I'm sorry but this USC example is awful. Specifically the part about saying they were a better team on paper than LSU. USC sucked last year. It's like comparing our 2016 team to a NY6 bowl winner that year. Talent "on paper" doesn't matter. As Texas fans we should know that better than anybody. Discussion of the upcoming season should be based around the skill levels of the players in 2019, not how they were rated as freshmen. And it's pretty obvious that LSU in 2019 will be significantly better than USC in 2018. Comparing them in that way is pretty disingenuous and I think you know that.
I think using USC as a data point of how our defense performs against pro-style offenses is fine, and the rushing yardage is an interesting point. My opinion is that our defense can play the run well, but they don't always do so. USC, UGA, OU2 were elite run defense performances, but the defense didn't perform like that consistently. Maybe they will against LSU, but I don't think that's a given. Coburn could really raise the ceiling of our defense, but replacing Omenihu is going to be tough and Mac is a total question mark. Wheeler was bad but at least we knew he could be ok against USC, UGA, LSU, etc. We can't say that about Adeoye or whoever else wins the spot yet.