Mundt's blocking helps the 12 Personnel formation be effective
| March 18, 2021 01:52PM |
[noceilingsfootball.com]
3 Reasons Why 12 Personnel Formations Might be the Hardest to Defend
As a coach with a primarily defensive background, I spend a lot of time thinking about what other teams could do on the offensive side to really make life difficult for us. Best case, these are no more than off-season “what if” scenarios that can be fun to think about from a creative standpoint. Worst case, they are late Friday night/early Saturday morning “what the hell just happened to us?” scenarios.
We are primarily a 4-4 Cover 3 team with a single high safety, and have typically been very successful defensively. Evolving offensive trends have also made us have some discussion over things we might need to start implementing. Even in looking at some different fronts and coverages, I keep coming back to one personnel grouping that, in my opinion, might be the hardest to cumulatively defend.
The Patriots made this grouping popular around 2011 with the likes of Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez (who was pretty damn good before he turned his life story into a plot straight out of Grand Theft Auto) as their two tight ends. The Patriots achieved a tremendous run/pass balance that really put defenses into a bind. Today, the Pats use Martellus Bennett in combination with Gronk, along with Julian Edelman in the slot, to continue to terrorize defenses. It also helps to have some guy named Brady back there calling the shots.
Of course, Tom Brady is arguably the greatest QB of all time, Gronk is a world-class talent, and Edelman can do just about anything you can ask an offensive player to do. The Pats do an unbelievable amount of things with those guys on a level that no college team, let alone a high school team, could begin to do. It’s 12 personnel on steroids and pixie dust. However, the structure of 12 personnel alone provides many unique challenges to a defensive staff.
WHAT IS 12 PERSONNEL?
FIGURE 1. ACE FORMATION WITH AN H-BACK OFF THE LINE.
In the commonly used two-number system to describe personnel groups, 12 personnel means anything that involves 1 running back and 2 tight ends, who in theory can be hybrid fullback types or slot/receiver types instead of just your traditional, hand in the dirt tight end. Figure 1 above is an example of a 12 personnel formation, Ace, with a traditional Tight End labeled Y, and the hybrid H-back player off the line. This is something you would be more likely to see an H-back look like at the high school level, where the talent level of a kid is more likely in line with what you are asking that player to do. The Patriots, on the other hand, can take that H (Gronk) and move him around in a multitude of formations that keeps “12 personnel” out on the field, but is really almost like a completely different grouping due to his talent and versatility.
Other examples of popular formation groupings are 21 personnel (2 backs 1 tight end) which is more pro-style oriented, 10 personnel (1 back 0 tight ends) which is a full spread look, and 11 personnel (1 back 1 tight end) which is a combo pro/spread grouping. Offenses utilize these different groupings for different reasons – either “formationing” a defense to run what they want, or simply as a way to get their best 11 out on the field.
At the high school level, teams may utilize multiple offensive formations, but typically they are limited to just 1-2 personnel groups that they’ll trot out (plus maybe a goal line or short yardage package). After all, practice time is limited, and a lot of us don’t have the luxury of two-platooning and specializing our kids throughout the week.
THREE REASONS WHY 12 PERSONNEL IS HARD TO DEFEND
Although a personnel grouping by itself gives no indication of what exactly an offense does scheme wise, it can paint a solid picture of what their identity is. I find 12 personnel to be a particular pain in the rear end to defend for the following 3 reasons:
1) Run Gaps vs. Vertical Threat Balance
Whether the offense uses their two tight ends in a traditional manner, or one off the line as an H-back, the nature of 12 personnel makes it so that there is an immediate threat from the offense to attack any of the 8 gaps created from tight end to tight end. This lends a lot of defensive coordinators to immediately feel the need to get into an 8-man front to account for those open gaps.
FIGURE 2. 12 PERSONNEL – ACE VS. 4-4
The problem for defensive coordinators is that, even though things are a little more condensed, there is also an immediate threat for four receivers to get vertical right now (4 Verticals against Cover 3, anyone? Figures 3 & 4 below).
FIGURE 3. FOUR VERTICALS
FIGURE 4. ACE TRIPS – FOUR VERTS
Right away, 12 personnel puts defenses into a run/pass conflict where defensive coordinators have to juggle protecting 8 gaps with 4 eligible receivers – all of which can be attacked right now. That is 12 threats that the offense can all hit very quickly post-snap that you will need all 11 guys to be aware of.
All personnel groupings allow for run/pass balance, which is what many offensive coordinators look to achieve… but I’m not sure that any can hit those threats with the speed and balance that 12 personnel formations can. I look at it as a run-heavy grouping first, but with the potential to hurt in the pass game with simple, multiple target concepts.
2) Motion, Trades, Unbalanced, etc. – Dictated Strength
While the run/pass balance presents some difficulties, you can generally do some things to force an offense away from their strengths.
This, however, might be the most PITA part of defending these types of formations.
Whenever an offense involves tight ends, and in this case two of them, they are going to be able to dictate your strength more often than not. This is a battle that, as an even front coach, you know you might have to lose every now and then. Some of us might not mind that much because, even if an offense knows where your 3 tech and your 1 tech are going to be (Figure 5 below), you know what they’re going to give you there. You can move around a little bit post-snap to alleviate some of this, but that just makes your defensive game plan and what your kids need to be able to do that much more complicated. Odd front coaches might not worry about this quite as much, but generally an offensive coordinator using these types of formations will be able to game you pretty good in terms of knowing where you are going to be.
FIGURE 5. ACE TWIN TE
Every defensive coordinator hates motion. If any DC tells you it doesn’t bother them on some level, they’re lying. Offenses that come out, line up, and snap the ball are much easier on our 16-18 year old Einsteins. With a slot and an H-back off the line, there are tons of different types of motions that can come from these looks.
FIGURE 6. ACE MOTION TO ACE TRIPS
In addition, the ability to trade tight ends (Figure 7 below), manipulate strength, and even easily get in to some unbalanced sets can be a big headache for the defense. Even if a defensive coordinator has some things worked up in the game plan, it still has to be communicated to the kids and executed. Motions and trades can disrupt all of that in a hurry.
FIGURE 7. ACE TRADE TO ACE TWIN TE TRIPS
3) Flexibility
All of the above allows for tremendous flexibility in what an offensive coordinator can do – especially with the use of Trips. I gave an example in my Cover 3 vs. Today’s Offenses post about how much stress 12 personnel formations can put on a 1-high safety defense. Not just for the ability to run a bunch of Cover 3 beaters, but also in the need for your free safety to fit in the run game and to use an overhang to account for the #2 receiver.
FIGURE 8. ACE TRIPS VS. 4-4 COVER 3
ACE TRIPS VS. 4-4 (STRENGTH AWAY)
Regardless of where you set your 3 technique, you are in a bind because of the open D gap to the trips side. If the 3 tech is set to the trips (Figure 8 above), you might have to bump your backers to play the D gap (or C if you bump your DE out to a 9 tech), and your overhang player to the weak side might have to become a B-gap player – something they’ve probably never done. If you set your 3 away from the trips (Figure 9 above), you can balance your front up a little bit more, but the D gap to the trips remains very exposed. Veer and zone read teams can have a field day with this.
“OK Twich, well all you’ve diagrammed so far are 1-high structures. We are a quarters team and don’t have to worry about 4 verticals, displaced overhangs, or adjustments to motion as much.”
That may be true if you take a look at how a 4-3 quarters team would align to the same formation (Figure 10 below).
FIGURE 10. ACE TRIPS VS 4-3
As a former coordinator in a quarters system, I know there are multiple different quarters checks to handle #3 vertical. The three most basic are:
Option 1 – Having your trips side corner and safety ignore the #3 receiver (maybe playing 2-Read) and have the responsibility fall onto your backside safety and middle backer, or
Option 2 – Playing “country” quarters and midpointing #1 and #2 with your corner, and #2 and #3 with your trips side safety, or
Option 3 – Traveling both corners over to man #1 and #2, trips safety mans #3 vertical (Figure 11 below).
FIGURE 11. ACE TRIPS VS. 4-3 CORNERS OVER
All of the options have their benefits and drawbacks (for the record, I’d align as in Figure 11 for simplicity and to keep the box as occupied as possible with run-first players). In the 4-3 with a 2 high safety structure, 12 personnel requires a defensive back to be a gap fitter in the run game versus two tight ends (8 gaps, only 7 front defenders). Your safeties must have great eye control in making their run reads and vertical route reads. I still would be weary of veer teams and zone read teams to either side of the defense out of a 2-high structure.
As a DC, it comes down to deciding what you are going to take away and what you can live with giving up. Offensive coordinators have a lot of flexibility in where they can attack your defense out of 12 personnel, regardless of your front and coverage.
CONCLUSION
In any personnel grouping, it takes the right players and detailed coaching to be able to do what you want to do successfully. We did not even get into specific types of offenses and plays, but many systems could thrive and execute their concepts in the formations described above.
In coaching the game and researching different schemes and philosophies, I have come across multiple great ideas on both sides of the ball. 12 personnel offenses embody many of the things that I would find difficult to defend in today’s game, and this article only merely scratched the surface. It takes the right combination of talent within their team to execute effectively, but 12 personnel formations provide an offensive coordinator with a tremendous amount of opportunities for innovation and creativity to execute against any type of defense.
Have you seen much 12 personnel in your league as a DC? What personnel groupings give you the most trouble? Please leave any comments below!
As always, feel free to tweet at me or shoot me an e-mail at coachtwich@gmail.com.
3 Reasons Why 12 Personnel Formations Might be the Hardest to Defend
As a coach with a primarily defensive background, I spend a lot of time thinking about what other teams could do on the offensive side to really make life difficult for us. Best case, these are no more than off-season “what if” scenarios that can be fun to think about from a creative standpoint. Worst case, they are late Friday night/early Saturday morning “what the hell just happened to us?” scenarios.
We are primarily a 4-4 Cover 3 team with a single high safety, and have typically been very successful defensively. Evolving offensive trends have also made us have some discussion over things we might need to start implementing. Even in looking at some different fronts and coverages, I keep coming back to one personnel grouping that, in my opinion, might be the hardest to cumulatively defend.
The Patriots made this grouping popular around 2011 with the likes of Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez (who was pretty damn good before he turned his life story into a plot straight out of Grand Theft Auto) as their two tight ends. The Patriots achieved a tremendous run/pass balance that really put defenses into a bind. Today, the Pats use Martellus Bennett in combination with Gronk, along with Julian Edelman in the slot, to continue to terrorize defenses. It also helps to have some guy named Brady back there calling the shots.
Of course, Tom Brady is arguably the greatest QB of all time, Gronk is a world-class talent, and Edelman can do just about anything you can ask an offensive player to do. The Pats do an unbelievable amount of things with those guys on a level that no college team, let alone a high school team, could begin to do. It’s 12 personnel on steroids and pixie dust. However, the structure of 12 personnel alone provides many unique challenges to a defensive staff.
WHAT IS 12 PERSONNEL?
FIGURE 1. ACE FORMATION WITH AN H-BACK OFF THE LINE.
In the commonly used two-number system to describe personnel groups, 12 personnel means anything that involves 1 running back and 2 tight ends, who in theory can be hybrid fullback types or slot/receiver types instead of just your traditional, hand in the dirt tight end. Figure 1 above is an example of a 12 personnel formation, Ace, with a traditional Tight End labeled Y, and the hybrid H-back player off the line. This is something you would be more likely to see an H-back look like at the high school level, where the talent level of a kid is more likely in line with what you are asking that player to do. The Patriots, on the other hand, can take that H (Gronk) and move him around in a multitude of formations that keeps “12 personnel” out on the field, but is really almost like a completely different grouping due to his talent and versatility.
Other examples of popular formation groupings are 21 personnel (2 backs 1 tight end) which is more pro-style oriented, 10 personnel (1 back 0 tight ends) which is a full spread look, and 11 personnel (1 back 1 tight end) which is a combo pro/spread grouping. Offenses utilize these different groupings for different reasons – either “formationing” a defense to run what they want, or simply as a way to get their best 11 out on the field.
At the high school level, teams may utilize multiple offensive formations, but typically they are limited to just 1-2 personnel groups that they’ll trot out (plus maybe a goal line or short yardage package). After all, practice time is limited, and a lot of us don’t have the luxury of two-platooning and specializing our kids throughout the week.
THREE REASONS WHY 12 PERSONNEL IS HARD TO DEFEND
Although a personnel grouping by itself gives no indication of what exactly an offense does scheme wise, it can paint a solid picture of what their identity is. I find 12 personnel to be a particular pain in the rear end to defend for the following 3 reasons:
1) Run Gaps vs. Vertical Threat Balance
Whether the offense uses their two tight ends in a traditional manner, or one off the line as an H-back, the nature of 12 personnel makes it so that there is an immediate threat from the offense to attack any of the 8 gaps created from tight end to tight end. This lends a lot of defensive coordinators to immediately feel the need to get into an 8-man front to account for those open gaps.
FIGURE 2. 12 PERSONNEL – ACE VS. 4-4
The problem for defensive coordinators is that, even though things are a little more condensed, there is also an immediate threat for four receivers to get vertical right now (4 Verticals against Cover 3, anyone? Figures 3 & 4 below).
FIGURE 3. FOUR VERTICALS
FIGURE 4. ACE TRIPS – FOUR VERTS
Right away, 12 personnel puts defenses into a run/pass conflict where defensive coordinators have to juggle protecting 8 gaps with 4 eligible receivers – all of which can be attacked right now. That is 12 threats that the offense can all hit very quickly post-snap that you will need all 11 guys to be aware of.
All personnel groupings allow for run/pass balance, which is what many offensive coordinators look to achieve… but I’m not sure that any can hit those threats with the speed and balance that 12 personnel formations can. I look at it as a run-heavy grouping first, but with the potential to hurt in the pass game with simple, multiple target concepts.
2) Motion, Trades, Unbalanced, etc. – Dictated Strength
While the run/pass balance presents some difficulties, you can generally do some things to force an offense away from their strengths.
This, however, might be the most PITA part of defending these types of formations.
Whenever an offense involves tight ends, and in this case two of them, they are going to be able to dictate your strength more often than not. This is a battle that, as an even front coach, you know you might have to lose every now and then. Some of us might not mind that much because, even if an offense knows where your 3 tech and your 1 tech are going to be (Figure 5 below), you know what they’re going to give you there. You can move around a little bit post-snap to alleviate some of this, but that just makes your defensive game plan and what your kids need to be able to do that much more complicated. Odd front coaches might not worry about this quite as much, but generally an offensive coordinator using these types of formations will be able to game you pretty good in terms of knowing where you are going to be.
FIGURE 5. ACE TWIN TE
Every defensive coordinator hates motion. If any DC tells you it doesn’t bother them on some level, they’re lying. Offenses that come out, line up, and snap the ball are much easier on our 16-18 year old Einsteins. With a slot and an H-back off the line, there are tons of different types of motions that can come from these looks.
FIGURE 6. ACE MOTION TO ACE TRIPS
In addition, the ability to trade tight ends (Figure 7 below), manipulate strength, and even easily get in to some unbalanced sets can be a big headache for the defense. Even if a defensive coordinator has some things worked up in the game plan, it still has to be communicated to the kids and executed. Motions and trades can disrupt all of that in a hurry.
FIGURE 7. ACE TRADE TO ACE TWIN TE TRIPS
3) Flexibility
All of the above allows for tremendous flexibility in what an offensive coordinator can do – especially with the use of Trips. I gave an example in my Cover 3 vs. Today’s Offenses post about how much stress 12 personnel formations can put on a 1-high safety defense. Not just for the ability to run a bunch of Cover 3 beaters, but also in the need for your free safety to fit in the run game and to use an overhang to account for the #2 receiver.
FIGURE 8. ACE TRIPS VS. 4-4 COVER 3
ACE TRIPS VS. 4-4 (STRENGTH AWAY)
Regardless of where you set your 3 technique, you are in a bind because of the open D gap to the trips side. If the 3 tech is set to the trips (Figure 8 above), you might have to bump your backers to play the D gap (or C if you bump your DE out to a 9 tech), and your overhang player to the weak side might have to become a B-gap player – something they’ve probably never done. If you set your 3 away from the trips (Figure 9 above), you can balance your front up a little bit more, but the D gap to the trips remains very exposed. Veer and zone read teams can have a field day with this.
“OK Twich, well all you’ve diagrammed so far are 1-high structures. We are a quarters team and don’t have to worry about 4 verticals, displaced overhangs, or adjustments to motion as much.”
That may be true if you take a look at how a 4-3 quarters team would align to the same formation (Figure 10 below).
FIGURE 10. ACE TRIPS VS 4-3
As a former coordinator in a quarters system, I know there are multiple different quarters checks to handle #3 vertical. The three most basic are:
Option 1 – Having your trips side corner and safety ignore the #3 receiver (maybe playing 2-Read) and have the responsibility fall onto your backside safety and middle backer, or
Option 2 – Playing “country” quarters and midpointing #1 and #2 with your corner, and #2 and #3 with your trips side safety, or
Option 3 – Traveling both corners over to man #1 and #2, trips safety mans #3 vertical (Figure 11 below).
FIGURE 11. ACE TRIPS VS. 4-3 CORNERS OVER
All of the options have their benefits and drawbacks (for the record, I’d align as in Figure 11 for simplicity and to keep the box as occupied as possible with run-first players). In the 4-3 with a 2 high safety structure, 12 personnel requires a defensive back to be a gap fitter in the run game versus two tight ends (8 gaps, only 7 front defenders). Your safeties must have great eye control in making their run reads and vertical route reads. I still would be weary of veer teams and zone read teams to either side of the defense out of a 2-high structure.
As a DC, it comes down to deciding what you are going to take away and what you can live with giving up. Offensive coordinators have a lot of flexibility in where they can attack your defense out of 12 personnel, regardless of your front and coverage.
CONCLUSION
In any personnel grouping, it takes the right players and detailed coaching to be able to do what you want to do successfully. We did not even get into specific types of offenses and plays, but many systems could thrive and execute their concepts in the formations described above.
In coaching the game and researching different schemes and philosophies, I have come across multiple great ideas on both sides of the ball. 12 personnel offenses embody many of the things that I would find difficult to defend in today’s game, and this article only merely scratched the surface. It takes the right combination of talent within their team to execute effectively, but 12 personnel formations provide an offensive coordinator with a tremendous amount of opportunities for innovation and creativity to execute against any type of defense.
Have you seen much 12 personnel in your league as a DC? What personnel groupings give you the most trouble? Please leave any comments below!
As always, feel free to tweet at me or shoot me an e-mail at coachtwich@gmail.com.
