ESPN's Mel Kiper had quite the humdinger of a take the other day regarding an aspect of the NFL that's as innate to the game of football as just about anything: two-deep safety defensive strategy.
Kiper drew laughs and disbelief - from fans to players - after he took to ESPN's Get Up and complained about how the league should be banning defenses from two-deep safety looks.
"Well, I grew up with the best of the National Football League, 60's, 70's, into the 80's," Kiper argued. "You're talking about deep shots, right? The go route, the nine route, the post. You're talking about Terry Bradshaw in the Super Bowl hitting John Stallworth. You see Leeroy Irving diving, right? Just off his fingers. There's the receiver. They laid it out there, right? Hit the receiver in stride. 65-yard touchdown. It's a beautiful thing to watch. That's what I want to see brought back to the National Football League. Okay? Checkdown kings. Bubble screen sensations. Boring football. Uh-uh. Game manager, I get it. I want to see those deep shots. That's what the NFL was built on. I grew up with John Unitas, Fran Tarkenton, Ken Stabler, Daryle Lamonica. You talk about quarterbacks, Joe Namath, Brett Favre when he was doing what he did. Bert Jones with the Baltimore Colts. You think about those quarterbacks who would throw the ball down the field. I said what Bradshaw did with Stallworth and Swan. Roger Staubach. That's what I want to see brought back.
"I'm telling you, we've got to change this thing," Kiper added. "You can warn them. The referee, they come up [and say] 'hey, guys, you've got to get up a little bit, right? You're too far back.' Warn those safeties, but you've got to figure out - competition committee, somebody, somebody has got to figure out what that depth is, but it's too far back right now. The NFL is being ruined by these two-high safeties."
Dan Orlovsky's laughter on camera pretty much tells the story about what he - and many others - think of Kiper's suggestion: not much. However, it was still brought up to Miami Dolphins WR Tyreek Hill this week, and the Dolphins' superstar wasn't on board with the change, focusing instead on the job he and the offense has to do.
"(laughter) I will say this; it does take the fun out of the game, but at the same time people are trying to win games," Hill said. "It’s up to us to try to figure it out. That’s why people love football because of how it’s played and all kind of things can be stopped and stuff like this, that’s the beauty in it. It’s our job to come inside this building and figure out how do we get this not ran against us. Our coaches have been doing a great job all week, putting the ball in Skylar’s hands and trusting him this whole week. I’m really interested to see how this game plays out.”
It's already become hard enough for NFL defenders to do their jobs. Roughing the quarterback has never been easier to flag. Players cannot hip drop tackle anymore. Can't hit high. Sometimes can't hit low. It's truly difficult. Telling them where they can or can't line up is a new level of absurdity on that spectrum.
Fortunately for teams facing the Dolphins, where the two-high safety look has been somewhat effective at limiting Miami's deep passing game, the chances of such a change happening are somewhere between slim and none.
As such, indeed Miami will have to figure out how to counteract those changes, just as Hill indicated.
