Defensive Alignments & Coverages

[OzoneAz]

Mike and I were talking the other day about Defensive play calling and got in the discussion about flipping plays and why I do so often. Come to find out not a lot of people in the league are aware of the reasoning and hopefully I can provide some insight and help some who might be struggling on the defensive side of the ball.

In the Madden playbook play calling system the play drawings are designed with the left side of the formation being the weak side and the right the strong. When a user flips a play in the selection screen and the defense comes out in default alignment it creates huge alignment and personnel mismatches resulting in favor of the offense. When you flip the play it will put your Dline, lbs, and slot cb in the proper gap alignment and fix the zone and/or blitz assignments to the correct designed side as the play was intended to be ran.

Unfortunately there is no way you can tell if the offense has flipped the play until after the players come out of the huddle. You must observe were the players are lining up and make the decision of flipping the play if there is a mismatch alignment/assignment. This sounds like a lot especially when teams come out in hybrid strong/weak side shotgun formations but with a little practice it becomes second nature.

One way you can minimize flipping your play on every down is to flip in the play in the selection screen when the ball is on the right hash assuming that the offense strong side will be to the field side (left), but again that is purely a guess and might still require you to flip your play call based on formation strength.

Here are some examples. I have picked a base 4-3 formation which is isometrical (well, kind of), things get even ore complicated when you stsrt throwing in Over/Under sets which is an entire thread of its own . In both examples I have flipped the offense while keeping the defense default.


Examples
4-3 stack C3 Sky brings the safety down to play the flats (designed strong side) while at the same time showing a 8 box look. The strong side is obviously going to be to your your right. The Offense has come out in "flipped" off-tackle run". Not only does the offense have the numbers, but the oline is mismatched by being misaligned against the Dline. Against the pass you can see in the play art that the yellow zones are favoring the right side while the single safety is on the left side this a rotation to the right. Remember you want to put your defense in the best postion posible in order to be succesful.

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Blitz example
4-3 Stack weak side blitz designed to stop weak side runs and counters. Offense has come out in a pro set with a weak side run but "flipped" play call. Again the offense has big run number advantages in that the strong side of the Offense is matched with the weak side of the defense. Strong side on the offense will pick up the blitz while weak side should give the RB the run off tackle or even jump to the outside for a big gain. Flip the defense in this scenario and the results will be much diffrent in favor to the D.

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I hope this helps and if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

majesty95 Xxclaywilliamxx, BigTexas18, pack1797, @Glen, @Cieske, rkjones217, Paytonno1son, BlackPaw, @woodsmall12,NightHawkTH32, CJTHA1, georgiafan, Ninersfan8052, zbenjamin85, Spayer419, Jukemwr21, Studley021, @Tigers20,dspbuckle, OzoneAz, Blackhawk375, Vandalay14, Molholt, doubles87, priestmvp, Danperez, oBUCKNUTo, Jbek

 

[majesty95]

Good info here. I think its best to predict where your opponent is going to go based on tendencies and flip your play in play calling to minimize how often you have to flip your play at the line of scrimmage. Typically offensive guys don't want to sit around and wait on your defensive players a large amount of the time. By watching your opponent and identifying that he almost always run the strong side to the open (or widest) part of the field (which almost everyone does most of the time) you can significantly reduce the amount of times you come out in the wrong alignment.

With that being said, its also wise to understand the coverage and what it is designed to take away as he showed in the Cover 3 examples.

 

[BlackPaw]

Very good info from the both of you. This type of thinking requires a sim mindset. Yo really have to understand the game and how play calling is somewhat dictated by the hash marks. Goody stuff Oz

 

[OzoneAz]

With that being said, its also wise to understand the coverage and what it is designed to take away as he showed in the Cover 3 examples.

Been working on that for a while but been busy with Holiday stuff. I am Hoping it gets posted sometime this week but no promises. Understanding the strong and weak side of formations will help with coverage breakdown as well.

 

[Vandalay14]

Simple flipping your play on defense is an absolute must. Like Chris said, the play is designed to match up with a right side strong-side formation and if the offense just flips in the play calling screen, they have the advantage. Flipping the play doesn't necessarily give the defense an advantage - it just negates the offensive advantage.

You will also see Madden players flipping their play in nickel formations as well. It's empirically obvious that the nickel back will be lined up over the slot receiver. But the standard defense places the NB on the left side unless it's M2M coverage; if the offense has either flipped the play in the huddle or is in a trips formation (eg. Y-trips right), the slot will be on the right side, so the defense will need to be flipped to get the better coverage on the play side.

Now, some defenses have arranged their players not to need to do this. Their nickel sets might have a better coverage linebacker over the TE and their rush linebacker on the weak side, thus creating the coverage they already need. But not all teams are set up the same, necessitating a simple flip.

 

[majesty95]

Again, I just want to reiterate that we do not want a rash of guys all of the sudden flipping their defenses on the field every other play. That gets annoying and bogs down the game. It is still a game and issues can be created when your players are moving at the snap. It also puts you at a disadvantage if your opponent notices and snaps while your guys are moving. There has always been an agreement that you allow the defense to set before you snap. However, if guys are constantly flipping plays, their opponents aren't always going to wait on them. You can avoid this by flipping in the play call screen to try and predict what side they will line up the strong side too. You can also get away with not flipping on a Cover 2 or Cover 4 as they two high safeties basically make it even on both sides of the line so flipping wouldn't accomplish much.

 

[Vandalay14]

Flipping a cover 2 or cover 4 isn't meant to affect the deep coverage, obviously. However, it does affect the underneath coverage as well as the ability for the front 7 to stop the rush, as the play is designed to stop a right side rushing attack. If the offense is left side strong, the offense is at an advantage. Flipping the play simply doesn't give the defense any sort of advantage - it just cancels the offensive advantage.

It's just part of the chess game of football.

 

[majesty95]

The coverage is mostly irrelevant in a C2 or C4. In C2 the LBs still split the three hook zones over the middle. In C4, the Mike still has the middle and the Sam and Will still play the outside curl/flats. That doesn't change by flipping the play. The only thing this would affect is if you are in an over or under front. Then you are playing to the strong side to defend the run (or bumping the TE) by putting the Sam on the line. However, Madden still doesn't replicate this correctly. Madden just puts the Will on the line instead of swapping them like it should in an over front. But even if you flip those plays, the OLBs don't switch, just the coverage, so you can get the same effect by just shifting your LBs. Or, if you are expecting a pass, speading them or pinching them to create equal separation.

Again, I agree that you ideally would want the SS to be on the strong side of the offensive formation for run support. If you are going to play an over or under front, most of the time you would want the LB on the line to the strong side. But most of that can be done in play calling by predicting your opponents tendencies. Much like you should be paying attention to your opponent's tendencies and calling plays based on what you think they are going to do and not audibling or hot routing every play, you should do the same on defense and not be flipping your play every other play or the majority of them.

OzoneAz and I basically had this discussion offline so I am just restating my stance on here. pack1797 and I don't want to see a situation where guys are always flipping their plays on defense. It ruins the game. And we've seen hundreds of players come through here, and have several in here now, who have great success on D without doing it, myself included. I mostly flip them in the play call screen based on their patterns with utilizing the strong side. I also flip on the field occasionally when I'm wrong. However, there becomes a point when its splitting hairs and its flipping just to flip based on a perception and not an actual mechanic in the game that hurts or hinders you. So, again, just restating my point so we do not confuse guys and see guys flipping plays all the time on defense.

 

[OzoneAz]

majesty95 Out of 4-3 c2 and c4 there is not a lot of movement other than line shifting to get to proper allaignment. However, out of nickel if you "base allign" you have to flip the play so your nickel back lines up over the slot reciver.

Also out of the 3-4 formations switching is fairly important because not only auto alignes your D line but dictates which side the blitzing lb comes from.

 

[Glen Cieske]

Great thread, I've flipped formations to move weddle around. I mainly used line shifts or LB shifts if I feel like the offense has an unfair advantage.

 

[x0xHumblex0x]

Man Align, Base Align and/or Hot Routing individual defenders as the offense approaches the OLine will compensate as well. identifying the strong/weak side can be seen by just watching how your defenders are moving around without using any Alignment - but you will need to quick adjustments before they get to the LoS.

Flipping Offensive plays doubles your playbook and you formations with the same personnel, (i.e. 2 wr, 2te, 2hb), allows you to come out is so many different weak, strong, I formations with some singleback and a few SGs.
it also gives the offense a very balanced attack keeping the defense guessing.