clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Dom Capers and the Zone Blitz

If you buy something from an SB Nation link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement.

Maybe Dom Capers wasn't the first choice, or even the second, or third choice...but it doesn't matter.

He's the new defensive coordinator and he held a press conference. What I really wanted him to talk about was the zone blitz. Is he going to use it? Instead the only reference to it was about what he did with it in the 1990s while he was coaching in Pittsburgh and Carolina. But he did talk about "coverage and disguise", which I guess is his way of saying he will use a zone blitz:

(What do you like to do in coverage?)
"Well, I think that if we know they're going to throw, ... I think your coverage has got to be a combination of pressure and coverage. I don't think it can be just one element. Obviously the better pressure you get on the quarterback, the better your coverage is going to be. I think you've got to be able to mix your coverage. I just don't think that there's anybody good enough in this day and age to just sit in one thing with the multiplicity of the offenses that you see. So I think you have to be able to change up and it's got to be a combination of pressure, coverage and disguise and not letting people know exactly what you're doing, because I don't care who you are, how good you are, if they know exactly what you're doing, you're going to have problems stopping them."

Also, I'm not sure he's sold on immediately utilizing a 3-4 scheme, and I'm not sure he thinks DE Aaron Kampman can play in a 3-4 scheme either.

"I think you make a tremendous mistake if you come in and say you have a cookie-cutter 3-4 defense and this is what we're going to be and try to fit your personnel to that..."

(There's some thought this isn't the ideal defense for Aaron Kampman. Do you envision him as another Tony Brackens, or how do you envision him?)
"As I mentioned, I think you made a big mistake. I know Aaron Kampman has been a very good football player and has had a lot of production. I think the number one thing you do is you try to adapt what you are doing to your good football players. If a guy is a good football player we're going to find a way to use him."