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Want to Be A Good DB? Find Yourself A Weave

There are many steps to becoming a top notched defensive back.  Many of those steps have been covered in the many articles that have been written on this blog and placed in my member’s area on this site.

One of the more overlooked aspects of playing defensive back these days,  especially for corners is the backpedal.  More and more,  players and coaches are opting to just have their players turn to the side to cover wide receivers.  You know who is enjoying that the most?  Wide receivers.  Nothing excites a wide receiver more than to getting you turned to a side so they can have easier access to your back where human beings,  as of now,  don’t have eyes.

There’s a reason that I  called my company All Eyes DB Camp.  The most important tool you have as a defensive back are your eyes.  The best way to keep both eyes on a wide receiver and or quarterback is to remain square.  This goes for cornerbacks and safeties.

Why do cornerbacks need a good weave?  For starters,  it is essential when playing in off man coverage.  Often times,  in their routes,  wide receivers will stem the defensive back.  Stem means when a wide receiver works against your leverage either inside or outside to gain an advantage before they make their break.  If a wide receiver can successfully get inside of you on an inside route before they make their break,  they can ensure that you will behind them when the ball comes.  If they can successfully get outside of you on an outside route before they make their break,  they stand a really good chance of getting separation and to the football before you do when it’s thrown.

With that being the case,  having a good weave can put you in better position to hold your leverage and defend routes while in coverage.  A weave allows you to move inside or outside of a wide receiver trying to stem you without turning to the side or turning your back.  Why is that important? Because you don’t know which way that wide receiver will break.  Why not give yourself a good chance at breaking left or right when it happens?  Being able to weave gives you that chance.

For safeties who are in charge of covering a tremendous amount of ground when they are lined up either on the hash or in the deep middle of the field,  having a weave can get you to the ball faster.  Being able to move left or right without turning to the side allows a safety get off the hash in either direction with equal efficiency.  Similarly, it allows a safety playing in the post (middle of the field) to get to the numbers on either side equally as fast than turning one way or the other prematurely.

With a good weave,  a safety can move laterally based on the shoulder turns or movement of the eyes of a quarterback without committing one way or the other.  This allows him to force the quarterback to commit to throwing first before he commits to running one way or the other.  Football is a game of inches,  mastering a weave gives the safety a chance to get to a thrown football sooner than if he just simply turned and ran before the ball was actually thrown.

For more on the actual execution of a good weave,  watch this YouTube video I put together below.  If you have any questions,  drop a comment on the video or email me at cwilson@alleyesdbcamp.com.

Want to Be a Better DB? You Gotta Watch Ball Man!

I am sure the generation before me had this same thought but you guys nowadays have it easy.  My generation had betamax and VHS if you wanted to record your television.  If you wanted to listen to your favorite song on an album you had to fast forward and rewind on a tape after you ejected it and flipped it over to the other side.

I did much of my learning about playing defensive back in high school via television.  First of all,  that meant the game I really wanted to see had to be showing in my area that day and I had to be sitting in front of the TV to watch it.  If I had somewhere I had to be then I just missed the game  unless we had something called a VHS that could I record it with.  Of course,  you had to put the recordings on a tape and those cost money.

I would refer to those tapes constantly to gain the information I needed.  When I grew tired of having to fast forward to find the plays and the players I wanted to see in action,  I made highlight reels.  To do that,  I needed two VCR machines.  I won’t go into the ins and outs of what had to be done with the two machines to make the videos just know that it involved time, patience and energy.

This current generation has a load of resources.  First,  you have the ability to see any game you want from the comfort of your own home on any Saturday or Sunday.  Second,  if you missed the game,  you can watch it again on YouTube,  NFL.com or any other number of streaming services.  Moving to the part of the video you want is as simple as clicking ahead on the progress bar or clicking on the 10 second rewind or fast forward buttons.  If I woke up one day in 1980 whatever and had that available to me,  I would have thought I died and went to Heaven.

Yet with all this available to this generation,  too many young DBs don’t simply watch football whether live or on playback.  Saturday or Sunday afternoon finds you on PlayStation or XBox.  I will give it to you,  major distractions like that weren’t available to us in my time.  It would have been tempting.  Ultimately though,  I am fairly certain that my desire to acquire the knowledge would have pulled me away from the distraction and to the games.

To be elite you have to be smart.  To get smart you have to study.  To study,  you have to just sit down and watch games.  You can observe a lot just by watching.  Sit down and watch a full game from time to time.  It is necessary to observe the flow of a game,  how plays are called,  how defenses adapt and how defensive backs operate from play to play,  moment to moment.  Cut ups are great but sometimes you just have to get the feel of a game to learn how to play it.

I realize that our current culture has a lot of  youngsters feeling that they can just drill themselves to greatness.  You feel the more you do drills,  the greater you will become.  That has it’s ceiling.  Ultimately,  your brain gives you the power to institute the moves that you learned from the drill.  You have do drill your brain too.  Drill your brain by just sitting down and watching ball.

Not only should you watch current games but when you are determined to be elite,  watch old games.  Watch games from your youth or games before your time.  Mike Tyson was a vicious physical specimen with a killer mentality.  Ultimately that is not what propelled him to the top of the boxing world.  What did that was his love for the sport of boxing.  That love led him to be a boxing historian who watched hours of tape of boxers that competed before he was born.  In training and in competition,  Tyson understood the reason for every move and moment simply because he had watched the greats before him do it.

Watching old games helps you understand how the game evolved,  why certain players excelled and how you can mold yourself into similar or even superior greatness than them.  It happens subconsciously and you just find yourself making plays.  It will seem like it’s out of the blue but it really comes from the hours of observation of the game, the position and the players.

Studying the now keeps you in tune into to what’s happening.  Studying the past helps you see the future more clearly.  If you want to reach your full potential,  cut the TV on and start watching football.

4 Things You Are Doing Wrong in Your Press Man Stance

If you ever lined up to race someone or stepped in a batter’s box to hit a baseball,  you are aware that before someone yells go or a pitch is thrown,  you could win or lose.  Have your feet in the wrong spot and you will come out wrong in that race.  If you hold that bat in the wrong spot or line your feet up incorrectly and you’ll never touch that baseball with your bat.

In a similar fashion,  your stance in press man can set you up for victory or failure before the ball is even snapped.  With that in mind,  let’s talk about four common mistakes defensive backs make in their stance when they play press man.

(1) Hump in Your Back

Few good things happen in life and athletics when you have a hump in your back.  That means,  shoulders slumped in,  stomach tucked in and hips almost pointing upward.  There is very little power in such a position.  Any athlete in such a stance would find it extremely difficult to deliver a powerful blow with their hands or burst from one spot to another when their spine is throwing up The U.

Can some people survive like this?  Yes.  Would they be better if they didn’t?  Certainly.  A stance made for winning starts with your chest out and your hips facing straight ahead.  Now you can strike with your hands to redirect a wide receiver with some authority.  You wouldn’t slouch your back to squat 300 lbs.  Don’t do it to press a wide receiver.

(2) Feet Too Wide

Don’t send me any old clips of Deion Sanders.  When you are arguably the best athlete to ever play the game,  you can line up with your feet like they are at opposite ends of a surf board.  If not,  take my word for it,  get your feet at or somewhere near shoulder with apart.  You can ill afford to waste time,  pulling your feet back in to plant them,  to redirect them to respond to a wide receiver’s exit move.  You can try just to buck conventional wisdom but who wants to waste the time.  Get your feet under you so you can have some lateral balance.  You must be ready to move with power on those initial moves by the receiver.  You can ill afford to waste time bringing yourself to balance before you go chase the hip.

(3) Too Much Weight on Your Toes

I see this one a lot and some trainers may want to argue with me on this.  Again,  balance is key.  You can not be at the line of scrimmage waiting on your toes for the offense to snap the ball.  You will not be on balance.  If you want to dispute me on this,  go look at a baseball player in the batter’s box or watch a basketball player in front of a player with the ball before they have made their move to the basket.  Neither athlete is up on his toes waiting.  They will have both of their feet firmly planted on the ground.

To effectively push in one direction or the other,  an athlete must have his whole foot on the ground.  One of the most explosive things an athlete can do is dunk a basketball.  To get up in the air,  he will plant his entire foot on the ground to lift up to the basket.  He will not be placing only the ball of his foot on the ground.  Now that you know this,  there is zero advantage to being up on your toes like you have on high heels waiting for a wide receiver to explode off of the line of scrimmage.  If you are a player,  stop doing this.  If you are a coach,  stop coaching this.  It puts the DB at a disadvantage. If nothing else,  you run the risk of losing your balance waiting for the snap and taking a false step at the time the ball is actually snapped.

(4) Not Low Enough

Now this can be flexible,  to a point.  When I am working with new defensive backs,  I often have to tell them to get lower in their stance.  I also tend to emphasize this more since we are not working with pads on.  Whatever your stance is in shorts,  you will likely be higher with the weight of equipment on.

So why lower in your stance?  You have to effectively load your quads and hamstrings to push out left, right or back.  There’s no way around that.  There’s the old saying ‘if you stay ready,  you never have to get ready.”  If you are too high in your stance,  you will have to bend anyway once the WR moves so that you can load the leg muscles to push in the necessary direction.  So do you want to waste the extra half second doing that or do you want to save yourself that precious time by already having the proper depth?

The other thing that being low enough gives you is horizontal balance.  If you’re too high at the line,  there’s a chance a wide receiver can come off the line into you and put you on your back.  It’s not a move they do often but they will do it.  If it’s done to you once,  you will never ever want it to happen again.  God forbid if it’s on film and hits the dozens of social media networks hungry for content.

Your stance in press man is about power and comfort.  Practice the first part so that you can achieve the second part with the proper alignment.  Practice being lower, with your feet closer together,  with your chest out and your feet under you.  Get comfortable doing that so that when the time comes,  your comfort level exists in a stance that readies you for success.

For more on your stance,  check out the video below I put together on YouTube.

Am I A Safety or a Corner?

So you are young in the game of football or perhaps your coach has moved your over to the dark side (aka defense).  Perhaps you have been contemplating a move to the side of the ball where aggression is not frowned upon (also known as defense).  Your athletic traits say you should play in the secondary but where exactly?  This article will help you answer that question.

I know what you are thinking.  You are thinking this article is going to be about what physical traits matchup with each position.  Wrong.  There are  plenty of articles and videos out there about that topic written by amateurs and professionals alike.  What my experience as a coach has taught me is that whether you are a safety or a corner really has more to do with your mentality.  What part of the game and in particular playing defense,  really lights your fire.  When you have figured that out as a player,  you will likely make all the other things work.

There have been cornerbacks that have thrived at the position when they did not have the ideal speed or size.  Likewise for safeties.  What I have noticed for those guys has been an undying passion for what it is they do.  This is why I say that where your heart lies is where your feet should also.  With that being the case what are those mental attributes you need to examine to determine whether you are a corner or a safety?

(1) Do You Love to Tackle?

Notice I didn’t ask if you if you like to tackle.  I asked you if you love it.  If you love tackling then most likely you are a safety.  Yes,  when playing defense,  everybody has to want to tackle but when it comes down to loving it,  that’s not most cornerbacks but it’s most likely most safeties.  When that 200+ lb. back comes roaring through the gap that the linebacker failed to fill,  it’s the safety who has to be there to get him on the ground and give the defense another chance.  To do that,  it’s best that you love tackling.  When wide receivers are feeling real comfortable running across the middle,  is your instinct to want to jump in front of them to bat the ball down or lower your shoulder into their ribs so they are less enthusiastic about bending a route into the middle of the field?  If your answer is the latter,  you might be a safety.

(2) Do you Love 1-on-1 Match-ups?

If the part of the game that excites you is lining up against another man play after play and keeping his hands off of the football then you might be a cornerback.  Some guys just love the feeling that gives them.  Some guys just thoroughly enjoy studying a guy’s every move and foiling his plans come game day.  If that’s you then corner may be where your passions will meet it’s purpose.  At safety you aren’t often put in that situation.  There may be times where you are called upon to match-up on a tight end all game because he’s a menace but by and large you are taking a view of the whole offensive unit and must divide your focus not only between a set of wide receivers and the quarterback but the other team’s ground game as well.  Following around a guy like you are on a FBI sting typically is a job for a cornerback.

(3) Do You Love X’s and O’s?

If you play for me,  everyone has to get in their playbook and study film.  However,  just because I or a coach makes you do it,  doesn’t mean you will love it.  If studying playbooks and opposing offenses brings you immense joy then you might be a safety.  As I stated in the paragraph above,  safeties are responsible for dissecting an entire offense.  Everything from the split of the wide receivers to the alignment of the offensive line gives you clues about what is to come.  From your position directly in front of the offense,  you can observe all of those things and plan accordingly.  Safeties typically have one of the highest football IQs on the defense.  Cornerbacks typically just want to know what the coverage is and go about their business.

(4) Do You Love Running?

On good defenses,  everybody runs but nobody does more running than a cornerback.  This is especially so if your team is running a heavy press man scheme.  Press man means that you are running no matter what.  It can be a fullback dive and that miserable back up wide receiver is going to sell you on that go route that’s not coming.  Loving running doesn’t mean you have to be a track star.  It simply means that you don’t mind doing it play after play.  For cornerbacks,  there’s also nothing like that run play to the opposite side of the field that you have to go run down followed by a trip to the huddle to hear the call “Cover 1” come in for the next play.  When that happens,  you better love running because that’s what you will be doing.

Being a safety doesn’t mean you won’t run.  It doesn’t mean you don’t like to run but it does mean that you will do less of it than a corner.  From your position,  often in the middle of the field,  you are closer to the action.  You are also often looking in at the play and can throttle it down when the back is stopped cold at the line of scrimmage.  A corner in man coverage does not have that luxury.  I will say this,  if you don’t like running,  do not,  I repeat,  do not play corner.

(5)  Do You Love Communicating?

When I say communicating I am not talking about talking trash.  I mean do you like relaying information to others from things you observe.  One of the stark differences between corners and safeties is this component.  By and large cornerbacks find it hard to communicate formations, movements, etc. as they like to be locked in on the man or men that are lined up fairly close to them.  Safeties, on the other hand,  typically like seeing the formations, alignments, motions, etc. and communicating to the rest of the defense.  Safeties are in the advantageous position of being directly in front of the offense and yards back where they can see the total picture.  Being able to communicate what they are seeing is vital to a defenses’ ability to stop a play.  If you enjoy this part of the game then you are more of a safety than you are a corner.

(6) Do You Love Technique?

As I have stated with each of these questions,  they are all important to every position in the secondary.  However,  whether or not you love it will determine where you might excel playing defensive back.  If having perfect technique is something that you strive for then you might be a cornerback.  Cornerback is a more technical position than is safety.   When you are lined up in front of a wide receiver playing man to man as corners often are then it’s basically a battle of techniques.  A slip in your form for even a second and you can find yourself on the wrong side of a long touchdown pass.

On the flip side,  a safety with strong technique will excel but things aren’t as urgent for them where technique is concerned.  An extra step in making a turn or a delay in reacting to a move by the offense and there is time to make it up.  That is less so for the guys on the edges playing closer to the wide outs.  If being obsessed about where your eyes are,  what your feet are doing and where your hands are placed is what drives you to play the game then you might be a cornerback.

There you have it.  As I have said before in posts on this website,  80% of this game is mental.  So with that in mind,  whether or not you are a safety or a corner has more to do with your mental approach as opposed to your physical traits.  When you love something,  you will be surprised at the lengths you will go to in making it happen.  If you can truly answer yes to all of the questions I asked in this article then congratulations you are either an A1 player or on your way to being an A1 player that can line up at safety or corner.  Now you can start taking assessment of what your physical traits may be and how they matchup with the duties of either position.

 

Know Your DB History: Dre Bly

I have a treat for all of my sub 6 footers playing corner today.  This one is long overdue but it is here now.  If there was one guy that played this game that knew how to get his hands on the football consistently,  it was the one featured in this post.

Lost and forgotten in the era that saw Deion Sanders and Rod Woodson give way to Champ Bailey and Charles Woodson into Darrelle Revis and Richard Sherman was a 5’9 7/8′ cornerback out of North Carolina named Dre Bly.

How was Dre Bly introduced onto the scene?  As a redshirt freshman at the University of North Carolina when he pulled down 11 interceptions earning him All American honors.  Only five people in history have done so in their freshman seasons and Bly is one of them.  Over the next two seasons at North Carolina,  Bly tallied up nine more interceptions and left college as the Atlantic Coast Conference’s all time leader in interceptions with 20.  Alphonso Smith of Wake Forest would later break that record with 21.

Bly came to North Carolina in 1996 out of Western Branch high school in Portsmouth Virginia where not only was he an all state football player but an elite baseball player as well.  Bly would obtain first team All American honors twice while at North Carolina in both his freshman and sophomore years.  He’s the only player in ACC history to be a consensus All American twice in his career.

After three season in Chapel Hill,  Bly entered the NFL draft.  His lack of eye popping workout numbers (5’9 7/8″ 186 lbs. 4.51 (40) and 35 in. VJ) kept Bly out of the first round and ended up being the 41st pick in the 1999 NFL draft by the St. Louis Rams.  Though he was rarely a starter for the Rams during his four years with the club,  Bly had big production.  Over his four years,  he started just 25 games but had 14 interceptions.  He returned three of those interceptions for touchdowns and totaled 247 yards in interception returns.  In his rookie season,  the Rams won the Super Bowl.   After four seasons,  Bly left the Rams and signed with Detroit where he became a full time starter.

Bly spent four seasons in Detroit and averaged nearly five INTs per season.  He returned two of his 19 picks for touchdowns and made the Pro Bowl twice.  He was also an All Pro in his first season with the Lions.

Bly would then move on to Denver for two seasons pulling in 7 interceptions there and then three INTS in 2009 as a member of the San Francisco 49ers.  Bly would eventually resign with Detroit in 2010 before retiring that year.

In all,  Bly would total 43 interceptions in his career which is more than names like Lester Hayes and Darrelle Revis.  Bly would also score 8 touchdowns as a pro while tallying up 652 interception return yards.  In 2014, he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame.

Currently,  Bly is the cornerback’s coach for the North Carolina Tar Heels.

 

Two Hand or One Hand Jams in Press Man?

I often get asked this question about press man coverage.  “Coach do you prefer two hand or one hand jam in press man?”  My answer initially is typically one people don’t like.  “It depends”.   This article explains.

First of all,  when it comes to coaching defensive backs,  every coach has his own way.  Some coaches are sticklers for their particular technique.  Others will let you do your thing as long as it is working.  Today,  I am going to talk to you about what worked for me as a player,  what I taught as a coach and what I instruct now as a trainer.

My mode of thinking on this is simple.  When a receiver is close enough to you for you to touch him,  whether or not you use one hand or two hands to jam him depends on his positioning.   If the wide receiver is within your frame (i.e. directly in front of you) then use two hands to jam him.  For those worrying about your hips getting locked because you threw two hands,  understand that this does not matter because the wide receiver is directly in front of you.  We don’t know whether he’s going right or left.  Obviously,  using two hands allows you to gain better control over the wide receiver than using one.  The logic is that if he is directly in front of us,  use all that we can to control him.  This is an ideal position.

It makes little sense,  in my opinion,  to use one hand to jam a WR directly in front of us when we don’t know which way he’s going.  Throwing one hand in that situation almost commits us to opening one way and that way could be the wrong way.

So now that we have established that,  when do we use a one hand jam?  You don’t have to be a genius now to figure this one out given what we’ve just discussed.  We use one hand on the jam when the WR has exited outside of our frame (i.e. moved outside of our shoulders either to the left or right).  To get into their route,  a WR will typically exit outside of you left or right unless he’s a tight end who his trying to run right over you.

So with that in mind,  when the WR exits and he is close enough,  it is time for us to use one hand in our jam.  Which hand do we use?  We use our off hand (i.e. the hand further away from the WR).  Why do we use the off hand?  We do so because it is now that we do not want to lock our hips.  By using our “off hand”,  we allow our hips to open so that we can kick slide at a 45 degree angle and move in a way that keeps us in close contact with the WR.

If we use the hand nearest to the WR,  our hips get locked.  When that happens we can not slide at a 45 degree angle and we put ourselves at a disadvantage when it comes time to open up and run down the field.  If we shoot the near hand to make contact with a WR that is outside of our frame, we will lose precious steps upon our turn should the WR continue up the field as expected.

The purpose for us in jamming once the WR exits our frame is to touch him if he’s close enough while also keeping our body in a position to turn and run effectively should the route continue on that path.

Fairly cut, dry and simple.  I have included a video below with more on this to give you a visual and a few more tips on using your hands to jam at the line of scrimmage in press man.  Enjoy it and should you have any questions,  feel free to reach me via email at cwilson@alleyesdbcamp.com

Should I Move to DB?

Many times I get asked in via email and DM if an athlete should move to defensive back.  As much as I get asked that question,  I am pretty sure there are many other guys who are asking that same question in their own heads.  Today I am going to use this article here to address it.

First,  I will start off by saying,  I grew up wanting to be a running back.  The first individual player that I ended up liking was a running back for the Los Angeles Rams named Wendell Tyler.  You young guys are going to have to google that name,  it’s not widely known.  Wendell was a double whammy for me.  He played for my favorite college football team at the time (UCLA Bruins) and was also playing for my favorite NFL team (Los Angeles Rams). There was just something about that blue and gold I guess.

There was also something about putting the ball in a guy’s hands,  making a whole bunch of defenders miss with sharp cuts and athleticism then having the crowd cheer for you as you scored a touchdown.  Soon my all time childhood football idol came along for the Rams in the form of Hall of Famer Eric Dickerson.  Dickerson was Wendell Tyler x 10.  So,  by the time I started playing organized football,  I was all about being a running back.  To make a long story short,  I developed into a pretty good running back but I had a friend who was certain that I would make an even better defensive back.  He was persistent about it and as I matured in the game,  there were coaches who made the same observation.  By the time I started getting recruited to go to college,  the move seemed clear and Deion Sanders had come along to add some pizazz to playing cornerback.

For many of you,  the dilemma is still raging on inside your head so here are four things for you to consider when deciding if you should move to defensive back.

Are You A Good Athlete?

Sure,  football in general requires you to be an athlete.  However,  the best athletes on the football field are the defensive backs.  Don’t try to debate me on this you wide receivers!  Special teams units are loaded with defensive backs for that reason.  Sure you can survive at defensive back if you aren’t the greatest athlete but it’s going to be tough.

You give yourself a much better chance to be a playmaker and to handle the many responsibilities of defensive back if you can move your feet fast,  have reasonable speed and jump + change direction.  These are major requirements for the position.

Are You Undersized at Your Other Position?

Like me,  while I was a good enough athlete to play running back at a high level in high school,  my days were probably numbered.  I graduated from high school at a whopping 163 lbs.  That does not make for a long life at running back.  Perhaps you are a decent athlete playing linebacker at 185 lbs.  Or you are a defensive end at 200 lbs.  who is likely not going to grow anymore.  If you have some smarts and good feet,  you may benefit from a transition to the secondary.  Depending on your level of athleticism,  you can play cornerback or safety.  Commit yourself to studying the position and you can be making a transition that could extend your playing career.

Not Featured on Offense?

Are you playing offense but you are hiding in the shadows? Do you think that your athletic talent is not being realized and utilized on the offensive side of the ball?  Are you the back up tailback that never really gets any carries?  Are you the 3rd option as a wide receiver on all of the pass plays?  Are you in high school playing wide receiver for a team that throws the ball 10 times a game?  This might be a fine time to flip over to the dark side.

Perhaps it’s being selfish or it’s just being smart.  Why ride the pine if you are a worthy athlete that loves playing if you can move over to defensive back and help your team keep points off the board ?  You may love offense like I did as a youngster but trust me,  when you start making plays on defense,  you will break up with your girlfriend offense and marry a strong woman named defense.  If you are a good athlete like I mentioned before,  strongly consider it.

Are You Naturally Aggressive?

Defense is the part of football that is about toughness.  Sure there are some offensive teams and systems that require roughness but basically all successful defenses require aggression.  If being aggressive is in your DNA,  perhaps you were born to play on this side of the ball.  If you are of the correct size and have the required speed + agility,  a move to defensive back could change your career.  The more aggressive position in the secondary out of cornerback and safety is safety.   However,  aggressive cornerbacks can be tremendously successful.  If you possess cornerback traits and are aggressive,  make that move.  If you are more of a safety type that won’t mind coming up and hitting running backs and tight ends,  then give moving to safety a thought.

The most recent 2020 NFL draft produced 48 defensive back draft picks.  This was easily the most heavily drafted position as it is every year.  There are five offensive lineman on the field,  usually four defensive lineman on the field and many times four wide receivers.  Despite that,  defensive backs have consistently outpaced those positions and others when it comes to getting drafted.  So what I am saying is that there is a demand for defensive backs.  If you can answer yes to one,  some or all of the questions I have asked in this article then you may be ready to meet that demand with a position change.

Do You See What I See? Great Secondaries Watch Film Together

I was in a game vs. a rival once.  Of course,  because it was a rivalry game,  I wanted to do well.  As such,  I did my fair share of film watching that week.  I would often look for situations that I could either take advantage of or plays I needed to know were coming so I wouldn’t get caught with my pants down.

One particular play caught my eye that week.  One of the wide receivers for the other team was a supreme route runner.  He had a post corner route that was practically un-guardable unless you knew it was coming.  I studied like a forensic scientist to determine when that post corner was coming.  One particular situation was in the red zone.   The team would line up in the I formation and they would split as the quarterback took his drop.  That situation was a post corner route every time.  Ok so I am ready!

Well,  sure enough,  the game comes and the team enters the red zone.  Since this play was the bread and butter can’t miss play for them,  they sure enough came out in the I formation.  However,  the supreme route runner who lines up on my side all the time,  lined up on the other side of the field.  As soon as I noticed it,  I start yelling across the field to the corner on the other side.  As it turns out,  he can’t really hear me,  doesn’t know what I’m saying and they get lined up.  Sure enough,  the backs split as the quarterback takes his drop.  Sure enough,  I get a corner route from my wide receiver and I’m on it like the logo on his helmet.  As I look back,  I see the ball is not coming.   My eyes immediately drift to other side of the field.  What do I see?  I see the other cornerback on the ground and the ball in the hands of the supreme route runner.  Touchdown.

A valuable lesson was learned on that day.  A good player does everything he is supposed to do and maybe even a little more.  A great player does all of that but also gets his teammates to do the same.  This is how great units and teams are made.

Football is the ultimate team sport.  In no other sport is your success determined by the performance of your teammates.  What good is being prepared for games if your teammates are not?  They will just attack your teammates and you’ll be left with nothing to do.

One thing I have learned about great secondary units.  Not only are they physically talented and have a tenacious mentality,  they also tend to watch film together.  Had I watched film with the other corner on my team,  he most likely would’ve known this play was coming.  Even if he forgot, we would’ve discussed what kind of hand signal we could use across the field to warn each other that it was coming.  Yelling across the field is not always a good option.  He could have either intercepted the pass, knocked it down or make the QB eat it and have him get sacked.  He also could’ve made the quarterback come off of the throw and come back to my side with a late throw which was going to go 100 yards the other way FOR SURE!

Great secondary units prepare together by watching film,  organizing their thoughts,  putting together alerts and being ready for all the little tactics the offense may unleash during the game.  Over time you can even come up with some of the counter plays the offense might come up with that haven’t been shown on film.

You being great is great.  However,  that is not going to be enough.  If you want to be great great,  bring your teammates with you,  prepare together and be a part of something greater than you and not just the greatest by yourself.

5 Things A DB Should Know Before the Snap

One of the biggest things I stressed as a coach and do now as a trainer is preparation.  Often times when players think about preparation,  they think about offseason work or preparing during the week for the game.  However,  preparation doesn’t just stop there.  Being prepared before the play also gives the maximum chance of being successful.

Here are 5 things a defensive back should know before the snap to be prepared for the play.

(1) Down and Distance

You would be surprised how many times a player lines up before the snap and doesn’t know the line to make for the first down.  It happens and in this day in age of hurry up offenses,  it can happen quite a bit.  Despite the offenses’ tactics,  it is essential as a DB that you know both the down and the distance.

Much of what an offense does is determined by what down and it is and how many yards are needed to get the first.  I would venture to say that everything they do is dependent on that but that’s not entirely true.  However,  you start this during practice.  Hopefully your team makes a note of what down and distance it is during your team and 7on7 sessions.  If they do not,  I would make that suggestion to the coach.  If this still does not happen then I suggest you use your imagination and make up a down and distance.  Anything to get you into the habit of making a note of it before the play.  Your film study should lead you to make reasonable conclusions about what play is coming based on the down and distance.

(2) Personnel

The next thing of importance is who is on the field for the offense.  Has the team come out in three tight ends,  five wide receivers,  two running backs?  This is important to know.  It means everything to your defensive coordinator as he uses that information to know who he wants to be on the field for the defense and then what play to call to stop what he thinks many be coming.  If it’s that important to your coordinator then it’s also important to you.

Not only should you make a note of who is on the field but you should note where they are aligned.  Did they align a guy that is normally outside in the slot?  That should give you a head’s up that something unusual may be coming.  Is the WR lined up in the backfield?  Did they bring the backup QB in as a WR.  You have to sniff out these things so you aren’t caught by surprised.

(3) Formation

Offenses run plays out of formations.  The first thing called in the huddle is the formation.  To run the play they want to run,  they have to be in the right formation.  That’s so basic isn’t it?  Be honest with yourself and realize how many times you lined up and didn’t know the formation.  Now realize that you can never do that again.

Knowing the formation gives you the chance to eliminate possible plays and narrow in on what handful of possible plays may be coming.  It’s also not enough to just know if it’s doubles,  trips or empty.  It’s important to know who is lined up where and then notice the little things like the slot WR being lined up on the ball or the tight end lined up as a wing as opposed to on the line of scrimmage.  Formations are everything,  you simply can’t not know them before the snap.

(4) Splits

Now that you have taken note of those three important things,  you can jump into the advanced stuff.  To run certain plays the way that they want to,  offenses must line players up in certain areas to effectively execute their plays.  Splits mean something.  Offenses are banking on you not noticing them.  Most offenses think the defense is dumb and won’t notice.  Make them the dummies by paying attention.

Is the WR on the numbers,  at the top of the numbers or on the bottom of the numbers?  For you novices,  lined up at the top of the numbers means the player is lined up on the edge of the numbers painted on the field that is further away from the sidelines.  Bottom of the numbers means lined up on the edge of the painted numbers on the field that is closest to the sidelines.  This terminology is derived from watching film as the top and the bottom of the numbers coincides with how the player appears when you are watching the screen.

The splits determine the routes.  Every now and then the offense will try to fool you with a different split but the more they try to fool you,  the bigger the risk they run of not executing their play right.  Believe what you see when it comes to splits.   This also applies to slots and every other eligible receiver on the field (including backs).  A back aligned behind the tackle in a shotgun formation is likely releasing out into a pass route.  A running back aligned seven yards deep in the backfield is most likely going to get the ball on a run play.  Try to notice every little thing you can about positioning of players.  It will allow you to anticipate.

(5) Anticipate Motion

Here is one of the things I would constantly remind my defensive backs of when I was coaching.  Since motion by the offense can frequently lead to a change in coverage and or technique,  anticipating motion can prevent you from being surprised.  Surprise can lead to panic and panic is never good on a football field.

Obviously you need to know the coverage before the play.  However,  also anticipate motion and what the coverage may change to if that motion actually does occur.  Being prepared for that will allow you to stay calm and execute.  This is especially important for safeties as they are responsible for making coverage calls and checks.  As a safety,  you simply can’t get caught by surprise by motion.  Expect it and be ready to make the necessary coverage check.  The entire defense, especially the corners,  are dependent on you making those calls.

So there you have it.  Offseason preparation is important.  Game week preparation is essential but it’s all for naught if you aren’t adequately prepared before the ball is snapped each play in a game.  All of the things I mentioned above can be honed by doing it in practice and can only happen if you study enough film of your opponent.  So get your opponent on your screen right now.

Coverages Explained | 2 Invert

We’ve all heard of Cover 2 as well as 2 man.  Those are common coverages when playing with a 2 high safety defensive scheme.  However,  there are some change ups that you can put on that common Cover 2 and today we will talk about one them called 2 Invert.

In the video at the end of this post,  I go into detail about the coverage in a white board segment that breaks down the responsibilities for everyone in coverage.  In it’s simplest form though,  2 Invert basically involves a change in responsibilities between the cornerbacks and safeties.

The safeties can line up in their normal cover 2 alignment on each hash.  Perhaps they can align a little more shallow than normal at 10-12 yards which would be more similar to a Cover 4 alignment.  Upon the snap,  the safeties move down into the flat area to defend any routes moving into that area.

The cornerbacks who are normally responsible for routes in the flat in Cover 2 will now replace the safeties.  Prior to the snap,  the cornerbacks will retreat back and slightly in.  Upon the snap they get to the hashes and cover 1/2 of the field the way a safety would in Cover 2.

The responsibilities of the other underneath defenders (linebackers and / or nickel-dime backs) pretty much remains the same.  For diagrams and more detail on the responsibilities,  check out the video below from my YouTube Channel.

Any questions or feedback,  feel free to reach out to me via email: cwilson@alleyesdbcamp.com

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