Coach ,

You may not have to worry about what other levels of the game do, like transfer portal and name image and likeness, but as Virginia Tech defensive coordinator Justin Hamilton brings up in his clinic talk, the days of "wait your turn" are pretty much over.  

Players, at ever level, want to be involved now, or at least earlier, and if they aren’t they may not transfer out of your program, but they might just find something else to do with their time.  

Coach Hamilton knows that if he does not find a way to get the players they worked hard on recruiting involved, someone else will. He calls the approach they use, an “adapt or die” mentality, and it is useful at all levels of the game if you want to retain and develop your players to the fullest.

You can take the approach of “I don’t want that kind of guy anyway,” but Hamilton sees a different way. At VaTech, they look at ways in which they can cross train their players as well as create multiple teaching roles for their coaches in a way that they can create more roles for players and get the buy-in that they want.  It strengthens player morale, and ultimately their team culture.

Hamilton explains the landscape and their adapt or die approach in this video (click image).

Hamilton’s creativity in how this is done is through a different approach in how they train their players. He wants to increase the overall football IQ of his defense. One way to do this is to expand the teaching role of each position coach. For example, his defensive line coach might spend 20 minutes teaching the safeties about the responsibilities of the 3 technique tackle. 

Why? Well at some point, they might ask a third level player to fit the B-Gap, and by teaching what the guy who plays that gap does on just about every snap, they may have a better understanding of how that works.

They also cross evaluate through the use of skills circuits. The circuits done each week allow the coaches to spot player skill sets that may work well in certain situations. In the clinic coach points out on film how they utilize a defensive tackle who was a running back in high school in their TEX games as a defensive linemen, and lter shows how they use his athleticism to drop him into the hook curl from the tackle position. 

Seeing how that dynamic player can use his skills in certain situations creates more roles. So while he may be third or fourth on the depth chart on normal down, on third and medium or long, he may become the first teamer.  

Coach explains how they create multiple teaching and cross training in this video:

You can fight it, or embrace the changes and adapt to make those challenges the strengths of your team. Hamilton and his defensive staff and players are doing it at Virginia Tech. He details his whole approach and gives specific examples on film in his entire clinic talk “Creating Roles for More Players.”

This is an approach worth learning more about and discussing with your staff. You may just find guys who can help you in ways you have not thought of or realized.

Always be growing,

Coach Grabowski