LB's Shedding Blocks

coach, best of luck......

I've found (what I teach) that the 'flipper' tech works well and instills a 'mentality' conducive to engaging all blockers and keeping shoulders square to LOS.

A real good resource for the details can be found in Lou Tepper's "Complete Linebacking"....but basically you can boil it down to
1.)pad level (low man wins....that cliche never gets old, does it?)
2.)foot placement / plant ~ without THIS your guys will get planted.
3.)coil (really not worth mentioning, but it just gives a mental image that they are preparing to 'crash')
4.)hip roll (extension)....they are not bench pressing anyone, their hip explosion (hang clean) is going to go up and through the blocker.

This teaches our LB's (a little crazy to begin with) NOT to avoid contact (teaches them to run around the block ~ usually, downfield) but meet the blocker (especially FB) at the LOS and spill the play outside. We teach our inside guys to attack to their playside gap responsibility and give them the inside shoulder / flipper while keeping a clean outside shoulder. This squeezes the gap and puts them in good position to still make the gap play.