By Matt Osborne
SouthernPigskin.com

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The addition of a new defensive coordinator was the most important addition Texas A&M made over the past few months.

For Kevin Sumlin and the Texas A&M contingency making the trek to Hoover, Alabama, for the 2015 edition of SEC Media Days, the talking points really haven’t changed all that much such the program made its inaugural trek to the conference’s media circus three years ago.

Sure, the Aggies no longer have to field questions about being the newcomers in the country’s most dominant conference, but many of the undertones from their first Media Days excursion remain largely unchanged.

Transitioning to the SEC from the offense-heavy Big 12, Texas A&M wasted little time in proving that its offensive attack would be able to consistently produce against the vaunted defenses in its new conference. Thanks in large part to a little help from a guy nicknamed “Johnny Football”, the Aggies actually led the league in total offense in each of their first two seasons in the SEC.

But the other main storyline upon which media members pounced three years ago was how the Texas A&M defense, which had not fared well in the Big 12, would hold up against SEC offenses.

Playing against offenses which were not as explosive and powerful as the ones they had faced in the Big 12, A&M argued, the thought was that a step down in the caliber of offensive competition would allow its defense to make correlated improvement.

Unfortunately for Aggies fans, however, the concerns media members had about the defense back in 2012 now appear to not have been as severe as they likely should have been.

In three full seasons in the SEC, Texas A&M has finished no better than ninth in the conference in total defense. In fact, the Aggies have finished dead last in the conference in that category in each of the past two campaigns.

Such stark contrast between the offensive and defensive units ultimately led to Sumlin making a change in coaching personnel during the offseason. Mark Snyder, who had been responsible for leading the Aggies’ defense in each of their first seasons in the conference, was fired in late November, making the necessary room for the program to target a high-profile coordinator replacement.

After an extensive search which included communication with numerous notable defensive coordinators around the country, the Aggies ultimately shelled out a large enough sum of money to lure longtime SEC defensive guru John Chavis from Baton Rouge.

In college football, it is usually the personnel changes which occur on the depth chart via transfer or recruiting which make the most profound impact on changing the fortunes of a program.

In the case of Texas A&M, however, there is no question that the addition of a new defensive coordinator was the most important addition the program made over the past few months.

Chavis, who started his coaching career in the Southeastern Conference as a graduate assistant at Tennessee back in 1979, has firmly entrenched his status as one of college football’s best assistant coaches. He has even won the Broyles Award, presented annually to the top assistant coach in the country, as recently as 2011. In his final five seasons at LSU, the Tigers never finished worse than third in the conference in total defense.

Having been oft-described as one of the true defensive innovators in college football, Chavis will arguably faced with his biggest test in 2015, as he inherits one of college football’s worst units from a season ago.

While Sumlin has continuously recruited at a high level over the past few seasons, that influx in talent, to this point, has not resulted in improved performances from the defense on the gridiron. The recent recruiting rankings reflect a level of performance which the numbers simply don’t back up.

Even so, the Aggies remain optimistic that the inclusion of Chavis can bring about the change necessary to make the Aggies a legitimate contender in an SEC West filled with parity.

“It’s a great fit for us and a great for him,” Sumlin commented on Chavis when he took the podium in Hoover. “He was ready for a new challenge. We were in the market, obviously, and here’s a guy who’s got a tremendous track record in the SEC and recently in the SEC West.”

In addition to the changes that Chavis will make in areas such as alignment and terminology, he has also made it a point of emphasis to alter the entire mindset of Texas A&M’s defensive players.

“I think the immediate difference is probably in ‘attacking personality’,” senior defensive lineman Julien Obioha remarked. “You know, first day, he walked in, and he said, ‘You do all these workouts and you do all this 7-on-7 in the summer to win a championship. No school in the SEC West should be afraid to say they are doing all this work to win a championship.”

Set to return starters, including rising sophomore phenom Myles Garrett, the expectation was already that the Aggies would be improved on defense this fall.

But with the addition of one of the top defensive minds in the nation, that improvement should be even more drastic than originally anticipated.

And for a Texas A&M program which is still trying to make a run at an SEC title, that is certainly a thought that will generate realistic optimism.