Cal's pass rush has been a major
problem for three of the last four years, and is one of the
most-discussed topics among the fan base. It would technically be
possible to break down our pass rush and to talk about all of the
things that we could be doing
instead of what we actually do, but trying to predict the
hypothetical results of such changes would be too speculative and
abstract for my tastes. Instead, I'm going to defer to the
actual DC's in the conference by writing a series of posts breaking
down some of the best pass rushes in the PAC-12. As of right now,
I'm planning a series of individual posts on Colorado, Utah, and
Washington. In 2016, those teams were the three best in terms of
sacks per game against PAC-12 competition. Depending on how things
go with these posts, there's a second tier of ASU, Stanford, and UCLA
that could be worth going into.
Before we get into the pass rush posts
themselves, however, I'm going to say a few things about the basics
of pass protection; the pass rush makes less sense if you don't know
what it's designed to defeat, so this post will serve as a quick
introduction and as a resource for my later posts on various rush
schemes.
