted a simple scheme. He stated that with the new practice rules from the CBA that they believed there would be more injuries and players wouldn't be able to catch on to complex schemes as quickly and thus a simple scheme would be best to remedy that problem.
Well, the league hasn't seen more injuries and so much of the rest of the league has been able to use modern schemes and have better defenses than what Marinelli has fielded.
To me, this defense will never get better until we get a better D-Coordinator, a better combination of a MIKE-SS-FS and we get a better strength and conditioning coach and program to cut down on the countless hamstring and lower back injuries. Until then...we're just spinning our wheels.
YR