Opinion: Move to 3-4 defense will be beneficial for Arizona Football

As the Arizona Football overhauls their defensive staff, I believe their move to a 3-4 defense will prove beneficial and will get immediate results.

It’s definitely been a busy off-season for the Arizona Football team, and Kevin Sumlin deserves a little credit for essentially cutting ties with the previous defensive staff and overhauling almost completely.

As I’m sure you’re aware by now, the Wildcats brought in a new defensive coordinator in Paul Rhoads, in addition to Stan Eggen (defensive line) and Andy Buh (linebackers).

Arizona Wildcats

The move surely signals the much needed transition away from the 3-3-5 defense. With the hiring of Rhoads, Arizona will now incorporate a 3-4 defense, which virtually means, one more linebacker, or at least moving one secondary player to linebacker.

Why do we like the change?

Well, for one the intended purpose of the 3-4, is to ideally have more speed and athleticism on the field. So presumably with the higher number of linebackers and athletes you have out there, the better.

The only problem, is that Arizona surely has lacked here the past couple seasons, and the biggest challenge for Rhoads and Co., will be whether he can get the most out of the group he has.

But schematically, I think the 3-4 will highlight more strengths of the current players Arizona has and that will breed better results.

I do believe Arizona has enough talent to competitive

Yes, you heard me right. Call me a homer, but I do think Arizona has enough talent to be competitive on defense, and as mentioned earlier in this article, where I feel Arizona has lacked is in coaching, and lot of that being scheme.

Previous defensive coordinator Marcel Yates I feel didn’t do good enough of a job in putting his players in a position to be successful, and look no further than the teams’ results recently.

By leveraging the skills you have in guys like Colin Schooler, Tony Fields II, Anthony Pandy, Jalen Harris, etc. I feel you’re going to get better results!

It’s a versatile defense

Simply stated, it’s a defense that can be very changeable! Because of the defensive set, you can do numerous things with like; dropping linebackers into coverage and being able to better hide those coverages, or you can disguise more blitz packages, while allowing for more hybrid defensive players.

What do I mean? Well, the best example I can use is kind of like the Denver Broncos in how they’ve utilized players like Von Miller (currently) and DeMarcus Ware. Both are more or less defensive ends, but have lined up as a pseudo-linebacker in some cases and have been successful as a result. Plus, the Broncos run a 3-4 defense typically. *Side note, in no way am I comparing Arizona’s players to All-Pro’s like Ware and Miller.

Having that “extra backer” in the 3-4 could allow for an edge rusher like Harris to line up as a linebacker and be this hybrid-type player which I’m alluding to, which personally I feel plays to his strengths!

The fact that Harris seems to already be hanging with linebacker coach Andy Buh, could be indication that maybe that is Arizona’s intent! One could hope anyways!

Anyways, while I’m not saying Arizona will be leaps and bounds better defensively this year, I do think we will see some good improvement. After all, really hard to get worse than 120th in the country defensively.

Either way, we’re just excited to see what this team looks like when Spring Football kicks off March 2, and will conclude with the annual team scrimmage on April 4. As always, Bear Down, Arizona!