Is a 4-3 the best way to defend the spread?

[march madness]

Im happy the Gophers beat Northwestern. They have had our number. I'm just wondering if they had more athletes, that could run after the catch, what the outcome would be? Watching this game brought back memories of Florida dominating Ohio St in the championship game.

If you play 4 lineman and 3 linebackers against 4-5 receivers you are guarenteeing you will play zone every play. If your linebackers are your best players why not put them in a 3pt stance and let them rush the passer. I think you get your 3 best pass rushers on the field with your two best coverage linebackers. You man up on the receivers and have 2 safeties. You then try blitzes off the corner, up the middle, everywhere. You will give up an occassional draw with the smaller team, but i think it gives you more options on defense.

 

[borninthebarn]

I think you have to get to the QB. There was a huge difference between the times we got pressure and didn't.

A 4-3 with great pass rushers is a great way to defend the spread because your 4 are going to pressure and get to the QB. If you don't have a strong pass-rushing front 4, you need to either blitz or find a way to cover. We didn't really do either much Saturday, but when we blitzed and rushed Kafka he was much less effective.

I think either a 4-3 or a 3-4 can be effective, it just depends on your personnel.

 

[Schnoodler]

The only thing that I thought was glaringly absent was a Mike Blitz probably slightly delayed. Not all the time but occasionally would have kept Kafka a little more nervous.

 

[monk10]

The main difference of the spread vs. the run-shoot is you still have to defend the run. The run-shoot was not evolved enough for anyone to worry about a balanced running game. Most spread offenses want to run the ball 50% of the time. I haven't watched enough of the NU game to know how much of a running threat NU was against us to know if that would been a good idea or not.

 

[grunkiejr]

We played a lot of zone against Northwestern instead of man because it does a better job of protecting us against the big play. We took a bend but don't break approach to defending their passing game. If we were in man consistently you probably would have seen Northwestern take advantage of it by vacating one half of the field and then running a slot WR lined up against a LB in to that half of the field. That is a favorable matchup for the slot WR and if he is able to beat the LB it is probably 6 points.

The thing that makes Northwestern's passing game very hard to defend is that they throw before the DL can get to the QB. They don't try to throw downfield very often instead focusing on routes that are 5 yards and under. Even if a DE comes untouched in to the backfield they have a dump off that they can hit prior to the DE hitting the QB. Last year they had a very weak OL but they managed to lead the Big Ten in fewest sacks allowed because of this strategy. You'll notice when McKinley and Wilhite got to the QB to knock it loose at the end of the game they were in a position where they had to hold the ball longer to get the ball downfield because of the score/time remaining.

Because it is hard to get to the QB with DL I think it makes more sense to run a 3-4 defense to get another LB on to the field which helps in coverage. The 4th LB can play in coverage or he can still rush the passer and if he breaks through he'll get there quicker than the DL that has been removed. Most teams will either play a 3-4 defense (if they have the personnel--bigger DL are needed to eat up blocks allowing the LB's to run free) or a nickel coverage (4 DL, 2 LB, 5 DB's) against a spread offense to get more athletic defenders on to the field.