Tank's Take January 10, 2003

How to prevent yourself from winning.

No one knows who came up with it no one knows when it was first used. However the earliest known occurrence of the prevent defense was in the city of Troy when they prevented the Greeks from ill will by accepting their first of a giant wooden horse. We all know the result of that strategy, just try to find Troy on a map. Since the prevent defense was employed by Napoleon at Waterloo, and by George Custard at Wounded Knee. Each with disastrous consequences, now the Prevent Defense has become a favored end game strategy of NFL coaches, do people ever learn?

In theory the prevent defense does work in some occasions. When you have a 2-touchdown lead or lager, with less then 1 minute left and the opponent has no time outs. Letting them get some yards to chew up clock does work. However, at the endzone the defense should have a trap set ready to spring when the offense gets close. Case in point in the latter stages of their blow out win over the Colts last week the Jets allowed Peyton Manning to chew up yards, but around the 20 they had tighter coverage forcing a turnover twice. However, more often then not teams start using the prevent defense too early.

What exactly is the prevent defense? The prevent defense is when a team allows the offense to go up the field by not rushing the quarterback, and allowing the receiver to catch the pass. Once the receiver catches the pass they prevent the big play, by tackling him, hoping to keep him in bounds so the clock would continue to run, forcing the offense to burn one of their last timeouts, or make a mistake of turning the ball over when faced with desperation.

However, where the prevent defense does not work is that more often then not the receiver is just a step or two from the sidelines, and the clock is stopped. In addition big play are more the results in missed tackles then an over aggressive defense, plus a Touchdown is still worth 6 points weather it come on a single 60 yards pass or 6 slant passes. One thing coaches also fail to realize is that a Quarterback that is under pressure is more likely to throw an interception and less likely to make a big play. When not rushed a quarterback could be patient allowing a receiver to beat the cornerback that is covering him, which would result in the dreaded bug play. If the offense still has timeouts and there are more then 2 minutes left all of a sudden the game is in jeopardy.

However, what may be the worst side effects of the prevent defense is that it allows a defense which may have been struggle all day to find their rhythm, while making a defense which may have been in rhythm lose theirs. Case in point last Sunday in San Francisco the Giants grabbed a 2-point lead against the 49ers in the 3rd period. Though not necessarily the prevent defense the defense relaxed just allowing the 49ers to score a TD which cut the lead to 16. The 49ers offense, which had been misfiring all day, now had found its grove, and was able to make their 4th Quarter comeback. In the NFL a defense must keep alert all game, other wise they risk losing their aggression. What the prevent defense does is completely strip the defense of its aggression.

The prevent defense is not popular; in fact most teams deny they ever use it even after it clearly has just cost tem the game. The fall out of the Browns-Steelers game bears that out as Browns defensive coordinator Foge Fazio retired 2 days after his team blew a 12-point lead with 2 minutes left in Pittsburgh. Word has it, one of the reason Fazio stepped down was that he and Browns Coach Butch Davis disagreed over how to approach the last few minutes of the game. Fazio wanted the defense to be more aggressive while Davis over ruled him and employed a more "laxed defense." Had the Browns listened to Fazio they'd likely be playing this weekend.
Instead they are just another team that prevented themselves from winning, by using the prevent defense.