If I ever get a Madden game I’ll steer clear of the master!

To be truthful, that’s a question for an NFL draft expert, not a former HS defensive coordianator. I’ll bet we have members that can better answer your question than I.

I have some opinions though (not facts). I think that the true run stop DEs should be harder to find, since more and more systems emphasize the outside pass rush. Not knowing what a lot of colleges run, I wouldn’t know how many produce run stoppers.

When I wrote letters and played middleman for college scouts looking at our kids, I found that a lot of schools didn’t care so much about position “types”. They looked at film that we provided, and they looked at “combine like” numbers, but they didn’t care so much how we used a kid. We could have film and recruiting folders for each kid in our program, and a school might be interested in taking a guy we used on the DL for the OL, or the OL for a TE. They were far more interested in athleticism. THEY would determine where a kid ended up. (Sometimes you see this in the pros, as when a QB gets taken to be a WR or something).

So I can’t even tell you what “position types” colleges wanted from HS programs. They just wanted athletes that they could mold. As far as what the pros want from colleges, they look at much, much more. (We seemed to have the best record getting linemen from both sides of the ball, and LBs moved onto college teams).

Man coverage defenders are rarer than zone types. Giant 2 gap DTs (what we hear referred to as 3 technique players, but often incorrectly) are just rare physical specimens. LBs with the speed of DBs are rare (remember Wilson, DJ, and Gold when Gold was still good and WIlson was healthy?).

On offense, pocket passers with the situational awareness and intelligence to track a full field in seconds (Manning, Brady) are very rare. TEs that can catch and block AND excell at both are rare. WRs that can do four or more of the following are rare: catch difficult passes, after burner speed, run perfect routes, out muscle defenders, run block, stay out of trouble off the field or in the locker room.

Again, I’m just shooting from the hip. I have no facts in front of me.

I learn more at MHR than I share. This is a great site to pick up info about pro football (salary caps, drafts, etc), as well as anything current, past, or future for the Broncos.

Thanks for the encouragement counsel!

I’m tryin’ to keep up, but after the Hillis article and now this … I think I better just go have a beer and think about it.

is more of an approach to the defense, not so much a formation or alignment (though the simplest way to explain it is to show a chart as I do and explain what people usually do). There are many plays run out of a T2 system, and several formations.

In a dime, the MLB will zone deep, and the WRs may split the field in 1/3s with one WR playing man. They could also blitz the MLB and drop a CB into a center zone. There are many, many ways to go.

A key to helping the zones is to jam the WRs. Even in the dime, you might still keep the CBs up close to jack the WRs and buy the zoners all over the defense time (as well as time for the DL to break through).

Not to start a group hug or anything, but you’ve done an amazing job yourself on technical writing, and breaking it down for fans without a strong background. In fact, I believe you have the highest “recommend” count to date in the “recommended box”.

I’m just in good company friend! I enjoy your work here a lot, and get a lot from it.

We’re the ones the site is for. We’re the ones that the team plays for. We are the fans!

The more you get in depth with the game, the more you will start to see and the more you will understand. The game will stop being entertainment and become a science. Shortly after that it becomes an art form.

When I was still a middle school coach I was asked to watch a high school game to scout for the high school we fed into (and where I later ended up as a coordinator). I remember the first moment that football became an art. I was more knowledgable about football than I ever had been before, but wasn’t watching much pro football because of my busy schedule. So knowing my own level of ball (middle school) inside and out I went to the high school game.

I remember getting teary eyed because what I was seeing on the field was so beautiful. The execution, the intricacy of the plays, the adjustments. It stopped being a game or a sport and just become a painting in motion.

I developed such a passion for the game that I could watch tapes of our team losing a game and still marveling over the beauty of how an opposing team did something so flawlessly. When I moved on to the high school level (I went straight to the defensive coord position), I learned so much more. Then my schedual changed a bit and I was able to watch the pros and a little college again. Then I really appreciated what I was watching. Of course, even now I don’t now everything. But what little of the game one learns at the HS coaching level makes the pro level so much more artistic. That’s what I want to help members see by sharing what I can. I’m thrilled that you learned a little something and was able to apply it to games you had seen.

Just as you can watch the game and see the gaps open and close and watch players adjust in real time, wait until the following season when you’ve learned even more, and the game becomes a complicated dance where you can see “traps within traps within traps” opening and closing, and the best and the greatest players defying the greatest inventions of coaches who spent weeks to create what happens in the blink of an eye.

Or hell, you can just grab a beer and some buffalo wings and a few friends and forget the teary eyed crap. It’s a great time either way!

: )

You don’t have to answer all of these questions, just the ones you know.

First, in the program you were in, was this freshman flag or freshman regular football?

And by freshman, are you talking about college? If so, was it against other schools (team) or club? Was it standard 11 v 11 ball (eleven men on both sides)?

Do you know what the responsibilities of the defensive line were? What did the DTs do (primarily)? (I don’t need to know how they lined up).

How many LBs did your team run on most plays? Do you know if they played man, zone or contain? Would you say they blitzed often? If so, can you describe one or two blitz plays?

How often (if ever) did your CBs play man? If (when) they played man, do you remember if they played under or over their coverage (in front or behind the WR they targeted).

My biggest passion in football is systems, historical and present. Anything you can remember or that you know would be helpful. I’d love to help you figure out what your team was doing!

1. Mrs. Favre showed a lot of class. She saw a play starting and she would stop in mid sentence so the announcers could do their job. Instead, the announcers just kept talking and talking while the camera crew kept missing plays. I don’t blame Mrs. Favre one bit.

2. I’ll never forget the cheesy poem that they recorded Mrs. Favre reading. (“Cheesy”, for Cheeseheads that is). They played it twice. It ended with “My Brett, our Favre”.

I was scaring my family. “My butt! Your Favre! Where’s my fricken game!” My wife was shocked, but my daughter was rolling on the floor laughing and my friends (Packers fans) where just as annoyed as I was by missing the game because of the ESPN Fluff Team.

This always seems to be the case.

I responded to you down below. The comment title is, “There have been some grumblings about changes… “

I’m not the one to respond to this question. There are so many people on this site who understand all this a lot better than I do. I’m just concerned because I’ve noticed that when a thread gets this long that interest starts to lag and people don’t return so they might not notice your question. I don’t know if this is the best way to get your question answered but may I sugeest that you ask the same question again very early in some fresher posting. I’m not sure it has to even be germaine to the topic being discussed. I think that way you’ll get some attention.

By the way, I visited your site just before and after the game between our two teams last year and found everyone there to be friendly, knowlegdable and helpful. I want to thank them and you for that. Good luck next year. The Bills are always one of those teams I root for… ...as long as they aren’t playing the Broncos that is. ;)

P.S. Whoops.

Just as I’m typing this I notice that Hoosierteacher is doing just what I thought wasn’t going to happen. As best this ignorant wretch can tell that guy is one sharpe fellow.

Once again, good luck in ‘08. I died a little when your Bills lost those Super Bowls too and I sure hope you get another chance real soon.

I created a fan post with your response at Buffalo Rumblings. I’m not sure if this will generate any discussion, but feel free to jump in if you would like to comment. Thanks again!

Best of luck to you and Denver as well.