Wiktionary
n. (context American football Canadian football English) Collective term for the defensive players who are in position farthest from the ball at the start of a play and whose principal responsibility is to defend against forward passes. Includes cornerbacks and safety in both codes, and defensive halfbacks in the Canadian game.
Wikipedia
In American football and Canadian football, defensive backs (DBs) are the players on the defensive team who take positions somewhat back from the line of scrimmage; they are distinguished from the defensive line players and linebackers, who take positions directly behind or close to the line of scrimmage. The defensive backs, in turn, generally are classified into several different specialized positions:
-
Safety:
- Free Safety – most often the deepest safety
- Strong Safety – the bigger more physical safety, much like a small, quicker linebacker
- Defensive halfback (Canadian football only)
-
Cornerback – which include:
- nickel back – the fifth defensive back in some sets, such as the Nickel formation
- dime back – the sixth defensive back in some sets, such as the Dime formation
- The seventh defensive back, in the exceedingly rare 'quarter' set
- known as a dollar back or a quarter back (not to be confused with the offensive player who throws the ball)
The group of defensive backs is known collectively as the secondary. They most often defend the wide receiver corps; however, at times they may also line up against a tight end or a split out running back.
Usage examples of "defensive back".
Fife was a defensive back who had been disabled all year, a ruptured spleen.
I nodded -- but I didn't really understand what he meant until an hour or so later, when Coach Madden signaled the end of that day's practice and Davis suddenly rushed onto the field and grabbed the quarterback, Ken Stabler, along with a receiver and a defensive back I didn't recognize, and made them run the same pass pattern -- a quick shot from about 15 yards out with the receiver getting the ball precisely at the corner of the goal line and the out-of-bounds line-- at least twelve consecutive times until they had it down exactly the way he wanted it.
The video eye of Number Four showed Albie the glint of distant floodlights on the rounded pyramidal shape of Number Six, as Six came closing on the intruder like a defensive back ready for a hard tackle.
Helps to have a defensive back tall enough to get to the ball before the receiver.
Not a wizened techno-nerd, Noonan had played defensive back at Stanford before joining the FBI, and took weapons training with the team just to fit in.
He had tried out as a free-agent defensive back with the Browns, Bengals, Redskins, and Lions and finally put in his application at the Detroit Police Academy.
The Baba kept running backwards like a football defensive back, still firing the Uzi.
Provost was listed as a first baseman on the baseball team, a member of the relay team in swimming, and as the starting defensive back on the football team.