Quote Originally Posted by 3irty1 View Post
What I thought for sure was coming this year was a 1-gapping 3-4 scheme. Ted loaded up on 1-gap 3-4 players, all the hints MM dropped hinted at a 1-gap 3-4 scheme, players talked about a more attacking style of defense. I'm happy with the 4-3/3-4 elephant/2-5 whatever-you-want-to-call-it as the answer, right now my issue is play calling.

Moving to a 1-gap scheme changes your whole defensive philosophy, the math up front is different. I don't care if your nickel is a 2-4, 3-3, 4-2, or 1-5, in a 1-gap front you can't trot that out against a balanced set and expect to stop the run with 7 vs 6 the way you can in a 2-gap front. On the other hand your base defense evens the math against the run and will be much better against the pass than its 2-gap counterpart. Plus with all the athletic lineman its zone-blitzing heaven. Against run-heavy offenses especially when your own offense is sucking balls we should have a front 7 more often than a front 6 so the back doesn't have a path to the secondary every play. I won't speak in absolutes, I think a Boyd-Guion 2-4 is fine once in a while as would be a base defense against a 3 WR set.
Good post, it was interesting to see what the NY Jets did on D. They stayed in base with 3 WR and shut Lacy down. They also allowed Jordy to go for over 200 yards. If you have a real good QB/RB combo defenses are going to have trouble defending you.