[Brickcity]

Buncom was not healthy at any time during his Stanford career, and in fact retired from football after last year for medical reasons. It's amazing he played at all.

Agreed. Total warrior, but knowing that you could see it on film. Kind of like knowing Love wasn't 100%, and Holder was playing on 1.5 good legs.

When we had 4 potential starting defensive 5th year seniors retire from football (Buncom, Jackson, Barton and Edwards) and not return this season, it certainly dealt a blow to our returning starter calculation and preseason prognostications, but the replacements for those 4 could all be better. Those guys were pretty banged up or tired of playing football so bring on the younger and potentially more talented replacements. None of those 4 would have been considered above average Pac12 starters and the guys that we have replacing all could be down the road.

Excellent point. I predict our safety tandem will be better this year - probably not even close given Buncom's struggles. Big improvement from Jackson to this year's starter. Barton may have been a better player than his replacement this year during the early part of the year - Barton was solid - but by later in the year, our top three MLBs should all have surpassed him - at least in terms of big plays.

[Brickcity]

Buncom was not healthy at any time during his Stanford career, and in fact retired from football after last year for medical reasons. It's amazing he played at all.

Agreed. Total warrior, but knowing that you could see it on film. Kind of like knowing Love wasn't 100%, and Holder was playing on 1.5 good legs.

When we had 4 potential starting defensive 5th year seniors retire from football (Buncom, Jackson, Barton and Edwards) and not return this season, it certainly dealt a blow to our returning starter calculation and preseason prognostications, but the replacements for those 4 could all be better. Those guys were pretty banged up or tired of playing football so bring on the younger and potentially more talented replacements. None of those 4 would have been considered above average Pac12 starters and the guys that we have replacing all could be down the road.

Excellent point. I predict our safety tandem will be better this year - probably not even close given Buncom's struggles. Big improvement from Jackson to this year's starter. Barton may have been a better player than his replacement this year during the early part of the year - Barton was solid - but by later in the year, our top three MLBs should all have surpassed him - at least in terms of big plays.