Run Defense: Holding the edge

[bschoolprof 6233]

Can someone tell me how this is supposed to work?

 

[Js1 85143]

The opposite of how we do it? 

[hookem48 4633]

worked pretty good for them

[The Whistler 14]

Assuming Roach has responsibility for the QB (big assumption here), he should at minimum chip the RB in pursuit of the QB.   At least, that's how I'd coach it.  It's like our players don't know we can hit the QB AND RB on a ZR (though Hager did against ND).  It doesn't matter who has the ball, you can hit both players on a ZR.

Edited October 12, 2019 by The Whistler

[David Dennison 18672]

Looks to me like Mitchell sucked real bad on that play.

[dingleberryswitzer 2724]

Yea looks like the DE and LB were frozen by the option look.  Neither were blocked.  LB hesitated, then it was too late.

[dcar00 14036]

that is shitty coaching. it is assignment football.  you don't guess, you play your responsibility

[Jkwellborn 6657]

Mitchell took a bad angle. Blown assignments. They happen. The DE can’t chip the rb if his responsibility is the qb. He has to take the qb.

Poor defensive scheme.

[JBJ 3649]

Roach has the RB there.  If he was dive, he would have squeezed down the line instead of hold and work upfield.

[Jkwellborn 6657]

Roach has the RB there.  If he was dive, he would have squeezed down the line instead of hold and work upfield.

It’s possible that Roach had the rb and Mitchell the qb, because it looks like Mitchell comes downhill in the gap. It looks like it would be that way, but you can’t tell in a clusterfuck like that.

[David Dennison 18672]

5 minutes ago, Jkwellborn said:

It’s possible that Roach had the rb and Mitchell the qb, because it looks like Mitchell comes downhill in the gap. It looks like it would be that way, but you can’t tell in a clusterfuck like that.

It sure looked like Mitchell had the RB and he bit on the QB, thus leaving his assignment.

Might be why he used everything in the tank to make up for it by knocking the RB out of bounds after 20 yards.

Edited October 13, 2019 by David Dennison

[David Dennison 18672]

1 hour ago, JBJ said:

Roach has the RB there.  If he was dive, he would have squeezed down the line instead of hold and work upfield.

If that's the case, Roach kind of sucks.

EDIT: The more I look at it, the more I think you're right and that is really, really, really depressing, because that was just awful.

Edited October 13, 2019 by David Dennison

[bschoolprof 6233]

Roach had outside contain and thus the rb. Mitchell had the qb keep back up the middle. Both were tentative and look poorly coached. Orlando’s implementation of this scheme sucks.

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

18 hours ago, bschoolprof said:

Can someone tell me how this is supposed to work?

 

No one has a clue what their assignment is. Coaching.

I’m nervous.

[dcar00 14036]

25 minutes ago, longhornmatt said:

I don’t have the gifs, but I’d like to see our alignments on OU’s last couple of drives when they just ran sweeps to the right over and over.  I’m pretty sure we were outnumbered to that side with no overhang defender to set the edge - including on their last first down to end the game when we should have been selling out to stop the run.

The play in the OP is guys blowing assignments, but there also seem to be a number of plays where we are destined to fail based simply on alignment.  Teams with talent on offense can basically run off tackle on us at will by just adding one blocker in the backfield - whether it’s an H-Back or running the QB and freeing up the RB to occupy a defender.   Our “strategy” to defend that seems to basically just be asking the safeties to run it down and hope they make an open field tackle before it’s too far downfield.

This whole 3 tite defense just seems like madness to me.  Here is an article that explains the basics of why it’s being adopted and what it’s trying to prevent.  

https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2019/2/5/18205641/tite-front-defenses-explained

It’s whole reason for existence is primarily to get an extra LB/NB off the line of scrimmage to help against RPOs.   To compensate, you have all 3 defensive lineman and two inside backers plug the inside gaps to stop the inside run.  

You sacrifice your entire pass rush, and you don’t set an edge at the LOS on at least one side (or both sides, with the way we usually align), and this is basically all just to defend against a single RPO concept.  How about you just tell your DBs to play with inside leverage and actually try to cover a fucking slant so it’s defended even if the LB bites on the run in an RPO rather than sabotaging everything else about your defense to stop one play?  How does this work against any offense with talent unless they are Georgia lining up in the I formation and stupidly running inside at the tite front over and over?  

You will note how the NFL is NOT running this defense, because not having a pass rush seems retarded to them.  Go figure.

 

Its OK defense to run, you can not be married to it.  this is Todd Orlando's baby because he coached at Houston against shitty ass teams that have to run RPO's all the time to be competitive.  Big Boy football doesn't depend on RPO's.  we need a new DC.  so far every team good and bad has run up and down the field on us.

the only thing TO's defense seems to be good at doing is getting some turnovers.

[bschoolprof 6233]

47 minutes ago, longhornmatt said:

I don’t have the gifs, but I’d like to see our alignments on OU’s last couple of drives when they just ran sweeps to the right over and over.

 

Like this?

Or this, on the very next play?

 

Edited October 13, 2019 by bschoolprof

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

2 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

Like this?

Or this, on the very next play?

 

Brandon Jones, senior captain and 5* recruit. Completely lost.

[bschoolprof 6233]

Yes, Jones looks like dogshit here, but the fault lies primarily with his coaches and what they are asking/telling him to do.  I'd love Orlando to walk us through how he wants his players to defend the counter in that first clip given our alignment.  It's pure madness.  

[ClubWhatever 12087]

I agree.  However in that sequence not having Roach was a tough deal because he can usually fight through the wall off by the tackle.  Not having a war daddy at each 4i is a killer for this defense.  They were exploiting Bimage because he is small.   Orlando has to adjust to his available personnel.  

Edited October 13, 2019 by ClubWhatever

[dcar00 14036]

6 minutes ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:

Brandon Jones, senior captain and 5* recruit. Completely lost.

comes down, turns his hips towards the center then to top it off, tries to make the play that the LB will make if the RB goes inside.  do your job.  that said this scheme sucks.  we are depending on a safety to set the edge.

[dcar00 14036]

3 minutes ago, ClubWhatever said:

I agree.  However in that sequence not having Roach was a tough deal because he can usually fight through the wall off by the tackle.  Not having a war daddy at each 4i is a killer for this defense.  They were exploiting Bimage because he is small.   Orlando has to adjust to his available personnel.  

losing Roach was a killer.  go to 4 DL, bracket Lamb and make hurts beat you.  but we can't because we are married to our scheme.

[tbone_ 14027]

My first thought on the first clip: WTF is 19 doing!

[VABuckeye 2472]

2 minutes ago, tbone_ said:

My first thought on the first clip: WTF is 19 doing!

Retreating?  Sorry to intrude.  We were looking at the same kind of shit the past two years until new coaches came in and fixed some things.

[satyanash 14281]

Ian Boyd took a crack at explaining the play.

 

[Levi 2576]

23 hours ago, bschoolprof said:

Can someone tell me how this is supposed to work?

 

I dunno but I feel like Brown came up to set the edge and stopped for some reason. I think like he should have taken on the block more aggressively to force the ball carrier inside to the trailing Mitchell. 

[LTtxfan 49007]

That's some fucked up defense in videos above!!

Appreciate all the discussion and video clips...

[Levi 2576]

1 hour ago, longhornmatt said:

That’s the only plausible explanation, but that requires our deep safety to race up to the LOS from 12 yards deep, also get outside the play even though he’s lined up in the middle of the field with ground to cover, take on a TE who is both bigger than him and who has time to wait for him and get the angle on him to prevent him from getting outside leverage, and do all of this before a RB can cover half the distance he has to cover.  

Even if Brown makes it work perfectly - which seems impossible because he’s at a huge disadvantage to stop that run - we’re setting our edge (1) with a 200 pound safety against a 240 pound TE and (2) several yards downfield in space where it doesn’t really matter anyway because the RB already has a head of steam and enough space to keep working outside if the blocker even slows Brown a little.   

Um, cool defense, bro.

For the sake of a discussion, Browns physical playing style should allow him to take on that block and probably come out on top setting the edge against a slow tight end that is at best shuffling his feet. We see it all the time when lineman come down hill on a screen and look foolish trying to block a corner or safety. Brown was also on the play side already starting to come down hill pre-snap because it looks like BJ bails to cover the deep middle third. Brown almost looked like he was reading the TE all the way and recognized run, which is why I don’t understand why he didn’t try to blow up the play. I almost feel like this wasn’t a bad play call by Orlando because if Mitchell reads the handoff better and brown sets the edge, it’s only a 1 or 2 yard gain. 
edit: the running back is also still reading brown, so if brown does do his job correctly then the RB has nothing else to do but try and cut it inside.

Edited October 14, 2019 by DoneWithit

[JBJ 3649]

 

I've diagrammed the play above.

OU is running a version of I-Veer, but Trapping the End and reading the Mike (Juwan).  He gives a Give read.

We are in Okie, but shaded over like an Under front. 

This isn't Rip 3, but is a Quarters check that plays similarly.  Because they are in Trey we check to Solo.  Solo kicks the Free Safety over into middle coverage, keeping the Mike out of run-pass conflict.  Because they are in fact reading the Mike here, it's a good call.

I think we also check to Stress Coverage  on the strong-side because the split of the WR is tight.  This puts the corner over the top and brings the Cover Safety into the box.

 

To answer the original question: the Nickel starts as force.  He's keying the slotted TE and when the TE releases, he's a cover player.

The DE becomes the force at that point.  Normally, a DE would squeeze down against a down block tightening any potential pullers, and taking away any backside cut back.  However, it's common against teams with a lot of read-options (like OU's Bash and Inverted Veer) to "Hold" the DE.  The LB reads have to change to compensate, but that's not terribly important to this play.  Suffice to say that the pulling guard brings the Will and Mike together to take the QB on the dive.  The DE should be taking the RB, and the call was exactly correct to blow up this play - the DE just didn't execute.

Edited October 14, 2019 by JBJ

[MonkeyDoughnut 10150]

I think original defensive was designed to overwhelm OU with choices and force them to have to choose from a multitude of successful options.

In reality Roach is supposed to take out the RB without hesitation there and let the LBs come in for Hurts.

[TornACL 7683]

The worst part about people screwing up their assignments is that then, in reaction, other players start playing tentative because they're at the ready to go cover for somebody else's mistake. 

 

[capnamerca 571]

9 hours ago, JBJ said:

 

I've diagrammed the play above.

OU is running a version of I-Veer, but Trapping the End and reading the Mike (Juwan).  He gives a Give read.

We are in Okie, but shaded over like an Under front. 

This isn't Rip 3, but is a Quarters check that plays similarly.  Because they are in Trey we check to Solo.  Solo kicks the Free Safety over into middle coverage, keeping the Mike out of run-pass conflict.  Because they are in fact reading the Mike here, it's a good call.

I think we also check to Stress Coverage  on the strong-side because the split of the WR is tight.  This puts the corner over the top and brings the Cover Safety into the box.

 

To answer the original question: the Nickel starts as force.  He's keying the slotted TE and when the TE releases, he's a cover player.

The DE becomes the force at that point.  Normally, a DE would squeeze down against a down block tightening any potential pullers, and taking away any backside cut back.  However, it's common against teams with a lot of read-options (like OU's Bash and Inverted Veer) to "Hold" the DE.  The LB reads have to change to compensate, but that's not terribly important to this play.  Suffice to say that the pulling guard brings the Will and Mike together to take the QB on the dive.  The DE should be taking the RB, and the call was exactly correct to blow up this play - the DE just didn't execute.

You know, I watch a lot of football. Have for a very long time. I'm an athlete, and watch a ton of sports. And there are times when I realize I don't know a goddamnmed thing about the game of football at a technical level. I know all the words in the above post, but I've never seen them put in this particular order, and I have no idea what you're talking about :). Thanks for bringing the heat ... maybe I can learn something.

[tbone_ 14027]

He could just be making shit up. I’d never be able to tell.

[ClubWhatever 12087]

All that can be boiled down to Roach has to make the tackle or else it's a guaranteed 10+ yard gain.  We knew last year at Game 1 that Roach doesn't have the mobility to make that kind of play.  And yet there he is.

[Burt Macklin 19000]

This is why it’s pretty much impossible to have a reasonable discussion about coordinators/play calling on message boards. It’s a bunch of people who have no idea what they’re seeing and are just angry the team gave up big plays. Orlando has a lot of issues, primarily the lack of development of young guys in his scheme for two years. Orlando needs to show improvement by the end of the season, or he should go, but people have been whining even after solid performances, like OSU. Most people on here whine about play calls they don’t understand, when the bigger issues are players understanding Their responsibilities and being assignment sound. A lot of the plays people have complained about (besides 3rd and 17 of course) have been much less about play calling and much more about players failing to execute or honor their assignments. 

On 10/12/2019 at 6:01 PM, bschoolprof said:

Can someone tell me how this is supposed to work?

 

It’s actually pretty clear. Roach has outside contain, like JBJ explained, while Mitchell has the inside gap. They’re playing a gap, not a man, so they both initially breakdown where they’re supposed to, but Roach gets impatient and loses his mind to dive inside, leaving no one for the RB and forcing Mitchell to ditch his gap and now chase down a faster RB. 
 

the play call was perfect for that run and if Roach just stays home for half a second longer, it’s a negative play. Like I mention later, if Roach had played DE last year too, maybe he makes this play. Instead, he gets over excited and doesn’t trust that the LB, Mitchell, will hold up his responsibility on the play, even though he actually did. 

On 10/12/2019 at 6:06 PM, The Whistler said:

Assuming Roach has responsibility for the QB (big assumption here)

Nope. They’re taught gaps, not covering a specific man, and you have their gaps mixed up. 

On 10/12/2019 at 6:10 PM, David Dennison said:

Looks to me like Mitchell sucked real bad on that play.

Also no. He played his assignment perfectly, he got to his gap and broke down, giving Hurts a give read, which should have been a 3 yard loss. if Roach stays home, the RB runs right into him unblocked. Mitchell also reacted pretty quickly by realizing Roach fucked up and chased down a faster RB. 

On 10/12/2019 at 9:38 PM, dingleberryswitzer said:

Yea looks like the DE and LB were frozen by the option look.  Neither were blocked.  LB hesitated, then it was too late.

They weren’t frozen.  The defensive play is to break down in their gaps, which both did. Roach just needed to stay home. Mitchell wasn’t hesitant, he did what he’s supposed to do in the correct play call for that play. 

On 10/13/2019 at 8:19 AM, Jkwellborn said:

Mitchell took a bad angle. Blown assignments. They happen. The DE can’t chip the rb if his responsibility is the qb. He has to take the qb.

Poor defensive scheme.

Also wrong. Mitchell didn’t take a bad angle. He covered his gap like he’s supposed  to. After executing the play correctly, he was in a bad spot to chase down a guy in a gap he wasn’t responsible for.

21 hours ago, Jkwellborn said:

It’s possible that Roach had the rb and Mitchell the qb, because it looks like Mitchell comes downhill in the gap. It looks like it would be that way, but you can’t tell in a clusterfuck like that.

It’s not a cluster fuck at all. It’s pretty obvious what was happening. 10 guys did their job and Roach got over excited on the first play of the game.  This is what makes Lincoln’s offense so hard to stop. He gives 3-5 options on every play and makes the D pay for screwing up any one of those 5 or so options. It’s why almost no defense has had much success against him at all in the last three years. He’s the best offensive coach in football by a good margin and people should also take that into account that when trying to jump on Orlando for very single mistake in this game. A decent amount of mistakes are exploited against every DC who faces Riley. 

21 hours ago, David Dennison said:

It sure looked like Mitchell had the RB and he bit on the QB, thus leaving his assignment.

 

Still no. It’s not a man scheme. No one “has the RB” pre-snap.

21 hours ago, bschoolprof said:

Roach had outside contain and thus the rb. Mitchell had the qb keep back up the middle. Both were tentative and look poorly coached. Orlando’s implementation of this scheme sucks.

They weren’t tentative. They’re coached to break down in their gaps. If Roach had been half a second “more tentative,” then it’s a 3 yard loss. 

20 hours ago, longhornmatt said:

I don’t have the gifs, but I’d like to see our alignments on OU’s last couple of drives when they just ran sweeps to the right over and over.  I’m pretty sure we were outnumbered to that side with no overhang defender to set the edge - including on their last first down to end the game when we should have been selling out to stop the run.

The play in the OP is guys blowing assignments, but there also seem to be a number of plays where we are destined to fail based simply on alignment.  Teams with talent on offense can basically run off tackle on us at will by just adding one blocker in the backfield - whether it’s an H-Back or running the QB and freeing up the RB to occupy a defender.   Our “strategy” to defend that seems to basically just be asking the safeties to run it down and hope they make an open field tackle before it’s too far downfield.

This whole 3 tite defense just seems like madness to me.  Here is an article that explains the basics of why it’s being adopted and what it’s trying to prevent.  

https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2019/2/5/18205641/tite-front-defenses-explained

It’s whole reason for existence is primarily to get an extra LB/NB off the line of scrimmage to help against RPOs.   To compensate, you have all 3 defensive lineman and two inside backers plug the inside gaps to stop the inside run.  

You sacrifice your entire pass rush, and you don’t set an edge at the LOS on at least one side (or both sides, with the way we usually align), and this is basically all just to defend against a single RPO concept.  How about you just tell your DBs to play with inside leverage and actually try to cover a fucking slant so it’s defended even if the LB bites on the run in an RPO rather than sabotaging everything else about your defense to stop one play?  How does this work against any offense with talent unless they are Georgia lining up in the I formation and stupidly running inside at the tite front over and over?  

You will note how the NFL is NOT running this defense, because not having a pass rush seems retarded to them.  Go figure.

 

It’s a good scheme. A lot of good DCs run this scheme. Orlando’s coaching of it is a different story. 

Also, it wasn’t developed solely for the RPO. It’s a scheme that has risen In popularity particularly due to spread offenses. Just because you don’t understand how it works doesn’t mean it’s a horrible scheme.
 

20 hours ago, bschoolprof said:

Yes, Jones looks like dogshit here, but the fault lies primarily with his coaches and what they are asking/telling him to do.  I'd love Orlando to walk us through how he wants his players to defend the counter in that first clip given our alignment.  It's pure madness.  

The first play was bad alignment for the counter. The second play was a fine play call. Jones should’ve kept outside contain and the play gets stopped for like 3 yards. Him jumping inside when the ILB was engaging the lead blocker killed the play and there’s no explanation for him doing it, other than he’s only played nickel for like two weeks now. 

Orlando hasn’t done a good job of teaching his guys things like leverage and containment. Often times, we’ve had guys in position to make plays (i.e. a good play call/scheme) and they fail to keep contain and we give up a huge gain. Still Orlando’s fault but not for the reason a lot of people aren’t pointing to.

Another big criticism for Orlando is how much he moves his guys around. Roach should’ve started at DE last year over Hager, instead of wasting a year learning LB. Orlando needs to keep his safeties in one spot, instead of moving them around so much. It makes it really difficult for them to know and execute their assignments when they’re loved around this much. IMO, all offseason should’ve been Foster at Joker, Jones at Nickel and Brown and Sterns deep, but even if Orlando picked different spots for those guys, he needs to more consistently rep them at their spots, so they can really learn their position and the scheme. 
 

19 hours ago, dcar00 said:

losing Roach was a killer.  go to 4 DL, bracket Lamb and make hurts beat you.  but we can't because we are married to our scheme.

Lulz. We would’ve gotten murdered with 4 down and bracketing Lamb every play. OU’s offense is way too good to only have 5 available players to cover all their other options. Riley, especially with a running threat at QB, spreads you thin and makes you execute at every single position. 1/11 mis-executing and it’s a big play. That’s what makes Riley so good and there’s no way 4 down linemen and bracketing Lamb would ever work. 

10 minutes ago, ClubWhatever said:

All that can be boiled down to Roach has to make the tackle or else it's a guaranteed 10+ yard gain.  We knew last year at Game 1 that Roach doesn't have the mobility to make that kind of play.  And yet there he is.

What are you talking about? This wasn’t a mobility issue. Roach was right fucking there. His problem was that he moved, not that he had a lack of mobility to make that play. 

Edited October 14, 2019 by Burt Macklin

[MonkeyDoughnut 10150]

IMO the problem is Orlando has overwhelmed them into thinking and not playing. In HS and below, Roach would have blown the RB up without even thinking. Now he's hesitating which for an offensive player is ok but it's deadly for a defensive player.

You see play after play players hesitating.

[El Hornarino 371]

^They have to calculate a double integral to figure out which assignment they have for each play.

Edited October 14, 2019 by El Hornarino

[Burt Macklin 19000]

4 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

IMO the problem is Orlando has overwhelmed them into thinking and not playing. In HS and below, Roach would have blown the RB up without even thinking. Now he's hesitating which for an offensive player is ok but it's deadly for a defensive player.

You see play after play players hesitating.

This isn’t about hesitation. Roach’s issue was that he needed to be patient for a half-second longer. Roach has to read the mesh point. There’s not a DE in the country taught to blow the RB up before the mesh point on that play.  

Hell, Estelle blew the RB up last week against WVU without thinking at the goal line and everyone ranted at Orlando for not teaching his players to contain on those plays. 

[LTtxfan 49007]

10 minutes ago, El Hornarino said:

^They have to calculate a double integral to figure out which assignment they have for each play.

 

[Laga4 1270]

On 10/12/2019 at 6:01 PM, bschoolprof said:

Can someone tell me how this is supposed to work?

 

Looks pretty easy to beat that formation. 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

3 hours ago, Burt Macklin said:

This is why it’s pretty much impossible to have a reasonable discussion about coordinators/play calling on message boards. It’s a bunch of people who have no idea what they’re seeing and are just angry the team gave up big plays. Orlando has a lot of issues, primarily the lack of development of young guys in his scheme for two years. Orlando needs to show improvement by the end of the season, or he should go, but people have been whining even after solid performances, like OSU. Most people on here whine about play calls they don’t understand, when the bigger issues are players understanding Their responsibilities and being assignment sound. A lot of the plays people have complained about (besides 3rd and 17 of course) have been much less about play calling and much more about players failing to execute or honor their assignments. 

It’s actually pretty clear. Roach has outside contain, like JBJ explained, while Mitchell has the inside gap. They’re playing a gap, not a man, so they both initially breakdown where they’re supposed to, but Roach gets impatient and loses his mind to dive inside, leaving no one for the RB and forcing Mitchell to ditch his gap and now chase down a faster RB. 
 

the play call was perfect for that run and if Roach just stays home for half a second longer, it’s a negative play. Like I mention later, if Roach had played DE last year too, maybe he makes this play. Instead, he gets over excited and doesn’t trust that the LB, Mitchell, will hold up his responsibility on the play, even though he actually did. 

Nope. They’re taught gaps, not covering a specific man, and you have their gaps mixed up. 

Also no. He played his assignment perfectly, he got to his gap and broke down, giving Hurts a give read, which should have been a 3 yard loss. if Roach stays home, the RB runs right into him unblocked. Mitchell also reacted pretty quickly by realizing Roach fucked up and chased down a faster RB. 

They weren’t frozen.  The defensive play is to break down in their gaps, which both did. Roach just needed to stay home. Mitchell wasn’t hesitant, he did what he’s supposed to do in the correct play call for that play. 

Also wrong. Mitchell didn’t take a bad angle. He covered his gap like he’s supposed  to. After executing the play correctly, he was in a bad spot to chase down a guy in a gap he wasn’t responsible for.

It’s not a cluster fuck at all. It’s pretty obvious what was happening. 10 guys did their job and Roach got over excited on the first play of the game.  This is what makes Lincoln’s offense so hard to stop. He gives 3-5 options on every play and makes the D pay for screwing up any one of those 5 or so options. It’s why almost no defense has had much success against him at all in the last three years. He’s the best offensive coach in football by a good margin and people should also take that into account that when trying to jump on Orlando for very single mistake in this game. A decent amount of mistakes are exploited against every DC who faces Riley. 

Still no. It’s not a man scheme. No one “has the RB” pre-snap.

They weren’t tentative. They’re coached to break down in their gaps. If Roach had been half a second “more tentative,” then it’s a 3 yard loss. 

It’s a good scheme. A lot of good DCs run this scheme. Orlando’s coaching of it is a different story. 

Also, it wasn’t developed solely for the RPO. It’s a scheme that has risen In popularity particularly due to spread offenses. Just because you don’t understand how it works doesn’t mean it’s a horrible scheme.
 

The first play was bad alignment for the counter. The second play was a fine play call. Jones should’ve kept outside contain and the play gets stopped for like 3 yards. Him jumping inside when the ILB was engaging the lead blocker killed the play and there’s no explanation for him doing it, other than he’s only played nickel for like two weeks now. 

Orlando hasn’t done a good job of teaching his guys things like leverage and containment. Often times, we’ve had guys in position to make plays (i.e. a good play call/scheme) and they fail to keep contain and we give up a huge gain. Still Orlando’s fault but not for the reason a lot of people aren’t pointing to.

Another big criticism for Orlando is how much he moves his guys around. Roach should’ve started at DE last year over Hager, instead of wasting a year learning LB. Orlando needs to keep his safeties in one spot, instead of moving them around so much. It makes it really difficult for them to know and execute their assignments when they’re loved around this much. IMO, all offseason should’ve been Foster at Joker, Jones at Nickel and Brown and Sterns deep, but even if Orlando picked different spots for those guys, he needs to more consistently rep them at their spots, so they can really learn their position and the scheme. 
 

Lulz. We would’ve gotten murdered with 4 down and bracketing Lamb every play. OU’s offense is way too good to only have 5 available players to cover all their other options. Riley, especially with a running threat at QB, spreads you thin and makes you execute at every single position. 1/11 mis-executing and it’s a big play. That’s what makes Riley so good and there’s no way 4 down linemen and bracketing Lamb would ever work. 

What are you talking about? This wasn’t a mobility issue. Roach was right fucking there. His problem was that he moved, not that he had a lack of mobility to make that play. 

unclear.

are you Jimmy & Joes or Xs & Os? 

[MonkeyDoughnut 10150]

2 hours ago, Burt Macklin said:

This isn’t about hesitation. Roach’s issue was that he needed to be patient for a half-second longer. Roach has to read the mesh point. There’s not a DE in the country taught to blow the RB up before the mesh point on that play.  

Hell, Estelle blew the RB up last week against WVU without thinking at the goal line and everyone ranted at Orlando for not teaching his players to contain on those plays. 

Not about blowing up the RB at mesh point, it's about Roach having contain. Only the RB is going outside him, he has to take him and force the action inside. Roach shouldn't be trying to determine who has the ball at this point before engaging.

[Burt Macklin 19000]

8 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

Not about blowing up the RB at mesh point, it's about Roach having contain. Only the RB is going outside him, he has to take him and force the action inside. Roach shouldn't be trying to determine who has the ball at this point before engaging.

Right but that’s not due to hesitation or thinking too much like you said in your first post.

I think it’s Roach being too fired up to start the game and desperately wanting to make a big play right away, so he abandons his assignment to go for where he thinks the ball is going.

[tbone_ 14027]

Burt - thanks for the insight. I appreciate your post.

And now I’m curious, do you have any recommendations for how we can stop blowing ass on defense vs these asswipes?

[Burt Macklin 19000]

1 minute ago, tbone_ said:

Burt - thanks for the insight. I appreciate your post.

And now I’m curious, do you have any recommendations for how we can stop blowing ass on defense vs these asswipes?

Not a whole lot. We have personnel issues, development issues, and coaching issues. There are some tweaks Orlando could make to his scheme/play calling that would help, but a lot of it is guys not making plays they’re in position to make, whether it’s the ball in the air or making tackles.

Sterns was injured during the OSU game, but he gave up outside contain constantly against Sanders when we had LBs trailing the play who would’ve tackled Sanders if Sterns just made him juke inside. We did the same thing last year many times, like against OSU with that slow ass, tall QB. Foster inexplicably jumped inside when we had the play bottled up otherwise. 
 

Overall, there’s a lack of trust/understanding in the scheme by guys. Roach should’ve trusted/known that Mitchell would be in his spot to take Hurts on the first play. Sterns should’ve known that he just needed to keep contain on Sanders (and the coaches should’ve drilled that into him after it happened over and over in the game). This stuff has been happening over and over.
 

Another great example is that second clip at the end of the game, Jones just needs to keep outside leverage. The trailing LB will engage the blocker and shut down the RBs space, but instead Jones jumps inside to engage the blocker for no reason and gives the Rb the outside. That play wasn’t a scheme/alignment issue giving OU the outside. We had one of our best tacklers unblocked to stop the RB for a short gain and he just royally fucks up his assignment. In Jones’ defense, he’s only played Nickel for like 2 weeks now. If he reps at Nickel all offseason, does he make the same mistake? Not sure, but it seems a lot less likely.

Against LSU, Orlando got insanely blitz happy and lost that game because of it ( he believed his CBs would hold up better in coverage, and if they had, many of his calls would’ve worked, but he should’ve been much quicker to realize his CBs wouldn’t hold up) so there was an easy fix from a playcalling standpoint, but he hasn’t done that since then. There’s no magic scheme that will fix a lot of these issues. He does sometimes give up easy plays based on alignment or call a bad play, but those aren’t nearly as systemic or consistent as guys screwing up their assignments and playing unsound defense. 
The clearest answer to fixing the issues is guys better executing their assignments, but that’s a complicated thing to fix if you have all offseason, let alone midseason. This is two years in a row now where Orlando’s defense shows major fundamental flaws by midway through the season. It’s not a good sign. He specifically said after the Tech game last year that they spent their bye working on fundamentals, and the D did show some noticeable improvement in tackling, contain, and leverage after that, so maybe he can do something similar by the TCU game, but even if he can, why does the defense ever have to get to this point for him to do that?

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

What percentage of defensive coordinators have been fired after declaring 'we just have to go back and teach the fundamentals' in the middle of year 3?

close to 100% i would imagine.

[bschoolprof 6233]

I’m starting to come around to Scipio’s conjecture that while Orlando’s scheme is generally ok (save for some odd alignments in various situations), the players have no idea what they are supposed to be doing in that scheme and they play with poor instincts. So it doesn’t really matter what scheme we are running or whether the call is “correct” on the whiteboard. Or, put another way, It doesn’t matter if Orlando knows what to do if the players don’t. We’ve had these issues for some time now, and it seems unlikely they will magically get fixed.

[dcar00 14036]

6 hours ago, Burt Macklin said:

 

Lulz. We would’ve gotten murdered with 4 down and bracketing Lamb every play. OU’s offense is way too good to only have 5 available players to cover all their other options. Riley, especially with a running threat at QB, spreads you thin and makes you execute at every single position. 1/11 mis-executing and it’s a big play. That’s what makes Riley so good and there’s no way 4 down linemen and bracketing Lamb would ever work. 

 

Lulz.  we got murdered anyway after Roach went down.  Hurts was the only thing keeping us in the game.  my problem is we don't even have an option to go 4 DL(yes I know we are thin) or to at least show some multiple fronts.  at least we could hopefully cut down on the RB's running free around our end like it is a Jr high A/B Scrimmage. its apparent after  2 years of this asshattery against spread teams(even marginal ones) that Orlando can't teach it to the level it needs to be executed against good teams. I'm not saying he's horrible by any stretch but we had to make OU throw while covering Lamb to win.  instead we gave up 7 yards a carry again.

we had the first year blip when opposing coaches don't have film(this bit TH this year to some extent, regardless of the PC coach speak).  

Good news is he can show us he's not horrible by manhandling the rest of the jags on our schedule and get another crack at those fucks.

[dcar00 14036]

on the play check the false step by the pulling lineman as he gets to the hole(for hurts if he keeps).  Its almost like it is designed to fool Roach into thinking it is keep.

we have 2 guys completely unblocked on the play and we can't get to the RB.

[The Whistler 14]

Ok professor Macklin, you know a bunch.  But if I were a drunk fan playing Roach/Coach, I would blow up the mesh point.  At minimum, if a known team is shown to play ZR, I will have a man designated to blow up the QB (even if we're a gap assignment team) just to send a message.  Doesn't matter who has the ball, hit someone. And if we're force to play gap integrity, hit someone in your gap irregardless of who has the ball (in ZR).  Quite frankly, I don't know why this doesn't happen more in college FB -- it's as if the defenders are waiting until the handoff/keep to make a decision. Drunk fan says F that noise.

Edited October 15, 2019 by The Whistler

[Jkwellborn 6657]

10-15 years ago more people played that type of assignment football it seems. It wasn’t getting cute like now. You had the fullback dive, I had the rb, he had the qb.