So I'm not as smart as many of you on this board about football in general much less the intricacies on the defensive side of the ball. Implicit in that admission is the fact that I'm nowhere near as smart as Lincoln Riley when comes to this game at which he makes a living and within which he is recognized as one of the brightest minds. Riley has stuck with Alex Grinch for a reason, and that reason is not that Grinch is some charming nitwit. Somewhere behind his Lincoln presidential vale of secrecy is a meeting of the minds.
What I do know are the following:
What I do know are the following:
- This team just came off of a season where our defense was atrocious and where we lacked both the talent and depth to be able to compete defensively with the best teams in the country;
- Riley and Grinch just finished taping an episode of "Extreme Makeover" where they brought in a ton of transfers as well as young talent to plug said gaps;
- That talent isn't going to instantaneously grasp all of the defensive concepts much less gel with one another into a cohesive wrecking machine;
- The 2023 USC Trojans just kicked off the first in a series of six easy games to start the season, and then they must face an unbelievable back stretch that will be as tough a run as any team will face this season;
- The primary goal in the first six games is not to achieve perfection in each and every contest but to create hundreds of teaching moments from each and every contest so that each and every pupil within the two-deep or three-deep roster will graduate with honors by the time we face Notre dame (and Washington and Oregon...). Riley and Grinch are trying to cultivate learning in a safe learning environment prior to the final exam.
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