Best Husker DE
- Thread starter Husker88
- Start date
I voted for Wistrom but I think Alberts and Vanden Bosch should have been options. I believe Alberts played DE in a 4-3 defense, but may be mistaken.
Alberts won the Butkus Award as the nation's top linebacker. But I totally agree with you - he was a rush end in McBride's defense, not a linebacker. (Something the Colts quickly found out...)
He played DT at Nebraska, DE in the NFL. If I recall correctly, he often lined up next to the sandman.
Wonder Monds played monster.
Wistrom just destroyed offenses. I rewatched a lot of his games in 2020. He was way better than I had remembered.
I voted Wistrom just ahead of Broderick. Wistrom was playing as a sophomore when that meant something and was constantly in the backfield. He also perfected the art of sniffing out run plays and sprinting straight down the line to murder some poor running backs ribs right as they reached the line of scrimmage that the Peter bros had essentially stuffed up. The Sandman was a better pass rusher I think but Wistrom was much better all around. I don't have the life experience to comment on a lot of the guys from the 70's.
The "Sandman". Dude was my dad's favorite player at that time and had his poster on my wall. I was very young, but we lived in Colorado and it always got his friends fired up.
should have had 2 or 3 best.. Nebraska back in the 70’s and 80’s and early 90’s ran a 5-2 defense and McBride went to the 4-3 in 1993 and now it’s more of 3-4 with 4-3 sprinkled in..
My Top 3 not in any order.
Willie Harper
Broderick Thomas
Grant Wistrom
My Top 3 not in any order.
Willie Harper
Broderick Thomas
Grant Wistrom
The sandman finished second to Derrick Thomas for the Butkus, so the logic on Alberts should apply to Broderick. Plus Broderick was an AA @ LB.
I feel like Thomas was primarily a DE, but in the 5-2 defense he dropped into pass coverage from time to time. I don't think Alberts ever did that in the 4-3.
Thomas was a bit like Willie Harper in that respect, and both had success in the NFL as LBs.
if I remember correctly willie Harper had a huge orange bowl game vs LSU. Imo willie would have won the Butkus award either his jr or senior year. It’s really hard to pick the top 3 let alone number one. I’ll say in no particular order trev grant and willie. The biggest problem with the older guys most fans didn’t get to see them play very often compared to guys such as grant and trev
Very good point… But I did..Winking
I stand by the three I chose.. Nothing against Trev…
I wouldn't vote for him, but feel that Randy Gregory's name should at least appear in this thread.
Broderick Thomas was a big personality. He helped put swagger in the Husker D after Oklahoma and Brian Bosworth commanded so much attention.
Even so, how can you vote against Wistrom?
Broderick Thomas was a big personality. He helped put swagger in the Husker D after Oklahoma and Brian Bosworth commanded so much attention.
Even so, how can you vote against Wistrom?
It’s not Vanden Bosch but damn, for one game(NW bowl game), he has as good a game as I can remember
Looks like Wistrom in a landslide so far. Wonder how much of that is recency bias and that he is tied to the last great era.
The two DE we tend to forget about are David White and Travis Hill they were the first two when Nebraska switched to the 4-3 they helped get the champions started
Bottom line, we had some damn good DE's at Nebraska. With the switch to the 3-4 we really don't recruit DE's because they are in reality considered OLB's now. I wish we would stick to a 4-3 and recruit true DE's because I feel we miss out on a lot of great talent and let's face it our recent OLB recruiting hasn't been exactly stellar. Find those quick fast DE's build them up and put some fear back into our opponents. This is my one big pet peeve regarding Nebraska's defense. jmo
