Pin and Pull Schemes Qb and RB Variations

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Pin and Pull

The pin and pull scheme is used at both the NFL and college level. Teams such as Auburn under Gus Malzhan and Noel Mazzone ran it at Auburn  and Chip Kelly runs it at UCLA. At the pro level you see teams such as The Buffalo Bills run the play with great success.

It is taken from the old Green Bay sweep. some spread sweep and some old wing T Buck Sweep rules. Some teams will run it using the standard, if uncovered you pull. Other teams will take advantage of angles and block down. Neither way is right or wrong, just teams have preferences on how they do it.. 

The premise of the play is to get a pin and angle on a defensive lineman. The lineman not pinning is the puller.  It allows offenses to take advantage of angles and utitilize offensive lineman to pull and get on the perimeter. The aiming point for the back is similar to outside zone as it is a perimeter run play. You will see teams pull 2-3 uncovered lineman in the scheme and it is an excellent play to get the ball on the edge. 

The play is very similar to the old wing T sweep in many of it's principle:

1. The front side Guard or tackle will block the alley defender. Often times he will either kick out the force defender or log the alley defender. The RB will play off his block and make his cut accordingly.

The front side rules are very simple depending  on who you ask. Some teams will take advantage of angles, If you have a down block, down block. This is true of some teams who will block down on a 3 technque with the tackle. 

Auburn blocks it this way. 

For example, if you have a 4-2 base like below. The TE has a down block and the tackle has a down block, so down block. This can involve anyone from the center out to the playside. Here's Auburn's scheme.
One thing you will notice about Auburn is they love to crack with their wide receivers and have the Guard block the corner to the front side.

Another team that makes a living on this play is Chip Kelly at UCLA. He has always been a pin and pull guru from his days with the Eagles and that continued when he worked with Noel Mazzone at UCLA. 

Here's their variation.

In the next few clips you will see the scheme vs LSU.  

What UCLA does vs the 4-2 scheme is different in the fact that they pull the tackle and center who are uncovered like many traditional teams would do. The traditional theorists would say pull the uncovered lineman.

Teams like UCLA will utilize the QB pin and pull with a lead blocker who is the rb.

They do it with the QB.

2. Here are some other. qb schemes and rules:

Uncovered lineman will pull. In this situation you get a 3 technique and a shade on the backside.

TE=block the 6i

OT=3 tech

PSG= pull first thing outside

Center=shade

BSG=pull 

BST= 5 tech

Now with an end outside, you will often get a kickout by the playside lineman. 

Here the Bills run it out of 12 personnel 

3  QB Pin and Pull:

The Bills love the pin and pull scheme. They will run it at times as a qb pin and pull.

Here they run it in the playoffs vs. The Patriots. They will often do it on 3rd and less than 3 situations. Here its from 3x1 off the fake to the RB.

Nice fake and pull the center and right guard.

Fake wide zone and pull the qb.

In this example, you get a  bear front. The Bills pull the Center and right guard and get a good down block from the tight end and wing. The backside cuts off the nose and defensive tackle. 

Due to the wide outside linebacker the Guard ends up kicking out the outside linebacker and the center turns up for the seal. 

Nice job of pulling by the center and guard. They get a hard force so ball gets turned inside.

 

 

Fake to the rb and get the center and guard to the right. Guard kicks the hard force and center sees it and leads up

Again they get the guard and center pulling. Create angles.

Here they run a similar play vs the Texans They get the nice seal and down blocks and Allen gets a huge gain off the jet action the other way. The Texans are in the under front

Here's a nice qb run for 40 plus yards.

Texas QB Pin and Pull out of empty

TE comes down and cracks the 5

WR blocks #2 

G and Tackle get on the edge

 

Texas goes empty

They run pin and pull

Create nice angles vs the odd front. Nice block,

Tennessee Pin and Pull Schemes vs Bowling Green 2021 (3 film clips are below the write ups)

1st concept

They run it with Center and left guard pulling and the right guard and Rt all blocking back.

They lead with the h back and pull the center and left guard.

Here they pull the guard and tackle and lead with the h back

Nice design.

The 2nd time they read the DE and still pull the center, right guard and right tackle.

Again nice scheme                                                         

nice kick out and lead pin and pull play.

In the last example vs Bowling green they run it with the rb

4-2 front

Right tackle and right guard block the dt and de. 

They pull the center and left guard with the left tackle cutting off the backside

They read the 5 technique 

Nice scheme and design.

 

 

They create good angles pin the de and get 2 guys around with a lead blocker

Empty Pin and Pull from the Utah offense.

Front Bear

Coverage cover 0

They bring the TE in motion and crack on the de. 

#1 wr blocks the SS

Tackle pulls and takes the CB

Nice scheme from Utah

Nice job with motion man cracking and the qb running it out of empty.

Nice job with the lineman getting on the perimeter

Nice angles and run

Ravens version of pin and pull.

They run it off jet motion out of 13 personnel

They get a nice down block vs the under front with the left guard and tackle and pull the center.

Ravens always do a great job with it.

Nice scheme.

Good blocking and down blocks.

Film with the clips above

They run it a 2nd time again for a huge gain.

Again nice angles and blocking with the reduced formation

See the angles. Te gets the good crack and they get the center on the CB by design.

Center kicks out the CB

Tackle gets to the LB

Panthers run pin and pull off of jet sweep action. Bunch formation puts bosa in a 5 technique. 

11 personnel

run jet with #3. SS goes with it and creates angles for the pin and pull the other way.Nice down blocks by

 80 and#2 

Chip Kelly UCLA Offense- Run Game , Boot and play action pass game

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Chip Kelly Offensive Mastermind!

There are several pieces to Chip Kelly's run game at UCLA. This article focuses on his run game and play action.  He has run  a great pin and pull scheme  for years with always a top running game.  He is also always evolving, adapting and changing his schemes and always one of the lead innovators in the sport. 

Here are some stats about his run game. 

2022.  #5 in rushing yards,  239 yards per game,   

           #1 in yards per rush   6.0 yards per rush

2021  #10 in rushing,    219 yards per game     

           #18 in yards per rush 5.2 yards per rush                

2020.  #12 in rushing ,    230 yards per game 

            #21 in yards per rush 5.1 yards per rush

Some of the plays you will see from their potent rushing attack. Most of this article was from the 2021 season, so there may be some changes in 2022.

1. Wide(outside zone) Zone

2. Duo

3. Pin and Pull

4. Jet Sweep

5. wrap 

6. Inside Zone read

He combines it with his passing game:

1.Boot/play action off the run game

2. Vertical pass game off outside wide zone  run game.

3. Of course Y cross(Saints is a key component) 

 Chip loves to run wide zone. He can run it in different ways. One way I like that he runs it is with the h back slicing across the formation. This is very effective vs man to man defenses who like to spin the coverage. You get a rotation and also can catch them out of position with a LB chasing the H back across the formation.

They ran this play 3 times for 42 yards vs Arizona in 2021.

UCLA Offense:

Jet with wide zone off slice blocking to the opposite side.

Here you get jet motion followed by a slice blocking scheme. Very effective when going against a team that runs man coverage concepts with secondary spinning. 

***NOTE, if the DB doesn't run with the motion, the h back will not slice block it. The h back will actually read what the motion man does. Interesting concept. So if CB doesn't run across the formation, then the h back will stay front side and block the LB if he knows it's zone coverage.

Here's 2 clips of the play. Jet/Slice Zone

PIN AND PULL

Another play that Chip Kelly likes in the run game  at UCLA is his pin and pull. He has always been a pin and pull guru from his days with the Eagles and that continued when he worked with Noel Mazzone at UCLA. 

Here's their variation.

In the next few clips you will see the scheme vs LSU.  

What UCLA does vs the 4-2 scheme is different in the fact that they pull the tackle and center who are uncovered like many traditional teams would do. The traditional theorists would say pull the uncovered lineman.

Teams like UCLA will utilize the QB pin and pull with a lead blocker who is the rb.

Here is my YouTube video of Chip Kelly and his Pin and Pull series.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywwtvVAUuuE

WRAP

They will use a wrap scheme at times and depending on the front will pull a different lineman or 2. VS Hawaii they were pulling the center to the side of the 2i and folding the technique with the guard and tackle on the backside.

DUO

Duo is a play that stresses double teams at the point of attack. At times you will get 2 to 3 double teams. Teams like it because it's usually a solid run scheme that can get you 3-4 yards.

UCLA runs it off their jet motion vs LSU

The first example they are condensed formation and run Jet motion.

They do a nice job with the formation and play call.

Here is my YouTube video of duo vs LSU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=au-H7vQr7As

Zone Read

Chip Ran more zone read in 22, mostly because he had a great athlete at qb. Here are some examples 

Traditional zone read

Clip Below

Great double teams at the point of attack.

                                           

                                            Nice cut off the 2 way go. RB stays skinny gets north and gets a big gain.

Unbalanced Zone Read

They run zone read with the h back coming across the formation. They get a light surface away from 3x1. They get decent #'s on the backside so Chip calls zone read.  The qb gets a pull read.

The DE comes hard inside and the qb pulls the ball. The H releases to the flat so the cb has to go with him. 

Huge running lane off the zone read action and h coming across nice play call vs the look.

Boot

After the run game, Chip has a great bootleg series both of jet motion and off wide zone. They will run jet and slice block it to the same side of the jet. Here they run boot for a 75 yard td vs LSU.

12/13 personnel Bootlegs is often seen in the offense.

UCLA Bootleg vs LSU

1st and 10 UCLA in 22 big personnel/13 depending on how you count the h back.

They fake jet sweep and counter and run boot to the field. Excellent design for a nice 75 yard TD.

Play action vertical passing game.

They will often run play action off their perimeter run game and can run it off any action. It is a play they run off their effective outside zone. They will get a nice horizontal stretch and throw the ball vertically. IT is a 6 man protection with the h back having a check release option. 

The thing I love most about it is they run it with a 3 man vertical concept that is very tough to defend off their outside zone action. 

Heres a few examples vs Fresno State.

Example #2 

Same pass protection, H back check releases...1/2 man scheme

Vs Colorado they go 3x1 and run a three man pattern on the front side with the deep over route against zone coverage.

Front side 

1- vertical route

2- post 

3-flat

TE runs the deep over and is wide open

Another clip of the passing scheme off jet motion

Another clip vs Arizona State and they run the sail route vs man coverage

Here are just some of the major aspects which makes the offense that Chip Kelly  runs.

Here are some other places to visit and learn about the offense.

UCLA Playbook: How to Run the Ball on USC's Seven Man Box

https://247sports.com/college/ucla/LongFormArticle/UCLA-Playbook-USC2021-175923117/

Chip Kelly 

Y Cross

https://rileykolstefootball.com/2018/02/23/chip-kellys-y-cross-concept/