He Dominated College Football, Now He Comes For The NFL | LA Chargers

[Music] if you love aggressive defenses boy I've got good news for you the Chargers are about to Blitz a lot Chargers bring seven to the line if it's first and 10 and they want to stop the run they're going to Blitz if it's third and seven and they want to get to the quarterback they're going to Blitz again go go go every situation every down every distance you're going to see Chargers jerseys flying into that back fi and dropped again what a time to come up with the sack but here's the kicker every Blitz from this team is going to look totally different week to week while also kind of looking exactly the same which I know sounds extremely confusing and that's kind of the point so just give me a few moments to [Music] explain unlike a lot of other older defenses the calling card of Jesse min's more streamlined system is modularity meaning every single piece can theoretically fit with every other piece like a module for instance every single front can be paired with every single Blitz or pressure path if you want to use a different coaching term for it and every single front and pressure path can also be paired with nearly every single coverage depending on how many blitzers are actually being sent of course in many other defenses certain blitzers can only be called out of certain fronts or Personnel packages and these blitzes are usually paired with certain coverages behind them everything is very rigid and as a result players are required to learn endless amounts of terminology just to remember each individual Blitz that's run out of each individual front there can be five or six dozen pressure paths to remember but compare that to Min system however and he only uses around 5 to eight fronts in his defense which is an easy number for players to memorize and master and he has somewhere in the ballpark of only a couple dozen pressure paths I won't use the exact number obviously but it's not as many as you would expect so in contrast to other NFL defenses Min system seems incredibly slim down but that streamlined appearance is also extremely deceptive if anything this defense is more complex and way harder to prepare for by any opposing offense remember it's all about modularity if any pressure can be run out of any front and packaged with almost any coverage when you add up every possible combination that Minter has at his fingertips he doesn't actually only have a couple dozen different calls in his Arsenal he has literally thousands of them let's go nickel nickel nickel nickel nickel by combining Simplicity with flexibility he makes his defense easy to learn for his own players but nearly impossible for the offense to decipher or in the words of Bucky Brooks simple for us hard for them let's take a look at some film from minter's defense at Michigan because seeing how this all works for yourself is probably the best way to understand it this is a sack that Michigan got against UNLV last season on Third and 7even on what is known as a simulated pressure out of a load front the call here if I was going to use General terminology for this family of defense is relatively simple it's just load tip six load is the front tip is the pressure path and six is the coverage which is just normal cover six or quarter quarter half for those of you who are not familiar with it now this is called a load front because obviously one side of it is loaded up with bodies and for a variety of reasons that I don't really have time to explain today often times that loaded side is going to be on the side that the running back is lined up on and we'll get to why that's important in just a second but all you really have to know for now is that it's important and as for the simulated pressure part it's called that because this looks like a blitz but it's not actually a blitz only four guys are pass rushing while the field side edge player drops into coverage so again looks like a blitz but it actually isn't that's why it's called a simulated pressure the name of this pressure path is called tip like I said before and that is short for tackle pick because this boundary side linebacker Michael Barrett is going to pick the inside hip of this offensive tackle in order to open up a lane for the boundary side edge rusher to Loop inside now Minter loves running tip out of this look for two reasons number one anytime you present a load front on defense that's going to set off fire alarms for the offense and a lot of the time they're going to handle that with a slide from the offensive line into that loaded side so they can get four guys blocking three think of it like the pass protection version of a panic button but on top of that number two Minter loves running tip from a load front because again that means most of the time the linebacker is going to be rushing from the side opposite of where the running back is lined up this is a really hard angle for the running back to handle in pass protection in fact it's nearly impossible for him to get there to pick up just a normal Blitz if the rush is well executed let alone getting there in time for him to help the tackle once Barrett picks his hip so as a result of this call load tip six you have cover six on the back end like we said with a load front on the front end and you have four offensive linemen sliding to handle only two rushers because again one of them dropped out into coverage and on the other side you have an offensive tackle that has absolutely no prayer of stopping a two-on-one and a running back that's in a completely hopeless position to help him out add all of that together and that is how you get a nearly unblocked sack with only a four band Rush and suffocating coverage behind it I want you to process everything that you just saw there on that play really understand all the components that make up any given defensive call front pressure coverage because in this defense you're going to see those exact same components rearranged over and over and over again just like this play later in the season against Maryland this was also on Third and seven and if you pay close attention you're going to notice that the pressure that Minter dialed up here is the exact same one that he called against UNLV tip however this time he's running it out of a different front this is what he calls a rush front and the coverage is also different now as well instead of cover six it's cover three so the total call is just rush tip three that's it it it's super easy for the players to remember it's the same pressure path with the same name just the front is different and the coverage is different but it works the exact same way every receiver is covered up and the whole back seven has Zone eyes on the quarterback former Wolverine and curret charger Junior Coulson attacks the inside hip of the tackle to set up the loop inside from The Edge and he gets enough push on that tackle himself to flush the quarterback from the pocket which of course starts a Mad Dash for the first down marker that the quarterback ultimately loses that is a win for the defense it was third and seven and they didn't get a first down so Maryland ultimately just settled for a field goal all right so you've seen a little bit of that modularity so far and I think you're also getting a better understanding of why this system is so hard to prepare for right because in theory they can call that same pressure out of any personel grouping any front package it with any coverage it's just a nightmare for any offense to deal deal with but here's where that nightmare gets worse because what makes this defense truly evil is not the fact that they can call that pressure anytime they want to what makes it truly evil is the fact that they can make you think they're about to call that pressure anytime they want to and then they just call something else they'll line up in the exact same way same load front same Personnel grouping same down same distance same situation same everything and you think you've got them all figured out because you're an offensive coach at Alabama and you've been studying this look for weeks everything's on the line in this playoff game and you think you've got it dialed in this is load tip six the linebacker is going to pick the tackle the edge is looping inside you're not going to take the bait and so you're not going to slide into that load front you're just going to let your guys handle it front side with even numbers and you're actually going to make sure this left guard is ready and available to handle the pick protection's going to hold up and so you're setting up this whole shot to the boundary because it's cover six and you know it's cover six and you got this you have Jesse min the rights pop that champagne boys you're going to The Natty except you don't have Jesse Min dead the rights because from that same look that you studied endlessly he throws an entirely different simulated pressure at you out of nowhere and you lose Michigan isn't running a tackle pick here they're bringing four rushers all from the field side and Mike Sandell was completely unblocked because Bama only had two blockers for three rushers they thought they could get away with with not sliding into that loaded side just this one time and Minter punished them for it pressure off the edge and he is sacked again for the fifth time in this first half once again he can call any pressure or even any simulated pressure out of any pre- snap look and as an offensive play caller you're never ever ever going to know which one of those blitzes is coming or not coming it's not that they're beating guys with a pass rush who were in front of they're being out schemed by the styles of rushes modularity folks that's the name of the game so learn it and love it because a modern defense has to deal with everything they get to deal with every wrinkle from every bag of tricks getting thrown at them every Sunday by every single offense they face it's a tough gig playing defense in the NFL but luckily for the Chargers their solution to this problem is kind of simple see if Jesse Min the defensive coordinator decides to bring someone from that second level and disrupt the timing of the quarterback they will fight everything with anything and by that I mean as a defense if they're going to be the ones that have to deal with everything then they're going to make you the offense have to deal with any he bring pressure Lance hit and he is dropped fourth and goal lasers picked off oh the Chargers defense comes up big and you see in just the aggressiveness Jesse men's really starting to cut these guys loose [Music]