As John Reed points out , the phrase “Eagle” is abused, inconsistent, and overused. And even though Earle Neale’s “Eagle” defense is celebrated, it’s hard to know exactly what it is. Jene Bramel’s excellent series on pro defenses shows something akin to a 5-2-4 Oklahoma (father of the modern 34), but the diagram of Neale’s Eagle defense in Ryan and Walker’s 46 book (page 10) looks something more like this:
This latter diagram is more believable, since people do claim that dropping the nose guard in Earle’s defense led to a kind of 4-3 (Or in Steve Belichick’s notation of the time, a 45 – back in the 1950s, corners would be sometimes be counted as linebacker depth players).
The three players in the middle – the diamond – are a 0 technique nose tackle, and two 3 technique tackles. The 3 technique tackles can also be called eagles – terminology used in odd front 4-3s and also certain derivatives of the 46. These sons of the 46 are often called double eagle defenses because of the 46 “diamond“, which they inherit from Buddy Ryan’s defense.
The most important of these defenses is called the Desert Swarm defense, made famous by Dick Tomey during his period as Arizona’s head coach. This defense lives on in college through the work of Rich Ellerson, currently the head coach at Army, who was a defensive staffer during Tomey’s run at Arizona. Though a number of sources call this defense a 4-3, it’s more an 8 in the box defense of the Ryan family, with the strong safety playing more of a linebacker technique, and the alignment to me looking quite a bit like a 5-3. To note, in the Desert Swarm, one of the 3 techniques (usually the weak side tackle) is a flexed tackle. Ironically, in the photo below, the flex tackle is on the strong side of the formation.
Literature on this defense is a little hard to come by. Some links that you might find useful are given below.
- Excellent summary PDF on the Arizona Desert Swarm defense
- 5A Texas football on Arizona’s Desert Swarm
- Coach Huey on the Desert Swarm
- Coach Huey on the double eagle. Nice ASCII diagrams.
- SI on the Colorado State-Arizona game (quotes from Ted Bruschi).
- RC Online on Army and its Desert Swarm implementation.
- John Reed’s Football Dictionary. Funny and pointed.
To summarize: a double eagle defense is one with a nose guard and 2 3 technique tackles. A double eagle flex has one flexed tackle. A double eagle double flex has two flexed tackles. Earle Neale’s Eagle appears to be a double eagle, though no one is 100% certain. These defenses should not be confused with the 34 Eagle of Fritz Schurmer, which is an eagle of an entirely different color.
Update: a more nuanced look at Fritz Schurmer’s Eagle can be found here.
July 20, 2011 at 11:58 pm
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July 28, 2011 at 9:22 am
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August 4, 2011 at 3:31 pm
[…] Sons of the 46: Double Eagle Defenses, then and now. […]
August 13, 2011 at 8:05 am
[…] like the Tom Landry defense, but does resemble, somewhat, the double eagle flex defenses that were popularized by Dick Tomey and Rich Ellerson. A screen shot and a diagram of Rob’s defense follows. […]
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[…] Rex and Rob Ryan are known to use the Bear front, otherwise known as the double eagle, and in its 1985 incarnation, the 46, and in preseason week 1 year 2011, both brothers flashed […]
May 25, 2012 at 10:46 am
[…] the pros, the first move was to Clark Shaughnessy’s 5-3 or perhaps to Earle Neale’s 5-2-4 double eagle. Steve Owen then started experimenting with the 6-1 “Umbrella”, because his team […]
August 3, 2013 at 11:27 am
[…] monster or rover back, and is commonly seen in eight in the box defenses to this day, including the Desert Swarm defenses of current Army coach Rich […]
September 6, 2018 at 2:48 pm
[…] what this 46 defense attempts to achieve, stemming from the 1940s and Alfred Earle “Greasy” Neale’s Double Eagle front in Philadelphia. Carroll’s tweak appears to be letting his EDGEs pick the width they line up at, which sometimes […]