How the Philadelphia Eagles rush as a unit

he Philadelphia Eagles have had one of the most dominant defensive fronts in recent memory. Yes, they have top tier DLineman like Brandon Graham (my former Michigan teammate) and Fletcher Cox, but what these guys do best is rush as a unit.

The whole idea with any base 4 man rush is to apply pressure to the QB without giving him anywhere to scramble. The eagles do this by assigning level, overlap and 2 way go rusher responsibilities to the front.

Level Rusher

The responsibility of the level rusher is to aggressively rush from the edge without letting the QB break contain. The level rusher does this by making sure he doesn't rush past or beneath the upfield shoulder of the QB.

Overlap Rusher

This rusher initially rushes to the A gap to attract both the guard and the center and allow the other 3 rushers to have 1 on 1's. If he feels another rusher out of his lane he can wrap that rusher to make sure the rush is balanced.

2 Way Go Rusher

This rusher has the option to win in either the A or B gap. He just can't get washed by the QB or rush too far upfield.

How to Determine Responsibilities

The ends will always be level rushers; however, the 2 way go and overlap rusher will be based off a pre snap read like the center's point in this clip. In a perfect world you want the overlap rusher to the zone side and the 2 way go rusher to the man side.

Well that's it for this week. Thank you for tuning into another D-Line Examples!

See you again next week.

And whenever you are ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

1. Learn how to turn your D-Line into a block destruction machine here (1,100+ students)
2. Learn how to develop top tier pass rushers and a lethal pass rush attack here (1,000+ students)

-Craig