You hear it on every podcast: Coach Simple, Play Fast, Win. But what does that really mean?
This episode of The Football Coaching Podcast is all about explaining my own personal coaching philosophy. Because a lot of coaches get it wrong. They think I’m a 4-2-5 Defense guy, or a power run game guy.
None of that is true. My entire coaching philosophy is summed up with 5 words. Coach Simple, Play Fast, Win. And you hear it on every podcast. Now, let’s go in depth on what that really means.
The 3-4 Defense has become increasingly popular because of the flexibility to defend everything from downhill rushing attacks to elaborate Spread Option and RPO offenses. In today’s episode we’re going to look and the 3-4 Defense System that is a part of JDFB Insider.
The 3-4 Defense System gives you a simple approach to defense. But with an added complexity and flexibility you can use as needed. We’ll talk about the base front, stunts, and blitz package that are taught inside the system. You can also download alignments to standard formations in PDF format above.
There’s a lot of moving parts to being a Head Football Coach. Here are some of the critical lessons I learned this season.
2018 was my first season as a Head Football Coach. Overall the year was successful, but there was a lot of learning. I’ll share some of the lessons learned that weren’t in the manual when I started on the job.
You can download my 12 Lessons Learned as a Head Football Coach PDF document above. These lessons have nothing to do with X’s and O’s. If you don’t have your X’s and O’s nailed down, or have a plan for it - you probably shouldn’t be in charge yet.
How can you learn to be a better football coach this off-season? There’s more opportunity available than ever, but you’ve got to look in the right places and have a focused goal.
I’ll share 6 resources you can use to learn to coach football, whether you’re just starting out or continuing your lifelong coaching education. And the 3 keys that you must follow to get a coaching education that’s actually going to help your team win games.
You had a great game plan. It should work. Maybe it’s even working for you… to a point. But at halftime, you need to make a few tweaks to get to the finish line.
Halftime adjustments in your 4-2-5 Defense (or any defense, for that matter) can be made for a number of reasons. In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, I’ll break down the 5 reasons you should make an adjustment, and share some of those potential adjustments for your 4-2-5 Defense System with you.
Don’t let a driving, pouring rain cost you a football game. Or footballs. Because footballs are expensive.
In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, I’ll go into detail about how to prepare for a rain game. I’ll give you the 11 items your program needs to have to get ready (put these on your off-season shopping list!).
Then we’ll talk about in-game management. Keeping the balls, and your players, dry all night. And how you can still hit the perimeter without tossing the football.
Finally, I’ll share how we played a game in a driving rain, and got all of the footballs back to game-ready. The entire process (good and bad) is shared on this podcast!
You beat them once. Or maybe you lost to them. But this is your second game against the same opponent!
Last season, we faced this conundrum twice. We played our week 9 opponent in the first round of the playoffs, and our week 10 opponent in the 2nd round. It’s tough to prepare for the changes you’ll see!
In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, we’ll focus on preparing an Offensive Game Plan to face a team you’ve already played one time this season.
Need a different result? Need the same result again? Doesn’t matter. This episode will get you prepared to win!
The biggest difference maker in the success of your offense, and maybe your football team, is how good your Offensive Line plays. For most offenses, that includes great Pass Protection.
Today’s episode of The Football Coaching Podcast focuses on Offensive Line footwork for blocking defenders in drop back passing. And it’s really independent of what pass protection scheme you decide to use.
Learn the most important rules of pass protection. Then find out how to coach the first two steps that will win your Offensive Line most pass protection battles!
Your opponent drove the ball the length of the field. They’re inside your 5 yard line. It’s time to make the big stop.
Defensive Coordinators need to take a big step forward right now - and accept that getting the stop is not very likely. After all, you couldn’t stop them up til now.
But if you CAN make that big stop? What a momentum changer! So your Goal Line Defense needs to be ready to show up.
In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, we’ll install a basic goal line package for the 4-2-5 Defense that gives your guys a shot to be heroes (even when they probably shouldn’t be).
We’ve all been through those long practices that seem to drag on forever. It’s not productive, no matter how long you spend out on the field.
What if you could get twice as much accomplished, in just a fraction of the time on the field? Higher energy practices. Consistent effort from your players.
And then get home to your family earlier?
It can be done. But you’ve got to commit to a more efficient practice plan. In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, I’ll share with you how to get the job done!
Also, check out the interview I had with Justin Dottavio where he talked about how he keeps his practices to 90 minutes.
You drive the length of the field. But when it really counts, your goal line offense has a tough time punching the ball across the finish line.
This episode of The Football Coaching Podcast is all about turning your offense into a high powered short yardage machine. Find out how you can create a powerful goal line offense and still keep it simple for your players.
Player safety is the single most important aspect of coaching football today. But it doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice effective blocking and tackling.
We started using the Hawk Tackle method before it was even a thing (though we had no idea what we were doing). It has been a huge benefit for football coaches all over the country by increasing player safety while also improving tackling efficiency.
I’ll go over technique and drills for teaching all aspects of tackling technique in this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast!
With the defensive philosophy that I subscribe to, the ‘umbrella’ is critical to the success of the defense. That means your Safety reads must be fast and accurate.
You can’t have a lot of confusion or hesitation. And you can’t give up long passes on play action because of a bad read.
In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, we’ll look at 4 different methods of coaching safety reads. Then I’ll go in depth on the one that I’ve found to work the best for our guys.
Coach Brent Dearmon has a pretty impressive resume including most recently working as Offensive Coordinator at Arkansas Tech. Now he’s turning around his alma mater at Bethel University in Tennessee.
In this Football Coaching Podcast interview, Coach Dearmon shares how you can install RPOs into your offense, and how to call plays to attack any coverage. Plus he’ll talk about the turnaround process at Bethel, and about his time working for Gus Malzahn at Auburn.
Coach Dearmon and CoachTube.com generously provided a special deal for Football Coaching Podcast Listeners to get $10 OFF Identifying & Attacking Coverages with the RPO. Coach Dearmon teaches everything you need to know to incorporate RPOs into your offense right now. Click here to get this exclusive deal.
The Outside Zone Play is one of the best offensive plays in football. In the NFL, it may be the most frequently called run in the entire league.
But you don’t care about the NFL. You care about your football team, and how the Outside Zone Play can help you.
Listen to this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast for the complete, in depth look at how to run the Outside Zone Play against all 6 defensive fronts - and absolutely anything else you might see. Plus we’ll break down a few variations to get even more mileage out of the outside zone blocking scheme.
The Pistol Power Offense System has a lot of roots with the Washington Redskins playbooks from the 1980s. Today we’re taking a look at one of those playbooks.
Be warned… this playbook was a mess. There’s no way any Redskins player ever received the playbook in this format.
But we powered through! Look at Inside Zone, Outside Zone, and a couple of very interesting variations of 3rd & Medium or 3rd & Long plays from this 1986 Washington Redskins Playbook. You can also download the playbook above here.
Time to shut down the run. Get serious. You don’t defend spread teams every week! Better be ready to play it tough! This week, we’re talking about running that powerhouse 4-4 Defense against all of the most popular offensive run schemes in football today.
Okay, time for true confessions. This is how we teach defending the run in the 4-2-5 Defense System, and you can sign up at the top of this article to get instant access to a free video series on it. The 4-4 Defense, 4-2-5 Defense and 6-2 Defense are all essentially the same.
You can spend hours and hours watching Hudl, hoping to find some little secret nugget that makes you a genius on your defensive game plan. Truth is, you’re wasting a lot of time.
Learn how to watch film efficiently and take care of the things that matter in your life. Listen to today’s episode for efficient defensive game planning, and then download the free Offensive Film Study Sheet above!
In the Pistol Power Offense System, we use Half-Slide Pass Protection as our drop back protection scheme. If you want a scheme that works great and adapts to any front, this is the place to start.
Listen to this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast to get the basics of Half-Slide Pass Protection. Could this be the solution to your Quarterback protection problems?
There’s a few myths in coaching offensive line run blocking that we need to break through. Then we can start to build a better run game.
In this episode, we’ll talk about why you don’t need your Offensive Linemen to sustain blocks longer. Or drive their man down the field. And how you can make your less talented Offensive Line look like a group of All Pro’s with a few minor adjustments.
Coaches love to over-complicate things. In a lot of situations, the less complicated answer would be the better one. That’s often the case with coverage packages.
Aside from trying to run every coverage, many coaches are running a coverage that is much more complicated than necessary. If you’re in a league, conference or level where the teams you need to beat are run heavy offenses, Cover 3 coverage might be perfect for you.
I’m going to break down how to teach Cover 3 coverage for the 4-2-5 Defense, but the teachings are very similar no matter what defensive front you choose.
Coaching Cover 3 Coverage in the 4-2-5 Defense on YouTube: https://youtu.be/sYTcU5zsaE4
The Up Front Offensive Line System by Dave Christensen: https://joedanielfootball.com/upfront
Check out all of the coaches on The Football Coaching Podcast Network
https://joedanielfootball.com/upfront
Dave Christensen has been coaching football for 36 years. Mostly working with the Offensive Line. And I had a great time talking OL play with him on this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast.
Listen to this episode to hear Coach Christensen talk about what it takes to have a great Offensive Line, the most important drills for your Linemen, and what a typical practice plan looks like for his D1 Offensive Line practices.
Coach Christensen has also created an awesome course called the Up Front Offensive Line System. CoachTube has set up an exclusive deal for Football Coaching Podcast listeners to save 50% Off the Up Front Offensive Line System for a limited time only! Click https://joedanielfootball.com/upfront to get instant access to this incredible coaching system.
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It’s nice to do a podcast where you don’t need any notes. You’ve talked about something so many times that it just flows.
That’s the Power Series for me. It’s the foundation of our offense, and has been for a number of years.
In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, I’ll go in depth on the details for executing the Power, Counter, Power Pass and Counter Pass in the Pistol Power Offense System.
Download the Huskies ‘92 Defense Playbook Here
The 1992 Washington Huskies 4-4 Defense Playbook is the subject a deep dive look on this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast. And it’s an interesting look.
We’ll investigate the similarities and differences between the Huskies 4-4 Defense and the more modern 4-2-5 Defenses today. Is there really a difference in the core structure? Listen to The Football Coaching Podcast to find out!
You need a defense that can easily adapt to any offensive attack. If you’re changing everything from week to week, you’ll be in trouble when your players get confused.
The 4-2-5 Defense System has been built around the Joe Daniel Football motto of Coach Simple, Play Fast, Win. In this episode of The Football Coaching Podcast, we look at the philosophy and principles that build the foundations of the 4-2-5 Defense.