Based purely on last season, our defense was very good, and when you compare their play relative to our offense, they were EXCELLENT. Our offense did NOTHING to protect our defense last season (bottom 5 in scoring, bottom 5 in rushing, bottom 5 in time of possession - we did our defense literally no favors) and still we were in every game because of our very very solid defensive play.
Losing Clemons and Soliai is definitely a hit, but we also need to bank on the fact that our rookies, specifically Jordan and Taylor, will be able to play for us this season. Moreover, the thought should be that Wheeler and Ellerbe will improve as they both had poor outings and were unfamiliar with schemes and players around them. With this in mind, our defense should hopefully be right around the same place (or better) but our offense needs a huge improvement.
I think getting Moreno and especially Lazor were great moves. The OL is still a work in progress and is the biggest question mark with this team. You fix the OL and you can fix our issue of lack of offensive balance that has plagued this team for over a decade.