A History of Zone Blocking (Great read)

For those interested in the ins and outs of the kind of blocking the Colts do, check this out.

In two recent books about schematic development in the NFL, the origins of zone blocking in the NFL seem to have come from two different places. Blood, Sweat and Chalk, written by Sports Illustrated’s Tim Layden, makes Howard Mudd the personification and central figure of a scheme that seems to have no true origin in the professional game. Layden puts some nebulous stuff together about how the single-wing was based on double-teams and trap blocking. Therefore, everything old is new again, and there are no real blocking innovations in the NFL, etc. And on and on. Layden also writes that “through the 70s and 80s … as defenses became so much more sophisticated – linemen slanting and stunting in ever more unpredictable ways – it became nearly impossible for an offensive lineman to simply block the man across the line because that man wasn’t rushing directly at him.”