Nose Guard: Establishing an Effective Two-Gap

As we all know, football schemes are cyclical. Trends seem to re-surface. The double wing has become the spread, the Wing T has morphed into elements of the fly sweep and the old sixty defense has transformed into a 4-2-5. While the schemes may come and go, one position has been as constant a cornerstone in defensive football as the name that it bears- the nose guard position. Usually, this denotes images of Ted Washington from the Buffalo Bills or Gilbert Brown of the Green Bay Packers stuffing up the middle of the offense with their 300 lb. girth. But like anything else, the true double-gap nose technique has shifted more into the evolution of shade defenders who have only one gap to be responsible for. Thanks to Jimmy Johnson and the development of even fronts, teams have started to employ more tilted nose players whose main objective is to get off the ball and get penetration into