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Zone Blitzing the Spread Offense

How elements like speed and spacing can be negated with a solid pressure package
by: Mike Kuchar
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There are some major philosophical components that need to be taken into consideration when coaches devise defenses. The first are structural concerns – what base front will you imply, even or odd? What will be your base coverage – will you be in a one high or two high safety defense? How will you defend the run game – will you be a “box” team that filters all perimeter runs to the middle of your defense, or will you prefer to “spill” everything to the perimeter, making the speed of your defense an asset as you run down offenses.

When you start to focus on philosophy, you need to determine whether you will be a pressure defense or not. Teams that decide on bringing pressure have usually relied on bringing six to seven men on the snap, creating all out blitz circumstances. Sure, it sounds good and looks dynamic on the whiteboard. But the truth is with the advent of spread offenses, receivers can be deployed in any area of the field to attack a defense and attack it quickly. So when you think about bringing a ton of heat at a spread offense, you may risk surrendering a big play.

Problems the Spread Offense presents

Despite what may seem to be obvious discrepancies, it’s important to note the difference between man and zone pressures. What it comes down to are two consistencies: the appearance of a free safety and the prevention of giving up a big play. So many coordinators that are conservative by nature often cringe after sending in a play call for an all out, six or seven man pressure. Why? In the back of their paranoid consciousness, there lurks some dangerous ‘What if’s?’ What if somebody shakes a tackle – and all it takes is just one – and gets out into the open field with nobody left to save us? The thought could cripple our confident and aggressive play calling.

So, all of a sudden coaches got smarter. Let’s keep that get-after-it, hell bent philosophy. But tone it down just a notch adding that tiny sense of security imbedded in our nature that makes us all coaches. We’ll still keep our kids fired up by installing these crazy, concoctions of blitzes. But if all else fails, we got our security blanket, the deep safety. It was this simple philosophy that helped morph perennial Big-East doormat Rutgers University into a top 25 contender. “Two years ago we looked at what we thought was hurting us and the number one thing we had to do to win was limit the big play – which for us is 25 yards or more,” recalls head coach Greg Schiano. “In the 786 snaps of defense this year, we never played without either one or two safeties in the middle of the field. I coached in the NFL and it took me a couple years to figure that out.”

Essentially, there are two main elements a defensive coordinator has to take into consideration when preparing to play a spread offense. The first is if the QB can run the football. In this case their zone read could be a problem. The second is figuring out who they want to get the ball to and what type of passing scheme they establish. Are they a sprint out, quarter roll, three step or vertical passing team? So, when designing blitz packages to attack the potency of the spread offense, it’s essential to play with at least a single safety in the middle of the field. Quick strike offenses can get the ball out in a hurry. You need to have some sort of defensive shell in the secondary to be able to rally on the ball and make plays. Mark D’Onofrio, the defensive coordinator at Temple, often stresses the importance of “dying slow” on the defensive side of things. This means stopping the offense from hitting a home run by scoring on a big play. Give them the opportunity to work their way down the field by attempting to move the chains little by little. The percentages are in your favor that they’ll either commit a crucial mistake turning the ball over or they simply will stall on their drive.

Potential answers in blitzing the spread scheme

As American Football Monthly documented in its September issue on designing the zone blitz, the beauty of the scheme is that once the principles are established, the possibilities of who you send are endless. Since most zone blitz schemes follow a three under, three deep principle you must have two curl-to-flat players, a middle hook player, and three deep thirds players. Of course it doesn’t matter who those players are – it’s a giant puzzle with defensive coordinators filling in the pieces, which is what makes it so effective and confusing to offenses.

“We bring pressure from anywhere, and we’ll do it about 60-70 percent of the time especially against a spread team,” said defensive coordinator Jim Girard from Wayland High School in Massachusetts. He plays against his own spread offense every day in practice. “We do this for a couple of reasons: it keeps offenses off balances and our strength is our speed. We have faith in our coverage behind it. We live and die by it and we’ve been fortunate that we’ve been living and not dying too much (the Warriors were 10-2 last season). I just think at the high school level you need to bring a heavy pass rush because QBs will get rattled.”

An odd-stack defense by structure, when Girard wants to get his opponents riled he relies on “Sam X Lightning Weak” (Diagram 1). In this two by one set, Girard brings a five man pressure – typical of a zone blitz scheme – by bringing the three down linemen along with the Sam and Lou linebacker. The corners and the free safety play thirds while the Rob LB and the Will cheat over to play the curl flat area. The Mike drops into the hole to match up on the number three receiver. “In this case, we’ll usually tag it weak, so the outside linebacker away from the strength knows where he’s going. We want to bring the pressure from the weak side of the formation. If they motion to change the strength we’ll check out of it and attack it from the other side,” said Girard.

Diagram 1

Since many spread schemes rely on the zone read, stunting up front may be rendered ineffective against a good zone blocking scheme. That is why Joey Wiles, the head coach at St. Augustine HS in Florida, stresses the importance of fitting the zone blitz against popular spread teams’ favorite plays with a dominant running QB. He should know. Wiles faced a budding superstar named Tim Tebow while Tebow was at nearby Neese High School. “There was no question that playing a kid like Tebow changed our entire defensive philosophy,” said Wiles. “We used to be a man pressure defense and would send six guys and lock up and play man coverage behind it. That just couldn’t happen against a player like Tebow. Once he would see our kids running with their backs to him in man coverage, he would take off and that’s a major problem. We could either keep doing what we do or change something. So we adjusted into a zone blitz scheme and kept all eyes on the QB on our zone drops.

“We’re down here in Urban Meyer land so we’ll see the zone option six or seven times a year. The number one thing that I think is important is that you have to make your run fit perfect all the time when blitzing. Kids can’t just blitz to blitz. If it’s going to be a steady part of your defensive diet, you need to make sure you can handle all of the blocking schemes, especially the zone option.” Let’s take one of Wiles’ most common blitz schemes, aptly named “Sooner” after the Oklahoma program that he borrowed it from. A 4-3 defense by nature, in all of Wiles blitz schemes, he’ll call the strength of the defense to the field – aligning the Sam, Mike, strong end and strong safety in that direction. On the snap, the end will make a hard stick into the A gap; the nose crosses the face of the center; the Mike comes hard into the B gap and the Sam comes off the edge, while the strong safety drops into the curl flat area (Diagram 2). If a zone option develops into the field side, the end and Mike will handle the dive because they are A and B gap players. The Sam plays the QB and the strong safety and the free safety with the security blanket handling the pitch.

Diagram 2

Another effective zone pressure scheme against the zone read option is what Wiles calls ‘Raider’ (Diagram 3). The Raider scheme employs a strong middle pressure by the Mike and Will linebackers, while the Sam plays number two to the curl flat. In this particular formation, the Sam needs to “apex” or split the difference between the number two and number three receivers to cover the area effectively. The Mike and Will LBs will execute a cross blitz with the Mike coming in the weak side A gap first. However, Wiles grants his Will a certain liberty to protect against a zone read. “If the Will notices a run play, particularly the zone read coming to his side, he will no longer go on a blitz,” said Wiles. “He will stay to play the pitch man on an option scheme to the boundary because we are one man short over there. Spread teams will often align in a trips set to see which alley defender is weak. If there isn’t one, that’s where they will go with the option.”

Diagram 3

So, you may have the zone zipped up but what about the spread pass game? Most spread schemes when facing a zone pressure defense, try to take advantage of the off corners by hitting quick seven yards hitches. This is a formidable route against teams that will drop or bail their corners out, creating a few yards of separation at the snap. Wiles will combat this by running his “Boundary Pirate” stunt (Diagram 4).
Diagram 4

Instead of bailing out on the line of scrimmage, the boundary corner will assume a press technique and then blitz from the boundary on the snap. The coverage rolls to his side with the free safety moving to play one third, and the strong safety and the opposite corner playing the other thirds. “Most QBs at our level hardly ever check to throw a pass into the boundary, so a lot of times you’re catching him with a blindside hit. It could be devastating,” said Wiles. But if the offense does want to throw into the boundary, there is a genuine mismatch with the dropping end playing the number two receiver. Wiles will give the defensive end to the side of the blitz the option of not dropping in coverage by reading the hat of the tackle. “Your end looks at the tackle. If he pass sets, the end boundary drops. If the tackle blocks down signifying a run situation, the defensive tackle now crosses his face and becomes a contain rusher while the end falls back inside as a fold player. It’s just another way to throw them off.”


WHAT IF?
with Coach Joey Wiles


Q1. What if the number two receiver in a spread scheme is a dominant WR, who needs some more attention to be drawn to him?
“I think you need to find the guy that they want to throw the ball to. A lot of times in a trips set it’s that single wide receiver. Or if they are running a two by two set, it is the slot or number two. If we’re facing a good number two WR, we’ll make a switch call with our drop end and our Will. Our Will plays number two to the curl flat while the end drops over the middle playing number three.”

Q2. What if you don’t have the personnel to match up with a spread offense and blitz theme effectively?
“Naturally, many defenses that see spread teams will run some form of odd defense to match up personnel-wise with spread WRs. First off, you get your quicker players on the field and two, the end that usually drops in coverage is a better athlete because his is an LB type. If I didn’t have the size up front to run an odd stack, I would move more to a 50 defense with two standup outside LBs and three quicker defensive linemen.”

Q3. A lot of teams that run a spread scheme will run four verticals down the middle of the field. What if they do that and you’re only playing three deep?
“Anytime a corner has two detached receivers to his side before the snap, he plays a divider technique. That means he apex’s the number one and two receivers. On the snap, he stays between both receivers if they go vertical, without giving the QB a clear throwing lane. If they both go vertical, he continues to get depth and stay between them.”






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