Football is a sport where old habits die hard, and where old ideas tend to stick around - either through inertia, intellectual laziness, or both - a lot longer than they should. The best in the business are generally those ahead of the curve, rather than those running old trends into the ground.
“The problem is never how to get new, innovative thoughts into your mind, but how to get the old ones out.” - Dee Hock
Part of the NFL’s current conventional wisdom is that the pass rush is the most important element of the defensive side of the game.