2006 Alabama Pass Defense

Generally speaking, the 2006 Alabama pass defense received good reviews for their performance. They were generally considered the strength of the defense, and it is often pointed out that as a unit they finished fourth in the SEC in overall pass defense.

Overall pass defense, however, ranks teams based on the total number of passing yards allowed. And, as Football Outsiders pointed out, "Ranking pass defenses on total yardage allowed is phenomenally stupid. Poor teams will give up fewer passing yards because opponents will stop passing and run out the clock instead." Of course, the inverse of that is also true for good teams. And, without going too in-depth here, there are other pitfalls with ranking teams based on pure yardage allowed alone.

So, I decided to do an in-depth analysis of the 2006 Alabama pass defense. As usual, I looked at every SEC team in conference play (eight games), and saw how they all stacked up.

Long story short, for the Crimson Tide, it's not too pretty.

The best part of our 2006 pass defense was that we intercepted a relatively high number of passes. We snagged 10 interceptions in conference play in 2006, which tied us for 3rd in the conference in interceptions. Moreover, those interceptions weren't just a fluke due to opposing teams throwing a ton of passes against us (thus giving our defensive backs more chances at getting interceptions). We finished 3rd in the conference in interception rate (total interceptions divided by total pass attempts), as 5.21% of passes thrown against our defense resulted in interceptions.

But, honestly, we shouldn't read too much into those interceptions. Yes, we did intercept ten passes in 2006 conference play, but those interceptions were sporadic at best. Six of those interceptions came in the first two conference games, when we faced a redshirt freshman quarterback in his first SEC game (Chris Nickson, Vanderbilt) and a true freshman (Mitch Mustain, Arkansas). After that, though, things fell off dramatically. Over the course of the final six conference games, we racked up a mere four interceptions, and three of those came in the first half of the Tennessee game. Combined in the Florida, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, LSU, and Auburn games, and the second half of the Tennessee game, we intercepted one pass. In those 150+ passing attempts, the only interception was Jeffrey Dukes interception returned for a touchdown against Mississippi State.

At bottom, we really didn't force turnovers that well, as a whole, in 2006.

After that, though, it gets worse.

In terms of completion percentage, Alabama finished eighth in the conference in 2006, as opposing quarterbacks completed almost 59% of their passes against the Crimson Tide (specifically, 58.85% of passes). That's a very disappointing statistic, to say the very least. The entire Kines' defensive scheme -- in terms of defending the pass -- was built upon abandoning an aggressive pass rush in favor of dropping multiple defenders into zone coverage, thus forcing opposing quarterbacks to throw into heavy zone coverage. The underlying idea to it was that opponents would not be able to complete a high percentage of passes, and those that were completed would generally go for a relatively short gain. People often made a big deal about our lack of sacks (last in the conference in total sacks and adjusted sack rate), but that really would not have been a problem at all if we had successfully defended the pass with the heavy zone coverages.

Unfortunately, at least in 2006, that didn't work as planned. As noted earlier, teams did complete a high percentage of passes (almost 59%, eighth in the conference), and what was worse is the fact that when those passes were completed, they gave up relatively large chunks of yardage. All told, we gave up on average 12.44 yards per completion, which put us sixth in the conference in yardage allowed per completion.

Moreover, we gave up touchdown passes at an alarmingly high rate. All told, we allowed a touchdown pass on 5.73% of the passes attempted against us, and that put us tenth in the conference -- trailing only pass defense hapless Vanderbilt and Mississippi State -- in terms of touchdown rate (passing touchdowns divided by total passing attempts).

What can I say? Despite assertions to the contrary that the 2006 pass defense was quite good, that argument simply doesn't hold water once you analyze it. The truth of the matter was that the 2006 pass defense was, at absolute best, mediocre. The Kines defense was based on not rushing the passer, and dropping multiple defenders (usually between six and eight) into heavy zone coverages. As noted earlier, the idea was that opposing quarterbacks would have trouble completing passes against the heavy zone coverages, and when they did complete passes, those passes would generally go for small gains. But, again, it just didn't work that way. Opposing quarterbacks did complete a high percentages of their passes, and those passes, when completed, generally went for relatively large gains. Moreover, passing touchdowns came at an alarmingly high rate, and though from a raw numbers perspective we intercepted the ball quite a bit, the truth of the matter is that the interceptions were very sporadic at best, and after the Arkansas game we really just could not get it done on that front.

Despite what has been often repeated, the 2006 pass defense just wasn't that good.

Since I broke down the entire conference, I'll make a post tomorrow analyzing the rest of the SEC in 2006 pass defense.