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Nickel 3-3-5

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Cover 3 Cloud

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Pinch the Dline
  4. Slant Outside
  5. Shift linebackers right
  6. Blitz the right side of screen linebacker and the middle linebacker

Overview: This play brings immediate pressure from the right B-gap only blitzing 5 people. User the linebacker in the yellow zone and takeaway your opponent’s first read and by that time the pressure will be on the QB.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Loop Crash 2

Setup:

  1. Base align
  2. Press coverage
  3. Pinch the defensive line and crash them inside
  4. Shift the linebackers to the right
  5. Bluff blitz the right of screen defensive end

Overview: On this play, we are only blitzing 4 people getting nice pressure from the linebacker looping in. Mixing this play in with the rest of the plays from this formation will give your opponent a headache and he will not know what to expect.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Cover 1 Contain Spy

Setup:

  1. Base align
  2. Press coverage
  3. Pinch the defensive line and crash them inside
  4. Shift the linebackers to the right
  5. Blitz the right of the screen linebacker

Overview: This is a 5-man blitz that will come off of the right edge. This play is good to mix in because it is a man defense so it can catch your opponent off guard, and still brings good pressure on the QB.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Nickel LB Blitz

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Pinch and crash your defensive line down
  4. Shift your LBs to the right
  5. Put the blitzing linebacker on the right side of the screen into a zone and user him.

Overview: This is an identical play to the pressure we provided from 3 Overload Fire Press, however this is a man version. The man coverage provides a great mixup because your opponent will be very used to seeing zone coverage from this formation.

With the fast pressure from either the left A or B gap, we will force the opponent to make a bad throw right into the man coverage.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: 3 Overload Fire Press

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Pinch and crash your defensive line down
  4. Shift your linebackers to the right
  5. QB Contain
  6. Put your blitzing MLB in a zone and user control him

Overview: This is one of my favorite blitzes this year because it allows us to potentially get two rushers free while only rushing 5 defenders. Why this works is the left side DE draws the attention of multiple linemen, which leaves the edge rusher and/or the looping linebacker free.

You can also adjust the coverage in behind it to fit your situation, such as playing underneath or overtop coverage.

 

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Cover 4

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Pinch your defensive line
  4. Crash your defensive line up
  5. Shift your line backers to the right

Overview: With every great defensive scheme that brings pressure from all sides such as this one from the Nickel 3-3-5, it is extremely important to have a play that you can play great coverage from as well. For me, I love the cover 4. With us heating our opponent up all game long, we can mix in a coverage play and catch them blocking extra players to stop the heat.

This will have them sending less routes out and will give us even more players in coverage, which is exactly what we want. 8 defenders on 3-4 routes is a great advantage for the defense. This is also my favorite run defense out of the formation because it allows us to blow up the run without committing a lot of defenders and leaving holes elsewhere if they pass.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Tampa 2

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Put your OLB on the left into a QB Spy
  4. (Optional) Put your DE on the right into a zone or man coverage
  5. Right when the ball is snapped, click down on the right stick (R3)

Overview: This technique can take a bit of timing but when you do it right, you can get extremely quick pressure.  This play can be flipped to the other side with all of the directions reversed.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: Nickel LB Blitz (Version 2)

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Put your OLB on the left into a QB Spy
  4. Put your MLB into a zone
  5. (Optional) Put your DE on the right into a zone
  6. Right when the ball is snapped, click down on the right stick (R3)

Overview: This is the man to man version of the Tampa 2 play.  It can be flipped to bring right side pressure as well.

Playbook: Kansas City Chiefs

Formation: Nickel 3-3-5

Play: 3 Double Buzz

Setup:

  1. Base Align
  2. Press Coverage
  3. Put your OLB on the left into a QB Spy
  4. Blitz your slot cornerback
  5. (Optional) Put your DE on the right into a zone
  6. (Optional) Adjust the zones behind it
  7. Right when the ball is snapped, click down on the right stick (R3)

Overview: This is a really difficult defensive look for most users because it is a well disguised cover 3 defense.

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bradsooner
bradsooner
6 years ago

Having a little trouble knowing when the right time to bring a blitz is

sisi680
sisi680
6 years ago

How crash your defensive line down please

oscarparra08
oscarparra08
6 years ago

Which Defensive playbook should I go with? The Seahawks or the KC one?

Lawry_1
Lawry_1
6 years ago

Every play I run I just get burnt with a streak? The base align press just gets killed! Do I just not press ?

Lawry_1
Lawry_1
6 years ago

So really this scheme is no good cause every play it says to press? I guess just base align do the set up and manually drop the corners back

kgranger10
kgranger10
6 years ago

Ive had issues with getting beaten badly on streak routes when base align-> Pressing…. Is there a reason that this is happening? Most specifically I have noticed with my MUT Hero 95 PRS Talib which makes even less sense. Am I missing something? The beats have been just straight outside releases

bvandizzle
bvandizzle
6 years ago
Reply to  Madden School

all of these base + press blitzes might get beat on any play if they line incorrectly. How do you counter that? Do you set up everything and then manually check on cb and move him if necessary?

Repoboy25
Repoboy25
6 years ago

Do we need to have auto flip on or off for these defenses to work?

bvandizzle
bvandizzle
6 years ago

how do you press and base align and not get beat over the top. I am playing guys who simply max protect and fade fast outside wr and beat me deep against either a deep blue or man pressed with base align. Please advise.