Protections are EVERYTHING! – Kurt Warner Game Tape Breakdown of Justin Fields Hit

In today’s StudyBall we're going to be talking about empty protections. I had a conversation on Twitter about an empty situation that Justin Fields found himself in this past weekend. He took a big hit and a lot of debate on: “Was it the O-line’s fault? Was it Justin Fields’ fault? Was the protection wrong?” All of those different things. So there are a lot of nuances that come into protection that I know sometimes isn’t that sexy unless you’re a big guy. But me as a quarterback, I think protections are everything. Knowing where you are going to go with the football and what you are supposed to do on every play from a passing standpoint, to me is the second most important thing for a quarterback is to understand protection. Understand who the line is blocking, understanding who you are responsible for whether you got every blitz picked up. Whether you got a change of protection, whether you have to throw hot. All of those things are extremely important. Whether you are a football fan or a coach, or a quarterback, protections are VITAL. Today we’re going to talk a little bit about the scenario that happened this past weekend and how I saw that play play out. The difference between a five-down and a re-mike. Those are our key distinctions in knowing how it should be picked up, who makes those calls. You saw the center when they walk that guy down. He called the five-down because it was easy for him to see what was in front of him. On the one with Justin Fields, would probably fall to the quarterback to have to re-mike it because the center is probably not going to see that one all the way to the front side, he will probably go to the inside mike and then we have to deal with it from there. So, to me, it is extremely important. So many different looks depending on whether the guy is backed up or he isn’t. Is the mike weak side or strongside? Can we dual from one to two? Do we go inside out? All of those things and for me, when it comes to empty, take care of one side for me. Like that first. Okay if we get an advance beyond that, we can say: “we can push it to the next guy, but I am always going to say protect inside out.” Protect those guys in the box because I can deal off with the guys that are coming off the edge. Little bit of miscommunication there on what they were doing. Because you saw Chicago do a lot of different things in that game. One time sliding weak, one time sliding strong, away from the mike backers to an uncovered slot, and one time passing it off to the other side. So, really have to be on the same page with those things with your offensive lineman and your quarterback really having a great understanding when you go empty. Because as you saw with Justin Fields, everything happens really really fast when you have five-out and guys are coming from the edge. #NFL #JustinFields #QBConfidential