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AFM Magazine


The Defensive End: Up or Down?

Should your defensive end play in a two or three-point stance?
by: Terry Jacoby
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Chuck Martin is quite familiar with success. Martin will begin his third year as head football coach at Grand Valley State University, the winningest Division II football program in the country. He has led the Lakers to 23 wins, a D-II National Championship, a 13-game winning streak and a Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) title. The Lakers’ success begins and ends with defense. Eleven of GVSU’s 13 opponents were held to 17 points or less and seven scored 10 points or fewer. The Lakers shut out opponents in 25 of 52 quarters during the 2006 season.

Martin says the Lakers prefer playing their defensive ends down, but he certainly sees reasons why coaches might prefer the other option. “This is one of those interesting topics where there is a pro and a con,” Martin said. “We certainly understand why people are having their ends up. A lot of it has to do with people playing smaller, more athletic guys and they let those kids stand up. The obvious advantage if you’re playing a stand-up defensive end is that he’s probably a more athletic player. You’re getting away from the old school where the down linemen are these big guys that you’re now taking off the field and replacing them with a more athletic type player.”

For Martin, though, the negatives outweigh the advantages.

“The negative (to a stand-up defensive end) is that the offensive tackles these days are pretty big,” he says. “From our standpoint, when we see a stand-up defensive end we understand that maybe he’s a good pass rush guy. But from a leverage perspective and then from a size perspective, because a lot of the stand-up guys just aren’t that big, we will run right at them and make them pay for trying to have a smaller, more athletic kid on the field.”

Martin doesn’t shy away from the ‘old school’ label. Football, no matter how you dress it up or stand it up, is still won or lost in the trenches. “We will use our size and strength as an advantage,” he says. “They have this player on the field to be more athletic, but let’s see if he can stop the run. We will go right at him and get one of our big tackles to lock up with him. This should create some space to run the football. From a leverage standpoint of coming out of a two-point vs. coming out of a three-point you’re just not as low, and the game is played low. And by standing him up you’re putting a kid in a position where he’s not as low as he could be.”

Grand Valley State, which is located in Allendale, Mich., near Grand Rapids, has been grand on the offensive side of the ball as well. You don’t go undefeated without being able to score some points. The Lakers broke the 30-point mark eight times and outscored their opponents 434-159. And looking to see whether a team plays its ends up or down is a factor in how Martin and his staff draw up the offensive game plan.

“If we see a team playing a stand-up end, part of our game plan would be to attack him in the run game,” he said. “If he’s undersized, we will make them pay. Usually, you don’t stand up big guys. Again, you stand up the faster, more athletic guys. They might have an advantage with this guy standing up when it comes to pass rush, but the disadvantage for them is when it comes to stopping the run. So we will force them to stop the run.”

Martin says the trend has gone back to the more traditional stance. “We don’t see (stand-up ends) as much as we used to,” he said. “It was a couple years ago where people were standing up and we still see it; but it’s mostly on strictly passing downs, like third and long where they aren’t worried about the run game. I think teams that stand up their ends either have very good players or haven’t been victimized by teams trying to attack them with the run there.”

A Decade Ago

A few years back, Grand Valley used to stand up its ends. But no more. Martin admits it could change for teams – but not necessarily his – depending on the offensive scheme lining up across the field. “If you were playing a team that threw a lot, you might be more apt to have a guy stand up,” he said.

Such as a team playing a spread offense with the quarterback armed in the shotgun. “We probably still wouldn’t do it because we’ve been down that road before, but I think that would be the time to do it for a lot of teams. For us we learned a long time ago that it’s so hard to stop the run out of a two-point. Against a team that runs the ball at all, you’re in a much better position trying to stop them from a three-point as opposed to a two-point.

“When I was at Eastern Michigan University we had our ends up and we had a fair amount of success with it. So, it’s not that I don’t think it can be done. Coaches have to base their decision more on their own personnel than the type of offense they face. It depends on what best suits your personnel.”

Leverage doesn’t show up in the box score, but it’s a key to a team winning or losing, according to Martin. “Leverage is the position you want to be in on a particular guy across from you or even on the ball,” he said. “So if you maintain outside leverage to the football you always want to keep yourself outside of the football, or if you want to maintain inside leverage on the ball you want to be inside the football. It’s a position relating to someone on the other side of the ball or the football itself. Where you want to be in relation to the football. A DB has to decide if he wants inside leverage on a receiver or outside leverage on a receiver. We use that term a lot on both sides of the ball when it comes to covering and blocking and chasing.”

And what does the type of stance mean when it comes to leverage?

“Some people say that you can maintain leverage better out of a three-point because you can react quicker out of a three-point, but I’m sure someone would argue the other way too,” said Martin, who is 23-3 as a head coach and 71-9 as a member of the GVSU coaching staff.

Martin also doesn’t believe that providing easier reads by standing is enough of a reason to have the ends up. “You can make reads whether you’re up or down,” he said. But he does see where it could be a mental advantage for some players. “We are all trying to get more athletic,” he said. “You’re playing linebackers at defensive end. If it’s a tough sell and if the kid doesn’t want to move, maybe you let him stand up. So now he feels like a linebacker. So even though you moved him to a different position, by having him stand up, he feels like he’s still playing linebacker.”

At Grand Valley State, though, you can expect to see the defensive ends down low. “We just think you get off the ball so much better,” Martin said. “You don’t see anyone run a 40-yard dash out of a two-point stance. The stand-up guy is starting in a position we never want to get in.”

Stand-Up Guy

San Diego State doesn’t have the record that GVSU has posted over the past few seasons, but with Chuck Long now the head coach, the Aztecs appear headed down the short road back to national prominence. Joe Bob Clements begins his second year as defensive line coach with the Aztecs, who take a different ‘stand’ on how their defensive ends play.

“Basically, if you run a 3-4 schematic you have the defensive ends up and we do some of that,” Clements said. “Whether you call them defensive ends or outside linebackers, you have three down linemen and two guys that are standing up on the outside. We call them outside linebackers. But they are basically stand-up defensive ends.”

One of the reasons Clements is a stand-up guy is it doesn’t tip your hand to the offense.

“Design-wise, it’s a good disguise,” said Clements, who in his first season at San Diego State helped the Aztec defense to the second-best red zone defense in the Mountain West Conference. “Out of a 3-4, one of them is going to be rushing, one is going to be dropping. You can confuse an offense because they don’t know where that fourth rush is going to be coming from, whether it’s coming from them or one of the inside linebackers.”

Clements also doubles as the team’s recruiting coordinator – and finding linebackers is easier than traditional defensive ends. “From a collegiate standpoint it’s easier to recruit linebackers than it is defensive linemen,” he said. “Any big body on a high school team is going to be heavily recruited. Every college in the nation is going to want him. There is a premium on the big guys. There are just more linebackers out there in the recruiting pool than defensive linemen.”

He believes there are other positives on the field as well. “It’s a lot easier to pass drop from a two-point stance,” said Clements, a defensive end at Kansas State for four years who made 107 career tackles in 41 games. “In some cases it’s easier to read the runs because you can see more in reading the runs.

“But a negative about it is the stand-up guys are going to be weaker against the power running game,” he said. “Anytime you are asking them to be responsible for the C gap, especially with a tight end right there, they aren’t going to be as firm or as strong as a down lineman with his hand on the ground. When it comes to pass-rush stunts, pass-rush twists, blitzes, it gives you a lot more options with the player standing up. But when it comes to the straight pass rush, I don’t think they are as fast out of a two-point stance as they would be out of a three-point stance.”

As far as playing the angles, Clements says, “it could be a positive or a negative. You gain an advantage with the better angle, but you’re negating the advantage because you’re further away from where you need to be.”

In the chess game that is football, Clements believes the 3-4 reduces the number of moves your opponent can make. “By having the defensive ends up, it lessens the opponent’s offensive package because of the uncertainty of what you’re going to be in out of a 3-4,” he said. “They aren’t 100 percent sure about what front you’re in and where that fourth rush is coming from. If you’re slanting either direction they’re not quite sure so this limits the amount of plays they run against you.”






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