Over at Inside Texas we continue to examine the match-ups for Texas against each opponent on the schedule. This time we cover UCLA (free!).
Some of the main points about UCLA include the fact that they have a really solid OL, a potentially great DL, and a future NFL player at QB. Those are more or less exactly where you want to have premium talent on the football field, especially if you can pair it with experienced, if only average, talent at the skill positions and the defensive backfield.
As it happens, the Bruins have a very experienced secondary and some veteran pieces at WR and RB as well. Provided that Brett Hundley is working hard this offseason, and you'd better believe he is since this is essentially a contract year for him, there's the potential that UCLA will be able to build a really strong team around these strengths.
This is probably the 2nd most talented team on the schedule, I'm sure you can guess who #1 is.
Tuesday, July 1, 2014
How LeBron can position himself to win more championships
It's not clear where LeBron James is going to end up for the 2014-15 NBA season, although most signs point to him resigning in Miami for a max deal that will set him up for big earnings on his next contract after the NBA signs a new TV deal and the salary cap is adjusted to reflect the inevitable cash infusion that follows.
Since LeBron James has played in the last four NBA Finals, vowed to win enough rings to require more than one hand to accommodate, and is at a stage in his career where he's drawing comparisons to people like Michael Jordan, it's worth considering what set-up will allow him to continue to accumulate rings.
Building around LeBron James is almost the easiest task a GM could undertake. James can guard anyone on the floor save for pounding low-post players that can exhaust him and limit his effectiveness on the offensive end. He's a phenomenal defensive weapon, especially in the 4th quarter, for erasing an opposing team's best perimeter creator on offense.
On offense, he's developed his game to the extent that you can't sag off him without risking a deluge of jump shots, he can blow by most defenders and finish at the rim, and he's continuing his inevitable evolution into an eventual point-power forward who can facilitate offense from the block as easily as he's done on the perimeter.
Barring major injury, it's likely that LeBron James will be a highly effective player well into his 30's due to his tremendous power, passing, and overall skill that will allow him to thrive in the post even when he can no longer blow by opponents with the dribble.
Lineup flexibility afforded by James' endless skills is huge. The Heat need only surround him with shooters and some players who can protect him from exhausting defensive assignments on the block. They aren't grounded by traditional positional designations because of James' versatility as a defender, ball-handler, and facilitator.
The only kind of player that is easier to build around is a two-way center. A center who can score and pass out of the post on offense and protect the rim on defense is actually easier to build a team around than LeBron James. They are easy to design systems around and they tend to enjoy long careers since they don't rely as much on athleticism. See Duncan, Kareem, Garnett, Parish, Wilt, Russell, Shaq, etc.
You can witness this in Miami's defensive strategy during their four-year Finals run.
Because the Heat lacked a classic rim protector but had an abundance of athleticism thanks to the presence of their big 3, Spoelstra designed a defense that is built around scrambling, trapping, and aggressive play on the perimeter. He leveraged their traits as a team into an elite defensive unit despite not having a classic big man to make things easy on the back end. They aggressively attacked an offenses' first and second options and forced ball movement to players who were less threatening.
Well, this strategy has finally seen it's end. It's been brought down by a combination of beautiful offense by the Spurs that was capable of lighting up the scoreboard by moving the ball to 4th and even 5th options and it was brought down by the decline of Dwyane Wade.
Wade is no longer an elite player and he's too old and broken down to uphold his end of the deal in Spoelstra's defensive strategy. At 29 and 30 years old, James and Bosh aren't going to be able to maintain this strategy for much longer either. Since the Heat are more or less tied down to Bosh and Wade because of their contracts, they have limited options in rebuilding around James. Of course, he leveraged Bosh and Wade into giving up their player options to make big piles of money in 2014 but we can assume that they are going to replace those options with long-term deals that will keep Miami's cap tied to Bosh and Wade.
Since James has become a de-facto GM (and perhaps the most powerful man in the NBA), he has three options for building a championship team around himself:
1) He can run it back with the Heat and new role players
Mario Chalmers, Shane Battier, Rashard Lewis, Udonis Haslem, Michael Beasley, Greg Oden, it's not inconceivable that the Heat could rebuild their bench with players that have something more in the tank than this crew.
Shawn Marion has been mentioned as a possible fit and he could allow Miami to continue their small ball strategies while protecting James from guarding players like David West and instead give that onerous assignment to Marion. They'd also re-elevate their defense to elite levels since Marion is a phenomenal defensive player. At least in the short term, this would be a very effective band-aid.
If the Heat found enough quality players on the discount rack they could even phase Dwyane Wade into a 6th man role in which he still plays 30 minutes a game but he comes off the bench and leads the 2nd unit while James is finally allowed to take breathers in playoff games and doesn't burn himself out and shorten his career.
The problem with this scenario is that the Heat are still married to their exhaustively aggressive defensive strategy if they want to field an elite defense unless they find a rim protector in the scrap heap of the NBA free agent pool. This isn't particularly likely. Rim protectors are precious commodities that are usually highly valued and there aren't a ton of them on the open market. Who could Miami bring aboard that would allow them to move Bosh to power forward and still have an elite defense?
They took a great risk in testing whether Oden could fill that role. He can't, time to move on to a new plan.
2) He can join an explosive offensive team like Golden State or the LA Clippers
Most scenarios in which this happens aren't very likely and will usually involve the Clippers giving away DeAndre Jordan or the Warriors either giving up Bogut or relying on his health. In either event, it's not likely that James would be playing on a great defensive team since Bogut's health is so unreliable and Blake Griffin is hardly a defensive leviathan. Additionally, I'd be curious to see how a team with Griffin, CP3, and James is able to play effectively half-court offense with only 1 ball on the floor.
In any event, James could form an elite offensive team in many different places around the country but they'd be in the same boat as the Miami Heat; forced either to adapt a frantic defensive pace to make up for the lack of a rim protector on the back end or just outscore people. That's not going to win championships, especially if he's in the West.
For the record, offensively I think the best next step for James is to play in a Triangle offense that will make his transition into a post player who dominates into his 30's a much more straightforward task. The Triangle offense accomplished this aim for both Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant after they lost some of their explosiveness, it can do the same for James, perhaps even more so.
3) He can team up with a big man
While Chris Bosh has been the consummate teammate in Miami, adapting his game to fly around the perimeter on defense and give up the post-scoring that made him famous in exchange for 18 footers and corner-3's, he was always one of the iffy parts of the Big 3 formula. Signing Bosh to the max along with two other pricey players made it next to impossible for Miami to support the big 3 with a rim protector as it's simply too costly.
The other iffy part was where Wade was included for huge money despite being an injury-prone perimeter player who overly relies on his athleticism and was approaching the make or break age of 32 in a hurry. We saw how that worked out. It was great for the first four years, now it's falling apart.
LeBron James can't maintain the heavy minute toll of the regular season and playoffs forever, even though he's built like a tank. In addition to transitioning into playing more on the block on offense rather than relying on the dribble, James would greatly benefit from playing in a defensive system that shifted the main burden onto a rim protector on the back end.
The best long-term scenarios for James would be one where his defensive prowess is unleashed playing in front of a good, defensive big man while he's able to take breaks on offense while another player carries the load offensively.
Playing in Chicago with Rose and Noah, in Houston with Harden and Howard, or in Atlanta with Millsap and Horford would represent some of his best options for easing back his burden and creating the opportunity to play for championships throughout his career.
If the Knicks had a better big man than Samuel Dalembert then playing in New York under Phil Jackson's tutelage would be an intriguing option as well.
LeBron James is finally reaching the point in his career where he needs to make further adjustments to his teammates and his game in order to achieve longevity of excellence. He's clearly a very intelligent player as he's stayed in excellent position to do so by evolving his skill set and maintaining contract flexibility. The big question is whether he'll recognize how playing with a big man on defense is the only missing ingredient to filling the rest of his fingers with rings.
Since LeBron James has played in the last four NBA Finals, vowed to win enough rings to require more than one hand to accommodate, and is at a stage in his career where he's drawing comparisons to people like Michael Jordan, it's worth considering what set-up will allow him to continue to accumulate rings.
Building around LeBron James is almost the easiest task a GM could undertake. James can guard anyone on the floor save for pounding low-post players that can exhaust him and limit his effectiveness on the offensive end. He's a phenomenal defensive weapon, especially in the 4th quarter, for erasing an opposing team's best perimeter creator on offense.
On offense, he's developed his game to the extent that you can't sag off him without risking a deluge of jump shots, he can blow by most defenders and finish at the rim, and he's continuing his inevitable evolution into an eventual point-power forward who can facilitate offense from the block as easily as he's done on the perimeter.
Barring major injury, it's likely that LeBron James will be a highly effective player well into his 30's due to his tremendous power, passing, and overall skill that will allow him to thrive in the post even when he can no longer blow by opponents with the dribble.
Lineup flexibility afforded by James' endless skills is huge. The Heat need only surround him with shooters and some players who can protect him from exhausting defensive assignments on the block. They aren't grounded by traditional positional designations because of James' versatility as a defender, ball-handler, and facilitator.
The only kind of player that is easier to build around is a two-way center. A center who can score and pass out of the post on offense and protect the rim on defense is actually easier to build a team around than LeBron James. They are easy to design systems around and they tend to enjoy long careers since they don't rely as much on athleticism. See Duncan, Kareem, Garnett, Parish, Wilt, Russell, Shaq, etc.
You can witness this in Miami's defensive strategy during their four-year Finals run.
Because the Heat lacked a classic rim protector but had an abundance of athleticism thanks to the presence of their big 3, Spoelstra designed a defense that is built around scrambling, trapping, and aggressive play on the perimeter. He leveraged their traits as a team into an elite defensive unit despite not having a classic big man to make things easy on the back end. They aggressively attacked an offenses' first and second options and forced ball movement to players who were less threatening.
Well, this strategy has finally seen it's end. It's been brought down by a combination of beautiful offense by the Spurs that was capable of lighting up the scoreboard by moving the ball to 4th and even 5th options and it was brought down by the decline of Dwyane Wade.
Wade is no longer an elite player and he's too old and broken down to uphold his end of the deal in Spoelstra's defensive strategy. At 29 and 30 years old, James and Bosh aren't going to be able to maintain this strategy for much longer either. Since the Heat are more or less tied down to Bosh and Wade because of their contracts, they have limited options in rebuilding around James. Of course, he leveraged Bosh and Wade into giving up their player options to make big piles of money in 2014 but we can assume that they are going to replace those options with long-term deals that will keep Miami's cap tied to Bosh and Wade.
Since James has become a de-facto GM (and perhaps the most powerful man in the NBA), he has three options for building a championship team around himself:
1) He can run it back with the Heat and new role players
Mario Chalmers, Shane Battier, Rashard Lewis, Udonis Haslem, Michael Beasley, Greg Oden, it's not inconceivable that the Heat could rebuild their bench with players that have something more in the tank than this crew.
Shawn Marion has been mentioned as a possible fit and he could allow Miami to continue their small ball strategies while protecting James from guarding players like David West and instead give that onerous assignment to Marion. They'd also re-elevate their defense to elite levels since Marion is a phenomenal defensive player. At least in the short term, this would be a very effective band-aid.
If the Heat found enough quality players on the discount rack they could even phase Dwyane Wade into a 6th man role in which he still plays 30 minutes a game but he comes off the bench and leads the 2nd unit while James is finally allowed to take breathers in playoff games and doesn't burn himself out and shorten his career.
The problem with this scenario is that the Heat are still married to their exhaustively aggressive defensive strategy if they want to field an elite defense unless they find a rim protector in the scrap heap of the NBA free agent pool. This isn't particularly likely. Rim protectors are precious commodities that are usually highly valued and there aren't a ton of them on the open market. Who could Miami bring aboard that would allow them to move Bosh to power forward and still have an elite defense?
They took a great risk in testing whether Oden could fill that role. He can't, time to move on to a new plan.
2) He can join an explosive offensive team like Golden State or the LA Clippers
Most scenarios in which this happens aren't very likely and will usually involve the Clippers giving away DeAndre Jordan or the Warriors either giving up Bogut or relying on his health. In either event, it's not likely that James would be playing on a great defensive team since Bogut's health is so unreliable and Blake Griffin is hardly a defensive leviathan. Additionally, I'd be curious to see how a team with Griffin, CP3, and James is able to play effectively half-court offense with only 1 ball on the floor.
In any event, James could form an elite offensive team in many different places around the country but they'd be in the same boat as the Miami Heat; forced either to adapt a frantic defensive pace to make up for the lack of a rim protector on the back end or just outscore people. That's not going to win championships, especially if he's in the West.
For the record, offensively I think the best next step for James is to play in a Triangle offense that will make his transition into a post player who dominates into his 30's a much more straightforward task. The Triangle offense accomplished this aim for both Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant after they lost some of their explosiveness, it can do the same for James, perhaps even more so.
3) He can team up with a big man
While Chris Bosh has been the consummate teammate in Miami, adapting his game to fly around the perimeter on defense and give up the post-scoring that made him famous in exchange for 18 footers and corner-3's, he was always one of the iffy parts of the Big 3 formula. Signing Bosh to the max along with two other pricey players made it next to impossible for Miami to support the big 3 with a rim protector as it's simply too costly.
The other iffy part was where Wade was included for huge money despite being an injury-prone perimeter player who overly relies on his athleticism and was approaching the make or break age of 32 in a hurry. We saw how that worked out. It was great for the first four years, now it's falling apart.
LeBron James can't maintain the heavy minute toll of the regular season and playoffs forever, even though he's built like a tank. In addition to transitioning into playing more on the block on offense rather than relying on the dribble, James would greatly benefit from playing in a defensive system that shifted the main burden onto a rim protector on the back end.
The best long-term scenarios for James would be one where his defensive prowess is unleashed playing in front of a good, defensive big man while he's able to take breaks on offense while another player carries the load offensively.
Playing in Chicago with Rose and Noah, in Houston with Harden and Howard, or in Atlanta with Millsap and Horford would represent some of his best options for easing back his burden and creating the opportunity to play for championships throughout his career.
If the Knicks had a better big man than Samuel Dalembert then playing in New York under Phil Jackson's tutelage would be an intriguing option as well.
LeBron James is finally reaching the point in his career where he needs to make further adjustments to his teammates and his game in order to achieve longevity of excellence. He's clearly a very intelligent player as he's stayed in excellent position to do so by evolving his skill set and maintaining contract flexibility. The big question is whether he'll recognize how playing with a big man on defense is the only missing ingredient to filling the rest of his fingers with rings.
Monday, June 30, 2014
Defending basketball on grass: Learning from TCU
Over at SB Nation I examine how TCU designs, structures, and recruits their 4-2 defense to stop HUNH offenses.
TCU's strategies are starting to become mainstream across the league, and you see Kansas St. employ many of the same principles with the aim of building a single defensive package that can stand up to a large variety of opposing tactics.
In theory, if you have 11 players that can work in concert together to make things difficult for the offense regardless of the opposing strategy or plays, you can start to build the kind of chemistry that leads to premier execution.
When football becomes basketball on grass, execution of simple structures becomes the most essential goal in order to achieve victory.
TCU's strategies are starting to become mainstream across the league, and you see Kansas St. employ many of the same principles with the aim of building a single defensive package that can stand up to a large variety of opposing tactics.
In theory, if you have 11 players that can work in concert together to make things difficult for the offense regardless of the opposing strategy or plays, you can start to build the kind of chemistry that leads to premier execution.
When football becomes basketball on grass, execution of simple structures becomes the most essential goal in order to achieve victory.
Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Previewing the 2014 Texas football schedule: BYU
BYU is going to present some challenges to Texas, despite not having the fastest skill players and having to play Texas in Austin. I tackle the Longhorns' week 2 opponent over at Inside Texas and you can read it for free!
In this series, we'll eventually breakdown the potential difficulties or advantages Texas seems to have against every opponent on the 2014schedule including details on:
-Strengths and weaknesses in the opponent's roster
-Particular schemes and strategies that Texas will find easy to exploit or difficult to handle
-Specific formations and lineups that Texas will be contending with
-and overall tactical oversight of how the match-ups are likely to shake out.
You aren't going to find content like this just anywhere and certainly not during the dog days of summer ;)
In this series, we'll eventually breakdown the potential difficulties or advantages Texas seems to have against every opponent on the 2014schedule including details on:
-Strengths and weaknesses in the opponent's roster
-Particular schemes and strategies that Texas will find easy to exploit or difficult to handle
-Specific formations and lineups that Texas will be contending with
-and overall tactical oversight of how the match-ups are likely to shake out.
You aren't going to find content like this just anywhere and certainly not during the dog days of summer ;)
Friday, June 13, 2014
Basketball on grass and the up-tempo offense
Over at SB Nation I take a look at how the Oregon Ducks find 5-man skill player lineups that offer them the most matchup advantages over their opponents.
In general, hurry-up/no-huddle (HUNH) offenses are at their best when they can find a particular 5-man lineup that the defense can't match personnel-wise, and then hammer the weak spots hard at high tempo so that the defense can't sub or adjust.
For instance, let's say that the Ducks are in what I labeled as their "Flying V" personnel. They find that if they flex out their TE that the defense isn't able to handle perimeter screens honestly. They can then run option or screen plays over and over again from flex-TE formations at a pace too quick for the defense to adjust.
When you hammer a defense over and over with the same plays, that's when they start to get desperate and start lunging and cheating to the ball in ways that set them up for misdirection, play-action, or other back-breaking plays.
Let's say that you miss a pass or they otherwise find time to sub. Let's say they've been playing nickel and now they bring out 3rd linebacker to play out in space who can handle your TE's blocks on outside screens. Well now you bring the TE back to the line of scrimmage and get him matched up in coverage vs their Mike linebacker while that new linebacker is now asked to cover a receiver or the slotback.
Now you hammer these new match-up advantages and see if you can get the defense reeling and cheating as they grow desperate to make plays. Consider also that they are getting physically fatigued in addition to becoming mentally fatigued because of the effort they are expending to stop these plays and the pace at which you are running them.
Explosive plays ensue.
Versatile hybrid players KILL in the HUNH, just as versatile players like LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard, or Boris Diaw are killing in the NBA Finals. When you watch a HUNH team like Oregon, keep an eye out for the hybrid players because they are often a big part of what makes the engine go.
In general, hurry-up/no-huddle (HUNH) offenses are at their best when they can find a particular 5-man lineup that the defense can't match personnel-wise, and then hammer the weak spots hard at high tempo so that the defense can't sub or adjust.
For instance, let's say that the Ducks are in what I labeled as their "Flying V" personnel. They find that if they flex out their TE that the defense isn't able to handle perimeter screens honestly. They can then run option or screen plays over and over again from flex-TE formations at a pace too quick for the defense to adjust.
When you hammer a defense over and over with the same plays, that's when they start to get desperate and start lunging and cheating to the ball in ways that set them up for misdirection, play-action, or other back-breaking plays.
Let's say that you miss a pass or they otherwise find time to sub. Let's say they've been playing nickel and now they bring out 3rd linebacker to play out in space who can handle your TE's blocks on outside screens. Well now you bring the TE back to the line of scrimmage and get him matched up in coverage vs their Mike linebacker while that new linebacker is now asked to cover a receiver or the slotback.
Now you hammer these new match-up advantages and see if you can get the defense reeling and cheating as they grow desperate to make plays. Consider also that they are getting physically fatigued in addition to becoming mentally fatigued because of the effort they are expending to stop these plays and the pace at which you are running them.
Explosive plays ensue.
Versatile hybrid players KILL in the HUNH, just as versatile players like LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard, or Boris Diaw are killing in the NBA Finals. When you watch a HUNH team like Oregon, keep an eye out for the hybrid players because they are often a big part of what makes the engine go.
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Should women be encouraged to play football?
At Campbellsville University in Kentucky, a girl named Shelby Osborne has made the football team and will play as a defensive back, making her only the second female to play a non-kicker position in college football.
You can read about her experience in her own words here.
Equality is a popular cause in these times and consequently stories like this are often pushed as demonstrating the progress of egalitarian ethics in our modern society. However, there's an underlying assumption that I think deserves a closer look. Is it actually ethical to champion a woman playing a violent, contact sport with grown men? Is this behavior that we want to encourage from females in our communities?
There are some obviously inspirational themes to this story:
You have a person championing over the odds to pursue a dream.
You see someone refuse to back down to public pressure in pursuing what she feels is right.
Both of these are honorable themes, to be sure. But there were also some superficially honorable themes to the "Children's Crusade" and it'd be hard to argue that it was particularly ethical to allow that event to occur.
Personally I find three themes in this story to be disconcerting:
1). Football is not a safe sport, especially for women
The long-term brain damage commonly associated with football has many people wondering if the game should be changed so that we can encourage young boys and men to play in good conscience. We already have to mitigate fears that we are asking them to ruin the ends of their lives by incurring serious brain damage or suffering other injuries that could lead to chronic health issues.
These issues are magnified when we add women to the equation. As is common with egalitarian ethicists, many are ignoring the scientific fact that male and female bodies are different.
Females have weaker necks, which scientists believe is a primary reason that women's soccer has such a high rate of concussions. Because the brain is a free-flowing organ within the skull, violent collisions where our heads aren't stable can lead to brain injuries even when the head isn't contacted.
Violent collisions are the name of the game in football. Is it wise to encourage a 5'6", 140 pound female to play a sport in which these collisions are common?
Females also have smaller, thinner bones and less muscular bodies. Both of these are important factors in the event of a violent collision. After all, Force=mass x acceleration.
Smaller muscles means less acceleration and less mass for absorbing blows. If you create a collision between a 140 pound female and even a 140 pound male, as rare as they are in football, you are creating an equation that likely equal 1 injured female.
We are seeing the same thing with women in the military. Evolution has not designed women to engage in violent activities, especially against men. So we should encourage them to do so anyways? What does that prove again?
2). Shouldn't society look to protect women?
Call me old-fashioned but I think that one of men's primary roles in society is to protect women and children. Not to engage in violent competition with them and look to smash them.
Given that we already know women are inclined to be inferior at men at a sport like football, what can a man prove by beating up women on the gridiron? What are we teaching young men if we encourage women to engage in these sports?
That they shouldn't protect women? That they should take advantage of their natural strength to beat them up in competition? That physical aggression is not something to be reserved for use against men of comparable strength but used to dominate women?
3). What's the upside?
I was concerned with the motivation that Shelby Osborne included in her interview with SB Nation for wanting to become a football player:
"Well, it was the sectional championship game of my junior year, and we weren't playing so hot or even to the best of our ability. I said to myself, "I could play better than that," and that's what planted the seed in my mind that this might actually be possible!"
That doesn't strike me as a particularly noble aim, wanting to upstage the young men playing for her high school that she felt weren't good enough. Credit to her for putting her money where her mouth was, I suppose, although she apparently went on to play mostly JV ball and didn't seem to have actually played "better than that" after all.
But is this the message we want to send young men? "You aren't doing a very good job in society so we're going to try and replace you with women." Incidentally...how well do we think that's going to work?
I think football's upside is that it teaches men to take risks, to channel natural aggression to work within a team construct to protect each other and advance towards a goal, and to hopefully learn lessons like humility and wisdom. Because of these reasons, while I'd like to see the sport become safer I think it's a valuable activity for young men.
What's the upside of encouraging women to play tackle football with men? Frankly, I don't see one that overcomes what seem to be obvious downsides.
You can read about her experience in her own words here.
Equality is a popular cause in these times and consequently stories like this are often pushed as demonstrating the progress of egalitarian ethics in our modern society. However, there's an underlying assumption that I think deserves a closer look. Is it actually ethical to champion a woman playing a violent, contact sport with grown men? Is this behavior that we want to encourage from females in our communities?
There are some obviously inspirational themes to this story:
You have a person championing over the odds to pursue a dream.
You see someone refuse to back down to public pressure in pursuing what she feels is right.
Both of these are honorable themes, to be sure. But there were also some superficially honorable themes to the "Children's Crusade" and it'd be hard to argue that it was particularly ethical to allow that event to occur.
Personally I find three themes in this story to be disconcerting:
1). Football is not a safe sport, especially for women
The long-term brain damage commonly associated with football has many people wondering if the game should be changed so that we can encourage young boys and men to play in good conscience. We already have to mitigate fears that we are asking them to ruin the ends of their lives by incurring serious brain damage or suffering other injuries that could lead to chronic health issues.
These issues are magnified when we add women to the equation. As is common with egalitarian ethicists, many are ignoring the scientific fact that male and female bodies are different.
Females have weaker necks, which scientists believe is a primary reason that women's soccer has such a high rate of concussions. Because the brain is a free-flowing organ within the skull, violent collisions where our heads aren't stable can lead to brain injuries even when the head isn't contacted.
Violent collisions are the name of the game in football. Is it wise to encourage a 5'6", 140 pound female to play a sport in which these collisions are common?
Females also have smaller, thinner bones and less muscular bodies. Both of these are important factors in the event of a violent collision. After all, Force=mass x acceleration.
Smaller muscles means less acceleration and less mass for absorbing blows. If you create a collision between a 140 pound female and even a 140 pound male, as rare as they are in football, you are creating an equation that likely equal 1 injured female.
We are seeing the same thing with women in the military. Evolution has not designed women to engage in violent activities, especially against men. So we should encourage them to do so anyways? What does that prove again?
2). Shouldn't society look to protect women?
Call me old-fashioned but I think that one of men's primary roles in society is to protect women and children. Not to engage in violent competition with them and look to smash them.
Given that we already know women are inclined to be inferior at men at a sport like football, what can a man prove by beating up women on the gridiron? What are we teaching young men if we encourage women to engage in these sports?
That they shouldn't protect women? That they should take advantage of their natural strength to beat them up in competition? That physical aggression is not something to be reserved for use against men of comparable strength but used to dominate women?
3). What's the upside?
I was concerned with the motivation that Shelby Osborne included in her interview with SB Nation for wanting to become a football player:
"Well, it was the sectional championship game of my junior year, and we weren't playing so hot or even to the best of our ability. I said to myself, "I could play better than that," and that's what planted the seed in my mind that this might actually be possible!"
That doesn't strike me as a particularly noble aim, wanting to upstage the young men playing for her high school that she felt weren't good enough. Credit to her for putting her money where her mouth was, I suppose, although she apparently went on to play mostly JV ball and didn't seem to have actually played "better than that" after all.
But is this the message we want to send young men? "You aren't doing a very good job in society so we're going to try and replace you with women." Incidentally...how well do we think that's going to work?
I think football's upside is that it teaches men to take risks, to channel natural aggression to work within a team construct to protect each other and advance towards a goal, and to hopefully learn lessons like humility and wisdom. Because of these reasons, while I'd like to see the sport become safer I think it's a valuable activity for young men.
What's the upside of encouraging women to play tackle football with men? Frankly, I don't see one that overcomes what seem to be obvious downsides.
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
5 strategies teams use to choose players for their defense
The college football schedule can often present some challenging struggles for a program that intends to build their roster around defensive excellence.
The 4-3 Over defense popularized by the Jimmy Johnson Miami Hurricanes really launched this tactic into the modern era, the Gary Patterson 4-2-5 TCU defense is largely a modern take on it.
Consider Bob Stoop's Oklahoma Sooners; they play nine of their 12 games every season against the Big 12 conference, which is almost entirely dominated by the spread offense and particularly the Air Raid strains that are taking over Texas football.
If Oklahoma wants to have any kind of successful season they need to win the games on their schedule...but achieving success against their non-conference slate or against likely opponents in a 4-team College Football playoff could potentially pit them against power-run oriented teams like Alabama, LSU, or Stanford. So how do they build their defensive roster in a way that allows them to handle the variety of personnel match-ups that opposing teams will present?
There are four main approaches to defensive roster-building that seek to answer this question:
1). Shrink the field
Some teams build their teams by simply trying to get the fastest team possible on the field and relying on team speed to attack opponents, rally to the ball, and essentially shrink the field so no offensive player finds a match-up advantage or leverage to operate in for more than a small window of time before the defense converges on him.
Gary Patterson's TCU Horned Frogs are a perfect example of this approach as they rely on 4-2-5 base personnel that has at least five defensive backs, including three safeties, on the field at all times. They'll also play speed at cornerback that can run deep with vertical routes.
Even in their fronts the Horned Frogs target linebackers who can change direction and run in underneath coverage, defensive ends who are aligned wide and are often athletes bulked up and deployed to terrorize the edge, and even defensive tackles who have the lateral quickness to stunt and play blocks outside-in.
In all of their tactics, TCU is looking to handle opponents by playing speed everywhere and racing to where they think the ball will be, and then where ever the ball actually goes.
The 4-3 Over defense popularized by the Jimmy Johnson Miami Hurricanes really launched this tactic into the modern era, the Gary Patterson 4-2-5 TCU defense is largely a modern take on it.
3-3-5 defenses that are aggressive in calling blitzes often fit under this heading as well.
2). Man the trenches!
Other teams have one major priority in choosing their defensive roster, to have big people up front who can carry the load for the rest of the team and allow different types of athlete to have success behind them.
Notre Dame's defenses under Bob Diaco are one prime example, the Gary Andersen 2013 Wisconsin Badgers are another. By having 2-gappers in the front and sturdy linebackers controlling the action up front and allowing the four DBs in the secondary to primarily concern themselves with keeping the ball in front of them, these teams can play the ultimate "bend don't break" approach.
The key is having a nose tackle who can command double-teams and control the spaces between the tackles along with defensive ends who can collapse the pocket and protect linebackers from seeing OL advance and meet them at the 2nd level to open up creases for the running back.
3-4 defenses are often prone to applying this principal in choosing the players for their roster while the 4-3 Under defense also tends to value bigger bodies who can protect the linebackers.
3). Fireproof
Given the modern spread coach's love of playing versatile personnel and finding mismatches to attack with RB/WR or TE/WR hybrids, some teams prefer to choose defensive personnel around the principle of having match-up proof players across the defensive front and back end.
The Seattle Seahawks are a great example. With large and athletic players like 6'3", 232 pound strong safety Kam Chancellor, 6'3", 195 pound cornerback Richard Sherman, 6'1" 207 pound cornerback Byron Maxwell, or blazing fast, 5'10", 202 pound free safety Earl Thomas, it's hard to find match-ups to attack against the Seahawks.
"Fireproof" defenses often rely on a lot of single-deep safety coverages such as Cover-3, Cover-1, or Fire Zone blitzes that will basically amount to man coverage.
The Fire Proof defense outnumbers the running game, puts big, athletic people against your weapons and basically says "come at me, bro!"
Across the front, the Seahawks are also very match-up conscious. Although they primarily play a 4-3 Under front, they choose their pieces up front based on competencies with particular spots across the DL in different packages chosen for skills like "run-stopping," "2-gapping," or "pass-rushing." Ideally, the Seahawks always have the right pieces on the field to match up against whatever the offense is likely to bring.
Fireproof teams often use a lot of Fire Zone blitzes that bring five rushers because their LB corp and secondary, being chosen largely for their size and athleticism, are often adept as either pass-rushers or holding up in pattern-matching coverage against an offense's athletes.
4). Outsmart 'em
University of Central Florida head coach George O'Leary ironically wants the smartest team he can find. His Knights play a variety of different defenses and disguise their intentions before the snap from the offense.
The overriding theme with his players is that they always understand what the offense is doing and how they will respond to it within their own diversity of calls. Just try and speed up the pace against the Knights and see what happens. They don't need to constantly stare at the sideline for calls or guidance, they know what they're doing and they're ready for what you're doing.
Some teams try to achieve a similar result by having as simple a defensive scheme as possible but the Knights are able to maintain a certain degree of complexity in their system because they make sure to recruit players who are smart enough to handle it.
5). Just get the best football players
Of course there are always teams that will look to choose find the best players to fulfill different roles, much like how the Seahawks choose players for their defensive line. Rather than attempting to have a unified vision for their defensive personnel, these teams just worry about having good players who might be effective due to any number of physical or mental attributes.
A team like KSU gets a lot of mileage by simply making sure that they find players who can handle the main tasks of their system. Can you fulfill the main competencies of your position? You're eligible? Nah, I don't care what you look like, come to Manhattan!
A team like KSU gets a lot of mileage by simply making sure that they find players who can handle the main tasks of their system. Can you fulfill the main competencies of your position? You're eligible? Nah, I don't care what you look like, come to Manhattan!
Any of these strategies can work, when applied well and consistently, assuming your team has access to the players needed. Recruiting turf plays a large role as well, teams better make sure that they can get a cast of >6'0" DBs to come to their school before they embrace a "Fireproof" plan for building a defense.
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