Vic Fangio weighs in on the cyclical nature of NFL defenses

Barring a stop at Stanford in 2010, Vic Fangio has been in the NFL for nearly 20 straight years as a coordinator and position coach. That much time in a league that has evolved so much means he has gained an interesting perspective on the evolution, and cyclical nature of the game at its highest level.

One New Orleans reporter asked him his opinion on the 3-4 defense yesterday, being that Sean Payton is looking to hire a 3-4 guy to be his defensive coordinator next season.

Fangio's response was interesting, and noted how defenses have evolved since he entered the league in 1986.

"I can remember when I first came in the NFL here with the Saints, there were only three or four teams running the 4-3, everyone else ran the 3-4. Then there came a run in the mid to late 90's where it kind of flipped. Now in the 2000's it's slowly become to where it's pretty balanced." he said.

Fangio went on to explain that he prefers the versatility of the 3-4 because you get an extra guy on the field that has "pass responsibilities in his job description", and the angles make things a little more difficult for an offense to block.

Plenty more quality input from Fangio below, including why personnel people aren't crazy about the 3-4 scheme, and why it's so difficult to projecting college players who played defensive end as stand up defensive outside linebackers in the 3-4 at the next level, 

Fascinating stuff.