Quote:Not backwards at all.  Many tweeners struggle to bend because they prefer to avoid contact and rely more on speed to go around/by linemen, and tend to get pancaked against the run.

 

Think Akin Ayodele when he tried to play RDE.

 

Had he been LEO, he may have worked out a little better.  He wasn't really a 4-3 linebacker, he wasn't really a 4-3 RDE... but he was ok in a 3-4.  Had he started his career and was groomed at LEO, who knows... that's the risk of tweeners.  Boom or bust.

 

Chris Clemons is a tweener, Andre Branch is a tweener, Ryan Davis is a tweener.  In Seattle Bruce Irvin was a tweener.  It fits Gus's defensive scheme because the scheme exaggerates their ability to win with finesse in space.  If you watch the film the Jags' LEO lines up very far out, almost like a wide 9 set.   You have to side-step so many blockers from the LEO position and you're never going to get a direct route to the sack. 

 

But the good news is, you can't double team them way out there.  The guard would have to pull block to the outside and leave a gaping hole in the B gap.  The whole point of the LEO is to totally isolate the left tackle, without help (because the other guys are busy blocking our other three 300+ pound dudes), and put pressure on him to contain a highly athletic and nimble kind of player he's not used to blocking.  The best part of the LEO to me is being able to chase even the quicker running quarterbacks down -- Chris Clemons doesn't let Andrew Luck escape the pocket without a fight, we learned that week 12.

 

Dante Fowler is ferocious and physical at the line but when I watched his games, he doesn't move side to side very well or come back to the ball when he overpursues the play.  He's great if you want to stick him in the face of an offensive lineman and power right through him, but that's not really what the LEO does.  His backside pursuit and ability to change directions isn't as good as Vic Beasley for example.

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