Re: 2025 Clemson Defense

I played ball until I was 27 and coached a few years beyond that. We were only lacking at DE depth including a starter. PWoo was a bad experiment.

What I have seen is incredibly undisciplined pass rush integrity. The pass rush should collapse the pocket in on the QB without allowing escape lanes. Linebackers should plug any gaps the pass rush leaves unless they are pulled due to assignments. The DE constantly lost outside contain and rarely turned the play back to the interior. Gap integrity was garbage all year.

In rush defense I saw the same type of issues. Low gap integrity with help almost always out of position. Too many bites on eye Candy. Terrible arm tackling. I always taught tackle the hips because the hips don’t lie. Never follow their head, eyes, or feet. Stick your shoulder on their hip and bring your hand like a club to dislodge the football.

Beyond pass rush I see linebackers missing multiple assignments. RB and TE running free on late release wheel routes or down the middle of the field wide open. Carter was the most egregious. Bad presnap reads slanting the dline the wrong direction or not at all. Play calls coming in far too late.

Lack of a stud run stopping safety. Even when we have 8 in the box (single high) and the safety walks up in the box they aren’t disrupting the play. Think Tanner Muse or Simmons blowing up the RB or QB run. Sammy is trying to fill that role but can’t cover like a true hybrid.

The corners and safeties lose leverage to WR too easily. They also take bad angles and lose phase which causes them to make horrible pass interference plays to stop the home run. When they play press man, they don’t jam the receivers up and get burnt because of it. They don’t use their hand to violently break off of wide receiver blocks either. They look like they are on roller skates. Hence the many explosive runs given up this year.

Terrible play calls on third and long. The defense will be dominating on first and second down playing aggressive zone blitz packages or outright blitzes then drop eight into a deep zone with huge soft spots. That usually results in 3rd and 16 getting picked up easily. Those in coverage have horrible spacing and fail to rotate help quickly enough.

There also seems to be lack of development. True freshman seem to burst on the scene and play extremely well their first season while regressing the next couple of years. Quality Depth seems to be an issue as well. Lack of gameplan adjustments to stop what the offense is doing well. Zero half time adjustments.

The issues are many and are glaring. Talent is mostly in place. Execution is not.

TigerPride97

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Dec 24, 2024, 1:25 PM

3-4 is a terrible defensive scheme because there's 0 margin for error. If you have the perfect puzzle pieces it works, if you don't, it's horrible. We don't have the personnel at all to run a 3-4. Our issue is not really scheme. It's fundamentals and playcalling.

First, let me explain how a good 4-3 defense is supposed to look. There should be two 5 technique defensive ends. These are smaller defensive ends than in a 3-4, but a bit more athletic. They are only responsible for one gap at a time, typically focusing on QB contain (so the outside). The defensive tackles are more important in this formation. The 1 technique should be lined up in the strong A gap, and draw a double team. He's the biggest and strongest defensive tackle in your team. Some call him a nose tackle here, because he still lines up across the nose of the center, just like in an old 5-2 defense. Finally, the most important defensive tackle is the 3 technique. He should be bigger than the ends, but more athletic than the 1. He needs the ability to float on the weakside to help the linebackers. I'll talk about the linebackers if needed, but I think I can make the point without it. All that you need to know right now is that the Sam should be on the strong side and be your strongest linebacker, the Mike is sideline to sideline, and the Will, your most athletic linebacker, should be on the backside.

The idea is that with the 4-3, you don't have to read an offense that precisely, because every defender has a gap. If they're guarding that gap, you shouldn't be allowing runs. In that vein, it's extremely important to keep 7 in the box at all times, unless the offense shows they're running 4 or 5 receivers. If the will drops into coverage, the FS or SS needs to come into the box and take their gap. Otherwise you'll get killed on draws.

We mostly try to do this, but we have horrible technique and fundamentals (which go beyond bad tackling and good handwork, another issue). Let me show you what I mean by fundamentals and technique.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwfO5OdFDQ8

Start at :35. This is a weird play. On this play, someone isn't doing their job. On the strong-side of the offense, Texas outnumbers us. Even more importantly, TJ Parker has pulled inside of the offensive tackle and is now in the B gap. Because of that, Wade should be taking the C gap that would normally be Parker's responsibility. But Barrett is over on that side, and he's lined up OUTSIDE the tight end. That means the C gap is unaccounted for. The running back goes right up the C gap for a 5 yard gain. That is just the players not knowing where to line up.

Now, :42. The linemen lined up properly here. However, Denhoff attacked the offensive tackle straight up instead of the outside shoulder. That leaves him unable to adjust to the screen. More importantly, Goodwin has the linebackers playing very far back. There are not 7 guys in the box any longer, and it creates a long time to adjust. I don't know why you'd have your backers playing 7 yards off the line on 2nd and 5. Combine that with Khalil taking a bad angle to the running back, and you allow a first down.

:51. I can't see what happened here, but looks like Sammy got pulled away from the middle of the field by the slot receiver, and whoever should have moved into the zone didn't, allowing a quick strike for another first down. You also have pretty bad tackling technique on display here.

1:00. This is picture perfect 4-3 defense. They all did everything right here. Everyone accounted for their gaps and kept in their zones. Woods drew the double team he was supposed to, Tre properly floated into the B gap (Tre has much better fundamentals than Page), and the 5 techniques focused on contain. As a result, Quinn can't see the open receiver, panics, and Tre makes the sack.

1:08. This was an excellent playcall and almost everyone did their jobs properly. Someone probably should have been quicker to recognize the WR screen so Wade wouldn't have to fly over there late, but it's an overall good defensive play just countered by better offensive play.

1:17. Horrible play here. They tried to cross assignments for Denhoff and Page, but (1) Page let himself just get bullied out of the B gap and (2) Carter is in the wrong place.

I could keep going, but I think this was enough to make my point. It's not an issue of us running the 4-3. When we do it correctly, it can be very effective. It's that (1) our players often find themselves out of position, (2) our linebackers and safeties play too far back which allows teams to set up their blocks and forces us to take bad angles to make the tackles, and (3) our players often get out-leveraged or pushed out of position. Those are problems that are more systemic than simply changing our scheme. It points both to Goodwin's lack of aggression (notice that he didn't disguise or bring a single blitz on those plays) and to our positional coach's inability to teach basic fundamentals.

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2025 Clemson Defense