Pros and Cons of Key Defensive Secondary Schemes

The NFL season is just around the corner so let’s dive into some pros and cons of key defensive schemes in the secondary. One key defensive concept that’s deployed is press man coverage. The pro to press man coverage is that cornerbacks are jamming the wide receiver and throwing the timing of their route running off. However, the con to press coverage is that if the jam is unsuccessful and there is no safety help over the top, the cornerbacks are vulnerable to getting beat downfield easily.

Another key defensive concept is leverage. When a cornerback is giving a wide receiver inside leverage, they are not getting beat to the outside and thus taking away something. The con to this is that the wide receiver has a clear angle to beat the cornerback on any inside route. And vice versa, when a cornerback gives outside leverage, they are not allowing inside leverage but they are left vulnerable to an outside route.

The final defensive concept of this exercise is zone coverage. Zone coverage is when linebackers and secondary players are “assigned” to an area in the field to cover. This requires discipline as at times, a defender must let a receiver run past him and trust the zone defender behind him to cover him. Typically, in zone, defenders have their eyes on the quarterback, so they have the ability to read the quarterback’s eyes and see where he wants to throw the ball. The cons to zone coverage are that the best secondary players don’t get to cover the best offensive weapons and the quarterback can use his eyes to move the defense away from his targets.