Not that it needed validation, but Marcus Freeman’s February commitment to keeping the rover position in his defense feels even more bankable in April. Asked Tuesday about the vision for that role, Notre Dame’s first-year defensive coordinator cited the man who occupied it the last two years as the spitting image of his ideal rover.
“There’s a guy who played here previously named Jeremiah Owusu-[Koramoah],” Freeman said. “He kind of fits that mold. If there’s a perfect rover, you’d look for the traits he possesses.”
True, though not exactly a revelation to Notre Dame fans. There is a deeper message, though. Freeman is open to keeping the rover as an every-down staple if there’s a player (or even a collection of players) who warrants such usage — despite the lack of a like-for-like rover position in his previous defenses.
Freeman is inheriting it from predecessor Clark Lea and wanted to keep it. In Lea and 2017 Irish defensive coordinator Mike Elko’s units, the rover covered slot receivers, played in the box, blitzed and set edges. Owusu-Koramoah’s blend of physicality, speed and explosiveness made him adept at handling all four of those and an every-down player.
Freeman’s 2019 and 2020 defenses at Cincinnati were primarily a 3-3-5 alignment, with three corners and two safeties. At Notre Dame, he will run a mix of three- and four-man fronts. Where that leaves the rover in terms of its usage is not yet clear.
In that 3-3-5, Freeman had a linebacker position called the “sniper” manned in 2020 by the 5-10, 205-pound Jarell White, who is only about 15 pounds lighter than Owusu-Koramoah. It’s the closest thing to the rover in those Bearcats defenses.
White played nearly 80 percent of Cincinnati’s snaps, but his alignment was much less varied than Owusu-Koramoah’s. Per Pro Football Focus, White was in the box on 480 of his 595 defensive snaps and spent only 56 of them in the slot.
Owusu-Koramoah’s 2019-20 snap distribution, for comparison: 690 snaps in the slot, 433 in the box and 195 on the defensive line.
In four-man fronts, will Notre Dame have the rover out there? Or will it be two heavier linebackers with five defensive backs? Like the nickel back position, that may be a game-by-game determination based on the opponent’s tendencies. The video from 11 spring practices has revealed one conclusion: Freeman will experiment with everything. It seems, though, rover is more likely to be a prevalent role than a bit one.
“We’re trying to move that rover around so you don’t know where he’s aligned,” Freeman said. “At the end of the day, he has to be a disruptive edge-setter. He has to be a guy you can play in coverage.”
The other piece in answering the rover question is personnel. Owusu-Koramoah is on the cusp of being a first-round pick because he’s one of a kind who is replicable in designation only. If he were around, Freeman would find a way to keep him on the field for every play regardless of scheme tweaks.
There’s not enough known about primary rover contenders Jack Kiser and Isaiah Pryor at this point to declare them likely to play that often. It’d be a lot to ask two players who had coverage ups and downs in their limited sample sizes to run with slot receivers on a regular basis. That doesn’t mean they can’t cover at all or impact pass defense in some other way.
“Jack is learning the position because he doesn’t have a ton of experience out there,” Brian Kelly said. “What we like about Jack is he’s extremely athletic, even in space, and a guy you enjoy coaching.
“You can see his improvement. He’s around the football. There are some things in the pass game we have to work on. He doesn’t have the elite speed to play the slot receiver one on one, but we can do a lot of other things with him in terms of blitzing him, zone coverage, things of that nature.”
Kiser has logged 131 defensive snaps in his two seasons, with 40 of those coming in his spot start at linebacker against South Florida last year. He shined in that game, with eight tackles and 2.0 for a loss, but was in and out of the rotation the rest of the season. He had three other games with at least 20 snaps and four with fewer than five snaps.
Pryor, the former Ohio State safety, slid down to rover late in training camp and played nearly all his 63 snaps in mop-up duty.
One of them will be asked to handle a more meaningful role. So far, Freeman said he’s excited about that idea.
“Kiser and Pryor have both done a heck of a job at the rover position,” Freeman said. “I expect big things out of both of them.”
And by extension, of the position they play.
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