How Brandon Staley is changing the future of defensive football

the constant cycle of evolution in offensive and defensive football is something that defines the game every coach at every level has always been looking to find a schematic advantage that can give their team an edge over the opponent whether that's through peer creation or modification of another coach's creation the most recent successful innovation in defensive football at the nfl level is current la chargers head coach and former la rams defensive coordinator brandon staley's approach to combating modern offenses staley's scheme didn't just appear out of thin air though he took ideas and philosophies from coaches at multiple levels of the game and blended them to create last year's best defense in the nfl today i'll take you through where staley got each element of his scheme how he modified each of those elements to combat modern pro offenses why the scheme was so effective last year and why i believe more teams will soon look to replicate it so get comfortable and bear with me because whether you just started watching football yesterday or you've been studying the game for years i guarantee that this is a topic worth your attention and if you stick around until the end you'll get to hear a special offer from the sponsor of today's video my bookie i want to start by going back to 2013 when seattle seahawks head coach pete carroll and defensive coordinator dan quinn had successfully assembled the legion of boom the cover 3 based one gap defense that other teams around the league would spend the next half decade trying to replicate the legion of boom's defining philosophy was an extra box defender instead of the two safeties that teams typically deployed seattle took their strong side safety cam chancellor and aligned him close to the line of scrimmage playing the role of a hybrid linebacker rather than a traditional safety by adding a defender into the box seattle's defense out gapped the offense in the run game meaning they had a defender for each gap that the offense could target on the ground their secondary consisting of chancellor richard sherman and earl thomas was so good that they could play mostly stock cover 3 zone and offenses still didn't have an answer defensive coaching staffs and front offices who tried to replicate this defense quickly found that a rangy free safety who could cover both sidelines at once was required for this scheme to be run successfully and it just so happens that earl thomases don't grow on trees this lack of sustainability combined with the rise in the shanahan wide zone offense which i'll get to in a minute rendered the lob style of defense obsolete just a few seasons after their 2013 super bowl run the wide zone offense was first popularized back in the late 1990s and early 2000s by then denver broncos head coach mike shanahan and offensive line coach alex gibbs fast forward to 2021 and coaches using some form of the wide zone offense include seahawks offensive coordinator shane waldron rams head coach sean mcvay 49ers head coach kyle shanahan falcons head coach arthur smith packers head coach matt lafleur jets offensive coordinator mike lafleur vikings offensive coordinator clint kubiak brown's head coach kevin stefanski and bengal's head coach zach taylor saying that this style of offense has taken over the nfl is an understatement and one of the main reasons why it's become so popular is because of its ability to pick apart single high safety coverages while still presenting the threat of a run because the zone scheme run game is so effective defenses typically opt to add an extra defender into the box to help in run support creating a single high safety shell this helps the defense in the run game given that the extra defender in the box makes the offense out gapped but the single high safety shell limits the defense's versatility against the pass that lack of versatility leads to predictability and allows the wide zone offense to use crossing concepts out of play action that take advantage of the single high safety shell and displaced linebackers here's an example from the 2020 titans offense under then offensive coordinator arthur smith baltimore presents a single high safety shell pre-snap with one safety in the box and the other in the deep middle of the field the route concept calls for a drift route from corey davis on the top of your screen and a deep clear out route from aj brown at the bottom tennessee's offensive line makes this look like wide zone to the left which causes baltimore's linebackers to flow away from the middle of the field in pursuit of the running back then the drift route from davis gets into the space vacated by those linebackers and tannehill hits him for a 14-yard gain assuming the linebackers are moved by the play-action fake the only way to really stop these play-action crossing concepts consistently is by deploying double high safety shells but by doing so the defense is losing a defender in the box for run support so in order to defend the wide zone offense modern defensive coaches are tasked with effectively neutralizing the run and the pass simultaneously in 2020 brandon staley's number one ranked la rams defense deployed double high safety shells at the second highest rate in the league but this forced him to deploy a stacked box at the second lowest rate in the league one would assume that this too high safety defensive philosophy would cause staley's defense to get gashed in the run game because of the offense's consistent numbers advantage up front but believe it or not the result was actually the opposite staley's defense not only ranked first in overall yards per play allowed but also ranked third in rushing yards per attempt allowed and third in rushing yards per attempt allowed on zone scheme run plays which begs the question how is the rams defense so good against the run despite using two high shells at such a high rate the answer comes down to a few key things one of which being la's main defensive front which is known as the tight front the tight front uses three down defensive linemen and each lineman is aligned inside of the offensive tackles it's also sometimes referred to as the 404 front because each outside defensive lineman or defensive end is aligned in the four eye technique on the inside shoulder of the offensive tackle while the nose tackle is aligned in the zero technique meaning his shoulders are square with the center the tight front is not common in the modern nfl and before last year it was almost unheard of but before i explain why staley used an obscure defensive front to combat modern offenses and why it was successful let me first give you a background of the front's history ironically the origin of the tight front has absolutely nothing to do with the modern wide zone offense and was actually popularized by chip kelly during his time with the oregon ducks in the early 2010s kelly and duck's defensive coordinator nick aliotti used the front to defend various run plays out of kelly's own spread offense that other college football teams were quickly adopting current colts defensive tackle deforest buckner and current 49ers edge defender eric armstead each played the four eye roll on oregon's defense and their function was to clog up the middle of the field by occupying the offensive tackles in the run game and forcing running backs to bounce their runs to the outside now bouncing a run to the outside is exactly what wide zone run plays aim to do so it might not make sense that staley used this front and variations of it to defend against wide zone but hear me out i want to first focus on the effect of the zero technique nose tackle on interior offensive linemen wide zone tells the offensive lineman to double team the defensive lineman up front and whichever lineman is less engaged in that double team is responsible for advancing to the linebackers here san francisco is running wide zone to the right so the left guard and center are responsible for double teaming the nose because the nose isn't shaded to either side of the center it's going to be very difficult for 49ers left guard lake and tomlinson to reach him and take over the block which in turn makes it difficult for the center daniel brunskill to know if and when he can advance here brunskill tries to advance before tomlinson has a leverage advantage over ram's nose tackle sebastian joseph day and joseph day makes the tackle for a 2 yard gain offensive guards are typically far behind offensive tackles in terms of mobility and agility and by aligning his nose tackle head up on the center staley forced guards to move more than they're used to now the other key aspect of the tight front is the four eye alignment of the defensive ends the four eye technique is one of the most awkward and difficult alignments that offensive tackles can deal with especially on plays that require a double team up front including zone scheme run plays like i said earlier a defensive lineman aligned in the four eye technique is shaded to the inside shoulder of the offensive tackle and a defensive lineman aligned in the two eye technique is shaded to the inside shoulder of the offensive guard so the two eye for a guard is the equivalent of the four eye for a tackle former nfl offensive guard jeff schwartz had this to say about blocking a defensive lineman in the two eye technique on zone scheme run plays quote the 2i is perfect for splitting a double team on the front side of a zone play the guard has to be perfect in his footwork he needs to step play side but not too far because he has to get a piece of the 2i defensive tackle to allow the center to take over the block it's hard to put into words how difficult that truly is as a guard it was the toughest block i had i hated it your first instinct is to false step step backwards in order to maintain some power when you hit the 2i when you fall step you give up on getting to the linebacker and because you're thinking about getting a shot on the 2i you're often too slow getting to the linebacker the 2i can thus hold both players the guard and the center end quote when an offensive lineman can't efficiently climb to the second level on a zone scheme run play it's much easier for the linebackers and secondary defenders behind the line to find and pursue the ball carrier and i want to use this play as an example of how that concept applies to staley's defense the rams deployed their tight front and san francisco called wide zone right there's a lot that led to the success of this play from the defensive point of view but i want to focus on the right tackle mike mcglinchey mcglinchey's pre-snap responsibility is to double team the four i then to advance up to the linebacker behind him but because he has to chip the 4i on his way to the linebacker mcglinchey is slow to advance and his assignment helps to make the tackle for a short gain like jeff schwartz said these inside shoulder defensive line alignments make it very difficult for offensive linemen to efficiently advance on the front side of zone scheme run plays now even with the theoretical effectiveness of the tight front against the run staley's defense was still out gapped on a whopping 78 of defensive snaps last year and it takes more than just alignment to put together a good run defense without stacking the box in football there are one gap and two gap defenses the modern nfl is dominated by one gap defenses because in today's passing league defenses are forced to prioritize pass rush overrun defense when it comes to scouting there's no longer a significant demand for two gapping defenders because they aren't viable pass rushers so two gap defenses are all but obsolete and one gap defenses don't allow for a double high safety shell so staley uses a mix of the two here's a quote from staley himself on the pro football focus college football podcast about what he calls a gap and a half defense quote we're definitely not a two gap system at all because that would imply that we're reading and reacting we're still coming off the rock but we're going to try to play a gap and a half with all of our guys up front so that we can create more overlap in the first level by playing that way what it allows your second and third level players to do is get there end quote i'll get to the last sentence of that quote in a minute but first i want to show you what staley means by playing a gap and a half take a look at this play from back in week 3 against buffalo and notice that when the running back gets the ball the defensive linemen are occupying a gap but not penetrating this is what staley means by still coming off the rock his defenders are still aggressively pursuing a gap as they would in a typical one gap defense but they're not shooting that gap now watch out when devin singletary hits the backside b-gap michael brockers falls back into his secondary gap to make the tackle staley's defensive linemen are responsible for one assigned gap pre-snap but are also responsible for falling back on a secondary gap when the running back crosses the line of scrimmage one of the most revealing stats posted by the rams defense last year was their stuff rate and in case you aren't familiar stuffs are run plays that are stopped at or behind the line of scrimmage despite being ranked third in terms of rushing yards per carry allowed the rams were ranked 24th in stuff rate meaning they rarely allowed more than a few yards but also rarely made a tackle in the backfield now i want to turn your attention to the second portion of that quote where staley talked about how playing a gap and a half allows the second and third level defenders to play a more significant role in run defense take a look at this play from la's playoff game against green bay safety jon johnson is aligned closer to the line of scrimmage than safety jordan fuller but la's safeties were almost always staggered in alignment and johnson isn't in the box so this is really still a two-high safety shell post snap the defensive linemen occupy their gaps like they're supposed to but don't penetrate which forces packers running back aaron jones to take an extra split second before he accelerates downhill that seemingly insignificant amount of time allows jon johnson to fill the open frontside a-gap and make the tackle for a small game during his time with the chicago bears and denver broncos staley learned this gap and a half philosophy from his mentor vic fangio and when staley became a play caller himself he paired it with the tight front in la to assemble one of the best run defending units in the nfl staley's ability to effectively defend the run from light boxes did wonders for his past defense and now that i've covered his schematic and philosophical run defense principles i want to move on to how he put together the most dominant past defense in the nfl double high safety shells are much better against the past than single high safety shells because they allow for more diversity and ambiguity in coverage concepts making it much more difficult for a quarterback to recognize the defense's coverage pre-snap now more double high safety shells does not necessarily mean more double high safety coverages despite using double high safety shells almost 80 percent of the time la only used double high coverages 40 of the time which ranked 13th in the league this kept offenses guessing as to what la safeties were going to do post-snap here's an example from week 11 against tampa bay the box called a concept called middle read which tells both of the outside receivers to run go routes while the receiver aligned in a slot runs one of two different routes based on what he sees from the defense post snap during the stem of his route chris godwin is told to read the safeties and if the defense rolls into a too high coverage he runs a divide route down the seam but if they roll into a one-high coverage godwin bends his route under the deep safety la's coverage concept is a variation on match quarters which blends principles of zone and man coverage i'm not going to get into the responsibilities of every defender and push calls for the sake of time but i'll leave a link in the description to another video where i do the play call tells the safeties to offer vertical bracket help on the number 2 receivers if the apex defenders get burned at the line but if they don't the safeties don't have any defined responsibility aside from keeping their eyes on the quarterback post snap strong side safety jordan fuller sees that the number two receiver on his side is not a vertical threat so he turns his attention to the quarterback on the other side of the formation chris godwin keys the free safety jon johnson to determine whether or not he needs to bend his route but because johnson isn't rotating toward the middle of the field or expanding toward the sideline godwin can't identify the coverage eventually godwin looks inside to see fuller sitting in the middle of the field as a robber and bends his route inside but fuller was deep enough to undercut him if fuller was aligned in the box pre-snap he wouldn't have come from depth and godwin probably would have taken this for a touchdown so by using double high safety shells staley can call coverage concepts like match quarters that are more difficult to decipher post-snap now that we have an understanding of how staley's defense works and why it was so effective last year i want to explain why i believe that this style of defense will begin to take over the league in the next few years and that comes down to a relatively simple reality the staley fangio style of defense doesn't require very many specialized players it requires two hybrid defensive ends who have the strength and agility to play the run from the four eye technique and pass rush from the interior but those guys aren't all that rare at the pro level and no they do not need to be aaron donald it requires a solid run defending nose tackle who almost all good defenses already have it doesn't require a superstar edge safeties have to be good tacklers and willing to defend the run but don't have to be camp chancellor type hybrid linebackers or earl thomas type sideline to sideline ball hawks staley took full advantage of having jalen ramsey on his defense by aligning him pretty much anywhere but that doesn't mean that a lockdown corner who can be put on an island is a necessity this scheme can and will be tailored to fit different personnel groups which will take time so don't expect immediate success from staley's new chargers defense but double high safety shells combined with three man fronts like chip kelly's tight front are going to rise in popularity as teams around the league continue to adopt some form of mike shanahan's wide zone offense before i go i want to tell you guys a little bit about the sponsor of today's video my bookie 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Channel: Billy Stephens

Views: 482,235

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Id: wtVovyXJ5KI

Length: 19min 8sec (1148 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 15 2021