Having played in college and coached for 3 years at a JuCo in SoCal, as well as another 4 years in high school, real coaches do look at stats like Total D. Of course they will break those numbers down even much farther and get very granular, but in coaching circles it is a badge of honor being able to say your D gives up less than 300 yards/game in college, or in high school less than 200 yards/game. Or our D gave up less than 14 points/game last season. It is only in staff meetings when you are game planning or discussing where you need to improve that coaches get uber granular. Discussing things like 3rd down conversion rates, tendencies of opponents things like that. Good staffs know all their numbers; 3rd down and 7+, 3rd down 4-6 yards, and 3rd down less than 4 yards.

Here's my take on the whole Tuiaki situation. People tend to get way too emotional when it comes to these things and rarely take into account all of the picture when coming to these conclusions. But that makes sense considering the word "Fan" comes from Fanatic or Fanaticism.

Last year was historically bad, but it was also historically good. Defensively the numbers were epically bad, but you have to take all the numbers into account. Last season was the first time in BYU history where one can say BYU got it's first real taste of what the rigors of playing a P5 schedule will be like. BYU had lost a ton of talent from the 2020 team and was in serious rebuilding mode. As much as we want to believe certain things about BYU, BYU is clearly not a G5 team, last year's Cincinnati team would not have gone undefeated against BYU's schedule, designating BYU as a P5 equivalent for scheduling purposes doesn't make BYU a P5 program. BYU has been playing very difficult schedules without the many benefits that come with truly being a P5 program.

Over the next few years BYU is going to see the major difference having that P5 moniker makes. BYU has been trying to compete with that for the last few years without all of the many benefits that come with that. $30+ million additional that will be coming each year in revenue to the athletic budget. Massively upgrading the support staff to help out the coaches and broaden their ability to find and bring in more recruits. Player development will only be getting better. More doors will be open to better recruits. All of these benefits are going to make a huge difference for BYU.

IMO, Tuiaki has shown flashes of brilliance and potential. I believe that he has earned the right to see what he will do once he is competing on a much more even playing field against the types of schedules that will not require him getting his D's all beat up in the first month of the season.

That doesn't mean that there aren't legitimate criticisms of Tuiaki and his D at times. It also doesn't mean we can't be critical. The biggest criticism of Tuiaki's D last year is one that most fans never even recognized. I understand that most fans don't truly understand the game, but some of the complaints have just been silly. Decisions last year by Tuiaki and staff did have me more wary of Tuiaki coming into this season.

Last year BYU entered the season with only 2 game ready ILB's, and one of those was already injured, Wilgar. When Wilgar suffered his first Labrum injury in fall camp, the staff should have immediately moved Pepe Tanuvasa back to ILB and had him working their going forward. During the offseason, the decision had been made to move Pepe Tanuvasa into essentially, a Vonn Miller type role. Unfortunately, other potential ILB's got injured or didn't step up their play. Pepe should have been moved back, but he had already transformed his body, adding 10-15 lbs. of muscle for his new role, and the decision was made to leave Pepe there.

That would have been the equivalent of entering the season at QB with Jaren healthy, but Baylor already banged up and not sure if he will be able to make the throws, and then not getting sufficient practice reps for anyone else at QB. That was a huge mistake by the D staff.

With that said, the Baylor game showed this D staff can be very good. The Oregon was concerning, but you also have to take everything into account. Oregon was 100% a trap game, and worst of all was that woodshed beat down Oregon had received at the hand of UGA. That game was a worst case scenario for BYU, and best case scenario for the Oregon Coaching Staff.

If Oregon losses that opener by 14-21, we would have seen a very different Oregon Team. Getting completely embarrassed like that woke up Oregon. That coupled with BYU's struggles in the run game particularly at RB, sealed BYU's fate in that game.

I do understand to a certain degree people's concerns about Tuiaki. Even in the Oregon game, there are stats people aren't taking into account. BYU gave up 439 yards against Oregon. Wazzu last week gave up 624 yards against that same Oregon team.

BYU was in position to make stops on some of those crucial 3rd and 4th downs and the players simply missed tackles. BYU's tackling was horrific in that game. Is that all on the coaches. When you do a good job against Baylor when it comes to tackling, but then struggle the very nest game, that is primarily on the players, not the coaches. Tackling is all about effort. BYU's D looked a little tired in that game.

This is all just my opinion, but I don't think it's as bad as some do. That doesn't mean there aren't some legitimate criticisms. IMO, those criticisms often times focus solely on the bad, and ignore the good.