Film Review: Michigan State's Vayante Copeland and What to Expect in '16

A lot of Spartan fans were excited about the play of RS FR Vayante Copeland last season, despite playing in less than two games due to injury. I had a chance to go back and reassess his brief play, and honestly, was more impressed than my initial reaction. While there are areas where he needs to improve, he did show a lot of natural ability. In this post, I'm going to review Copeland's film and give my impressions of where to expect him to play going forward.

Notes

• Copeland played most of his time at the Field CB position
• He rotated out frequently in MSU's blitz package, though not always
• He rotated more frequently out against Oregon while healthy, but also got some snaps at Boundary CB. He eventually played his last snap of the season during the Oregon game, suffering from a season ending injury.
• Most understand Oregon's talent at WR, but I think it's important to note that WMU had a pair of very good WRs as well. One would have started on probably half of the B1G teams, the other will be a mid-to-late round draft pick when he declares for the NFL draft. This was good competition he played.

The Good
Eye Discipline
Early in the season, Michigan State came out playing a lot more MOD coverage (Man Only Deep) rather than their base MEG (Man Everywhere he Goes). This was likely a reaction to two things: 1) Several spread teams having success isolating the Field Safety on the slot (the MOD gives an outside zone help, so no two way go for the slot) and 2) youth at the CB position.

Copeland is at the top of the screen here. See how he opens up pre-snap and plays in off coverage. If the WR goes vertical, the Copeland will play him in man, if he doesn't, he will bail into a deep quarter zone. But to protect against the screen game, he's going to read inside to handle any quick pass play, and that's what he does here. Number 1 releases inside and tries to block the OLB. He immediately reacts upfield, keeps proper relation to the ball carrier, keeps his hat on the outside shoulder of the ball carrier, breaks down, and makes a nice play in space. But this play all starts with his eye discipline and not getting lost with the vertical threat from #1.

Here's a great example of him getting his eyes inside when the WR tries an inside release and finding the #2 and maintaining proper relationa and making a strong tackle.

Here is a bit of a different screen threat, rather than a bubble, it's a tunnel screen. But again, it's eye discipline. Here, he does a good job of not getting turned by the initial vertical threat, he remains patient (more on this later, but it's an inconsistency in his game and was a smart thing for WMU to try to attack). But once he notices the receiver work back to the ball, he identifies the #2 and works underneath the block and forces the play further inside to pursuit. This is all done because he has proper eye discipline post snap.

Flipping the Hips - Inside Turn
Now we are going to look at a couple instances of Copeland's ability to flip quickly and get into proper relation with the receiver. Here, the WR doesn't threaten an outside release, and instead stems immediately inside. Note that in most cases, Copeland is not playing a jam technique. This is MEG, this is press, but he is not jamming, which is what MSU is known for. This is another common aspect of the Spartan defense early in the season.

The WR does get a little bit of space in the instance of a quick slant, but this is a tight window. While you'd like Copeland to be a little tighter on the hip early, he has help inside from both the OLB and the safety, and he's maintaining the proper relation on the WR's upfield hip. The QB never gets to that side of the field in his progression, but the coverage is good so the point is still valid.

Similar thing, good first turn but loses contact a little too easily, but has inside help. This shows consistency. He's at the bottom of the screen here.

Flipping the Hips - Outside Turn
This is a great example of Copeland's natural flexibility on the outside. Here, he flips his hips with ease and doesn't lose speed while doing so. This allows him to maintain in-phase coverage throughout the whole route. The WR never has a chance to work back inside, Copeland is in contact with the WR throughout the whole route (watch the back hand a little at the end of the play, but his eyes are back to the ball because he's in-phase), and there is never any threat. His ability to flip his hips in this case made this nearly an impossible throw to make.

Here, the receiver is just running a go route and never threatens inside. This is MEG coverage all the way. The WR releases outside and Copeland easily sticks with him. Notice that as he turns he gets a nice punch with his inside arm on the WR's inside shoulder pad. He then rides him down the field, maintaining contact so as to control the WR and maintain his relation on the upfield hip and inside of the receiver (the arm prevent the WR from being able to work back inside easily).

Note that the open receiver in the flat is a bust by the OLB, who should release off the hitch from the #2 and bail to the flat. This was a problem MSU had from the Star position more early in the season.

Another example, top of the screen

Exactly... (top of the screen)

Flipping the Hips - Recovery

Here, he's beat. He turns and opens up inside and allows the WR easily outside of him with a lot of separation. But he recovers exactly how you want him to because he is fluid flipping his hips. Here, he is able to recover and almost immediately get back in phase despite having flaws off the LOS.

Attacking the Block

One of the things that immediately jumps off the screen with Copeland is his willingness to be physical. This is evident both in his tackling and his willingness to attack the block.

Here, he loses a bit of his eye discipline, which was normally solid. He's too tied into the WR in front of him and is late to realize the pass in the flat, which causes him to be late coming down to make a play. But when he realizes the flat receiver has the ball, he steps up, gets low, bends at the knees, and fires up and out with his hands extended while maintaining his helmet outside the blocker. He has the sideline defended and he doesn't give up any unnecessary ground.

This time he sees the play but is just a little late reacting. He appears nervous of the offense going over the top (given the situation, it's probably the right choice), and so doesn't form a wall as quickly as you'd like to see at the point of attack. But the main positive here, again, is how he takes on the blocker and allows the defense to get to the football.

Needing Some Seasoning
Redirecting on Breaks
Probably the biggest issue I saw from Copeland was his reacting to a second turn. That is, once Copeland flipped his hips on the first turn, he at times got a bit lost on the receiver, lost relation and contact, and got beat on the second turn.

Here he is at the top of the screen. He flips to the outside, but he loses contact with the receiver, thus not allowing the CB to be controlled. When the WR works to cut back inside, Copeland has a long stride and can't break down as quickly and runs past the WR. So the problem is two fold: he loses contact with the WR and can't slow him down and his straight line stride makes it difficult for him to breakdown when a receiver makes a downfield break.

That seems like a small thing, but here's a look later in the half. The main problem here is that he isn't patient enough. The WR looks to commit outside and Copeland is opening up immediately. Once he opens, the WR breaks back inside to the football, Copeland can't maintain contact with the WR because he has opened up too far up field of the receiver (he opened up to early and didn't stay on his front hip, he instead got over the top of him) and is forced to regather with several false steps, and is then well behind the play. Because of that, he also can't make the tackle in space, and the result is nearly a TD.

A couple plays later, again, he isn't patient enough with his technique. He loses his inside leverage and commits to opening outside, and this gives a free release back inside on the slant that the QB doesn't throw, but it is open (particularly in a red zone situation)

Closing Down his Stride

This was touched on with the previous issue, but that was more focused on committing too early or over committing to the first turn. But it does relate to closing down his stride. Copeland appears to be a bit of a long strider. This means there are some difficulties redirecting when running. I've been impressed with Copeland's ability to break from a flat-footed position forward and to flip his hips from a back peddle, but he has some struggles redirecting in space.

Here's an example where he's playing the #1 on the fade route and does a great job with his eyes. He puts himself "in-phase" with the receiver by having proper relation and being able to use his body. This allows him to get his eyes back to the football, which he does, and nearly makes a great play breaking off his receiver and undercutting an out route. But because of his stride, he gets his center of gravity out from under him and he slips a bit, allowing the receiver to make a play on the ball. This is an instance where he does some really nice things, but just doesn't finish the play.

Playing the Deep Third
Background: MSU runs a blitz scheme that plays 3 deep coverage zone. It's often been the case that MSU's DBs haven't been as sound in this coverage, and MSU has gotten away with that because they are so great up front at applying quick pressure that they get away with it on the back end. MSU doesn't practice this technique as much, because the payoff doesn't make sense. It isn't a necessity. So this isn't a revelation for MSU CBs.

The difficult part about zone defense, particularly for young players, is properly playing the man within the zone. Here, Copeland doesn't get proper relation between the receiver and the QB to be able to play the man and the ball. The result is that he fails to prevent the receiver from getting over the top of him, he loses the man because he gives up too much separation. This leaves him open down field, although the QB misses.

I did notice early on he got subbed out a lot in MSU blitz package. My feeling is that they were simply more comfortable with other guys playing the deep 1/3. It's something I honestly don't see sticking going forward, there really isn't part of his game that precludes him from being as good at this technique other than experience during these early season games.

Inconsistency with Hands and Patience

I noted previously that Copeland played a lot of press coverage, but not a lot of jam technique. That doesn't mean he's avoiding contact. Proper jam technique is difficult. If you don't have the technique down, it leaves you left in the dust. Copeland being a young player, Dantonio and Co. likely chose to play more press without the jam to avoid getting beat over the top. But that doesn't mean it's a hands off approach, it just means that you utilize your hands a bit further down field once the receiver commits to a release (this is different than a jam technique, which prevents the release all together).

What you see here is more of a jam technique. Copeland is squatting down, slide stepping, and trying to prevent the inside release. But he sells out on it and gets caught leaning as he's moving inside to try to maintain his proper inside position. But once get you caught leaning in jam technique, you often get burned because you don't have any strength to control the receiver. That's what happens here. This is inconsistency with hands, but it stems first with his feet and then with his patience (patience is, in my opinion, the most difficult aspect to teach/learn for jam technique), and that results in inconsistency with the use of his hands. It's the same with getting beat on down field breaks, it's not necessarily incorrect hand placement, or lack of playing strength, it starts from the feet and works up, and the issue is currently at the feet level.

This allows a clean outside release from the WMU WR. However, while he gets separation and he is briefly open, again, you see from Copeland his ability to flip his hips and he plays his out of phase coverage correctly to make this a difficult throw if the QB were to decide to throw it. Previously, I showed a clip where he did everything right except finish the play. Here, he makes a mistake at the start of the play, but does everything right after, and the QB decides not to make the throw.

Here, we again show a lack of patience. He turns outside quickly and that allows a free release inside, which is dangerous at this position. Now, he's a good enough athlete to essentially not allow great separation on the ball, but this is the difference between a catch with no YAC and potentially no chance at even a catch.

Cloud Support

The vast majority of the time, Copeland played the Field CB position. This is the normal development path for MSU CBs, who typically start to the field because they have less run responsibility (for the most part, they can focus on their coverage and not worry about the rest). Here, he gets put to the boundary. Oregon is unbalanced, and Copeland has cloud support responsibility with his run fit. CBs don't spend a lot of time working on run fits, but the best at MSU have done it really well in the past. But the RS FR wasn't really polished with this technique, and didn't really come up to make a play as you'd like (didn't maintain proper leverage, didn't break down).

Conclusion

Areas of Strength

• Eye discipline on throws to the flat
• Ability to flip hips from flat-footed and back peddle
• Recovery ability
• Being physical at the point of attack

Areas for Improvement

• Redirecting on breaks (closing stride)
• Playing the deep third zone in blitz package
• Inconsistency with hands and patience in jam technique
• Cloud support for run fits

As I said, I was more impressed with what I saw on film than my initial impression. Copeland appears to be a very fluid player. He flips his hips really well without losing speed/burst on his initial turn. Given MSU's scheme, this allows him to consistently play with tight coverage. As a young player, he still has some technique concerns. The biggest concern is currently his footwork and patience once the WR can gain his release. MSU played a lot of press and MOD with Copeland, but didn't jam as often as they have in the past. When asked to jam, Copeland did lose position on his receiver at times (though he displayed nice ability to recover). He also lacks patience at times. I said within the body of the article that this is one of the most difficult things to learn and do with consistency, but he often turns too early and gets too far up field, and that puts him out of position and allows him to get beat on down field breaks. While he didn't really go up against many double moves, based on what we see on film, that may be an area of concern.

But from a technique standpoint, and patience standpoint, that can be fixed with experience and more work. It isn't an inherent issue with athleticism or something. He flips his hips well, he recovers well, he's got a nice frame. The more difficult thing to fix will be his ability to breakdown in space from a full stride. Closing down your stride and sinking your hips so that you can react to downfield breaks may come down to some physical issues, and is at least something to do with his running form, which is more difficult to fix. So while a lot of the concerns of his game can be ironed out, there are some questions to what level he can reach: is he an eventual All American, All B1G, or something else? His natural ability, frame, and eye discipline suggests he'll switch eventually to boundary CB, and he has the ability to develop into an All Conference performer. If he can also iron out some of the more inherent concerns or perfect his technique to the degree that he can mitigate some of his flaws, he could be even better. Coming back for spring practice was huge for MSU and where they can expect Copeland to be come Fall. Technique takes coaching, which takes time, and takes reps, and Copeland still needs more reps. He got some in spring. He appears to be a player that will surprise some teams in Fall, though it may still be another year before he takes his leap.

Review: Has the Window Closed for Michigan State? The Growth, Dominance, and Future of the Spartan Defense

Back in January, Ian Boyd dropped the disrespect alarm on many within the Spartan fan base when he seemed to indicated that the Michigan State run of success may be coming to an end.

Review: Has the window closed for Michigan State

I don't necessary believe that Boyd was necessary calling the demise of MSU football with his article. Nonetheless, it's understandable for MSU fans, who have been hearing that same, repetitive rallying cry for nearly a decade, to attempt to shoot him down. In the process of doing so though, I believe some pertinent points have been missed. In this post I'll discuss my thoughts on Boyd's article, where I agree with him, and where I'd like to expand on his thoughts.

A Brief History of the Spartan Defense
Pat Narduzzi, then a LB coach, formed the seeds of his version of the Cover 4 defense while with Scott Shafer at the University of Rhode Island. Shafer, who was then the DBs coach for the Rams, would later take his iteration of this invention briefly to Michigan under Rich Rod (1 season) and almost to Maryland under the tutelage of DJ Durkin, among other places. Meanwhile, Narduzzi took what he had developed with him to Cincinatti, where he would become the Defensive Coordinator under newly minted Head Coach Mark Dantonio. Dantonio had had his own success as OSU's DC running predominately a Cover 1 and Cover 3 defense (and in general, a very multiple defensive attack) but was able to be convinced by the up-and-coming defensive mind to role the dice with this new wave defense. The wheels were set in motion on the development of one of the most successful and influential defensive schemes in recent college football.

Success was not immediate however. In 2005, Cincinatti featured one of the worst defenses in college football, where they fell from simply being a bad defense the year prior. The defense looked to be headed in the wrong direction for the Bearcats, when in 2006, Dantonio's final season at UC, the defense suddenly jumped into the top 25.

Dantonio turned the success of his program at Cincinatti into a gig as the Head Coach of Michigan State and he took much of his staff, including Narduzzi, with him to East Lansing to reset the foundation that had been put down in southern Ohio. Again, success was not immediate. His first season only showed marginal improvement on the defensive side of the ball and too often gave up big plays, particularly in the pass game. His second season was much the same. The third season showed a bit more promise on the defensive side but failed to live up to the significant leap the Bearcats had taken under this staff previously. The issue: there simply was not the defensive talent, particularly in the defensive backfield, to sustain success with such a scheme.

But Narduzzi had a huge luxury at his disposal. It just so happened that Dantonio was known as one of the best DB coaches in college football, formerly training under DB guru Nick Saban at Michigan State in the 1990s. Dantonio had a huge luxury himself. The Spartans had failed to have sustained success for decades (though the late Saban years showed a lot of promise before he bolted to LSU), and so he had time on his side. The fact that year three didn't produce the defensive results that were desired did not deter the two defensive minds from sticking it out with a scheme they believed in. And so in 2010 they became a good defense, and they parlayed that success into a run of dominance that would last from 2011 to 2013, where they fielded top 10 defenses each year. And it's not like the 2014 and 2015 defenses fell off the map, they simply weren't downright dominant like they had been previous years. But from those dominant years, not everything stayed the same.

For a long time, teams looks at the Spartan coverage, saw two outside CBs on a proverbial island, and decided that was the weak point of the defense and attacked there. Fans were left screaming at the coaching staff to give the CBs help on the outside. Michigan notably attacked the isolated CBs late to score the go ahead comeback TD in what seemed like a winning streak that would last forever. Fans weren't too happy with this stupid scheme.  This issue seemed to repeat itself over and over again, often at the hands of rivals Notre Dame. But by 2011, most of the issues seemed fixed. Dantonio had worked is DB coaching magic and pulled 2 star recruits out of no where to have one of the best defensive backfield in the country. Notre Dame notably maintained the same game plan through 2013. While they managed to provide MSU it's lone loss of the 2013 season, a season that would end in a Rose Bowl victory, they now succeed by chucking fades down the sidelines or posts and getting pass interference calls (at times questionably so) rather than completions. Teams also relied heavily on the old ideas of beating the classic Cover 4 coverage, namely, out routes from the #2 and attacking underneath coverage, and frankly, just running the football. But none of these things were working as well as they should have per the "Cover 4 beater cheat sheet".

That's because Michigan State's Cover 4 isn't like the old Cover 4 Quarters look. The safeties aren't deep, the CBs aren't playing soft, this ain't your cursing at the TV prevent defense.

No. MSU has their safeties stick their heals as far up as 8 yards off the LOS. The CBs are playing press. It's a 9 man box that attacks down hill and has extra defenders ready at the point of attack. But it's not just that. Narduzzi developed a simplified scheme, but an encompassing scheme. Rather than ask his defenders to do any and everything, he reduced what his players had to do. He implemented a blitz scheme that could utilize Cover 0 or a zone pressure involving 3 high and 2 low. It worked with 3 down DL or 4 down DL and brought to prominence the double A gap scheme they employed so brilliantly. In each of these schemes, his defenders were performing and executing much the same tasks as they would in their base. And because it was simplified in this nature, they could do it all fast, faster than offenses were prepared to handle it, faster and better than offenses could execute. When Iowa went up tempo on the Spartan's, this ability to execute allowed Darqueze Dennard to get a call from the sideline on the fly, change his coverage from MEG to MOD (both Cover 4 schemes), and get a key INT.

MSU's defensive players didn't need multiple undergraduate degrees in football to be successful, but they did need a PhD. It was defense that grew in depth rather than width. And it was always evolving. And that was the key to it's success.

So Is the Window Closing
The most salient idea coming from Boyd's article is the idea of attacking the safeties with the slot. I just talked about how initially offenses were attacking MSU like it was their Old Man's Cover 4. This was wrong. While the CBs are on an island, their technique and their position on the field force long, down-field throws to be completed in order to take advantage of their isolation. At the college level, many QBs struggle to throw into tight windows down the sideline. The limited arm strength and accuracy allows CBs with good technique to win the majority of these match ups. So while WRs continued to "get open", offenses failed to find success with regularity with these "open" receivers. On paper, offensive coordinators continued to look at this matchup, a matchup they were "winning", and simply looking for better execution. But on paper is a theoretical world, in reality, eventually you need to be able to execute, and most teams couldn't execute better than the Spartans in this match.

But teams started to adjust. Bunch and trips formations became more regular. In 2014, Oregon came out with a variety of different trips formations to overload the Spartan defense. Suddenly, all these teams started taking advantage of some of the defensive weaknesses, namely, communication breakdowns against trips formations...

And isolating receivers in more manageable positions. One way do the latter is by holding the underneath defenders with the play fake and drawing the safety help away.

The other method is to take advantage of the difficulty of playing safety within this scheme, and all the run/pass conflicts that are presented.

All this can be run with play action, or more recently, Run-Pass Options (RPOs) which are the fave rave of current college football (and will continue to be as long as illegal man downfield goes uncalled). And the teams that have managed to have success against MSU have repeatedly attacked these weak points. This is the point of Boyd's article. The blueprint for success against MSU is out there. Now you may say "but that success has been limited in the Big Ten." Yes, it has for now. 

So MSU Can Still Whip the Big Ten?

No, not with the same thing they've been doing. More and more teams are incorporating spread elements, specifically the elements that teams like Oregon, OSU, Baylor, and Alabama showed to have success against the Spartans. The last team on that list is the epitome of modern day "pro style" offense, and they managed to incorporate those aspects into their offense. Even heavier teams, like Michigan that utilizes a bunch of 21, 22, and 12 personnel into their offense, have figured out how to attack this isolated safety match up.

Iowa figured out how to take advantage of the blitz package.

They did that repeatedly, successfully, in that game, hitting that quick pop pass against the MSU 3 high, 2 low blitz package. And yes, much of that incorporates spread elements, but that's the point Boyd is making. Not all teams have evolved on offense enough or have the QBs to take advantage of the weak links in the MSU defense. But good teams have and will only continue to improve. 

Why is that something I'm comfortable stating as a fact? As MSU has had success, more and more defenses have copied them. Narduzzi famously called out OSU for "stealing" his defense when they won their national championship. Sure enough, the Buckeye's base defense (which Ash looks to take with him to Rutgers) is heavily based on Michigan State's. Football is a copy cat game. People copy and implement the best aspects of football all the time.

So now you have Rutgers, OSU, Michigan State, Iowa, Minnesota, Northwestern, etc., all these teams running variations of Michigan State's defense. Not all are exactly the same, some only borrow elements to establish their own base, few run it as aggressively as MSU, but the fact remains that the Spartan defense has spread throughout college football. And offenses are adjusting to that. Before, offenses wouldn't implement a ton of their playbook for one team. But if half the teams they face have to same weak points they are almost certain to implement those aspects into their offensive playbook.

We've seen this in football time and time again. Cover 4 came about as a counter to Air Raid offense and 4 verticals. Saban developed his pattern match scheme because of the inability of the Cover 3 to stop four verts. The Tampa 2 was in large part a reaction to the growth of the West Coast Offense. The WCO was was a reaction to tight man-to-man coverage by running a lot of short, timing routes. You look at Rich Rod's read option spread, which at West Virginia was quite simple: read the DE, have a backside bubble. It worked like magic and no one could stop it, until they could. They ran scrape exchange and trap coverage on the outside to throw off the QB's reads. And Rich Rod had to evolve. He had to add a midline version of the read option play. And out of this came the OSU Power Spread, which in all honesty has very few reads and is more of a pro-style offense than most want to admit. Single-Wing to Wild-Cat to the Bear Defense. The chess game forever goes back and forth and back and forth as both sides counter the other side and both sides continue to evolve. And of course it all goes full circle.

And that's the point, the MSU defense won't remain as success if it just keeps chugging along. It can't. Because offenses are forever countering what successful defenses are doing.

So What Does That Mean?

First, what it doesn't mean: It doesn't mean that Michigan State's window is closed. It means that the Spartans have to continue to evolve. The question, then, is how do they look to evolve and remain successful.

When breaking down film of Vayante Copeland (the promising but still flawed RS FR in 2015) for another piece I'm planning on, it was reiterated to me that MSU ran a lot more zone last year. They utilized a lot more MOD coverage. This, of course, helps protect both the safeties in their isolated match ups (they aren't isolated if #1 doesn't threaten vertical) and to a degree the CBs. Teams attacked the flats more, and the Spartans looked more like a bend don't break defense than they have in years, but that's one reaction they've already made. I'm not convinced it is enough though.

Two things I'd like to see would return the favor to the Buckeyes. The Buckeyes often play with their safeties deeper. They don't expect their safeties to make their run fits near the LOS, but instead, allow for them to make a tackle at, say, 5 yards if the ball does in fact get to their level. That puts more emphasis on the front 7 to be sound against the run, it doesn't result in the offense getting behind the chains as often, but it does help prevent the big play. I don't expect the Spartans to do this consistently, but it's a nice changeup to throw at offenses (even having the safeties retreat briefly before flying into their run fits to disguise the look).

The second thing that Ohio State does in their blitz package, which borrows from Narduzzi's, is they also heavily utilize a 6 coverage, that is, 3 high and 3 low. If the Spartans utilize this look, combined with their 5 coverage (3 high and 2 low), the offense may pre-define their throw and throw right into coverage. The blitz forces a quick decision, the extra defender changes the voids in the zone to attack. It's another thing for the offense to think about.

The other option, which should not be dismissed entirely, is to start growing in breadth. This is a risk, it turns away from a philosophy that has made the MSU defense so successful in recent years. But it may be a necessary step. Incorporating some Cover 1 allows the Spartans to stay in man coverage on the outside, but it requires a bit different technique. So the defense has to learn to do more things. But the "beater" combinations that the offenses have been running to one-up the Spartan secondary no longer are as successful. Using at a periodic changeup may be enough to maintain the leading edge in this ever evolving game.

I honestly don't have a sure answer other than the knowledge that Michigan State needs to continue to evolve. You can't remain stagnant and expect to maintain success in this game. There are a lot of options for them to choose from, and surely, if they correct plan and manage those options, they can continue to be one of the premiere defenses in college football. But with that comes risk, and that risk needs to be managed. Luckily for the Spartans, while Narduzzi has moved on to Pitt, they still have Dantonio and his wealth of defensive knowledge; perhaps his way of stealing from the Buckeyes will be to harken back a bit to what made him successful while he was in Columbus. We shall see.

But it all comes back to what made Narduzzi's cutting edge defense so successful in the first place: it evolved out of a need and continued to evolve until it was one of the best defenses in the country. That evolution must continue going forward.

Inside the Playbook: Michigan Offense Reaction to Pursuit with False Keys

Previously, we discussed how Michigan and teams like MSU are playing pulling blockers. They key in both schemes can be boiled down to taking away the numbers advantage the offense is trying to gain at the point of attack. This is down by flowing across the formation by a backside LB or by inserting safeties into the run fills. As teams start keying pulling OL, they begin diagnosing plays faster and taking away the offense's advantage. That's where the offense can begin doing things to take away those keys or use the pull as a false key. Let's look at how Michigan's playbook handles this.

Patrick Semansky / AP

Don't Pull
Let's start with the simple task of not pulling a player. This provides one fewer key for the defense. Now, that seems simple, sure, run a zone or iso or a lead play and there isn't the pulling key. But what if you want to maintain the numbers advantage provided by a pulling blocker but you don't want to provide the key? That's where inserting multiple backs into the action can help.

Here, Michigan runs something that I call "Power F". Essentially, the FB acts as the pulling guard as the H-back acts as the kick out block (note the gaps formed below are the same gaps that are formed with a power play.

Note that on this play, the playside LB takes a false step then attacks the "pulling blocker" with the wrong shoulder, opening up a crease in the defense. Similarly, the backside LB gets caught up instead of getting across the formation.

Fold Block
Here's something that is criminally underutilized in modern football: the fold block. In fact, I haven't yet seen Harbaugh utilize this tactic, but I want to talk about it because it's something that I really love. The fold block is used to improve blocking angles for the OL while allowing an OL to be a lead blocker similar to a FB. If you have a OL with good feet, this can be deadly. You can also use it as a counter to the Power play.

Here, instead of attacking the "frontside" LB, the pulling blocker will actually be looking to attack the backside LB and the frontside takes himself out of the play. I've shown it below both against an Over and Under front (notice that the blocker changes from the backside guard to the center, which can sometimes be difficult for the center when the QB is under center, so the RB needs to allow the play to develop before getting down hill).

This play is perhaps even better served by a team that runs a lot of open side (weakside) Power, as seen in the next two diagrams.

You can also run this like a "G" play, with either the FB or RB (though that is a frontside pull)

While not Michigan, here's former Toledo coach (now Iowa State coach) Matt Campbell running a Center fold with what could be a read option on the backside of the play (both open and closed side)

Ian Boyd talked more about it here.

Influence Whams
A reemerging scheme in today's football is the "Wham" block. What hasn't yet reemerged with most teams is influence traps and whams. An influence trap cause the frontside of the defense to overplay the outside run, but the backside pulling blocker will still provide the backside players that "pull" key. So we'll save that, and focus instead on the influence wham play.

Here, you pull two OL, one gives a false "frontside" key, the other a false backside key, and forces the defense to react opposite where the play is actually going. The H-back then cleans up the defender covering one of the pulling guards. Not only is the DL flowing the wrong direction trying to squeeze out the pullers hole, but the LBs begin flowing the wrong way as well.

Pull a Guard - Cut Back
Of course, there is always the option of stressing the cutback to the RB if the backside is overpursuing. If the backside LB is getting himself down into the wash and committing himself to the front side play before the RB gets to the LOS, the RB can check for that over committal and cut the ball back across the gain for a nice gain on the backside.

While not the same, the trap play works in a similar way. Rather than sealing the defense on the backside, it seals them on the front side once they get over aggressive.

Pull a Guard - Play Action
A wise coach once told me "if you really want play action, pull a guard". 

This works to pull LBs out of their run fits and out of their underneath zones. It's also highly effective at forcing safeties that are involved in run fits to cheat down or lose their spot on the field. Harbaugh has consistently taken advantage of teams that try to heavily utilize safeties within their run fits in this way.

And here's a great example of the pulling guard freezing the safety and allowing the WR to get behind him (wait for the replay).

Pull a Guard - Boot
Or, of course, you can always run boot action. This play is a designed QB keeper all the way. The Michigan defense is overloading the front, so they still have a free hitter, but he takes a poor angle because he is anticipating crashing on the RB from the backside of the play. More importantly, look what it does to the ILB that would be the backside ILB against power.

Conclusions

Michigan is going to pull blockers, it's a key facet of their offense. They love to get additional bodies at the point of attack. But defenses are going to use those pulls as keys to get extra defenders to the point of attack as well. They key is to find the balance so that the defense must play honest. By having these counters to your standard pulls (Power, Counter, Trap), you force the defense to hesitate a bit and respect the backside run or the play action. In a downhill, power run scheme, that can make a huge difference in allowing for success.