Big Hits, Big Fines

I've played a lot of football in my day and I can fortunately say that I've never received any type of head injury. Last year when the NFL put into effect a rule protecting players from head to head contact there was a pretty significant uproar about it. Why?

I'm taking a chance to talk about the big hits in the NFL that have recently warranted a significant amount of media coverage-mostly due to the fines and installed regulations to deter players from turning themselves into highly competitive and trained missles with near demi-god strength.

Many of the arguments that i've read or listened to talk about taking away from the game and the sport or things about making the league less fun to watch. Even now i'm at a loss about why making the game just a bit safer 'takes away from the game'. Football about is about collective discipline and strategy, it's like game of human chess.

Let me start out by ranting; I was checking youtube for a hit made by Dunta Robinson (which i will show on this entry) and whether or not it warranted a fine. Callers were also giving their opinions on the NFL's swift hand of justice to limit these [near literally] train wrecks.

Anyway, back to my point; I was on youtube looking at this video clip of Dunta Robinson laying the wood and i scrolled down to read the comments attached to the video. These comments always crack me up, people get so attached to their opinions and statements that they begin to define them as a person-or at least define their internet persona.

It was shocking how many of these people made comments aimed at demeaning the sport, the league, and even the players.

As these men get older, bigger, stronger they become more likely to get injured. ACLs, turf toe, broken bones...concussions/head injuries. Don't get me wrong, i'm all for big hits. My favorite all time player is also one of the most feared by his co-workers but head to head hits are not the be all end all of the NFL or the game of football. It's shocking when people call players and the NFL 'pussies' because they want to minimize the head to head hits or protect players from suffering trauma to the head and neck.



Now think about this in perspective. Professional football players are stellar athletes that make quite a bit of money to play a game but at the end of the day, they're people. They are human beings just like us. They have feelings, they feel pain, they suffer, and most of all: they are not invincible. If anything, with the increase of speed and strength over the last 20 years, they're more likely to become injured.

Can you really persecute the NFL for trying to keep the players safe and healthy?  Not only do concussion hurt like hell, but they can cause serious long-term problems and in extreme circumstances even death. So before you say something stupid about big shitty formed tackles making football worth watching, realize what you're saying about the game and the players delivering and receiving them.

What is a concussion?



Defensive Fronts (Part 2)

In the first entry I talked about the two major types of fronts; odd and even. Most the entry was spent talking about even fronts and some variations on techniques that are used along with glaring pros and cons of the front.

This entry will focus more on the odd front and some of the basic techniques that can be used from it as well. Again, i'll try and maintain simplicity. I'll be able to cover a little more about the odd front, because we employ a 3-man front at West so i'm a little more conformtable talking about it. This is also why the majority of the information that I discuss-although applicable to other odd fronts-will mostly be in reference to a 3-man front.

One of the defining characteristics of an odd front is the NT (Nose Tackle). This is the player that's lined up in a head up alignment, also known as a 0 tech. This player can also be shaded to a strong or weak 1 tech or diangonally rotated, also known as a "jet", in any of the 3 alignments. Jetting isn't very popular in the high school level and more commonly seen at the collegiate level. Shading occurs in the high school level but not very often and even more infrequently into the lower levels of competition. In most high school levels of competition a NT lined up in a 0 tech over the center is going to be enough to get the job done in that most high school Center's have trouble snapping the ball and maintaining a block. Some Centers at the high school level have trouble getting their snaps off while being hovered over by a 0 tech let alone maintaining a block afterwards.

In the 3-man front the NT is typically a 2-gap player. This means that he's responsible for the gap on either side of the Offensive center. The Ends are way variation came set in. A bang tech is a method of play where the defensive lineman, an End in this case, attacks the Offensive lineman head on and plays a 2-gap responsibility. A loop tech is a method in which the End attacks the outside shoulder of the Offensive lineman and maintains gap control (a single gap). So the two pre-dominant methods of playing a 3-man front is a bang/2-gap or a loop/gap control.

These two variations and methods of play depend on the personnel and coaches preference. At West we play a loop or 2-gap system but at higher levels of competition, such as the collegiate level or in the pros it is not at all uncommon to see 3-man 2-gap fronts in which larger bodies are much easier to come by. Bigger bodies are prefered for 2-gap play because it's easier to fill, squeeze, or attack multiple gaps with larger players.

The glaring difference, scheme wise, between a 2-gap system and a gap control system is the use of bodies. In 2-gap the defense relies on the D-lines ability to control a gap on each side of them allowing the Linebackers to flow freely while a gap control requires the Linebackers to "check and flow". Neither system-in my eyes-is superior but simply a different way of playing.

The available players within the defensive scheme as a whole can greatly impact the method of the D-line play, for example, while Rex Ryan (Now HC of the New York Jets) was the Defensive Coordinator of the Baltimore Ravens he employed a 2-gap 3-man front because he felt that the superior speed and ability of the Inside backers (one of whom is future hall-of-famer, Ray Lewis) would be most efficient if all gaps were accounted for without the need of using Linebackers.

We've already covered that Centers covered by a 0 tech can generate problems within themselves, now let's move onto stunts and games froma 3-man front. The greatest strength of an odd technique is that it allows for more exotic blitz packages and the greatest reason for this is that it can be difficult for the Offense to identify where and if there will be an additional blitzer beyond the 3 down players.

Here are two of the more popular defensive fronts from an odd look;



Although pre-snap movement isn't as easy to do with an odd-front, it can be done and by including linebackers and defensive backs within the pre-snap movement it can become very cumbersome for a quarterback and offensive lineman to read. Many times the pre-snap movement that's done either adds a linebacker or removes a linebacker from the defensive line.

Strengths of the odd front include many of the same strengths as the even front but include the necessary use of Linebackers. In the talk about the even front, I showed the example of the 3rd down game. The same game can be done with the 3-man front while employing a Linebacker;

The thing that I personally like about the odd-front is that there are many ways to attack pass pro by dictating where help will come from. Like I had mentioned earlier and in the previous entry, the NT will generally cause problems for a Center, this will require a double team on the NT to stop any significant penetration. By using the NT to attack a gap you can dictate where the help will come from. So elaborating on this example, if the Guard on the game side is good enough to keep the levels from being split, we can use the NT to attack the game side A gap-necessitating a double team by the Center and Guard-keeping the Guard occupied and away from helping with the game.

FOR INQUISITIVE MINDS: If a Center is good enough to maintain a block on a NT and a coordinator wanted to attack with this game, sugaring the LB would be a good way to keep the Guard occupied. By creeping a LB into a shallow 20 tech (head up over the Guard but off the line), the Guard has to play the LB honest by setting early;



To continue along with the strengths of the odd-front, many blitzes can be disguised or hidden. Trumping the pre-snap blocking assignments by mis-leading the offensive line. With 3 or 4 LB's it's easy to apply pressure from a multitude of areas without taking away from pass coverage or run support v. tosses, sweeps, or reverses. Here's a good example of pressure applied from a gap control 3-man front;

Each of these fronts, the odd and even front have a strengths and weaknesses, or really a more appropriate statement would be that they each have strengths in different areas. Don't discount either front from one another-it would be foolish and you would fail to do either of them justice.

Defensive Fronts (Part 1)

I'm going to talk a little about defensive fronts and their strengths. Because there's a lot to cover even while trying to keep it simple so i'm going to cover this subject in two parts. I'll try and keep it simple, but being a defensive guy and doing a lot of recent research on how to utilize fronts to attack pass protection I may get a little excited and go off of a tangent or two.

Traditionally speaking, there are two major defensive fronts; an odd front and an even front. The odd front is what we run at West and typically consists of the 3-4 defense-a popular choice by The Patriots HC, Bill Belichick. In the high school ranks the 3-3 stack is becoming increasingly vogue, this defensive front also employs an off front. Even fronts are more common in larger collegiate programs and at the professional level. In high school, they aren't uncommon but the number of backers (4-4, 4-3, 4-2, etc.) and types of personnel within the front change greatly.

For familiarities sake, i'll try and keep this on topic in reference to high school and college. Odd fronts employ a 0-technique NT (0-technique in most systems refers to the position head up over the center and NT is short for Nose Tackle). This 0-tech is used to take advantage of the experience level of a high school center. A center will only ever snap with one hand (although two handed snapping happens its not common-certainly not at the higher levels of competition and rarely at the college level).

We'll use a right handed center for example. A right handed snapper will need to fully commit his right hand to the snap and his off hand (left hand in this example) will have a rubberband type effect during the snap. It will snap up in order to stop the rush of a defensive lineman. In the event of an odd front this will put a NT in the centers grill as soon as the ball moves in even the slightest. A lot of high school centers lack the ability to snap the ball and immediately dominate a block. A good D coordinator can use this to an even greater advantage by using the NT to attack the centers right side. Since the Center's right hand will be commited to the snap the Center will need to cross his body to get his left hand over to slow the rusher, worse case scenario he'll become off balance and lose the LOS before the battle's even started.

We'll address more of the odd front later.

The Even front takes away this immediate threat of the NT/Center but adds a definite rusher by having a fourth man on the Defensive line. This additional rusher can seem like a great idea-following the mantra "more is better", however, an even front takes away blitzing combinations/possibilities and allows an Offensive line to identify another rusher-as opposed to not knowing who will be rushing from an up position in an odd front. Some of the advantages of the even front are; D-line games, pre-snap movement, and one-on-one's.

Defensive line games are crossing stunts or false movements stunts that can be used to mix up blocking responsibilities of the Offensive line. Here's a very simple D-line game that can be effective on a passing down.



 This type of a game is even more effective with a stunting Defensive End that possesses exceptional speed. The goal for the End is to get the Offensive Tackle in a retreating state. The Defensive tackle is attacking hard on the inside shoulder of the OT and drawing in the Offensive Guard that he's lined up over. When the OG has been pulled outside with the DT the End will come inside of the gap created by the space. This is called 'splitting the levels'.

This is a simple game but the coaching is very distinct and should be called only during situations and may require some setting up of the offensive line before success is seen. It can be countered with a good center that's able to peel off any inside threat and pick up the End coming inside but that simply adds to the chess match that is football. SIDE NOTE: For those with inquisitive minds, a good DC would see the Center peeling off and would either sugar a backer (bluff a blitz by a Linebacker) or actually blitz a backer.

Pre-snap movement can cause a significant amount of confusion for an offensive line that struggles with adjustments or varies their blocking responsibilities. There are two dominant blocking styles; man and zone. Some more complex schemes can run a variation of zone/man. Both of these schemes can be challenged by movement up front before the snap which takes away the O-lines ability to adjust they're calls and ID their blocking responsibilities. Even the movement of a defender from the outside shoulder to the inside shoulder of an offensive lineman can greatly effect where and how he needs to adjust his blocking. For example, this is the same basic play but because the defense is line up differently blocking responsbilities change. If a D-line were to come out in one look at quickly shift during the snap count the Offensive line may not be prepared to make the necessary adjustments;



One-on-ones are another strength of the even front. With proper technique and coaching faster defensive ends can be placed on the edge and put in charge of coming off of the edge as fast as they can with Offensive tackles being placed on 'an island'. Double teams are primarily used by the interior 3 offensive lineman, Guard, Center, Guard. These 3 are usually less athletic than Offensive tackles and it's the shortest distance between the ball and a defender.

The personnel brought in for these types of fronts can vary a lot depending on the defensive style and philosophy of the coordinator but a common style of philosophy for body types has become prominent through the success seen by Monte Kiffin and his legendary "Tampa 2" defense using smaller defenders (keep in mind that a small defensive lineman in the NFL is still 6'2" 265lbs) with superior speed.

A lot of this changes when referring to the high school level, which can be effected by location, common body styles in the school and area, level of competition, and offensive sets seen. For example, when I played in high school we ran a 4-4 defense because we had smaller bodies with a higher level of speed and played at a smaller level of competition but on the other hand West Linn plays a 4-3 defense at a high level competition and they have the bodies to fill those interior spots and see a lot of passing oriented offensive attacks. The larger bodies at their disposal means they don't have to run a 3-man front [if they don't want too] and rely on LB's or Safeties to rush the passer. 

The style of the defensive front that's being used has a rationale behind it and is dicitated by many things. When you watch football, whether it be Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, make no doubt about it there's a rhyme AND reason behind the defensive front. Defensive coordinator position across the nation at many different levels are filled based solely on the type of kids in the program and how they want to use them.