Against the zone blocking scheme

[The Leaper]

So, my distaste has many levels. It's no one thing. I may change my tune after a while but I'm not a fad guy when it comes to how you play the game and I don't like the cut-blocking style of the zone blocking scheme. It's cheap.

The scheme may be "cheap"...but lining up 5 lineman capable of being top-line "smash-mouth" players isn't.

Guys who dominate on the OL in that way get paid massive amounts of coin. Before free agency, it didn't matter. Now it does. Hell, Rivera was on his last legs and Dallas still rolled a Brinks truck up to his door.

Personally, I agree that I would rather have a smash-mouth unit...however, it seems that in the current NFL it is easier to sustain an OL using a zone blocking scheme. This is because it takes longer for a true "smash-mouth" unit to become a cohesive unit and because it is harder to secure top-line players who dominate at the line of scrimmage. Fewer teams currently run zone-blocking schemes, so finding guys that fit that system is easier and cost effective.

[gureski]

When it comes down to it, isn't everything a scheme, a gimmick? From the forward pass, to Air Coryell to the 3-4 Defense to the West Coast Offense...isn't everything about trying to outwit your opponent any which way you can? In essence, doesn't winning or losing come down to talent and execution no matter what scheme you are running?

No, every scheme is not a gimmick and winning and losing doesn't always come down to who has the most talent. A Play-Action pass is way different then a Flea-Flicker. Flea-Flicker is a gimmick play. Play-action pass is a strategy.

The West Coast Offense is a strategy. It uses the same passing and running that regular offensive schemes do. It's all in the playcalling. That's all it is. The RB's still run and hit the holes and the WR's still run routes and catch the ball. It's not a gimmick. The WR's aren't pulling the DB's to the ground and then catching the ball and the FB's aren't punching the LB's in the nuts in order to pancake them. It's blocking, running, catching and so on. Standard stuff that all teams run. Only difference is the strategy of the offense and the playcalling. Where you run and when you run and what routes you run and what plays are called when.

This isnt' to say that an offense like the West Coast can't have gimmick in it. Remember how Holmgren had that one play that was widely known as a 'Pick' play where the TE would pick off the CB covering the WR as the WR ran across the middle of the field?

On the winning and losing thing and talent...

When a super-coach like Bill Parcells takes over a team they win. He's done it in multiple cities. There are certain coaches who can win with whatever talent they have. Coaching can and does play a big role. Whatever offense Dick Vermeil coached over the past 5 years played at a record breaking pace. Talent means alot....but there are other factors that can and do decide the difference between winning and losing. Coaches and schemes matter a great deal.

One final note...

I don't want to win at any cost. I'd rather lose and go 4-12 then win the classless way the Cowboys did in the 90's. I"m a Packer fan and somewhat of a traditionalist. I wont sell my soul for a "W" or a Championship. I want to be proud of the team I root for. I think back to the B.S. cutblock that Erik Williams laid on Jurkovich in 1995 and I think back to the Denver Superbowl where our D-lineman were being held and tackled to the ground and it makes me sick to think that our scheme will have some of that type of teachings in it. Makes me want to puke.

[gureski]

Let me say it this way...

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me you didn't mind what Erik Williams did to John Jurkovich in the 1995 NFC Championship game in Dallas.

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me that you still don't get physically ill when you watch replays of that 1997 Superbowl vs the Broncos where our D-lineman were getting tackled and held on a down by down basis!

That's our scheme now. We're going to be playing dirty like that. It's being taught to our lineman.

For me, I'd rather take the straight-ahead blocking that has been in G.B. since the Lombardi years over this crap. I don't want to run the ball and win if we have to resort to acting like the Cowboys and Broncos to do it.

[packrulz]

Let me say it this way...

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me you didn't mind what Erik Williams did to John Jurkovich in the 1995 NFC Championship game in Dallas.

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me that you still don't get physically ill when you watch replays of that 1997 Superbowl vs the Broncos where our D-lineman were getting tackled and held on a down by down basis!

That's our scheme now. We're going to be playing dirty like that. It's being taught to our lineman.

For me, I'd rather take the straight-ahead blocking that has been in G.B. since the Lombardi years over this crap. I don't want to run the ball and win if we have to resort to acting like the Cowboys and Broncos to do it.

The thing is, Denver won the Super Bowl that year and I've been impressed with the way Shanahan has been able to keep them competitive in spite of free agent losses, retirements & etc. I think the scheme is part of that, it's easier to find smaller zone blockers because they slip in the draft due to their size. Plus, Denver has interchanged running backs many times and they have had great success pounding the ball. I don't like the chop blocking but it's not illegal so other teams do it, the Pack can too.

[AtlPackFan]

Let me say it this way...

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me you didn't mind what Erik Williams did to John Jurkovich in the 1995 NFC Championship game in Dallas.

I'd like one true Packer fan to step up and tell me that you still don't get physically ill when you watch replays of that 1997 Superbowl vs the Broncos where our D-lineman were getting tackled and held on a down by down basis!

That's our scheme now. We're going to be playing dirty like that. It's being taught to our lineman.

For me, I'd rather take the straight-ahead blocking that has been in G.B. since the Lombardi years over this crap. I don't want to run the ball and win if we have to resort to acting like the Cowboys and Broncos to do it.

So anyone who runs a zone blocking scheme is inherently dirty and is out to mame the other team at any cost? If this is true, then why doesn't the NFL step in and outlaw it?

[CaptainKickass]

I don't even pretend to follow college football but I recall several draftees and current veterans stating that their respectice colleges ran a "zone scheme" etc. etc.

What are there like 3 in the NFL now? I got GB, Denver, and Atlanta - is that it?

I wonder how many college teams run it?

[The Leaper]

That's our scheme now. We're going to be playing dirty like that. It's being taught to our lineman.

Certain cut blocks remain legal in the NFL...and are in fact really the only way some undersized guys can get advantage on someone who outweighs them by 70 pounds.

Perhaps you want all OLs in the NFL to be filled with 375 pound players, who routinely become excessively obese and often face life threatening medical problems due to their weight.

I don't. I like that the system allows a 305 pound guy a fighting chance within the rules.

[AtlPackFan]

OK, someone please attempt to explain the nuances of the zone blocking scheme vs. traditional blocking schemes and why it as viewed as "dirty" way of playing football? I'm really having a hard time grasping why the NFL doesn't make it illegal if D-Linemen are getting hurt by teams employing the scheme?

[woodbuck27]

I'm on the side of those who will just wait and see how it works. At the same time I want to see good hard and clean penalty free play on both sides of the ball.

Your comments are certainly interesting guresky and your points well made.

Certainly what we saw on OUR OL the past two seasons wasn't working as well as it had in 2001-2003, but that is because of loss of key personnel, IMO.

It's now the ZBS and we must witness it's effectiveness and faults as well. Change . Lots of change to endure this Season.

[woodbuck27]

I'll pass this technicle article along to y'all as it does help in understanding the difference bet. the man and zone blocking Schemes. Also compares their effectiveness, using actual RB success or not and somewhat gets into the legal use of the cut block.

Stick with the read and you'll be rewarded.The question may then arise in you as it did in me as to, do we 'in fact' have the personnel to go on the field and make it work as well as Denver and Atlanta (Michael Vick - a factor) has.

Here is the article below, ( ** minus the graphs ). To study the **graphs use this link ** or the actual article :

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/ramblings.php?p=2484&cat=11

Zone Blocking vs. Man Blocking
3/31/2005

Guest Column by Brian Hook

As TMQ often says, Denver’s helmets should have a label that says "Insert running back, gain 1000 yards". So many Denver running backs have been accused of benefiting from "the Denver system" that we thought it would be a good idea to see what correlation might exist between the Denver "one-cut" zone-blocking scheme and overall running back success.

To gauge that we needed to trawl the archives for running backs that have gone from one system to the other. Unfortunately, this isn’t as easy as it sounds.

Denver running backs seem to remain Denver running backs for life — possibly because they have a nasty habit of suffering devastating injuries while a Bronco. Terrell Davis, Mike Anderson, Olandis Gary, Reuben Droughns, Quentin Griffin, and Tatum Bell have had almost all of their career carries as Broncos. The only player in recent memory that has gone from Denver to another team and achieved significant carries in both locations is Clinton Portis.

However, as luck would have it, some teams have recently transitioned to a zone-blocking scheme. Houston hired Joe Pendry as offensive line coach and installed a zone-blocking scheme for Domanick Davis between 2003 and 2004. Atlanta also saw a similar transition, this time by bringing in the godfather of the zone blocking scheme, Alex Gibbs, whom many a defensive player can thank for a career or season ending lower leg injury.

So this gives us four players to work with: Clinton Portis (Denver and Washington); TJ Duckett and Warrick Dunn (Atlanta); and Domanick Davis (Houston).


ZONE BLOCKING

For those of you unfamiliar with the Denver offensive line scheme, they use a technique known as "zone blocking". In a "man" or "drive" blocking scheme the lineman is responsible for an individual, and the play is designed for a running back to hit a particular gap. The zone blocking scheme, on the other hand, has a lineman blocking an area instead of a designated defensive player. If multiple linemen are blocking an area than one can break off and block into the second level.

The offensive line typically moves as a unit laterally, and the result of their blocks should create some natural seams or gaps in the defensive formation. The running back is responsible for finding a hole, making a cut, and then running upfield. One of the key tenets of the Denver system is that the running back takes what he can get — he should never dance around waiting for a hole to open. He needs to be agile, authoritative, and possess good instincts. Nothing fancy, just try to gain positive yardage.

A final element of the zone blocking scheme is the use of the much hated cut block to seal off backside pursuit. This means that any linemen on the backside of the play cut block defensive players in front of them, which drops the defensive players to the turf and, oddly enough, opens up holes for the running back. Note that the cut block is legal in this case, as long as the offensive lineman isn’t hitting the defender from behind and as long as he doesn’t roll up on his legs. But hitting him below the knees near the line of scrimmage is fair game, as much as the NFLPA doesn’t want it to be.

Obviously getting defenders on the ground is one benefit of the cut block, but an intangible benefit is that defenders start worrying about their knees and ankles. They lose a bit of their aggression and speed since they’re paranoid that some lineman is going to creep up on them and take out their legs. This has the benefit of slowing down the entire defense.

For the record, Joe Pendry claims that his zone blocking scheme doesn’t rely on cut blocks. Given Davis’s performance, he might want to reconsider that stance.


CONFOUNDING VARIABLES

Before we start looking at the data, let’s go ahead and establish up front that nothing we’ve discovered is conclusive. We’re dealing with very limited sample data and a huge number of confounding variables. Portis had to deal with moving to a run-heavy offense with a passing game as threatening as a sleeping infant. In addition, Washington’s starting right tackle (Jon Jansen) was lost at the start of the season. And, finally, Portis casually mentioned that he had been suffering from a shoulder injury he didn’t want to "bother" the trainers about during the season.

While Atlanta managed to keep its personnel relatively intact, they turned over their entire coaching staff and installed brand new offensive and defensive schemes. In addition Dunn and Duckett flip flopped roles as primary ball carrier — in 2003 Duckett was the workhorse but in 2004 that title moved to, well, Mike Vick, but for the sake of this article, we’ll just note that Dunn had more carries than Duckett in 2004, a reversal from 2003.

One final note before we get to the analysis: we’re not trying to analyze effectiveness (a la DPAR, DVOA, or Success Rate), we’re instead trying to get a feel of the "nature" of their carries. Are they getting stuffed more often? Are they breaking off fewer or more long runs? Standard metrics such as yards/carry or standard deviation have a hard time telling us about the style of a runner, but an analysis of the distribution of their runs gives us a pretty good idea.


THE ANALYSIS

We took the running play information from 2003 and 2004 for Davis, Portis, Dunn, and Duckett and sorted the runs into buckets. These buckets were:

0 or fewer yards ("stuffs")
1-3 yards ("short runs")
4-9 yards ("good runs")
10+ yards ("long runs")

Discounting situational success, the first two buckets are "bad" runs and the second two buckets are "good" runs. We then graphed the results for each back comparing the frequency of runs within each category between zone and man blocking schemes. The results were inconsistent but still interesting.

Now, without looking at any real numbers, I think the graphs tell us a lot about each runner. Let’s take a look at TJ Duckett first: ** see link above



Duckett clearly improved with the zone running scheme. In fact, that he had more runs for 4-9 yards than for 1-3 yards is impressive. In 2004 he almost halved the number of stuffs he suffered, he had a far greater percentage of "good" runs, but his 10+ yard frequency stayed about the same.

In other words, he isn’t a big play back, but in the zone scheme he was a lot more dependable for getting good, solid carries. Basically that distribution is exactly what you want from most running backs — get me at least 4 yards over half the time. It is not a coincidence that he has the second best RB Success Rate of backs in 2004 (up from #20 in 2003). (RB Success Rate explained here.)

Of course, other factors are at play as well — he wasn’t asked to carry as much and it he was used very differently. In 2003 over 65% of his carries were on 1st down, whereas in 2004 less than 50% of his carries were on 1st down.



Then we have his teammate, Warrick Dunn, who went through his own changes:


The graph ** basically says "In 2004, Dunn was far more likely to get you positive yardage, but less likely to get you GOOD positive yardage".



D. Davis, on the other hand, isn’t as cut and dry as expected:

The media have gone on and on about his lower yards/carry this year vs. last year (3.9 vs. 4.3). But the ** graph indicates that he was more consistent in the zone blocking scheme, i.e. a greater proportion of his runs were between the extremes of "stuffed" and "long run", which means he was stuffed less but also had fewer long runs. The numbers bear this out — in the zone blocking scheme he had 73.3% of his runs between 1 and 9 yards, but in the man blocking scheme only 64% of his runs were in that range. Visually this is obvious, as is the fact that he had more stuffs and long runs.

It is possible that the lack of cut-blocking on the backside prevented Davis from breaking out past the 3 yard area and grabbing large chunks of ground.


Now compare this with C. Portis:

The graph ** there, again, clearly shows the trend difference — there’s a crossover between the "bad" region and the "good" region. In other words, in the man blocking scheme he tended to have more "bad" runs and fewer "good" runs than in the zone blocking scheme. He ran more often for more yards in the zone scheme, however it should be mentioned that Joe Bugel and Joe Gibbs recognized this near the end of the 2004 season and supposedly incorporated more zone blocking type plays, however looking at the overall game summaries I don’t immediately see a difference.


SUMMARY

With such limited data and with so many confounding variables we can’t really draw any strong conclusions about man vs. zone blocking. But there are some interesting observations to be had.

First, the data seems to indicate that odds of getting stuffed drop with a zone scheme. This makes sense, since in a zone one-cut scheme the running back chooses the hole instead of sticking with the play’s pre-selected gap.

Second, there seems to be no correlation between scheme and the ability to rip off long runs. Davis and Portis had more long runs with zone blocking; Duckett was the same; and Dunn had more in a man scheme.

Third, it is possible that Davis might have had a better year if Pendry had used cut-blocking to Davis’s advantage — his distribution of runs is similar between the two years with the exception of his lack of long runs.

The "Denver system" isn’t a magical pill that a team can swallow to generate 1500 yard rushers with consistency, but obviously it has been successful for running backs in Denver. One reason it has not been widely adopted is time: it takes time to teach, time to master, and time to get the smaller, more agile offensive linemen that the system requires. If you take zone blocking and try to implement it with 340 pound behemoths, you will probably fail, and for better or for worse, 340 pound behemoths are what you’ll find on a typical offensive line in the NFL.



I hope this article helps y'all with some more in depth understanding of the ZBS.

[Scott Campbell]

One reason it has not been widely adopted is time: it takes time to teach, time to master, and time to get the smaller, more agile offensive linemen that the system requires. If you take zone blocking and try to implement it with 340 pound behemoths, you will probably fail, and for better or for worse, 340 pound behemoths are what you’ll find on a typical offensive line in the NFL.

Good read Woody!

That last paragraph was of little comfort. I hope our guys don't take too long to nail it down. It'd be great to see some video comparing the two.

[Tarlam!]

What's a "Cut Block" ?

[woodbuck27]

What's a "Cut Block" ?

Tarlam -

a cut block is basically a legal block thrown at a defender, in the knee to ankle area (without rolling up on the man) and thus can be very intimidating / injurious.

It's always scary to me to see one of our own hit with one, and as I result I place alot of weight on gureski's negative comments disagreeing with the ZBS and the use of this blocking technique.

[Scott Campbell]

And a little more:

The cut block is a variation of the drive block. It differs in that the blocker aims at the linebacker's feet and ankles instead of driving at the linebacker's numbers. If the defensive player has not focused his eyes on the blocker and is looking for the ball carrier, this can be an effective offensive tool. One minute the linebacker will be standing up; the next second he will find himself sprawled on the ground.

[woodbuck27]

And a little more:

The cut block is a variation of the drive block. It differs in that the blocker aims at the linebacker's feet and ankles instead of driving at the linebacker's numbers. If the defensive player has not focused his eyes on the blocker and is looking for the ball carrier, this can be an effective offensive tool. One minute the linebacker will be standing up; the next second he will find himself sprawled on the ground.

And a little more:

Possibly sustaining a seasonal or career ending injury. It's NASTY !