Wharton

we pull a lot, and my breakdown of the Chicago game showed a lot of it. Personally, pulling and trapping is essentially two ends of one motion - you pull a guard to trap, unless he's leading inside of another trap block, which I'd call a scoop block or pursuit block.

By Collin's words, I don't think he's saying that we don't pull or trap, I think it's that he's differentiating between the two. If so, I don't know where he's coming from there, but it won't have been the first time we'll have argued bitterly over meaningless semantics.


As for Wharton, I still like him. Excepting the Chicago game, he's got 3.5 sacks this year (with help, of course). To be fair, give him one of the Chicago sacks, I think that'd be somewhat realistic. I've liked him blocking head up, I've liked him blocking outside, and he's been dynamite blocking down on the DT when we sweep left. I'd be fine with him staying at LT, or going with the team's wishes to put him at RT "if things don't work out". If he did end up at guard, that's fine, but coming up with another left or right tackle this year would be expensive on a year where we're probably going to have to spend to get other things as well. At no point do I believe that this team is going to put Wahle at OT, and I'm fine with that.

 

Pulling and trapping are two different things, although I suppose you could say that you have to pull to trap. Trap blocks allow the defender to come free and are designed to lure that player into penetrating, at which point they are engaged in the backfield by a blocker from another area, usually with the idea being that the defender doesn't see them coming. I stand by the statement that I haven't seen us run a trap play in years, and while there may have been some, we haven't done it anywhere near enough to be considered a trapping team. If anyone chooses to disagree with that, by all means point one out and I'll take a look at it.

Meanwhile conventional pull blocks occur when the offensive lineman vacates his area, usually heading toward the opposite side of the formation but we've also pulled the guard around to the outside of the same side tackle. In these cases the vacating blocker's head-up defender is not allowed into the backfield freely, but is accounted for through down blocks by the adjacent lineman or occasionally a fill by the fullback. This pulling blocker then leads the running back. Rather than catching defenders by surprise, the pulling blocker is rather obvious and imposing.

 

semantics.

 

It seems odd to me that he can't get his right to help of a speed rusher, but he is athletic enough to be considered for a pulling guard or center. I would think that would require more effort or whatever than it would to slide around in order to chip the end comming around. Maybe it's a speed issue? Assuming it is a speed issue for him that's inhibiting his ability to get around, wouldnt that be something that can be improved since he is as athletic as he is? Not challenging the thought, just confused by it a little.

 

footspeed is a small problem with him - it's not unique or anything, he's just not an elite athlete for his position. He's just very good. When he has to set up in pass pro, and he takes his drop steps, his initial steps aren't always going to reach the fastest linemen. You want to get your hands on them, direct them, force them. Can't say if he has any issues off the snap, but it would make sense if he wasn't the fastest guy off the snap. When you can't always reach your rusher right off, you tend to have to lunge a bit to get there, or you waist-bend when you need to be bending more at the knees (you have leverage there). When you lunge, you basically have one good shove on your man before he gets around you, and after that he's free. That works sometimes, believe it or not, if the end's taken too wide a path and the QB releases fast, but it's as often dangerous.

He has the wingspan to handle the job, he can keep a guy in front of him for the most part, he just has issues reaching guys sometimes, and occasionally has trouble staying with them if he can't initiate enough contact at first. If he had a bit better feet, he would overcome it, because he could be that quarter second late and still force a speed rusher wide of his path and stay with him. I don't think it's an athleticism issue at all, but an agility issue.

 

A block from a pulling G usually takes place outside the Ts. A block from a trapping G usually takes place a few feet from where he started. He just lets the DT penetrate a little. That to me very different. Is this wrong?

 

A guard pulling for onside contain isn't moving any further than if he were blocking the offside DT. My coaches, and everyone I've talked terminology with through the years, has never said "this is a pull and this is a trap, and there's a difference." Every pulling lineman was doing the same thing except for the instance of the guard cutting inside contain to catch flow upfield. There was no differentiation.

There's differentiation, by some, as to the overall play style being called a trap play or sweep play; a power sweep is a trap of contain, but is nonetheless a trap. The onside guard is taking out the onside contain man. The guard that leads into the hole is the one doing something different.

And in the Gibbs terminology, those counter trey/FB trap/QB trap series that they used, the proof is simple enough - assignment calls for linemen to pull, the playcall is a trap. I've never seen a reason to differentiate, because I've never seen anyone differentiate.

 

My coaches, and everyone I've talked terminology with through the years have always considered it such a given that there is a difference between a straight pull and a trap that they'd never even heard of someone considering the terms interchangeable. If you check the way the terms are used in articles and analysis by current or former NFL people, you can see that they consider them separate things as well. As noted in my descriptions, they're two entirely different events. Magnus is just arguing with me because ... well ... that's just what he does.


And speaking of how people use the terms, mags, do you want to explain to me why Ron Rivera would say "I like them pulling and trapping"? If they actually did mean the same thing, wouldn't that be kind of redundant? Wouldn't it be like saying "I like them speaking and talking"?

 

you know, the flopping around like a punter tactic of "someone thinks I'm wrong because they have a bitter vendetta against me" might work if you didn't use it every day. I don't believe anyone ever bought the grandstanding anyway.

You've noted that you believe them to be separate things. You've not shown this "vast majority" you always claim to have, but sure, post some ambiguous quotes that state one's entirely different from the other. Hell, your description of your "experience" with it, which is your proof, is itself ambiguous at best. After all, if someone didn't not say it, they certainly must've meant it specifically. Do you have anything where anyone actually says "pulling isn't trapping"?



meanwhile, the Gibbs playbook specifically interchanges the two.

This website states that traps can occur at any hole.

This website interchanges the two.

This website denotes the two as the same as well. Much like most things I found, it noted a pulling guard doing trapping, inside and out, not that a trap was defined as here in formation and a pull was here in formation.

It's the same action, in cause and effect. Pullling and trapping or sealing are obvious links to each other. It'd be awfully hard for one to be independent of the other when one is directly involved in the act of the other, and vice versa.

Yes. People say redundant things all the time, but in a cause and effect relationship, a pulling guard traps. You pull, and then you trap. You can't trap without pulling, and you can trap in any of the nine holes.

 

'Trap' describes a short pull, based on what I've been taught/experienced. So I don't think it's incorrect to say there's a difference, or wrong to claim that they are the same principle idea, which is to vacate an area.