Tide turns in Bama’s favor in trenches

Published 6:00 pm Wednesday, November 1, 2017

LSU has a big problem heading into Tuscaloosa to face Alabama Saturday.

It’s a huge complication when trying to break the Tide’s six-game stranglehold on an entire LSU team and fan base.

Really, like, “big.”

Literally.

The little things, the Tigers are kind of OK there.

They’re not little by your normal humanoid standards.

Even defensive backs tend to be Big Men on Campus these days.

But at the skill positions, for the most part, LSU’s “little” guys can hang in there with the Tide’s smaller ones.

Go through those spots position by position and nowhere do you really stop and wince purple and gold.

At least it’s not a total mismatch.

Alabama has more running backs, for instance, but the Tide don’t have one any better than a healthy Derrius Guice.

Same thing at receiver, defensive back, linebacker, etc.

Even at quarterback, the Tigers’ after lo these many years of wandering in the dumpster fire of the position, now have a serviceable Danny Etling back there.

At the skills positions, there’s an edge here, an edge there, basically a push, sort of.

If it was a track meet, Bama surely wouldn’t be a 21.5-point favorite.

One problem, though.

Neither is it flag football.

“This is a big-man’s game,” LSU head coach Ed Orgeron said Monday, zeroing in on the problem whether he intended to or not.

LSU has some talent, just as it had for most of the losing streak to Alabama.

It’s probably not enough to scare the Tide, but the Tigers have fewer excuses in personnel than most of the rest of the frustrated SEC.

True, this year a lot of the more promising specimens are too young for their own good. But LSU has never been bereft of talent.

The Tigers have 50 former players currently in the NFL — many of whom were at LSU the last five years for some part of this Bama frustration — the most of any school in the country.

Even Alabama. The Tide have 44, if you’re wondering.

Fat lot of good it’d done the Tigers. LSU hasn’t scored more than 17 points against the Tide in any of the last seven meetings.

They didn’t score any points in two of them, including last year when a mere 11 points would have pulled the mega upset.

So this is what Matt Canada was brought in to cure as offensive coordinator. Orgeron even admitted that Alabama was a factor in getting Canada on board.

“One of the reasons I hired Matt was because of all the shifts and formations and stuff that I would think would give Alabama problems,” Orgeron said.

Canada has been hard at work in his lab for two weeks now, scheming and plotting. He has a devilish mind when it comes to offense and is sometimes referred to as a genius. 

He’s not a miracle worker.

Nick Saban, for instance, called all the shifts and motions “eye candy” for his defense to ignore.

Not to put emotions in his head, but you could almost imagine him watching LSU’s pre-snap gyrations on film and saying, “Oh, now that’s cute.”

I’m sure the jet sweeps caught his attention too.

Again, Orgeron, inadvertently or not, may have hit on the real problem.

“You can have the best play called in the world,” he said. “But if you can’t block those guys up front, it’s not going to work.”

So that still applies, huh? Well, good luck. But that could present a dilemma.

Maybe Canada will reinvent the wheel sometime between now and Saturday.

Otherwise, LSU has a big problem. Can you say mismatch?

It doesn’t hurt that Guice is finally healthy. Hopefully he still will be afterward. You can’t ignore him, but we already know he won’t have much effect on this game.

LSU as a team has rushed for 100 yards against the Tide only twice this decade. Three times the Tigers couldn’t crack 50.

In a span of a few minutes Monday, Orgeron made reference to “protecting Etling,” five times. So he’s obviously concerned.

Picking a few at random, Orgeron opined, “I think protection is the key” … “We got to protect him” … “Got to protect Danny, find some spots to throw the football.”

And …

“If you can protect the quarterback, you’ve got a chance. We can’t let them get their cleats in the grass and get in pass-rush mode.”

Yeah?

This year LSU will start two true freshmen offensive linemen against a Bama front that goes three-deep with NFL soon-to-be’s.

Maybe one day this offensive line grows up. Right now, it almost seems like cruel and unusual punishment.

It doesn’t get much better in the other trenches, where LSU has more experience on its defensive front but virtually no depth against what figures to be a never-ending grind, not to mention chasing an elusive quarterback in Jalen Hurts.

Orgeron is working on the problem, mostly through recruiting.

For now, though, as Chief Brody said, “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics. Email him at

shobbs@americanpress.com