Adjusting to life without the wedge

**singersp** · 05-31-2009, 07:22 AM

[size=13pt]Adjusting to life without the wedge[/size]

May 30th, 2009 â€“ 7:06 PM

by Judd Zulgad
startribune.com

Every special teams coach in the NFL was impacted in March when the league outlawed the presence of a wedge of more than two players on kickoff returns. The wedge was the blocking triangle of mammoth men that a returner followed up the field.....

**PurpleTide** · 05-31-2009, 08:09 AM

Didn't we lose Chad when he ran into the wedge against Oakland in the pre-season his rookie year? I don't know how this will effect the return game, probably be less big runbacks. For us, that's a good thing.

Maybe we can get that average starting field position for the opponent down where it belongs. < 25 yardline.

**gamecocksbaseball31** · 06-01-2009, 12:09 AM

What does this do for our kick coverage?
Does this help it?
Does this hinder it?

or does it matter?
:P

**singersp** · 06-01-2009, 05:18 AM

"gamecocksbaseball31" wrote:

What does this do for our kick coverage?
Does this help it?
Does this hinder it?

or does it matter?

:P

It may help it.

It may be just my observation, but it seems when a returner follows the wedge, he hesitates & waits for it to get set up, then follows it, not always turning into good returns. The speedier ones that run outside of the wedge & stretch it to the sidelines, seem to be the ones that get the most out of their returns.

**Marrdro** · 06-01-2009, 07:43 AM

I wonder how our new ST's Coach/Cord will deal with this.

a.
On one hand it will help our coverage teams as they can stay in thier lanes instead of worrying about the wedge.

b.
On the other hand, I don't know enough about the new guy to know if he (and his two new croonies) can come up with a scheme to bust our returners.

My guess, we will see a whole lot of penalties on this as they experiment with what they can get away with this year.

**V4L** · 06-02-2009, 04:02 PM

I don't like this idea.. I always loved watching the "wedge busters" like Chris Walsh

I liked having the wedge

**DiehardVikesFan** · 06-02-2009, 04:17 PM

This can only help us.
Our special teams sucked last year.

**V4L** · 06-02-2009, 04:18 PM

Heath will help us

**Mr Anderson** · 06-02-2009, 04:58 PM

"singersp" wrote:

"gamecocksbaseball31" wrote:

What does this do for our kick coverage?
Does this help it?
Does this hinder it?

or does it matter?

:P

It may help it.

It may be just my observation, but it seems when a returner follows the wedge, he hesitates & waits for it to get set up, then follows it, not always turning into good returns. The speedier ones that run outside of the wedge & stretch it to the sidelines, seem to be the ones that get the most out of their returns.

I think it might take a little time, but we may see more long returns. At the start of the season the numbers may drop. The wedge set up a ton of long TDs, if you made it through the wedge and the first line of defense on the coverage, generally there was only one or two men to beat, one of which was a kicker. Now it's gonna be different.

With no wedge, there is less obvious responsibility for the kick coverage.

With the talent among the return men in the NFL you better believe ST coaches are gonna write up new misdirection and complicated return schemes. Which is going to lead to more and more confusion among coverage, making it harder to stay disciplined and stick to your lane.