Sometimes the Higher you Go the Simpler Things Get

I just want comment briefly on some points that Brophy made earlier regarding LaTech's protections. From my perspective, the greatest insight to be gleaned from what LaTech is doing is that the AirRaid (and I use the term simply as a type of critical shorthand here) has become exponentially simplified, perhaps even reductive as it has evolved at the college level.

That the AirRaid has become even more streamlined in recent years is no surprise. All systems, in particular languages, possess a teleological desire to simplify themselves for their users. The AirRaid is no exception to this rule, especially in regards to protection. Since most AirRaid teams have by now evolved into pure one-back figurations within some type of a detached four hot environment the protections now only deal with defensive reactions elicited by either 2x2 or 3x1 alignments. As Brophy has noted, this exponentially reduces the number of reactions a defense will most likely respond with; moreover, they are all known quantities.

Now, all of this is pretty simple and straightforward. What I would now like to spend the rest of this piece discussing is why LaTech and other programs can afford to be so reductive in their approach to protection and why High School programs that employ this offense should be leary of following their lead. At the college level, it is a given that any team that runs this offense can throw the ball and protect the passer. In other words, defensive coordinators do not doubt their counterparts' basic competency in this area. Consequently, depending on whether they are an odd or even front team, they are going to run some type of a nickel or stack scheme. By nickel here I am not just talking about 5 defensive backs. Texas last year played with three linebackers most of the game against TTech, but they were aligned in various nickel looks. As a result, when an AirRaid team goes into Spring Practice the first front they throw up on the white board is something in the nickel or odd-stack family. They no longer scheme against base 4-3s, 3-4s, 4-4s, 50s, etc because they will NEVER see them. They then can focus all their time on technique and sorting.

But can high school coaches afford to be so reductive in their approach to protection, at least schematically? My answer is no. Maybe in certain regions of the country, such as in Texas or in the South where Spring ball is permitted, teams that run the AirRaid will have the time to develop the mastery required to elicit such basic looks; however, my experiences suggest that the first thing a HS DC will do in most situations is present you with some type of a base look and pressure the living heck out of you until you prove that you can throw the ball with ease. As a result, HS teams still need to be prepared to protect base fronts, which makes the job of the HS line coach, ironically, more difficult than that of his college counterpart.