I certainly appreciated the fact that he spent more verbiage on me than anyone else (I didn't read it, just eye-balled the length of the text) and indeed his defensive scheme was the reason UFC won their final three games to take home the gold.
Here's a brief summary for those who didn't bother to watch:
The primary threat that UFC poses to the passing game is a nasty little blitz designed to free up the LDE, and it really only works with a very fast LDE:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951799
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8952138
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8949996
jd ran this blitz almost (?) every time against every formation where the offense lines up a scat HB, rTE and rFB.
It generates some sacks, a good number of hurries, and almost always creates a short clock for the QB. It's not an "exploit" blitz per se as it certainly doesn't create auto-sacks, but the annoying thing about it is that leaving in rFBs or rHBs actually tends to make it more effective...leaving in an rTE might not be as bad, but I couldn't find enough examples to be sure.
Hood used a bFB at HB in order to steer clear of this blitz (which brings a different blitz instead) and tried to get one-on-one matchups with their excellent possession WRs, thinking they would win the rolls:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2207608&pbp_id=8292777
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2207608&pbp_id=8293153
It didn't work out often enough, and they got crushed.
Asau decided to pound the ball quite a bit more, which isn't really their game (though they aren't bad at it) and they stayed in the game till the end...but it's tough to play ground and pound possession dot-ball against a team that's really built for it. You lose out on the field position, stamina, morale and turnover battles and eventually fold up in the 4th (this was the first generation MPHD strategy, so it was nostalgic to watch).
I thought quite a bit about that blitzand wavered between trying to run the ball as Asau did (which takes me out of my game plan a bit), or keep in a bTE most of the game which would have led to different defenses, many of which I couldn't scout because nobody had really tried it.
After some deliberation, I decided to just face that blitz head on. Why? Because it would be predictable (they run it almost every time) and because I had built my O-line around picking up blitzes (very high agility, speed and pretty high vision), my QB is excellent at quick reads and beating blitzes (it's what I designed him to do) and my WRs are quick enough and have good fake skills, which I estimated was the biggest weakness in the UFC dots...they deflect balls really well, generate a ton of KLs, they are very fast, but they don't react particularly well.
So, I said what the hell, this is what my dots should be good at, let's just bring it.
And while we did have a few moments that looked promising :
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8950642
At the end of the day, the routes I picked just weren't beating that blitz (maybe could have picked better routes, maybe just wasn't in the cards at all).
The one run that I threw in did pretty well:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8950693
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951359
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951428
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8949909 (never give up?)
But that wasn't nearly enough to make up for a 44% passing rate, 6 sacks and 2 turnovers.
At the end of the day, the biggest advantage I felt UFC had was the lack of scouting opportunities they presented. They really only ran that defense for two games, and with their ball control style offense they presented very few defensive looks to analyze.
That's a smart way to play it, but takes a lot of work...you have to have a substantially new defense and preferably you have to test it in private scrims to debug it a bit.
jd did the work, and it paid off.
Congrats jd!
Here's a brief summary for those who didn't bother to watch:
The primary threat that UFC poses to the passing game is a nasty little blitz designed to free up the LDE, and it really only works with a very fast LDE:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951799
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8952138
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8949996
jd ran this blitz almost (?) every time against every formation where the offense lines up a scat HB, rTE and rFB.
It generates some sacks, a good number of hurries, and almost always creates a short clock for the QB. It's not an "exploit" blitz per se as it certainly doesn't create auto-sacks, but the annoying thing about it is that leaving in rFBs or rHBs actually tends to make it more effective...leaving in an rTE might not be as bad, but I couldn't find enough examples to be sure.
Hood used a bFB at HB in order to steer clear of this blitz (which brings a different blitz instead) and tried to get one-on-one matchups with their excellent possession WRs, thinking they would win the rolls:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2207608&pbp_id=8292777
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2207608&pbp_id=8293153
It didn't work out often enough, and they got crushed.
Asau decided to pound the ball quite a bit more, which isn't really their game (though they aren't bad at it) and they stayed in the game till the end...but it's tough to play ground and pound possession dot-ball against a team that's really built for it. You lose out on the field position, stamina, morale and turnover battles and eventually fold up in the 4th (this was the first generation MPHD strategy, so it was nostalgic to watch).
I thought quite a bit about that blitzand wavered between trying to run the ball as Asau did (which takes me out of my game plan a bit), or keep in a bTE most of the game which would have led to different defenses, many of which I couldn't scout because nobody had really tried it.
After some deliberation, I decided to just face that blitz head on. Why? Because it would be predictable (they run it almost every time) and because I had built my O-line around picking up blitzes (very high agility, speed and pretty high vision), my QB is excellent at quick reads and beating blitzes (it's what I designed him to do) and my WRs are quick enough and have good fake skills, which I estimated was the biggest weakness in the UFC dots...they deflect balls really well, generate a ton of KLs, they are very fast, but they don't react particularly well.
So, I said what the hell, this is what my dots should be good at, let's just bring it.
And while we did have a few moments that looked promising :
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8950642
At the end of the day, the routes I picked just weren't beating that blitz (maybe could have picked better routes, maybe just wasn't in the cards at all).
The one run that I threw in did pretty well:
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8950693
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951359
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8951428
http://goallineblitz.com/game/replay.pl?game_id=2209368&pbp_id=8949909 (never give up?)
But that wasn't nearly enough to make up for a 44% passing rate, 6 sacks and 2 turnovers.
At the end of the day, the biggest advantage I felt UFC had was the lack of scouting opportunities they presented. They really only ran that defense for two games, and with their ball control style offense they presented very few defensive looks to analyze.
That's a smart way to play it, but takes a lot of work...you have to have a substantially new defense and preferably you have to test it in private scrims to debug it a bit.
jd did the work, and it paid off.
Congrats jd!
Edited by tautology on Nov 22, 2012 09:47:46
Edited by tautology on Nov 22, 2012 09:45:52
though perhaps this sim was a bit more forgiving 
