PALMER: Final move for Perkins is the right one

By Hunt Palmer

Football is like a chess game.

It just involves half a dozen collisions resembling a car crash on every snap.

For the better part of three years, LSU’s coaching staff has tried to find the proper way to position Harold Perkins as the most dynamic chess piece on the board. While that effort hasn’t been fruitless, it hasn’t been mastered, either.

Perkins displayed his freakish athleticism and propensity for destroying an offensive gameplan through the second half of his freshman season. The former five-star recruit racked up 11 tackles for loss and six sacks over the final seven games in 2022.

That type of production, largely against SEC competition, revealed the potential of what Perkins could be molded into over what was assuredly just two more collegiate seasons.

Over those next two seasons, Perkins has totaled 5.5 sacks and 15 tackles for loss.

Of course, those numbers are skewed by the fact that an ACL tear cost him the final eight games of the 2024 season, but it cannot be ignored that through four games Perkins had not registered a sack and had made just two plays behind the line of scrimmage.  Often times Perkins was removed from the action by scheme or caught up in the wash as an interior linebacker.

He’s played edge. He’s played nickel. He’s played inside linebacker.

He’ll now play STAR.

On3’s Julie Boudwin caught up with LSU defensive coordinator Blake Baker who confirmed the news.

This is the last move for Perkins whose role has been hotly scrutinized and debated for two years.

The blessing and curse for Perkins is that he doesn’t fit a traditional mold. He’s lightening quick and exceptionally fast, but he’s 25 lbs. heavier than defensive backs like Ashton Stamps, Javien Toviano and Jardin Gilbert. He’s gifted in the pass rush game like Bradyn Swinson was, but he’s three inches shorter and 25 lbs. lighter.

He’s a hybrid. So, he’ll play a hybrid position.

Major Burns manned the STAR for LSU in 2024. He played 241 snaps at slot corner, 213 in “the box” and 49 on the defensive line. That’s a blend Perkins can handle. He’s athletic enough to cover tight ends and some short breaking routes around the first down marker. He’s dangerous rushing up the field and disrupting the backfield.

While that blend of alignment should work, the assignment will have to be different for Perkins than it was for Burns.

According to Pro Football Focus, Burns played 249 snaps against the run, 33 in pass rush and 292 in coverage. That chasm between coverage snaps and rush snaps will have to shrink drastically and can.

There will still be those who insist, remembering back to a three-sack game against Arkansas in 2022, that Perkins should simply rush the passer.

That’s not realistic.

Players 6-foot-1 and 225 lbs. do not simply line up on the edge and fly up the field. Offensive coordinators in the college and the NFL will have a 6-foot-6, 325 tackle plow right into a body like Perkins and wipe him out of the running play completely.

Keep in mind, PFF graded Perkins a sparkling 81.1 in coverage snaps in his last full season. Over 291 snaps, no small sample size, Perkins held his own in space. And he’ll have to at the next level which is ultimately where he will end up.

Brian Kelly, Baker and the LSU defensive staff appear to have their most talented unit to date. If they’re able to move those chess pieces around in a manner that helps an explosive offense control games, wins will come, and Perkins will stuff the stat sheet.

What LSU can do to create some pass rush situations for Perkins is get a lead. If teams get behind in the fourth quarter and have to throw the ball on LSU, Perkins won’t be doing much in the coverage game. He’ll be a tackle’s worst nightmare.

That could be checkmate.