Among offensive line coaches, you have a number of different approaches and blocking schemes, but much of it can be boiled down to two major camps: Are you a zone guy or a gap / power / pull scheme guy?
Each side has its staunch supporters that will argue until they're blue in the face why their approach is better and more effective, but without data to support it, zone over gap scheme and vice versa is really just an opinion.
Well, Josh Hermsmeyer took a look at what approach in the NFL has been more effective over the past two seasons when adjusting for defenders in the box and then charted the data for a visual representation. Below is the graph blown up from his
Is ZBS more effective when we adjust for MIB than a Power/Pull scheme?
Not until 8 MIB. Then the "overwhelming force" at the POA might be worth a quarter of a yard. pic.twitter.com/KLt1NA43N5
— Josh Hermsmeyer (@friscojosh) June 6, 2018
" target="_blank" rel="noopener">original tweet. As the chart shows, zone blocking doesn't overatake the power / pull scheme in effectiveness until the box reaches 8 men. Even at that point, it's only good for about a quarter of a yard. Hermsmeyer also provided a graph on league rushing yards per carry by defenders in the box for all types of runs the past two seasons as well. The layout of the graph looks likely just as you'd expect.
Is ZBS more effective when we adjust for MIB than a Power/Pull scheme?
Not until 8 MIB. Then the "overwhelming force" at the POA might be worth a quarter of a yard. pic.twitter.com/KLt1NA43N5
— Josh Hermsmeyer (@friscojosh) June 6, 2018
" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Head over to Hermsmeyer's timeline for more.