Question that I don't know. How often is individual technique based on the defensive play call vs. player discretion? For instance, if we are calling standard man under, I am going to assume that we want the DB to play trail technique, but if there is motion or a stacked WR, someone will need to play off.
It's not exactly drawn into the play step by step, but often times you'll have coaches telling you what you should be doing.
Rob Ryan gave his guys a lot more free reign than most, but even then, the defense they'd run limited the CBs to a few 'right' choices.
So you mentioned man under. If there is man under cover 2, you have a few more liberties in this coverage with what you can do, but if you play over, you'll probably get questioned/corrected on the sideline by your DB coach especially when you could've made a play on the ball.
So to sum up. You you have liberites... you can be judicious, but the situation (defensive playcall, offensive alignment and playcall, who you're playing against and what your coach is going to say when you trot over to the sideline, etc..) pretty much dictates what you're going to do anyway.
It varies from scheme to scheme, coach to coach, and at what level you're playing (I'd imagine the NFL is far more judicious than junior college which is as high as I got).
