In judging defensive ends, burst means more than bulk

Sporting News, The, April 2, 2001 by Dan Pompei

Because California defensive end Andre Carter is thin enough to hide behind a light pole, some people wonder if he's big enough to be an every-down defensive end in the NFL. But playing defensive end is not about rattling the earth. It's about rattling the quarterback. And Carter can do that.

None of the defensive ends who is expected to be first-round picks this year--Carter, Justin Smith of Missouri and Jamal Reynolds of Florida State--is a guy who wears out a mattress. At the combine, the three weighed in at 249, 267 and 267, respectively.

This is not alarming or even unusual, however. In the last five years, only four of the 17 defensive ends drafted in the first round weighed 280 or more at their respective combines. You settle for light pass rushers like you settle for light been Recent first-round picks include Jevon Kearse (262 at the combine), Duane Clemons (261), Regan Upshaw (249) and Simeon Rice (259).

Every team would like to have a 290-pound end who can pass rush. It looked like St. Louis' Kevin Carter was going to be that prototype end up until last year, but there really aren't any others in the NFL who have that combination of size, speed and pass-rush ability. The median weight of starting defensive ends in the league last year, according to their listed weight (which tends to be high) was 276 pounds.

Bucs defensive line coach Rod Marinelli, who will be coaching the undersized Rice this year, says he doesn't pay much attention to an end's weight, or even his bench press. "The keys are conversion of power and balance," Marinelli says. "In our system we'd take a guy who is 270 with quickness and explosion over a guy who was 310 without it."

This isn't like a pumpkin contest where they give out ribbons for the heaviest.

"(Andre) Carter can uncoil at the hips and explode," Bucs director of college scouting Tim Ruskell says. "That's better than bulk or weight-room strength. Sudden movement gives a player an element of surprise, whereas you can see brute strength coming and react with quickness to make a guy miss."

Most of the successful smaller ends have that quick-strike ability. If they don't have special traits to offset their lack of size, they'll get engulfed by bigger blockers. The best indicator of explosiveness is vertical jump, and Carter had an extraordinary vertical jump of 40 inches at his recent personal workout. Smith hit 35 inches; Reynolds jumped 34. So the lightest of the three may, in fact, play the biggest.

The primary concern with undersized ends is how they'll defend the run. But the truth is nobody drafts a defensive end in the first round to play the run anyway. A team. drafts a defensive end to make a difference on passing downs, to give the quarterback a view of the sky.

"We don't worry about if an end holds up against the run because you can always put more bodies in the box to cover up for a smaller guy," says Bills coach Gregg Williams, who had great success with Kearse when he was the Titans' defensive coordinator. "But if he has true defensive end speed, that's something you can't coach."

That said, nobody wants a defensive end who gets killed on the run. Bears coach Dick Jauron says none of the top three ends in the draft was "a detriment" against the run in college. None of them was a great run defender, either, but each was good enough.

Study Carter and you can see him repeatedly holding the point and getting off blocks to make tackles. Against UCLA, he drove 306-pound guard Oscar Cabrera 4 yards backward into the running back. Smith is more reliant on his speed than Carter, but he acquitted himself well against Texas mauler Leonard Davis, coming off the 370-pound tackle's blocks to make two tackles. Reynolds might be more inconsistent against the run, but you can see the potential there, as he held his ground even on a guard/tight end double-team against Maryland, allowing safety Chris Hope to tackle LaMont Jordan after a 1-yard gain.

The other concern with small defensive ends is they can wear down as the season goes on. Ravens end Michael McCrary is listed at 260 pounds, but by the time he played in the Super Bowl last January, he weighed 239. The year before, Kearse played in the Super Bowl at 240, down 22 pounds from his combine weight.

There are ways to minimize the weight loss, like lightening up in practice when players start to hit the wall, or altering the defensive scheme. As a rule, undersized ends need to be played on the edge, away from the tackles.

"A smaller man will get worn out if you play him in five technique (on the outside shoulder of the tackle), especially on the left side of the defense," said Jauron, who deploys a lot of five technique with one of the biggest sets of ends in the league in 290-pound Phillip Daniels and 300-pound Bryan Robinson. "Or if you use a three technique inside (on the outside shoulder of the guard), he can get worn out because he's not as big as the people he's going against. So with these so-called undersized ends you have to be careful about how much you play them and where you play them."