Inside the Playbook: Pass Protection Schemes

By -
One of the big issues Michigan has been having is in pass protection. If I went into all the complexities and calls of all the different pass protections, you would quickly realize why young players have trouble with this part of the game (to go along with the vast complexities of the run game). There is a reason that offensive linemen are often considered the smartest guys on the field. Well, we're going to go over the basics just to try to get you up to speed a little bit. For briefing sake, there are three different types of blocking schemes: man, gap (zone), and combination.

Man Blocking
BOB. Big on Big; Back on Backer. This is a man blocking scheme that is optimal for many teams because of its ability to get a hat on a hat, an offensive lineman on a defensive lineman, and a back on a preferred LB (if a back is in to block).

First let's look at a world where 5 person blocks exist. Whoever is the uncovered lineman is will be the "double read" blocker. The OL always wants to work to protect against the most immediate threat first. Who that is may depend on defensive tendencies or personal preference, but we're not going to get into that in great depth in this article.

The Big on Big concept will always work to "half-man advantage", that is, a non-center offensive lineman will block a defensive lineman that is lined up directly over top or shaded over him (half-man). Whoever is the bubble offensive lineman (doesn't have anyone over him or shaded outside of him at the snap) will work with the person inside of him (typically an OG and center) to the MIKE (MIKE as defined by the offense, not necessarily the MLB). The center doesn't necessarily follow the half-man concept, he will make a right or left call and that will dictate the blocking scheme

Right Call:
Slide1_medium

Notice here that the OG and the OC can work together to pick up the NT and either the MLB or the WLB. In a 5-man blocking scheme, this is a 2-on-3 blocking scheme that can pick up the entire DL and one interior blitzer. It is important to note though that if both LBs blitz, they can't both be picked up, and must be accounted for with a hot read.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *

To get a more in-depth look at how man pass protection schemes work, and catch up on gap and combination pass protection schemes work, head over to Maize n Brew with the link.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Football Fundamentals: Twins Passing Concepts

By -
Image
In this post we will look at some of the standard route concepts run from a twins alignment. Obviously, these can be paired with other routes (some I'll show including a RB), but this is to get the fundamental understanding of the routes. I'll try to explain the concept briefly, as well as provide names for what you'll hear the concept called elsewhere at times (these things get lots of names, some people use the same names but have different meanings too, so it can get confusing). If a number is visible near the end of a route, that is the nominal yardage the route will be run to. For more information on specific routes, we took a look at the  route tree earlier . In this article I will not discuss routes that utilize rub concepts close to the LOS (such as a switch concept). I will have a later article dedicated to rub routes from a Twins set. Many of these are similar to the TE-Flanker Concepts discussed earlier.
Read more

Football Fundamentals: The Tite Front Defense

By -
Image
The defense du jour against modern spread attacks is what is commonly known as the “Tite” front. Over the past couple years, you’ve seen Big 12 teams run it increasingly often, and SEC and other teams start to incorporate variants of the look more often as well as they begin to deal with an increasing number of spread formations. But what exactly is the “Tite” front? Like any front, say, a 4-3 Under, it isn’t necessarily any one thing. You can have single-high, two-high, or even three-high safeties. You can attach your overhangs differently. And with Tite, it may even mean different box numbers. And of course, there are multiple techniques that can be employed along the way. This post is a primer to the Tite front. At the end, I’ll link some of the better articles that get into greater depth for those interested, but for now, we need to understand the basics, so that we can understand how to attack it.
Read more

Football Fundamentals: 2x2 and Mirrored Passing Concepts

By -
Image
We are going to continue our look at various passing concepts, this time with 2x2 and mirrored passing concepts. In this post we are going to trim out the concepts that are designed to attack the middle of the field and put those into a separate post. 2x2 concepts allow an offense to attack a defense based on post-snap looks and coverages via a simple read of the safety. Completely mirrored concepts, when the same concept is run on the both sides of the formation (such as all-hitches), is something of which I'm not a huge fan, but there are advantages to it. You look at something like all-hitches, which overloads underneath zones, and you see a viable option in the short passing game against zone heavy teams; similarly, completely mirrored concepts can allow you to pick on certain defenders or to a certain side of the field based on defensive look. We'll also look at "base" concepts, which see the outside receivers run the same route, and a third receiver work the mid...
Read more