AMAZING: Colts tactician deservedly leads the charge in NFL’s new favorite defensive formation

NFL defensive coordinators have recently converted to following Gus Bradley’s preferred scheme: Cover-3

The NFL’s reputation as a copycat league continues. To exploit defenses, or vice versa, professional football teams must put on their best “I won’t copy your entire homework” faces as they elicit winning ideas and plays from their colleagues throughout the nation.

The next hot product that defensive coordinators throughout the NFL have been implementing is Gus Bradley’s bread and butter, the Cover-3 strategy. This surge of Cover-3s has been a favorite among coordinators for a variety of reasons.

Cover-3 was the most commonly used defensive formation in the NFL in 2023, accounting for 36.1% of the total.

This strong emphasis on Cover-3 configurations makes sense when you consider the incredible adaptability it provides. Outside of the foundation, coordinators throughout the league have begun to use Cover-3’s several versions to capitalize on its aforementioned versatility. Variations include Cover-3 press, Cover-3 guy, Cover-3 bail, and Cover-3 buzz.

Cover-3’s Variations

Cover-3 man and press look to be and operate on similar principles as Cover-1 and Cover-1 press.

In both Cover-3 and Cover-1 press, the outside cornerbacks are responsible for jamming the receiver across from them at the line of scrimmage. The key distinction between the two is that the strong safety, while mostly lined up in the box in both, is often matched up with a tight end in Cover-3 press, whereas he would be playing the run and/or on a blitz call in Cover-1 press.

Cover three men. It looks to be more similar to Cover-1 pre-snap than to its press variation(s). Once the ball is snapped, Cover-3 man returns to its base concept of zone coverage from the outside corners, until threatened deep, in which case it becomes man-to-man.

Cover-3 buzz is basically Cover-3 disguised as Cover-2 pre-snap. What appears to be two deep safeties rapidly becomes the free safety playing the deep third and the strong safety walking down into the box to remove the intermediate.

The most well-known Cover-3 implementation, and certainly the most complimentary to Gus Bradley, has been the famed Cover-3 bail, a variation popularized by Bradley with Seattle in the early 2010s. This version is similar to Cover-3 press in that the corners are creeping down to the line of scrimmage in the expectation that they will press, only to “bail” back at the snap and play out their intermediate-deep third as if they were in Cover-3 base from the start.

The NFL’s Implementation

Gus Bradley led the league in Cover-3 rate (55.5%), with Panthers DC Ejiro Evero (55.1%) not far behind.

NFL scoring averages have dropped for the first time since 2017. From 2018 to 2021, NFL teams averaged 2.38 touchdowns per game, a figure that had never dropped below 2.60. In 2022, that 2.60 mark fell for the first time during its streak, to 2.43, before slipping below its 2017 production. Cover-3’s popularity increased dramatically over the course of two years.

Since taking over as defensive coordinator for the Colts, Gus Bradley has only upped his use of Cover-3. Bradley had the NFL’s highest Cover-3 rate (43%) during his four years as Chargers’ defensive coordinator. Bradley has raised his usage rate in Indianapolis by more than 10% over the last two seasons.

However, leading the league in any category is not always a positive thing. Fans criticize Bradley’s approach because it is characterized by long, unsustainable drives when disruption (sacks, tackles for loss, etc.) is scarce. However, his Colts’ defenses have been as far from great as they have been from disastrous. They’ve been really good for the most part, demonstrating real growth after some time adjusting to Bradley’s scheme when Matt Eberflus left for Chicago.

Gus Bradley is in real time joining the rest of the NFL in its newfound love of Cover-3, but it won’t be long before the next best system is deployed. Bradley is ready to have his finest defense ever in Indianapolis after keeping his whole unit from last season and adding a potential veteran to the defensive backfield.