Back in the Saddle Again!!!!

Well, it's official!  Got hired last week as the defensive coordinator at a local junior high school.  Looks like I get to get back up on that horse again.  Sorry it's been so long since I posted, I've been going to meetings and getting ready for the upcoming season.  I know I needed (or maybe wanted) a year off, but middle school football shouldn't quite be the grind that high school football is.  I like the idea of having most of my weekends off and even having Friday's off (as we play on Thursday nights) to spend with the family.  So, in reality, I will have some time off, yet still be around the game.  I think it's the best of both worlds!




Now that's how you watch film!


Now, what to run is the question?  Looks like I'm going with the 46 Nickel this season.  I'm going to see how that does in this "spread to run" league we are in.  I think we should be fine, however I'm always nervous when playing this much man coverage.  However, I love the aggressiveness of the defense.  We'll see!

Like I say, get to them, before they get to you!



Postings may be few and far between on here, but I will check back in occasionally when I get my stuff together.  Still looking for information on the 3-4 defense.  If anyone cares to share, maybe we can co-write a post or something.  Also, looking for good punt block schemes from any defense.  I would really like to start focusing on the special teams aspect of the game a little more.  If you got anything to share send it to footballislifeblog@yahoo.com .  I hope everyone has a safe and productive season, and remember keep your players safe, it's been brutally hot out there!!!!




Stay cool!



Duece

Paid to Play? Why This Concept Will Ruin College Football



It's all about the Benjamin's baby...


I recently read an article on this topic at Smart Football (which is a great site, even though I'm completely dissing the idea behind one of the posts over there) and it got me to thinking, where are our morals?  Deep question, I know, remember I have LARGE amounts of free time on my hands here lately, so I do a lot of thinking...probably too much.  Anyhow, I don't see how advocates of a revenue sharing plan for College Football don't see the down side to their ways.  So I wanted to share the other side of the coin, the moral one.  I know this is a touchy subject and I will probably be blasted in the comments section, but you know what...I don't care!  This is my opinion on why College Football players should not be paid to play the game of football.

What really got me burned about this idea was the similarity that the topic has with government spending.  I know, I'm crazy right?!  Anyhow, as most know, I don't teach, I own my own business and part of what I do is site development.  Where I live, there has been a recent influx of public housing.  Being conservative, I'd rather have a hole drilled in my head than do anything with public housing.  However, we all gotta eat right?  Right!  I recently had a conversation with the head investor of one of these projects, and his attitude about public money, blew me away.  He was bitching about the fact that in Florida, Governor Rick Scott is making Welfare recipients comply with random drug tests to comply for the social service.  He was also griping about the Arizona Immigration Laws and how laws like these were taking money out of his pocket because it made it more difficult to find tenants for his low-income housing.  To move ahead in my story, the last comment he left me with was "If the government's willing to give this money away, I might as well get my share."  Where is the morality in this country anymore?  This is what ties in to what I'm trying to get across to you about the paying of amateur athletes in collegiate sports.  This idea that because the universities make so much money on the sports, that the athlete must be entitled to some of it, is ridiculous, and frankly it disgusts me.  Now let me elaborate.

Not one single college athlete has EVER been forced to participate in their sport.  NONE!  I would be willing to bet that all of them knew going in to collegiate athletics meant they were amateur athletes.  However, they DID know that they were getting their education paid for, by the institution they played for as a return for their services so to speak.  One of the most invaluable items we have in this country is a college education, yet we now have college athletes who want a bigger piece of the pie, with the attitude like the investor in the above conversation.  Why is this?  The answer, is easy, as it is one of the seven deadly sins....ENVY.  College athletes envy the money the universities they play for generate.  This is the same premise that liberals claim large corporations are greedy, and that they should give some of their money to the less fortunate.  This idea that it is somehow a crime in this country to make a profit AND KEEP IT has become what many call "greed".  Frankly, it's bullshit.  The institutions have provided a place for this athlete to not only perform, but to get better, as most have state-of-the-art training facilities to go along with some of the top facilities in the nation.  The other item, so often overlooked in this discussion, is the fact that these same "greedy" institutions provide these athletes with some of the land's top facilities in which to get something to which a monetary value need not be applied, and that's a college education.




Envy leads to Wrath


The liberal idea that profit is bad or evil rings ever so true in this argument.  However, look around you, this argument as killed this country we call America.  Between unions, and social programs, the ideas that this country was founded upon, have eroded and drifted away in the breeze.  The car you paid $35,000 for, probably only has around $15,000 in materials in it.  The auto worker's unions have pirated and pillaged the coffers of the auto companies to the point they nearly closed these companies down.  Look in your local newspaper and read every day, some where in this country, some social program is closing, or cutting it's numbers, or government employees are being laid off etc.  The reason, the socialist system does not work is eventually the payer runs out of money due to the greed of the payee.  How is paying college athletes any different?  There are a lot of similarities to the two ideas, think about them.




Bail em' out boys!


Then there is the overall attitude of the game.  Watch a college game on Saturdays and study the players and the coaches.  Then watch it on Sunday and do the same thing.  They are NOT the same.  The players on Saturday, play with a passion and aggression that is unparalleled in Pro Football.  This is even more evident in the argument between College Basketball and Pro Basketball.  At least in the collegiate game, they play defense.  Pro Basketball is nothing more than "Look at me, I get millions to play street ball".  I can't stand professional sports, because at the end of the day, the athlete gets paid, so winning and performing at the best of one's ability takes a backseat to Bentley's and Benjamin's.  I would advocate a performance based payment system for professional athletes, if I had my way (In Dueceland) where like most of us, if we don't do our job, we don't get paid.  So that defensive tackle who got blown out of the B gap on the goal line for a touchdown, doesn't get paid for his screw up.  I think you'd see the face of the game change a bit.  I know, I'm sick, I need help, and the game will only be played this way in Dueceland, but hey, that's what dreams are for.




Wonder how he did today?


In summary, if you pay college athletes, you destroy the game.  I do think there could be a happy medium here, but in all likeliness, it won't be anywhere near this.  I wonder if we will have college lockouts if they institute a "pay to play" system?  I think the advancement of the game, should be left on the field and in the coach's office, not in the pocket book of the players.  Remember, nobody made them sign that scholarship....

I don't normally have posts like this, but something sorta snapped this morning when reading Smart Football's article after reading what a joke of a deal our lawmakers struck over the weekend on the nation's debt.  That with the mounting fact that Washington D.C. could float into the Atlantic and I wouldn't give a shit, got me to typing.  I will try to stay away from posts like these in the future, and I kinda feel like Jerry McGuire when he wrote his mission statement.  Hopefully I don't run off too many people by writing an opinion post.

In other news, Smart Football has a great post about a man few understand.  Mike Leach's book, Swing Your Sword has created waves among coaches and there is a great article about it that can be found here.  Good article on what appears to be something I'm adding to my birthday wish list!  Leach was and is a great innovator of the game, I have heard nothing but good reviews about this book and look forward to reading it.

Brophy has a good post on Unbreakable Fire Zones.  Manny Diaz's concepts are growing in popularity, as can be seen in this post from Coach Hoover.  Two very good reads if you are into FZ concepts and keeping things simple and adjustable.  Good job guys!

Coach Hoover's latest post is one of the best blog reads I've had in a while.  It is a very in-depth article on something known as the Peter Principle.  After reading this, I can finally rank myself in the victim column of just such a principle.  Now I know why I can't stand stupid people!  Anyhow, a great read by a great mind in football, good job Coach Hoover.


Over at The 3 Back Option Football Spot is a great link to Coach Iannuci's quarterback manual.  A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away I bought this manual, and I can tell you READ IT!  I only thought I understood the option quarterback.  This manual will aid you in not only teaching your option quarterback, but developing him to be the "dealer" on the field you need him to be.  Please check out Coach Iannuci's blog, if you are triple option guy like me, you'll LOVE IT.




In other words...when Moby Dick was a minnow!


If you haven't checked out Gridnotes, you are missing out.  With so many bloggers out there, information can become hard to find.  Check out Gridnotes and get a summarized view of each article along with links to the full article, as well as categorized links to aid in finding just the right tidbit of information you are looking for.  It's in my favorites, what are you waiting for???

Lastly, Coach Hoover had a link to Becoming a Man for All Seasons, which is yet another very informative blog I think you should read.  Very good reads on a wide variety of topic, from the technical to the theoretical and even motivational. 

Still waiting to hear if I'm going to be a DC for a local junior high or not.  Don't know how to feel about it, as once again I'm helping a friend and that didn't get me too far the first time.  Anyhow, I guess it's coaching though right.  Season is upon us, free agency is maddening and we are going to have an NFL season after all.  Hang in there boys, football's right around the corner!




I'm ready for football dammit!!!!


Duece

The Strong Safety in the 46 Bear and 46 Nickel Defenses

As some of you know, from a previous post, I had some success (I do use that term relatively) with the 46 Nickel this past season.  Since using this defense, I have been enamored with finding out more information on its father, the Bear 46.  I have dug high and low and have come up with some very good resources, that have led me to some very insightful research.  The one thing that sticks out in my mind is the placement of the strong safety in this defense.  I will not go in to history here much, but as a lot of you know one of the key elements to Buddy Ryan's historic 85' Chicago Bears' Defense was the play of strong safety, Doug Plank.  With this position being so critical to the defense, it had me wondering why there were so many variations on the placement of this player.  It is hard to find any information on the 46, that has the strong safety in the same position.  So I thought a post about the pros and con's of the alignments of the strong safety were necessary.  I will also shed light, as I usually do, on what I did, and why I did it, so hopefully you can make an informative choice when placing such a critical player.

Early Years...The Beginning
Buddy Ryan's original position for the strong safety (SS) was at the weak side 40 technique.  There's much argument as to why Ryan put the SS here, however there is no doubt that this early alignment has since been challenged.  I can only speculate, but because the SS was in the box to the weak side, it allowed him to adjust to communicate with the linebackers (LB's) easier when and where he was adjusting to.  I'm sure there are other more concrete reasons why Doug Plank was placed in the weak side 40 technique, but for the purpose of this article, I will simply look at the pros and the cons of the alignment.

Pros
The Pros of the alignment are, in my opinion, very slim, as I did not utilize this alignment (well I sorta did since it WAS a safety for me, however it was NOT my SS, it was my WS).  The pros are as follows:

• SS is in good position to communicate his adjustment/assignment to middle linebacker (MLB) who can then adjust the front accordingly (Jayhawk adjustment).
• SS is in good position to walk out and cover a displaced #2 to the weak side.
• SS is in good position to defend the run, and is well protected by the Nose, weak 3 technique and the wide nine technique defensive end.

Cons

• SS is in poor position to see adjustment threat to the weak side, or handle motion away from the backfield to the strong side of the formation.
• SS is not typically a run first defender, yet is aligned in the box, and such schemes as Power O, or Power G can exploit a weak run defender on the weak side of the defense.
• SS has more to learn from this position.  His skill set is as follows:
• Read and react to keys like a LB.
• Cover receivers man to man.
• Drop off in zone coverage.
• Blitz from depth.

Strong Safety as the Seven Technique
The latter point will be argued in other sections of the article.  Basically, Buddy Ryan's traditional alignment is fine, but I think there have been other methods proven to be slightly more economically in their placement of the strong safety.  The first I will discuss, is one method I found in an old video about Boston College's version of the 46.  At one time, apparently BC ran their version of the 46 with 3-4 personnel.  BC placed the SS in the seven technique position, normally occupied by the Charlie LB (weakside linebacker) in Buddy Ryan's original scheme.  I will now take a look at some of the pros and cons of the SS being in the seven technique alignment.

Pros

• Only one defender has to learn a new skill set, all 10 others play skill sets related to their original scheme.
• SS is used to covering a defender man to man, whereas not all LB's are.  SS does not have to learn new skill set, and neither does LB.
• SS can use quickness on LOS to beat slower, bulkier offensive linemen when blitzing.

Cons

• SS still not in good position to get to adjustment assignments or adjust to motion.
• SS must learn new assignment when facing the option (normally has pitch or alley assignment, now must take quarterback fitting inside the load block).
• SS is usually undersized when compared to the LB being at the seven technique position.  This weakness can take its toll on strong side C gap runs as the SS is usually at a physical disadvantage to a tight end (TE) or offensive tackle (OT).
• In zone coverage SS will drop to an inside zone, he does not normally drop to.  This puts more teaching time into teaching the SS additional zone drops from his normal assignment.

Boston College's 3-4 Version of the 46

The idea behind what Boston College is simple, only change one player and the rest of the defense can align and get after the offense.  I like it, but the idea of having a defensive back (DB) standing in the C gap, did not particularly sit well with  me.  So I looked at some schemes that had the SS set outside the TE to the strong side.  This fit very well with my 4-2-5 scheme as our SS was asked to play up and around the LOS on numerous occasions.  Now, let's look at the pros and cons of aligning our SS outside the TE to the strong side.




Base 4-2-5 Alignment





4-2-5 Version of the 46


Pros

• SS only has to learn one new skill set, that of the outside rush.  Since we were 4-2-5 and ran TCU's Smoke Blitz, this was an easy install for me.
• SS can easily get to his assignment of being the adjuster to the strong side, and can easily chase motion away from the backfield.
• SS can drop off and cover an outside zone, which was his normal coverage responsibility in the 4-2-5.
• Because of the SS being involved in blitzes in the original 4-2 scheme, he could also easily be taught blitz games coupled with the strong side LB to confuse the offense. 
• SS in good position to defend the pitch on option, another carry over from his normal option assignments in the base defense.
• No new reads or reactions need to be taught.

Cons

• Further displacement from the box makes communication of adjustments more difficult.

I know, I'm biased, but I'm showing exactly what I did when looking at adding the 46 as a package to my defense last season.  I felt what I did "fit" what we were doing as a base defense, and allowed us to get into the 46 with little to no new teaching. 

The SS is a very important part of the 46 defense, and his placement is still up to your preference.  To be honest, no single way is correct or better, it's all in how you coach it up.  Just remember there are pros and cons to your decision, and that's why I posted this article.  For more information, check out my first post on the 46 Nickel, and go to by Scribd site and download some very good information!  Hope this helped, and I'm going to keep researching one of football's ultimate pressure defenses, the 46!!!



I do things MY way...



Duece