I'm not a fan of zone defenses either however, if you have the right athletes it is very effective. The zone defense forces the QB and his outlets (WR's, TE's and RB's) to actually read the D and pick an opening. When one of the two (QB or his outlet) are off the results are normally good for the D. An example of that is the zone Dallas played in our last Super Bowl win against the Steelers that allowed Larry Brown to be MVP. O'Donnell and his WR's were seeing different openings in the zone.
I think we have the right athletes to run a very effective zone but I believe we ask our defenders to think too much. Once that occurs players begin to not just do their jobs and handle their assignments/areas within the zone but, they also try to compensate for others and attempt to do other players jobs as well. This opens the defense up to too many gains.
All in all the zone is necessary in order to force offenses to work harder but it can lead to players being passive within it. An aggressive zone defense like the Steelers and Parcells Giants used to run is very effective.
The bottom line is our defenders need to play with more aggression or need to have that "dog" in them no matter what scheme we play and we will be effective. Just my two pennies.
