Defending the Spread Offense

Some people have asked me how we can defend Florida’s spread offense.

Here is my opinion.

Any offense or defense if run to perfection is unstoppable.

With that being said the spread option that UF runs is designed to force an opposing defense to play "straight up" in other words play position football. Most defenses of today use an outside in scheme, they try to force every play that an offense runs to the inside. 99% of the teams use a defense that overloads, either to stop the run or the pass. In this type of scheme you are taught NEVER let the ball get outside of you. The DT is told to come up field and cause havoc (like UT does) and the DE and OLB's try to turn the play in toward the middle. In this scheme the defensive player is taught to keep their blocker on their outside shoulder so that their inside arm/shoulder is free to help force the play in. The CB’s guard the sideline as well and try like the rest of the team to force the play inside.

Now what BAMA runs on defense is an inside out scheme based out of the 3-3-5. In this scheme your DT tries to stuff the middle - sort of block the O-line - but that is a bad way of saying it. Basically the whole D-line tries to hold ground and force the ball out toward the sideline. Then the LB's do the same then the CB's then the Safety's. In this scheme the defensive player is taught to keep their blocker on their inside shoulder so that their outside arm/shoulder is free to help force the play outside. The CB’s play in front of the WR and to the inside. Everyone tries to force the play wide. While in this scheme you will seldom get burnt on a toss sweep for example.

If teams played the traditional power running game today like Nebraska used to we would have the ball rammed down our throats. Basically we are doing on Offense and Defense what the PRO teams do. We try to use speed. One advantage to this is you force more plays to go out of bounds. This limits he Time of possession for opposing teams offenses and helps your offense control the clock. We are not doing anything new – this has been run by most of the NFL Super Bowl teams for the last 25 years or so. Dallas, New England, Tampa Bay, Miami etc etc. Basically we use The 3-3-5 a lot as we have more speed than most. We try to force the play to the outside and run it down. We use our CB's in run support as well as our safety's.

Understand BAMA as a defense wants to spread the offense and force them to go wide. That is why Arkansas was not a good match up for us because they had a huge strong line that wanted to run it up the middle.

Now UF's spread Option is designed to force the defense to spread. They want to go wide. Their offense plays into our strength frankly. As did Auburn's last year (the west coast). See for a long time the major offense was 3 yards and a cloud of dust. (Think Minnesota) - As more offenses go to the west coast and spread offense more teams will be forced to change their defense to be more like ours.

We have been able to recruit guys like Simeon, Keys, Rogers - tall fast guys around 200 pounds, 6 foot tall, and fast as lightning. There are a lot more of these guys than there are guys that are 6'4 300 pounds that run a 4.9 40. You can reasonably find a DE but the Big DT's are very hard to find. Basically 99% of the teams out there run a defense that tries to force things in to the middle - Meyer uses an offense that plays to that weakness and tries to spread the defense out. BAMA however already tries to spread things out so Meyer's offense does not force us to do something different.

When my dad and I coached and just about every coach will tell you that when you force a team to adapt - to change to you then more times than not you will win. For example - Nebraska back when they ran the option was very good. They controlled the ball and the clock. But if you could get them behind and force them to Pass then you probably would win. Arkansas came real close to forcing us to walk more guys up into the box to stop there running game, Minnesota did succeed. That is why you will hear people say that if we can stop the run with our front guys and not have to walk up a safety then we can win. If you can keep your Safety's back - reading the QB's eyes you can get a lot of picks.

The problem IMHO that Meyer's teams will have is they will not be slober-knockerd. Because the offense requires the QB, WR, HB, OL basically everybody to read first then option the play to the correct call. In other words they will be a react offense. The QB may for example have to read to see if he needs to hand the ball off to the HB, Throw the ball, or run to the outside, then when he gets out there he may have to pitch it or keep it or pull up and throw. That is a lot of things that have to go right on a play for it to succeed. Plus you can't miss a read and as the defense gets faster (IE BAMA vs. UK) you have less time to read and react.

Arkansas had a much simpler offense in that they were told put a hat on the guy in front of you and push. The QB then hands it off to the HB or does play action and throws long. Big difference.

I want to say in closing that I think what we do is ahead of the curve in college football. Make no bones about it, more and more college teams will try to spread the field forcing a defense to defend the whole field. Alabama has taken a preemptive strike and has decided to recruit that way. We have been able to sign kids to this scheme, as there are more 200 pound 6 foot guys than big bulky strong fast 6 foot 6 guys. What’s more because 99% of the teams we play use an outside in scheme our offense is used to playing against both styles of defense.

It cannot be underestimated how much of a difference familiarity helps breed success. In a typical 4 down lineman scheme where you try to force all plays inside the guards are covered and the best blocker is the center. He anchors the line, like Minnesota last year. He could help either guard with a double team and then slide out and block a Line Backer. In our 3-3-5 scheme we leave the guards uncovered forcing the center to block the nose tackle and the guards to do a lot more running chasing down the line backers to get a block on them – something that WR’s, TE’s and Full backs do in most offenses. What’s more our nose guard and Defensive ends are assigned a gap – hoping to draw a double team leaving the Line Backers unblocked. This is why Coach Kines has very good linebackers. He develops the defense to the point that the line backers make most of the plays against the run and when they read pass they drop back into a shallow zone helping the CB’s as they cover the short pass to the TE, and HB, as well as the quick little WR screen that LSU burnt us on in their National Championship year.

This “spread defense” relies more on speed than bulk. You have to make tackles and run to the ball. As you spread the play out the other guys hopefully come support. Mis-direction plays are usually good against this type if the defense is not disciplined and does not stay at home. In other words lets say UF does their little option play to the right around the DE. But as they get close to the outside instead of Leak turning it up or pitching it to his trailing halfback he pitches it to Chad Jackson on a reverse. If our backside LB and DE did not stay at home we are toast. You have to play your spot. That is what we do for the most part – we have had breakdowns, like in the Arkansas game. That is something that Meyer’s offense tries to do – account for the whole field even the backside as most of his plays seem to have the ability to go inside our to either side of the line as well as a vertical passing game.

I think we match up better on our defense with Florida, Southern CAL, Texas Tech, all the PAC 10 schools, Spurrier at South Carolina, Auburn etc etc than we do against Tennessee, Southern Miss, Mississippi State and Arkansas. We can still win those games but they will be much uglier. That is one reason why Coach Shula puts such an emphasis on our Offense starting fast – so that we can force teams to throw more than normal – which plays right into our strengths.

Anyway I hope I did not make it to confusing. Maybe I explained it a little.

Of course there are a lot more knowledgeable people than me out there and I may not know jack crap - if I am wrong then I apologize ahead of the time.