re: Our DBs will look different moving forward.

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I do not know enough Xs and Os to know if this is a good or bad thing, but I do know that if you give Bryce Young and Bama receivers easy 5 yard completions, they will take that all day long and kill you. You have to contest the catch with some of these elite WRs. You may lose and get burned, but if you do not have CBs that run with WRs one on one, they will take the top off you every game. Landry was a enforcer safety, not a CB. If we do not have quick twitch athletes at CB, we are screwed.

Look at what happened to UGA in the SEC Championship game. They play a lot of zone coverage like you are suggesting and a health Bama took the top off that defense.

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Good QBs will pick a zone apart. Even if you manage to pressure them. The key is to confuse their eyes/brains so they can't process as fast and allow that pressure to get home, at least enough to affect their feet or throws. So while pressure is always a must, think of it as setting the upper limit on their mental clock. Confusing them with coverages sets the minimum by defining who and where they can release the ball to. Remember, in zone coverage receivers stop/slow routes in space where in man coverage they continue the routes ahead of coverage. So their target will also behave differently thus changing their passes.

So the first deception most DCs try to do is show one (man) but drop out in the other. It can go either way. That's why you see the ball hiked immediately after a motion. D's will try to show you man by going with the motion man and then immediately change responsibilities and rotate coverages without moving personnel thus becoming a zone. If there's no time between the motion and the snap a D will not have time to communicate that call OR risk significant blown coverages.

This also changes your OLs protection often. If in man you can move a potential blitzer further away where he becomes a non-factor for the play call. If he won't move they likely just tipped their hand. If in zone the OL has to guess who is coming and adjust at the snap. So showing zone has advantages for the pressure, but disadvantages for the back 7.

This is where "multiple" and "hybrid" defenses come from. Sometimes it is as simple as showing one but playing another. A true hybrid will have some (front 4 + 1, for example) playing zone because it confuses protection more often, and the remaining 6 (or 7) show zone but swap to man. That way if they try overloads or floods to defeat a zone (which is what they saw) you'll end up with too many receivers and too many cover guys (because it was really man coverage) in one area.

And never forget: against a QB who runs, zone is always better because their eyes are to the LoS in the back 7. That's why Dak ate our lunch (and Welter). So once again, showing man (where that QB knows he has a better chance to run if needed if he sees green) and then playing zone (where he's got at least 7 eyes on him) tricked him mentally by changing what he mentally prepared for on that play vs. what he actually faced post-snap.