Pack shuffling safeties

Football is a physical game; many players are rotated in and out of the game, from play to play, possession to possession, quarter to quarter, to try to prevent them from getting tired.

Most of this rotation takes place on the defensive line or in the backfield with the running backs. This method hardly ever occurs within the secondary, especially with the safeties.  However, the Pack has used this unconventional method, playing multiple safeties throughout the game, and has greatly benefited from it.

 

Just four games into the season, the Pack has started three different combinations at safety and five players have seen significant time. Senior Clem Johnson has started three games, and redshirt freshman Earl Wolff has made two starts and leads the team in tackles. Freshman Brandan Bishop has started one game, while redshirt sophomore Justin Byers has started twice.

Senior Bobby Floyd has not made a start but is tied for fourth on the team in tackles, and unless any two players start to step up for an entire football game, coach Tom O’Brien says there is no reason to believe the rotation is going to change.

 

“It was situational things. We are still on the flux of who the top four guys are,” O’Brien said. “We haven’t been happy with a lot of things back there. Until somebody steps up and grabs a position, we’ll probably keep rotating guys in and out.”

 

The coach’s hands were forced into rotating the safeties in and out during the games due to the outstanding performances of young players such as Wolff and Bishop.

 

“They have both been pretty impressive,” Johnson said. “They are both freshman and have been thrown in the fire. They’ve reacted like veterans. They are out there making plays, not making mental errors, not missing tackles; they are going to be good in the future.”

 

The rotating carousel of the safeties does not bother the players. Johnson said they enjoy the opportunity to stay fresh throughout the game, but due to the rotation and the decrease in the plays they are in, they have to go out and play every play as hard as possible.

 

“Coach understands that in the fourth quarter, we need our legs and when we have guys who can come in and contribute, a rotation is a good thing,” Johnson said. “But we have to make the best of our opportunities and when we are out on the field we have to make plays. We just have to take advantage of each snap we get.”

 

With the rotation in action, the players use their knowledge as a positive to help each other by telling the guys who are about to go in what they are seeing on the field.

 

“Every time me and Brandan get out, we tell Bobby and Clem what we see, and when they go in and they see something different they will tell us,” Wolff said. “So it’s very helpful.”

 

Due to the number of  players vying for the safety spots, the amount of snaps available is limited, which could cause added pressure. When a player enters the game, he knows if he makes a mistake, he may not see the field again.

However, Johnson believes it does quite the opposite.

 

“I don’t look at it as pressure,” Johnson said. “I look at it as motivation, knowing that we have a rotation, we all know we have to play to the best of our abilities because we don’t know how many times we are going to be out there.”

 

According to Wolff, it is hard for the players to get into a rhythm during the game, but the chance to rest for much of the game outweighs the cost.

 

“It kind of does prohibit me from getting in a groove,” Wolff said. “But I don’t mind subbing in and out, it keeps us fresh.”

 

One advantage of using multiple safeties is the ability to put each individual player in a spot where his abilities would best benefit the team.

 

“We have a good group of guys in the secondary and we all can play,” Bishop said. “We all do some different things, some guys can do things better than others and coach feels comfortable using us all.”

 

Even though the players continue to fight it out on the field for playing time, off the field there are no hard feelings about playing time and who is starting.

 

“We have the least amount of players playing our position, but we are all like brothers,” Wolff said. “We joke around all the time, we play around and we are just all real tight.”