xtrawildcat
One question about offensive line schemes. It seemed to me we went away from all the pulling we did in the first couple of Big 12 games and now are straight ahead zone blocking similar to what Dickie had these guys do. Also having more success. I would be interested in your thoughts on this.
To truly be successful with pulling interior linemen they have to be fast and LARGE.
HCCK had that luxury at NDSU, and might eventually have it again at KSU, but until his interior linemen are at least as fast as the defense he's facing and adds multiple TEs who can effectively fill the gaps left by the pulling linemen, zone blocking is much easier and sometimes more effective.
In the Veer, RPO, Wishbone, and Triple option that the Service Acadmies run, your OL only needs to engage the DL or LBs for one, possibly 2 seconds. Each play is designed for the back to hit the hole and then angle (Veer) away from the defensive flow. When you pull, however, the Dl or LBs have to be engaged by someone for 3-4 seconds which is much harder.
In the zone scheme, the rules for OL is nearly instantaneous: where is your man; head-up, inside, outside? based on the play.
Personally, I prefer the zone scheme because the deeper you get into the game the more the OL learns about the moves and stunts the DL is using a majority of the time and learning how to counter the DL moves is much eaiser. Also, halftime adjustments are easier to break down.
To be perfectly honest the only time my teams pulled was when we ran the 2 plays made famous by SoCal in the 50s and 60s and by Lombardi at Green Bay.
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