Article by Jim Oddo

The Pittsburgh Steelers are one of the many football teams that have had excellent success running the 3-four defensive scheme. The three-four defense can be employed at just about any level of football, starting from flag and all the way up to specialist football. Of course the defense requirements to be modified for the suitable degree it is getting employed at.

Looking like the 5-four defense, the 3-4 will confuse many coaches at the youth football level. A vital element when setting up a challenging defensive method, like the 3-4 defense, is making certain it has been adjusted to the stage you are coaching. You do not require all of the difficult blitzes employed in the conventional 3-four if you are running this with an 8 year-aged staff. The stunts, slants, blitzes and corner back schemes come in several varieties in the 3-four defense. Many of these will have to be left out or tweaked in a big way if you want to use them at the pop warner stage.The younger your gamers are in age, the less complex you need to make it.

Each and every degree, such as flag, ought to use the defensive line slants. This devastating method will have your defensive line messing up your opponent’s blocking schemes and they will not even recognize you are performing it to them.

With the correct planning, including a complete scouting report of your approaching opponent, you need to be able to use the slant to confuse the blocking schemes of your opponent. The elegance of the 3-four defense is that you should be able to mess up your opponents entire offensive line using only three gamers. Hopefully you have scouted your opponent and have a great idea of the blocking styles he will try to use in opposition to your staff. Employing defensive line slants, you will be capable to occupy all 5 of his offensive linemen with just your nose guard and two defensive tackles. You will be ready to play most of the game with a two guy benefit. We display all the modifications for the defensive line slants and stunts in our youth three-four Defense Playbook.

For above twenty many years the three-4 defense has been my base defense. I have set up it with 14 12 months-previous travel stage teams as effectively as 5 year-old flag teams and have appreciated great accomplishment. I have coached in the smallest city in my conference and have hardly ever allowed better than two scores in any game. In almost fifty percent my games we have shut out our opposition and I have a winning percentage of over 80%. I believe in minimal, if any, blitzing and like to use the defensive line slant to preserve the opponent’s offensive linemen away from my line backers. Unblocked line backers run no cost to make plays and I want my greatest athletes working totally free.

In conclusion, the 3-four makes a amazing defense to use at all ranges of football as lengthy as the coaches use a modified edition applicable to the stage they are coaching.

About the Author

Jim Oddo has been coaching the youth sports of football, basketball and baseball for about 23 many years. He has coached kids ages four to 14 decades previous. In addition to coaching information, there is a range of tips relating to pee wee football playbooks. Discover more than 400 Free content articles and fantastic first concepts that will make you a winning youth football coach at: http://footballplaybooks.information.