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What I mean by that is I think it's a bad idea to play 8 in the box like I'm sure a lot of teams do to stop Tomlinson. I would play a standard 3-4 with two normally spaced Safeties. Why ? It's not the 12-15 yard runs that'll kill us, it's the 62 yard TDs. Play our standard 3-4, contain him as we can, and allow the DBs to do their job of stopping the 15 yard run from becoming a 62 yard run. By doing this not only do we hopefully contain (not stop) Tomlinson, we don't run the risk of a deep ball against an undermanned secondary.
As weird as it sounds, the way I would try to stop Tomlinson also plays to have a full complement of DBs. I think teams have a double edged sword against them if they bring a Safety up to stop the run by enhancing the chance of both a long run and long pass by removing a normally placed Safety.
As weird as it sounds, the way I would try to stop Tomlinson also plays to have a full complement of DBs. I think teams have a double edged sword against them if they bring a Safety up to stop the run by enhancing the chance of both a long run and long pass by removing a normally placed Safety.