Vic Fangio Defensive Breakdown: Diving Into the Go-To Calls in Passing Situations | Page 5 | FinHeaven - Miami Dolphins Forums

Vic Fangio Defensive Breakdown: Diving Into the Go-To Calls in Passing Situations

CMD said:
Cover 8 (Half-Quarter-Quarter)









Cover 8 is a split field concept, with cover 2 to the passing strength and a variation of quarters to the backside. This is often a trips check for Fangio along with Cover 6, and both are interchanged throughout the course of each game and selected depending on the teams they play. You will really only ever see Cover 8 (Half-Quarter-Quarter) at the NFL level because since the hashes are so narrow, the half field safety in cover 2 to the field side does not have near as much room he has to cover compared to wider hashes at the College and HS level.

One of the biggest reasons Fangio likes to run Cover 8, is the backside safety is in "Poach" technique, meaning he's playing on the hash and reading the release of the #3 receiver to the passing strength, if the receiver goes vertical, the safety will take him vertically. If the #3 receiver goes out or under, the backside safety will now get his eyes on the #1 Receiver Backside (The X receiver) and look to help the boundary corner on any in breaking routes from the X (think a dig route). You can see in the video above of the backside Safety seeing the #3 receiver go out, so he then looks to help backside. It is a blowout at that point in the game, so the safety is playing a little safer and not driving on the dig as hard as he could, but you can see what his reads are. In the next clip below, you'll see the #3 go vertical, and the backside safety then caps him vertically:







Playing quarters to the backside and having the safety poach to the frontside allows the MIKE LB to play closer to the LOS and doesn't have to worry about taking #3 vertical himself, you can see in the clip above the MIKE can wall and then pass off the vertical from #3 to the safety and then cuts off the shallow cross and nearly gets the pick all because he doesn’t have to worry about taking #3 vertical. It also allows the Cover 2 Safety to focus on the #1 and #2 receivers and get a better cap on their routes and get a true double both over the top and underneath to the front side.

When running this coverage, you need to be confident that your backside corner can handle the X 1 on 1, and your WILL can handle the RB 1 on 1, as they're both essentially in man coverage by themselves . If a team likes to put their best receiver backside in trips, or they've got a playmaker in the passing game at RB, you might be better off playing Cover 6 instead.




Cover 6 (Quarter-Quarter-Half)











They are now playing Quarters to the passing strength, and Cover 2 to the backside, which Fangio calls Cover 6. As previously stated, this is a good concept against teams that like to put their best player at the X on the backside and/or have a true playmaker at the RB position as having the Cover 2 on that side creates a true cap over the top of the X as well as underneath zone coverage and you're not leaving guys on islands to defend them. The Cowboys push the RB to the passing strength and create 4 strong to the frontside, which forces the WILL to add into the coverage on the frontside and now the boundary Corner vs the X can play essentially 2 man vs him with the safety as he has no threat to the flat.

You lose your poaching Safety in this coverage compared to Cover 8, because the backside safety is now playing the half and the frontside safety has to stay in his 1/4 for anything vertical to that side. What having Quarters to the strength does allow the defense to do though, is to make a box adjustment to any bunch sets from the offense:





I hope this picture explains it well enough, but essentially the Corner is watching for anything outside and vertical, the Safety is watching for anything inside and vertical, while the Nickel is taking the 1st receiver that declares outside, and the MIKE is taking the 1st receiver that declares inside.





The Cowboys try to run essentially all Crossers and try to sneak the back out and underneath them as they were expecting man coverage and wanted to get as many rubs as possible. The Broncos Box the bunch and the MIKE takes the underneath crosser and gets help from the WILL in a hook zone from the backside, the Safety nails down on the more vertical crosser and the WILLs position gives him help as well. The Corner gets an outside vertical stem from the TE who breaks it into a post so the Corner stays on him, and the Nickel shows nice patience to stay in his area and take the RB who sneaks out into the flat from the backfield. You can see why they call it box after the routes start to declare:





In Cover 6 you lose out on having the Cover 2 side to the strength of the formation and no poach safety, but the ability to use adjustments like Box can allow DCs to get true doubles on the backside when bigtime X receivers and RBs can take over games. Both Cover 6 and Cover 8 are usually Trips adjustments and can be called once the offense declares their formation and will usually be gameplan specific depending on the team and how they like to utilize the players in their offense.


Cover 1 Hole (1 Cross, 1 Robber)






I've always called this 1 Cross, but Fangio actually calls this 1 Hole in his terminology. His go-to man coverage on passing downs, it is hard to differentiate these coverages pre-snap with the Safeties usually staying in 2 High and not rotating until the ball is snapped. One Safety will come down, looking to hunt any crossers coming from the passing strength, the other Safety will drop to the deep Middle. Which Safety comes down and which drops to the deep middle will come down to gameplanning and will change depending on which teams they face. The inside defenders in man coverage will use outside leverage and carry their man to their help inside to the safeties. If the down safety sees a receiver crossing over the middle, he will take him in man coverage and the original man defender will now be the new Rat and will hunt for another crosser. You can see this in the gif above where Caden Sterns in Man coverage over the #3 hands the over route off to the backside Safety and then robs the Dig route from the #1 for the interception. This might be easier to see from the Endzone shot:



This is what makes Fangio's (and disciples) defenses so hard to go up against, the safeties staying high and then coming down post snap makes QBs take an extra second to read out what the defense is after the ball is snapped, which is another second that the rush can get to him. Staying in 2 high coverage shells and rolling down post snap allows the defense to leverage from depth and mitigate risk in the passing game.

“Easier to play down with leverage than back with panic”

Desai and other disciples run a similar structure with their own wrinkles, so if Miami does go with one of them this off-season, it should be a fun defense to breakdown next season.

Thanks for reading
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I will never again criticize the guy who is slow learning the playbook.
 
So Be said:
It was a VG OP but have to ask what you are basing what Fangio will do on 3 years ago or when he was a year long consultant with Philly last year, which many here do not know about?
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Sorry to respond so late, only just seeing this now. It’s only been since 2021 since Fangio has coached his own defense, so that’s what I’d look at first. But also watching other coordinators last year that coached under Fangio, especially guys like Ejiro Evero, Sean Desai and Ed Donatell.

The biggest difference I saw between the Fangio guys and Jonathan Gannon’s defense last year is Fangio and coaches who were under Fangio tend to run a lot more Cover 6 and Cover 8, whereas Gannon was more comfortable running straight quarters more often. Fangio’s defenses are also more aggressive, they place high priority in re-routing receivers to throw off timing.

Gannon’s defense last year definitely looked like someone trying to implement the scheme in 1 off-season and stuck to what he was more comfortable with for the most part with quarters, whereas you watch Fangio or Evero/Desai and you can just see they are just much more comfortable & experienced in the defense.
 
Hopefully he has something as far as time management to help the offense too.
 
Have to say although I love football and the Dolphins, having never played I can't say I have a lot of intel as to how we actually play. Great post and as said before definitely a candidate for post of the year 👏
 
CMD said:
Sorry to respond so late, only just seeing this now. It’s only been since 2021 since Fangio has coached his own defense, so that’s what I’d look at first. But also watching other coordinators last year that coached under Fangio, especially guys like Ejiro Evero, Sean Desai and Ed Donatell.

The biggest difference I saw between the Fangio guys and Jonathan Gannon’s defense last year is Fangio and coaches who were under Fangio tend to run a lot more Cover 6 and Cover 8, whereas Gannon was more comfortable running straight quarters more often. Fangio’s defenses are also more aggressive, they place high priority in re-routing receivers to throw off timing.

Gannon’s defense last year definitely looked like someone trying to implement the scheme in 1 off-season and stuck to what he was more comfortable with for the most part with quarters, whereas you watch Fangio or Evero/Desai and you can just see they are just much more comfortable & experienced in the defense.
Click to expand...
I am curious to see he will use X and press man. Also how he will use Baker, thinking outside.
 
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CMD said:
Cover 8 (Half-Quarter-Quarter)









Cover 8 is a split field concept, with cover 2 to the passing strength and a variation of quarters to the backside. This is often a trips check for Fangio along with Cover 6, and both are interchanged throughout the course of each game and selected depending on the teams they play. You will really only ever see Cover 8 (Half-Quarter-Quarter) at the NFL level because since the hashes are so narrow, the half field safety in cover 2 to the field side does not have near as much room he has to cover compared to wider hashes at the College and HS level.

One of the biggest reasons Fangio likes to run Cover 8, is the backside safety is in "Poach" technique, meaning he's playing on the hash and reading the release of the #3 receiver to the passing strength, if the receiver goes vertical, the safety will take him vertically. If the #3 receiver goes out or under, the backside safety will now get his eyes on the #1 Receiver Backside (The X receiver) and look to help the boundary corner on any in breaking routes from the X (think a dig route). You can see in the video above of the backside Safety seeing the #3 receiver go out, so he then looks to help backside. It is a blowout at that point in the game, so the safety is playing a little safer and not driving on the dig as hard as he could, but you can see what his reads are. In the next clip below, you'll see the #3 go vertical, and the backside safety then caps him vertically:







Playing quarters to the backside and having the safety poach to the frontside allows the MIKE LB to play closer to the LOS and doesn't have to worry about taking #3 vertical himself, you can see in the clip above the MIKE can wall and then pass off the vertical from #3 to the safety and then cuts off the shallow cross and nearly gets the pick all because he doesn’t have to worry about taking #3 vertical. It also allows the Cover 2 Safety to focus on the #1 and #2 receivers and get a better cap on their routes and get a true double both over the top and underneath to the front side.

When running this coverage, you need to be confident that your backside corner can handle the X 1 on 1, and your WILL can handle the RB 1 on 1, as they're both essentially in man coverage by themselves . If a team likes to put their best receiver backside in trips, or they've got a playmaker in the passing game at RB, you might be better off playing Cover 6 instead.




Cover 6 (Quarter-Quarter-Half)











They are now playing Quarters to the passing strength, and Cover 2 to the backside, which Fangio calls Cover 6. As previously stated, this is a good concept against teams that like to put their best player at the X on the backside and/or have a true playmaker at the RB position as having the Cover 2 on that side creates a true cap over the top of the X as well as underneath zone coverage and you're not leaving guys on islands to defend them. The Cowboys push the RB to the passing strength and create 4 strong to the frontside, which forces the WILL to add into the coverage on the frontside and now the boundary Corner vs the X can play essentially 2 man vs him with the safety as he has no threat to the flat.

You lose your poaching Safety in this coverage compared to Cover 8, because the backside safety is now playing the half and the frontside safety has to stay in his 1/4 for anything vertical to that side. What having Quarters to the strength does allow the defense to do though, is to make a box adjustment to any bunch sets from the offense:





I hope this picture explains it well enough, but essentially the Corner is watching for anything outside and vertical, the Safety is watching for anything inside and vertical, while the Nickel is taking the 1st receiver that declares outside, and the MIKE is taking the 1st receiver that declares inside.





The Cowboys try to run essentially all Crossers and try to sneak the back out and underneath them as they were expecting man coverage and wanted to get as many rubs as possible. The Broncos Box the bunch and the MIKE takes the underneath crosser and gets help from the WILL in a hook zone from the backside, the Safety nails down on the more vertical crosser and the WILLs position gives him help as well. The Corner gets an outside vertical stem from the TE who breaks it into a post so the Corner stays on him, and the Nickel shows nice patience to stay in his area and take the RB who sneaks out into the flat from the backfield. You can see why they call it box after the routes start to declare:





In Cover 6 you lose out on having the Cover 2 side to the strength of the formation and no poach safety, but the ability to use adjustments like Box can allow DCs to get true doubles on the backside when bigtime X receivers and RBs can take over games. Both Cover 6 and Cover 8 are usually Trips adjustments and can be called once the offense declares their formation and will usually be gameplan specific depending on the team and how they like to utilize the players in their offense.


Cover 1 Hole (1 Cross, 1 Robber)






I've always called this 1 Cross, but Fangio actually calls this 1 Hole in his terminology. His go-to man coverage on passing downs, it is hard to differentiate these coverages pre-snap with the Safeties usually staying in 2 High and not rotating until the ball is snapped. One Safety will come down, looking to hunt any crossers coming from the passing strength, the other Safety will drop to the deep Middle. Which Safety comes down and which drops to the deep middle will come down to gameplanning and will change depending on which teams they face. The inside defenders in man coverage will use outside leverage and carry their man to their help inside to the safeties. If the down safety sees a receiver crossing over the middle, he will take him in man coverage and the original man defender will now be the new Rat and will hunt for another crosser. You can see this in the gif above where Caden Sterns in Man coverage over the #3 hands the over route off to the backside Safety and then robs the Dig route from the #1 for the interception. This might be easier to see from the Endzone shot:



This is what makes Fangio's (and disciples) defenses so hard to go up against, the safeties staying high and then coming down post snap makes QBs take an extra second to read out what the defense is after the ball is snapped, which is another second that the rush can get to him. Staying in 2 high coverage shells and rolling down post snap allows the defense to leverage from depth and mitigate risk in the passing game.

“Easier to play down with leverage than back with panic”

Desai and other disciples run a similar structure with their own wrinkles, so if Miami does go with one of them this off-season, it should be a fun defense to breakdown next season.

Thanks for reading
Click to expand...

Awesome break down thank you!
 
This is so complicated.
Another day in the office spent on the forum.
 
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