Defending The Red Zone (7 pages, PDF)

Defending The Red Zone is a Gridiron Strategies Special Coaching Report subtitled "Theories, Concepts To Keep Opponents From Scoring," written by Robert Kitchen, defensive coordinator at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada. It addresses a problem every defensive staff runs into: as Kitchen opens, it is tough for teams to play the same red-zone defense from game to game, because they are attacked differently each week. Rather than hand you one fixed goal-line call, the report walks through the fifteen factors that go into building a weekly red-zone package — attitude, red-zone geography, personnel, formations, motion, hash marks, the run game and its blocking schemes, the option, pass actions, protections, routes and trick plays — and closes with a scouting checklist you can run on every opponent before the game. This is the digitised edition of the printed Special Coaching Report: 7 pages, PDF, with a searchable text layer.

What's inside

• Critical Factors For Building An Impenetrable Red-Zone Defense — the opening 15-point list of everything that has to be considered when you assemble a weekly red-zone plan, from your own players' attitude down to positional technique.
• Attitude of your defensive players — dominating the line of scrimmage, pushing the ball back up the field, forcing the quarterback to execute perfectly to score, and preparing players for the fact that "the bullets fly a little faster" in the red zone.
• Red-Zone Geography (Diagram 1) — the red zone broken into three distinct areas: the 20 to the 11 yard line, the 10 to the 5, and the 4 yard line to the goal line. Kitchen explains what offenses tend to call in each and argues for a separate defensive package per area.
• Breaking down the opponent's red-zone philosophy in three steps — how far their red-zone offense differs from their base offense and when they switch, whether they run a few plays well or a wide variety, and how their kicking game ties into play selection on later downs.
• Personnel and formations — substitution patterns and power groupings, three-back and three-tight-end sets, the two-TE set that forces you into a seven-man front, the wing that removes your edge penetration and technically creates a ninth gap, and the cluster/bunch formation that gives man-coverage teams trouble (with hand-jam and banjo answers).
• Motion in the red zone — the four reasons offenses use it, how motion is used purely to read your coverage, the change-of-strength adjustment your brackets and doubles need, and motion that manufactures a rub or pick in tight space.
• Hash marks — why an offense that can no longer stretch you vertically will stretch you horizontally instead, the choice between defending the wide side and defending the formation, unbalanced sets into the boundary, and the sprint-out and bootleg plays that come with them.
• Defending red-zone running plays — the runs best suited to the area (quick-hitting fullback plays and quick traps; traps, power off-tackle, counter trey and complementary boots at the point of attack; draws and QB draws against an aggressive, pressuring defense) and why backs are coached to run up the back of the pile.
• The opponent's run-blocking schemes — the two questions offenses ask (can the scheme handle pressure at the point of attack, and how long must blocks hold), gap scheme with down blocks and a kickout, long trap and counter-trey blocking, and the zone / man / combination debate with the defensive answer to each.
• Defending the red-zone option game — man-with-pressure versus zone-and-sound, teams that install option purely to keep you out of man, inside versus outside veer, the three-back attack that threatens dive and load on the same play, and the rule to defend the phases in the order they can hurt you while challenging the QB every time.
• Red-zone pass actions — the shortened, faster passing game; why 7-step drops give way to the 3-step game; play action and its slower-developing downside; sprint-out and moving pockets; bootlegs off full flow; throwbacks off toss action when nobody in man coverage is assigned to the QB; and the screen game. Plus the coaching point that in the red zone your DBs defend the goal line, not the back line.
• Red-zone pass protections — check-release backs, hot reads and QB sight adjustments, multiple launch points, protections called at the line of scrimmage and stemming to answer them, and where zone and slide protection break down: the back on an island between levels, who can be overloaded, isolated or mismatched.
• Routes and patterns — the working definition of route versus pattern, the fact that from the 17-yard line in the field is three times as wide as it is deep, contact on the release, inside cuts being cut off near the goal line, defending the fade, splits used to isolate a defender or set up a pick, crossing routes, multi-level patterns, back-on-linebacker mismatches, and the delay route with its blitz answer.
• Gadget plays, technique and practice — both schools of thought on trick plays and why a superior defense should expect to see more of them, pad level and technique in the most physical area of the field, forcing turnovers and creating a new LOS, and finding practice time so players learn the dimensions and speed of red-zone football.
• Red-Zone Scouting Checklist (sidebar, page 7) — 17 items to answer on every opponent before the game: down and distance tendencies in all three geographic areas, hash-mark tendencies, the yard line where they go to goal-line offense, short-yardage and snap-count tendencies, audibles and non-rhythmic cadences, "freeze" plays, screens and draws and where they come from, the option, formation tendencies, shifts and motions, no-huddle, line splits, personnel and substitution patterns, trick plays and reverses, pass actions and protection schemes, and picks or rubs.
• "Give Your Red-Zone Offense A Boost!" (sidebar, page 2) — the case for offensive coaches reading a defensive report and using it to fine-tune their own red-zone attack.

Who it is for

Defensive coordinators and head coaches who build a new red-zone plan for a different opponent every week, at high school, junior college or college level. The material is scheme-neutral: it is written around what offenses do inside the 20 and the questions you have to answer about them, so it applies whether you play odd or even fronts, man or zone. Position coaches will find usable teaching points for defensive backs in a shortened field and for linebackers matched on backs in the passing game.

It is also useful on the other side of the ball, and the report says so itself — one of its two sidebars is aimed squarely at offensive coaches who want to see how a defensive coordinator plans to stop them.

Be clear on what it is before you buy: this is a theory, concepts and game-preparation report, not a play-by-play install. It contains one diagram (red-zone geography), two sidebars including the scouting checklist, and prose written for coaches — there are no drawn coverage calls, blitz sheets or practice scripts.