'Simple' scheme nets big gains for trio of defenses

When Lovie Smith took over as Chicago's head coach last year, one of the first steps in installing the Tampa 2 defensive scheme was to change the way the Bears practiced. If a ball lay on the ground, Smith wanted his players to swarm to it like ants to a crumb, pick it up and carry it to pay dirt. And not just fumbles, mind you, but incomplete passes as well. (Per the rules of football, incompletions cannot be returned.)

"Sometimes you'll see us do it in games," Bears Pro Bowl safety Mike Brown said of the defense's take-it-to-the-house mind-set. The Bears have a league-high nine interception returns for touchdowns in Smith's two years as head coach. "It's our mentality."

Good defenses think alike -- aggressively. Before a recent practice in Indianapolis, Ron Meeks, the Colts' defensive coordinator, was asked how Indy's version of the Tampa 2 defense evolved in one season from the team's perceived weak link into a confident, physical group that carried the club through the first quarter of the season, before the Colts' high-octane offense got in gear.

"We play with so much energy and speed," Meeks said. "When the ball is thrown, we're like piranhas. We're attacking the ball carrier, attacking the receivers, trying to inflict as much pain and play with as much energy as we can. A lot of it is an attitude."

That aggressive approach is the foundation of the Tampa 2, the style of Cover 2 defense made popular by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers under Tony Dungy, starting in the mid- to late-1990s. Actually, it all started in the 1970s with Bud Carson's Steelers defenses, for whom Dungy played defensive back. Dungy learned the Cover 2 from Carson. In Cover 2, two safeties play zone (area) coverage, each of them responsible for half of the field. Dungy's Bucs had great success dropping a speedy middle linebacker (the "Mike") down the middle of the field to defend the pass, creating a three-deep look, while four often undersized but quick defensive linemen rushed the passer. And so, the Tampa 2 was born.

So, too, was a trend. Nowadays, most every defense in the league has some form of the Tampa 2 in its package. But no one is making the Tampa 2 do what it does better than the originators -- Dungy in Indianapolis, Smith in Chicago and longtime coordinator Monte Kiffin in Tampa. The Bears and Colts are division champions, and the Bucs a victory away from making it three-for-three for Tampa 2 teams.

The Bears' defense has had a season for the ages, drawing comparisons to Da Bears of 1985. Chicago is on pace to break the 19-year-old record for points allowed in a 16-game season (187). Chicago went 43 quarters without allowing more than seven points in one quarter, the second-longest such streak in the last 70 years. The Bears allowed the fewest points over eight home games (61) in league history. Naturally, Chicago's top-rated defense leads the league in fewest points allowed per game at 11.2. The Bears were 21st in total defense a year ago.

The Colts' defense also made a dramatic jump, in Dungy's fourth year, from 29th in 2004 to ninth this season. Indianapolis held its first five opponents to 10 points or fewer -- the third team since 1970 to do so -- and seven foes overall to 10 or fewer. The Colts rank second in points allowed per game (15.6). And like the Bears, they're playing with virtually the same personnel.

Meanwhile, Tampa has the NFL's No. 2-rated defense, having allowed 16 or more points only four times. The Bucs will finish in the top 10 in total defense for a ninth consecutive season.

It seems the Tampa 2 is an ideal scheme with which to turn around a defense virtually overnight. In 2001, Smith's first year as St. Louis' defensive coordinator, the Rams improved from 24th the previous season to third. Meeks was Smith's secondary coach that year, before going to Indianapolis with Dungy in 2002.

The secret to the Tampa 2 system? There really isn't one.

Less is more in this case. The brilliance of the scheme lies in its simplicity. What the Tampa 2 teams have figured out is that it isn't what they're doing, as much as it is who is doing it and how. Whereas success in defenses designed by the Bill Belichicks, Romeo Crennels and Nick Sabans place a great deal of faith in the players' aptitude, the Tampa 2's effectiveness has more to do with their attitude.

"There's no magic formula," Dungy said. "We don't do a whole lot, other than play hard and play well. Whether it's Pittsburgh or Tampa or Chicago or here, we're going to be fundamentally sound and try not to give up big plays and play hard and play smart. It's that more so than the X's and O's."

The Tampa 2 is quite player-friendly. Each player is assigned a gap, and he is to attack it. Chicago, Indy and Tampa like to stop the run with eight players near the line of scrimmage, and on passing downs drop into their Cover 2 zone. They like to play it safe in this scheme, so it doesn't call for a lot of all-out blitzing with zero coverage (no safety in the middle, corners one-on-one), instead preferring to rely on the defensive line to apply pressure on the quarterback. "We play the odds a lot is what we do," said Smith, Dungy's linebackers coach in Tampa from 1996 through 2000.

They're always hustling in the Tampa 2, gang tackling ball carriers. It helps that the players have an idea where the ball is going. The Tampa 2 asks the corners to reroute the outside (also the most dangerous) receivers, delaying the release and buying the line more time to get to the quarterback.

"That's where the rush and the coverage come together," said Mike Tomlin, the Bucs' secondary coach and one of the league's top coordinator prospects. "The way you attack it is vertically. But in order to do that, you have to protect, or you have to get a bunch of people out to stress us. If you get people out, we've got one-on-one with the guys up-front. If you keep guys in to protect, we've got enough people in pass defense, and guys are in position to see the ball come out."

And attack.

"It allows them to play fast," Tomlin said.

The concept behind the Cover 2 is to prevent the big play by keeping everyone in front of the safeties and, when possible, making big plays. Simple.

It's more of a mentality than it is mental.

"[Pittsburgh coach] Bill Cowher, when we played them, he had to laugh," Dungy said. "He said they had an extra day, because it was Monday night, and they had all this extra time. 'But you guys only have one defense. We couldn't even utilize it.'"

When Colts owner Jim Irsay and team president Bill Polian hired Dungy four years ago, they knew, with the players Indy has on offense, they wouldn't have much salary cap space to allot for the defense, meaning the Colts would have to build that side of the ball through the draft and not free agency. Dungy and the Tampa 2 defense he taught were perfect for the Colts and their home stadium, the RCA Dome, with its artificial surface. "He brought a defense that fit completely with the kind of players we had here and the salary cap approach that we were forced to take," Polian said.

In recent years, Indianapolis has lost linebackers Mike Peterson and Marcus Washington to free agency, and after the Patriots pushed the Colts around for a second year in a row in the playoffs, fans and media wanted to see the Colts spend money on free agents for the defense, even at the expense of retaining franchise (and franchised) running back Edgerrin James. But Dungy knew it would only be a matter of time before his young players matured in the system.

"That was the trepidation: 'How are we going to get better because we didn't go out and get five or six new guys?'" Dungy said. "We felt the guys we got, [former Eagles defensive tackle] Corey Simon and [first-round cornerback] Marlin Jackson, were going to help us, but we knew that most of our improvement would come from Mike Doss, Bob Sanders, Cato June, Raheem Brock, playing more in the system and playing better because they knew what they were doing."

Simon calls the Tampa 2 a "man-whoop-a-man" defense. "If you can't beat your man," Simon said, "you're going to find holes in our defense. It's simple and sound. It's not real complicated."

Dungy raised quite a few eyebrows, but he knew precisely what he was doing when he drafted undersized end Dwight Freeney in the first round of his first draft with the Colts. He was getting his version of Tampa's Simeon Rice, a premier pass rusher, a key component of the Tampa 2. Smith has two terrors coming off the edge in Adewale Ogunleye and Alex Brown. Sanders, taken in the second round last year, is the intimidator at safety, the Colts' version of ex-Buc John Lynch. For the Bears, that's Mike Brown.

The parallels in the blueprints don't stop there. Before Anthony McFarland took over, the Bucs had Warren Sapp as their dominant defensive tackle. The Colts have Simon; the Bears Tommie Harris, Smith's first draft pick. Lance Briggs is to the Bears what Derrick Brooks is to the Bucs, what former sixth-round pick and college safety June is to the Colts, the playmaking weak-side linebacker. Chicago has Brian Urlacher in the middle. Back in the day, the Bucs had Hardy Nickerson running the defense; now that guy is Shelton Quarles. Bears cornerback Nathan Vasher, Smith says, possesses the ball skills of Tampa's Ronde Barber.

What all of those players have in common is that they can move quickly. Along with an aggressive attitude, the Tampa 2 places a premium on speed. "I'm sure we don't emphasize [running to the ball] any more than anyone else does, but it's easier to fly to the ball when you have fast guys that can run," Dungy said. Speed often comes at the expense of size, though not always, as Smith discovered. "When I went to St. Louis," Smith said, "I was looking for those same body types. What I've since found out since I've been in Chicago, just looking at our linebackers, is you can have speed, quickness and size." Smith and defensive coordinator Ron Rivera grade their players on loafs, or how many times they don't hustle to the football.

At some point this season, the Bucs, Bears and Colts defenses were carrying their respective teams, some more than others. The Bears are an 11-win team despite infrequent contributions from their 31st-ranked offense. At the very least, Tampa 2 players don't have to carry huge playbooks. The Tampa 2's hallmark is execution rather than ingenuity.

The league's three Tampa 2 teams all have a legitimate shot at reaching Detroit and Super Bowl XL. Not coincidentally, Tampa, Chicago and Indy model their defenses after General Motors. They do one thing and they do it well.

"I tell guys it's like McDonald's," Dungy said. "If you like cheeseburgers, [the Tampa 2] is OK because the cheeseburger's going to be the same everyday, all the time, whatever city you're in, ask for a cheeseburger and fries, it's going to be the same. That's what we are -- the cheeseburger and fries that's the same way every week in every city."

Makes my point on why Jauron blows as a DC.

Jauron's D wasn't that bad for the Lions. Given the fact that all his LB's were hurt this year, they were very respectable. If the offense was able to actually score points this year, his defensive schemes would be a non-issue.

lions defense actually played well. but nevertheless, 3-4 defense is pretty good with the right personel. its the one defense that has given the colts fits before.

lions defense actually played well. but nevertheless, 3-4 defense is pretty good with the right personel. its the one defense that has given the colts fits before.


Yeah, the 3-4 is sexy NOW!

I remember just a couple short seasons ago that the Steelers were the only team to run the 3-4 because everyone else got away from it, but since the NFL is a copy cat league, there's more people running it.

I believe Buffalo ran the 3-4 too back in their hey day but yeah not too many.

Jauron's defense was not that good. They appeared respectable until they needed to get a stop then they couldn't. When teams needed to score they did at will and mainly with big plays.

I suppose if we had an offense that could score it would make the defense better but I rather have a DC that isn't afraid of making something happen than stand back in zone coverage and cover 2 and shit. Part of the problem is Millen drafted light weights at LB like Bailey. If you don't blitz the Boss he's a usless idiot back there.

I don' like 3-4 myself, but I do like the Tampa 2. It sounds like it would better fit our personnel. Imagine if we got another speed rusher in the draft (Williams?) and played Tampa 2 defense. We have the speed, playmakers, intimidating safety, etc to do it. I'd much rather see that here.

I wonder if the Tampa secondary coach they mentioned would be a good DC.

the 3-4 is a personel defense. if you dont have it dont run it. my team learned that the hard way the season before this season.

but with the right personel ists great and its the one defense that can still confuse peyton manning with the variated blitzes(thus he had trouble with the pats and the chargers beat him this year with it.)

The Lions do not come close to have the personel to run the 3-4. Hall couldnt play in it. Big Daddy wouldnt be good enough at nose and not good enough as an end in it. Big Baby is good in anything. Actually Kalimba Edwards would fit the 3-4 better than 4-3.


Art

The Lions do not come close to have the personel to run the 3-4. Hall couldnt play in it. Big Daddy wouldnt be good enough at nose and not good enough as an end in it. Big Baby is good in anything. Actually Kalimba Edwards would fit the 3-4 better than 4-3.


Art
its not about the line. its the linebacking core mostly. lets see. you guys would have bailey and davis on the outside with lehman and homes in the middle. the questions is can the handle it? or possibly convert hall or edwards to OLB and cody to DE.

Actually it is about the line too. You need your best players on the field and our inside guys are our best part of our front 7. Hall cannot play outside LB. He is too big and slow for that and too small to play end. He cannot hold up against the run now.

Bailey needs to play in space off the TE, use him right and he gets 6+ sacks a year. He has too much speed. Too bad he cant stay healthy.

Davis is a horrible LB. He cannot tackle and would prefer he was cut.


Art

Actually it is about the line too. You need your best players on the field and our inside guys are our best part of our front 7. Hall cannot play outside LB. He is too big and slow for that and too small to play end. He cannot hold up against the run now.

Bailey needs to play in space off the TE, use him right and he gets 6+ sacks a year. He has too much speed. Too bad he cant stay healthy.

Davis is a horrible LB. He cannot tackle and would prefer he was cut.


Art
the line just has to push the line. thats it. the plays are made by the linebackers.

my team had thin linebacker depth and deep on the defensive line. in the end our defense sucked last year because of no linebackers. we had even less linebackers this year but played 4-3 and played much better.

You made my point. Our best front 7 guys play on the Dline. Our LB outside of Holmes suck pretty bad. So you just want Shaun to hold up the line.

Sorry but he is a stud and you build a defense around him, not try to put him in to a D that doesnt take advantage of what he does.

Name one LB who is worth a day that is not injured or can tackle other than Holmes and he was injured but is not injury prone.

Art

I think that a Hall/Rogers/Cody line with Edwards/Lehman/Holmes/Bailey as the LB's wou be OK, but I would prefer a 5-2 or 4-4.

A 5-2 with Edwards(or new guy)/Cody/Big Daddy/Rogers/Hall(or new guy), along with Holmes and Lehman would be very good.

A 4-4 to capitalize on Lehman and Bailey's speed could be interesting too.

The Lions do not come close to have the personel to run the 3-4. Hall couldnt play in it. Big Daddy wouldnt be good enough at nose and not good enough as an end in it. Big Baby is good in anything. Actually Kalimba Edwards would fit the 3-4 better than 4-3.


Art

We would suck monkey ball in a 3-4 defense. None of our ends are capable of playing in it, and it would reduce the effectiveness of Shaun Rogers. Not to mention, we would have to rely on our LBs to make plays and the only one on our team that can do that is Holmes.

the colts are winningless against the 3-4 in the playoffs with manning at qb and undefeated against the 4-3.

the colts are winningless against the 3-4 in the playoffs with manning at qb and undefeated against the 4-3.

If we had the personnel that the Pats or the Steelers had, then I would agree we should be playing 3-4. But given our personnel, we should try to stay as far away from 3-4 as we can.

Anyone want to explain to me the finer points of the cover 2 philosophy, what it is and how it works? Is tampa 2 just a variation of it?

Anyone want to explain to me the finer points of the cover 2 philosophy, what it is and how it works? Is tampa 2 just a variation of it?

here you go gecko.

Thanks!

Maybe it's too difficult but I think teams should be able to switch looks on defense and throw 3 or 4 LB's on the field at different times in the game. It adds confusion for the opposing offense and if the 4-3 isn't working against a team being able to switch into a 3-4 to give the other team a wrinkle is a great move, IMO.

I watch the Dolphins with my Sunday Ticket a lot and Saban seems to switch his defense between the 3-4 and the 4-3 and he even will drop Jason Taylor into a LB spot. I would like to see us do things like that with Kalimba or one of the DE's in the draft that we might get.

All this is out the window though coz we're gonna be watching a lot of the same defense this year and that's what I don't like about the Tampa 2 defense. You need good/great defensive players to make it work and we are lacking enough play makers on D.

3-4 is a bad idea with the Lions personnel. The last thing we need is more linebackers. They all suck except for holmes. Don't touch the front 4, they are the best part of our defense. Get better at LB and at safety and run the Tampa 2.

not to mention Edwards will get paid somewhere else. I think he'll be gone.

Who is going to end up playing MLB in this scheme. Since the MLB is going to have a huge responsibility in the middle of the field, especially in coverage, I don't think Holmes will be retained. Lehman may have to be our MLB next year and I'm not sure I am comfortable with that.

I think Lehman will be. The only way I see it not being Lehman is if we trade down and MLB is the best player available. I think we'll end up with a DE or OT in the first, and grab a OLB in the 2nd or 3rd to make Lehman the MLB.

If we don't get anyone else Lehman is the guy, IMO but I don't think our MLB is on the team yet.

Who is going to end up playing MLB in this scheme. Since the MLB is going to have a huge responsibility in the middle of the field, especially in coverage, I don't think Holmes will be retained. Lehman may have to be our MLB next year and I'm not sure I am comfortable with that.

Unfortunately for us, he is our best LB right now. Even though he is a bad fit for the Cover 2 scheme, I would rather hang on to him given our LB's injury history.

The Dungy 'D' can be done dirt cheap

This is the way rabbits take over a neighborhood. First you see one, then you see five. Next thing you know they are everywhere and you can't protect your vegetables.

Three of the most effective defensive teams in the NFL this season -- the Bears, Colts and Bucs -- used "Dungy Defenses." Three more teams -- the Vikings, Lions and Bills -- will employ Dungy's principles next season.

The Vikings might not be running the scheme if not for the success the Bears had with it. New Minnesota coach Brad Childress says he believes running the Dungy Defense will be particularly beneficial in the NFC North, where the Bears are kings. "What better way to prepare for it than practice against it every day?" Childress says.

And Childress believes running the Dungy Defense should be as problematic for opposing offenses as it will be beneficial for the Vikings' offense. Childress is accustomed to game-planning against the Dungy "D," having faced a version of the scheme 11 times in the past six seasons. "It does give you some problems," he says. "It's disruptive on the outside routes with all the two-deep (coverage) they play."

The Dungy Defense is being duplicated mostly because the teams that have used it have had success with it. It helps that the scheme is easy to learn. Rookies can acclimate faster (see Bears safety Chris Harris). Veterans can step in quickly (see Colts defensive tackle Corey Simon). "It's simple," Lions president Matt Millen says. "If it's done right, you clean up all the gray area. You get everything defined so there are fewer questions for guys to answer. They know where they fit. They know what their responsibilities are."

The Bears play eight-man fronts on running downs. They drop into cover 2 on passing downs. They run only five coverages from their base defense: cover 2 and cover 3, which they play about 70 percent of the time, zone blitz and two forms of man (cover 1 and all-out blitz). In the nickel, they use four coverages.

Chicago runs three blitzes from its standard package and three from its nickel package. The Bears blitzed in passing situations only about 14 percent of the time this season, though they also run blitzed about 14 percent of the time. The key for Chicago's defense isn't the volume of blitzes, it's the timing. Coordinator Ron Rivera makes them count.

The streamlined approach has resulted in rapid growth in the two years coach Lovie Smith has been in charge of the Bears. "Our inventory as a defensive unit is small enough to where we are able to practice our base stuff every week," linebackers coach Bob Babich says. "And every week, no matter who we're playing, we're able to get better at those things." The more comfortable the Bears are with their responsibilities, the faster they play.

Players warm to the scheme because it allows them to cut it loose with a minimal amount of deliberation. "You get enthusiasm, you get people flying to the ball, those kinds of things," Colts president Bill Polian says.

And that, in Millen's mind, is the key. "It's not what you're doing; it's how you're doing it," he says. "What Tampa has created success with is not the coverage. It's not the concept. It's that they get everybody busting their (butts) to get where they have to go. That's the thing."

Finding players to fit a Dungy Defense can be easy, but the Vikings, Lions and Bills likely will be in a transition phase next season. They'll probably need to weed out -- or slim down -- some of their overstuffed linemen and find faster linebackers.

Corners for man-to-man schemes can be impossible to find, but corners for this scheme are as easy to come by as junk mail. They don't have to have imposing size, top speed or outstanding man-to-man coverage skills. All they need are instinct, discipline and toughness. The Bears' Nathan Vasher is a perfect example of a corner who might not fare well in some schemes, but he made the Pro Bowl playing for Smith.

The Dungy Defense isn't for everybody. But if it's run correctly, it sure can be hard on opponents' vegetables.

http://www.sportingnews.com/yourturn/viewtopic.php?t=60619

I think Detroit COULD run a 3-4 with Cody, Rogers and Redding on the line and Bailey, Lehman, Holmes and Edwards as the backers. Hall would be used for situational plays.

I think Detroit COULD run a 3-4 with Cody, Rogers and Redding on the line and Bailey, Lehman, Holmes and Edwards as the backers. Hall would be used for situational plays.

No thanks. I'd rather run the tampa 2. We already have the fast LB's to play it I think, and our CB's are not good man to man CB's anyway. The only thing we are missing really is a DE opposite Hall (maybe Redding can improve enough with Marinelli here), and maybe another LB to replace Holmes (I'm not big on Davis starting at all).

I think Detroit COULD run a 3-4 with Cody, Rogers and Redding on the line and Bailey, Lehman, Holmes and Edwards as the backers. Hall would be used for situational plays.

Running a 3-4, would take away the effectiveness of Rogers and Wilkinson. And why put more LBs on the field when all our current LB's suck?

Great point on the LB's. We can't even keep 2-3 healthy, let alone 4.

That's why we trade for Ray Lewis. Oh crap, that's another thread.