When producing a historical football roster at Trojans Wire, certain details emerge. One is that a lot of all-time historical rankings and evaluations do not have the positional precision of modern football. In past decades and eras, the differentiation between MIKE and WILL linebacker did not exist. A lot of historical rankings merely presented outside linebackers and inside linebackers.
For this reason, our USC all-time two-deep defense does not have middle linebackers. We simply provided more spots on our roster for outside and inside linebackers.
Similarly, a lot of historical rankings articles and research items referred to “defensive backs” without differentiating between cornerbacks and safeties. This positional split was easier to drill down and identify at a more precise level, but if you have ever read an article on “USC’s best defensive backs of all time,” you might not realize that USC was much deeper at safety than cornerback in terms of having all-time-great players. That’s one thing we learned in the process of putting this roster together.
Enjoy and, of course, debate these two-deep selections for USC’s all-time defense. We couldn’t pick everyone with only two spots on the depth chart.
See the all-time Trojans offense here.
Check out our other College Wire all-time defenses: Alabama / Auburn / Clemson / Colorado / Florida / Georgia / Iowa / LSU / Michigan / Michigan State / Nebraska / North Carolina / Ohio State / Oklahoma / Oregon / Penn State / Rutgers / Tennessee / Texas / Texas A&M