David, Gerry and Cockrell were part of a pass defense that finished ranked 35th in the season. The fact that they're part of a group that's ranked dead last now tells me it's mostly a scheme, attitude and execution problem right now. The talent could certainly be better, but unless you're Alabama, just about everybody's talent could be better. Not having Gregory and being thin at linebacker makes problems worse in the secondary.
This is really where you hope Riley's reputation of being able to develop talent pulls through. Teams with less collective talent than Nebraska have won conference titles which means the Huskers really aren't that far off from being able to compete.
I totally agree with most of what you're saying, but honestly I either want to clarify your point, or make a point of my own that you may or may not agree with.
When we say it's 'mostly scheme' I disagree, but I don't know how you intend that to mean. To me, yes it's a scheme issue but the reason is not the overall philosophy or the design, it's the fact that we are purely not executing it yet. Yes, those guys you listed are part of success's in the past, but that's in a scheme that committed 7 guys to pass coverage and had safety help over the top constantly. I'm not saying it's easy to succeed in that type of pass defense, but it's much harder to fail.
We are putting some of these same guys, who are fairly talented yes, in an entirely different position and a much more difficult one. There are things these guys are being asked to do that they've not really ever done at this level. In Bo's defense we kept a lot of things in front of us, or we knew we had help. It was hard for opposing QB's to find passing lanes because we simply had so many guys covering space.
These guys are now being asked to read the receiver, watch their eyes, use their hands and play the ball all at once. They're being challenged in an entirely different way.
So yes, we do have some talent, not as much as I'd like, and yes it is scheme, but we are four games in and no sane person could possibly think there won't be struggles when moving from a pass defense like Bo's to one like Bankers. It's gonna hurt a bit, or apparently a lot.
You've got to ask yourself though, what do we sacrifice if we start to ask less of the players, and more of the scheme in pass defense? In the Big Ten, I still say it's stop the run first. How much confusion do you add to the situation if we start altering what we do? Sure, Banker could change things up, but I think he obviously expects these guys to be able to do this. Other teams do this very same thing you guys. Just watch SEC football on the weekend. I hate saying that, but they've got the guys who look back, stride for stride with those receivers, and knock those balls down, and they do it all the time.