State of the Hogs: NFL coaches on why Hogs' 3-4 switch makes sense

Arkansas freshman defensive lineman McTelvin Agim celebrates a sack on Saturday, Sept. 10, 2016, agaisnt TCU at Amon G. Carter Stadium in Fort Worth, Texas.

— What is the 3-4 defense? How will it help Arkansas change its fortunes in the SEC following a 7-6 season in which it allowed 39 rushing touchdowns?

These are among the multitude of questions I asked veteran coaches with NFL and college experience in a series of phone calls Friday.

The six coaches reached have coordinated offenses in the NFL, coached defensive line in the NFL, secondaries in the NFL, coordinated defenses at Power 5 schools in college and several with college head-coaching experience.

The last reference covers Ken Hatfield, the winningest coach in Arkansas history, a play-caller as a head coach at almost every stop.

I'll start with Hatfield's only real clue, as he was walking into the arena for the SEC Basketball Tournament in Nashville, Tenn.

“If you are going to play the 3-4, get a mean tough nose guard,” Hatfield said. “And then you can make it tough on every center in America. It starts right there.”

Arkansas will rely on some quality young defensive linemen in the 3-4 conversion. One of the best is sophomore McTelvin Agim. The top candidates to be that mean, nasty nose tackle might be senior Bijhon Jackson or freshman Austin Capps. But this story is more about scheme than players.

Most of the NFL coaches agreed to the interview with the stipulation that their names would not be used. Fair enough. High-profile assistants don't need to be quoted outside of highly regulated sessions these days.

Arkansas coach Bret Bielema has spoken a little about the conversion to the 3-4 in the handful of media briefings I've attended over the last two months, including Razorback Club visits to Mountain Home and Tulsa, Okla., in the last few days.

“We just fit better,” Bielema said. “A lot of our guys fit. We have the stand-up end types and we have players who can be play off the edge a little better in the 3-4 than the 4-3.

“We are able to disguise our blitzes and be more multiple. It's easier to get more players to the field side, into space.”

That makes perfect sense to a veteran NFL defensive line coach. There was information on what Arkansas likely would be doing, perhaps similar to what is going on throughout the NFL and now popular on the college scene.

“They are probably going to run the four-eye scheme which is the college scheme craze,” he said. “It's an easy scheme to coach.

“The true 3-4 is what Alabama runs. It's what Nick Saban has always run. If you don't really know what you are doing in that true 3-4, it's a mess. If you know what you are doing, it's a great scheme.”

Interestingly, that coach was in the middle of breaking down combine and tape results for Arkansas defensive linemen, especially Deatrich Wise and Jeremiah Ledbetter. He said they'd get a high rating in his evaluations.

One NFL assistant said his staff just completed a study — common in the off season — on the SEC's almost complete switch to the 3-4. He was ready when I made the call, noting "this is a little like divine intervention with your timing. And, there are definitely reasons all those teams, like Arkansas, are going to the 3-4" in the last couple of seasons.

"One of our veteran defensive coaches said it was almost exactly what happened years ago in the old Southwest Conference," said the NFL offensive coach. "He said it was with the wide use of the option — veer and wishbone — in the Southwest Conference. You had to stop running quarterbacks. He said it's the same thing as the options the spread quarterbacks are running.

"The 3-4 — and that's really the 5-2 like the SWC teams were running — eliminates the options. The 3-4 eliminates certain runs. The 4-3 eliminates certain runs, but it gives some others. It's tough to stop the option out of the 4-3. There are some offenses that rely on angles with their blocking. In the 4-3, you give them a little more angles and can't (move) as much. This helps you become more flexible with the front.

"The 4-3 puts so much pressure on the defensive end. He has to worry about the option. So his pass rush ability is diminished."

Does that sound like what happened to the Arkansas defensive ends last year? They were not factors in pass rush, perhaps because of the read options run by many spread teams.

"I think so," the coach said. "I think what the 3-4 gives you is two over-hanging players on the outside that help you take away that space.

"The main thing though about the 4-3, it requires two big guys inside. That's the hardest thing to recruit. In the NFL, we get to draft them. The SEC has good defensive linemen, but it's still difficult to get those two great inside guys.

"I remember a few years back when Phil Fulmer was at Tennessee, they had two GREAT inside defensive tackles every year. So they could play that 4-3 and be great at it. It's just tough to get them like that. No one does that consistently. Nick Saban has done that at times, but even he knows it's tough."

Another former NFL defensive assistant with college coordinator experience has a preference for the 3-4, although he's been involved in 4-3 schemes, too.

“Even in the '70s, the 3-4 was out there in a big way,” he said. “But what they were calling it was a 5-2, but it's the same thing. Arkansas ran 5-2 for many years. They were calling their outside linebackers defensive ends. Really doesn't matter, though; same thing.

“I know Alabama under Ken Donahue was always 3-4 or 5-2. Ken Donahue was Bear Bryant's defensive coordinator for about his entire career and he was running that scheme.”

Why?

“It's about the best thing you can do to stop the run,” he said. “The 4-3 is good for making adjustments in pass defense, but college defenses need to stop the run. The sophisticated passing offenses that hit a few years back caused a lot of teams to switch to the 4-3 because they were running that in the NFL. But the NFL flipped back.”

The coach said it is easier to disguise things in the 3-4, including run coverages.

“The pass adjustments are harder in the 3-4,” he said. “That's why people went to the 4-3.

“Either way, you've got seven in the line. I think with the 3-4, it's easier to disguise what your tackles are doing. You can disguise what the inside or outside responsibilities are with your tackles.

“I think it's a matter of covering your linebackers better in the 3-4. The tackles are playing head-up, and that keeps teams from getting those big guards on your linebackers. If you can do that, the linebackers can scrape and get to the outside.

“It's just a matter of disguise. You can handle gaps better, and that enables you to play the run better.”

The stunts and twists are harder to predict. There was more than one coach who agreed that the 3-4 helps stop the run.

“You play the run better because you have a much better ability to blitz,” he said. “You have more options with twists, stunts and blitzes. That makes the scrapes easier for the linebackers.”

Got all of that? I was afraid it's too complex. Another coach gave a try.

“What's happened of late is that there are more teams playing three and four receivers wide,” he said. “So you are not playing straight old cover three. But the 3-4 or 5-2 allows you to be committed less to two-deep in the secondary. It's man over stuff, one deep free in the secondary. The combinations are easier and you are back to the disguise element.”

Harold Horton always ran some form of a 3-4 or 5-2 defense as an assistant at Arkansas or as a head coach at Central Arkansas.

“It just provides so much flexibility,” Horton said. “Coach (Frank) Broyles ran the 5-2. That's what we made our living out of throughout my time at Arkansas. It was my defense as a head coach.

“You have a lot of options, but the main thing, you better be able to be good in your base. What I thought it gave you was the ability to slant your front in either direction. You can slant to the formation or away from it and move or stem. I didn't think you were locked down.”

Horton agreed with Hatfield that the nose tackle was a key position, but he didn't think it had to be a massive body.

“What you want to do with the nose tackle is play both gaps,” Horton said. “You can do that if he's massive. Big and heavy helps. But we did it with speed and quickness like with Jimmy Walker, too. That big guy does help, though.

“You are playing gap defense, it means everyone has a gap. But if you can two-gap that nose tackle – play both gaps – then it makes it so much easier across the front. If he can be a two-gap guy, you have something that's tough to block.

“Then, you have to decide how you are going to play your ends, flip them to the formation or not. Our best defenses usually had someone who was better to the tight end side and one who was better to the split end side, or open. You usually don't have someone who can do both. That's rare.

Horton said legendary Arkansas assistants Jim Mackenzie and Wilson Matthews were fans of the 5-2 front.

“We had some calls for it so we had flexibility,” Horton said. “We could balance it up. We could walk the end out to the spit end to take away the ability to just rise up and dump it to the receiver.”

There was a chance to be anonymous with all of the interviews to protect jobs. Horton laughed about that.

“No one is going to fire me now,” said Horton, who did want to make sure to include his boss, his wife. “Betty is probably not going to fire me at this point.”