Scorehead wrote:
The Tampa 2, Cover 2 Defense is a passive, play it safe, bend but dont break style of Defense, & requires gang tackling from Linemen, DB's & Safeties. The Tampa 2 scheme relies on extremely fast defensive players and a hard hitting secondary that loves to gang tackle, neither of which the Bears have.
It also requires the Middle Linebacker carry a bigger burden than in other schemes, covering deep routes down the middle, something Urlacher hasn't been able to handle do to injuries or whatever.
The real problem with the Bears playing this D is that they don't have the right personel to play this D. The D linemen aren't quick enough. Plus, the Bears have not had good coaching at the D Line position to teach the techniques necessary to play a sound Cover 2.
The D line will hopefully improve with Rod Marinelli coaching the line.
There is no doubt that teams can win playing the Cover 2...the Steelers made it famous in the 1970's & the Bucs had success with it in the late 1990's & early 2000's.
I prefer a more aggressive D where the DB's play more Man to Man & play the WR's a little tighter...but thats just me.
Much better. Bonus for separating out opinion from posits.
Also, I believe Madden's early-80s Raiders (incl'g the champs) usually played what we now call generically a Cover-2, except their corners allowed the safties to stay closer to the middle of the field making otherwise simpler completions over the middle come with a heavier cost, so to speak.
Nobody wants to watch Safeties play man-to-man. It will soon be a thing of the past. The physical makeup of the players involved (e.g., safety vs back, TE) combined with rule changes completely eliminate man-to-man effectiveness by Safeties. I think we will soon start seeing a change from traditional two-safety lineups to a pseudo-SS with a true situational floater that would hybrid responsibilities with the MLB (or SAMLB, as the case may be).
What the hell do I know ... I can't even throw a damned football. I need to go take a squirt.