I didn’t get to watch the Miami-Virginia Tech game until after I already knew the outcome — I had been at another game at the same time, and was as surprised as anyone that Virginia Tech could score thirty-one, and even more than Miami managed a meager seven. But I can honestly say that I had more fun watching this game on replay, already knowing the outcome, than anything I’ve watched this year.

That might come as a surprise considering I just did an extensive breakdown of Miami’s (previously) vaunted pass offense, have family members who are diehard Canes fans, and still think Jacory Harris is one of the most entertaining players in the country. But you have to love what Bud Foster and Frank Beamer were able to do with Virginia Tech. The hype was all focused on Miami; the defense had looked atrocious such that Foster was putting news clippings and reprimands on players’ lockers; and Virginia Tech’s speed was basically exposed against Alabama, where the Tide managed to both run through and by the Hokies.

So what did they do? Play soft coverage and hope Harris made some mistakes? Revamp the offense to catch Miami’s speedy defense off guard? No. Foster and Beamer basically said fuck it, we’re going after Miami. That early fumble by Jacory Harris that set up the Hokies’ first touchdown? Well they did what I said they wouldn’t be able to: Foster dialed up a hide-the-children, all-out, man-to-man blitz with no free safety with the cornerback, Dorian Porch, coming off the short side of the field. (Miami was in a three receiver set with a tight-end backside. Foster put two guys to this backside: one played the tight-end in man coverage and the other, Porch, just blitzed, and of course Harris never saw him.)

And the blitzkrieg was on. Virginia Tech ran the ball well enough to convert good field position into points (and managed to dig themselves out of some bad field position after a muffed punt). A big pass from Tyrod Taylor and a blocked punt and the Hokies suddenly had a 21-0 lead, one that proved insurmountable.

VT’s players raved about Bud Foster’s defensive plan. What was it? Early in the game, as I said, Foster brought serious heat. All-out man-blitz type heat. I didn’t think VT could play man on Miami’s speedy receivers, but they barely had to because the well-timed blitzes were in Harris’s face before he could throw it. But Foster didn’t just bring these all-out blitzes.

Indeed, later in the game the strategy was actually much the opposite, as he went to a heavy dose of cover two: funnel the outside receivers inside to the safeties and force Harris to fit a tight through between defenders. This was something Harris was never really able to do. Now, a big reason for that was when Tech only rushed four Jason Worilds simply lifted up the man blocking him and threw him to the side and sacked Harris, as he did on a key third down early in the game.

Foster’s other tactic was to use the zone blitz, specifically some fire zones with five rushers and six pass defenders. He tended to do this on third and long, which put pressure on Harris and forced him to make a short throw where the Hokie pass defenders were in position to make a tackle. Again, throughout the game Harris never seemed to be in rhythm. In the first few games Miami OC Mark Whipple had done a nice job providing him with lots of pass protection and letting him take his time finding a receiver on a deep crossing route, corner route, or dig. Foster’s defense — and Bob Stoops’s Oklahoma defense — forces you to throw it quickly, and on rhythm. One-two-three-throw. Harris doesn’t seem to quite have this timing down, which is probably a function of how young he really is and how he will have to get better at all his reads and learn to make them quicker, during his drop, rather than relying on sitting in a perfectly constructed pocket and just waiting for a guy to break open.

After Virginia Tech established its big lead, Foster generally went with more coverage versus blitzes, though he went back to the man-to-man blitzes late. On the interception at the beginning of the fourth quarter, he called Virginia Tech’s old school “cover two robber,” which is literally a cover two — there are two deep zone defenders — but instead of using the safeties the cornerbacks drop, while the free safety plays a “robber” position. On the play Whipple had called the same double-move play that had worked against FSU: the receiver sprints upfield, begins like an out, and then angles inside the cornerback to the post. It works great against true single-safety defenses like Cover three, because the corner will play with outside leverage. Yet this time the corner, Rashad Carmichael, had sunk inside to play the deep half and Jacory Harris basically threw it right to him. I can only guess that Jacory thought he’d be playing with outside leverage.

Yet to some extent this beside the point. The plan for VT was very good. But in watching this game you couldn’t help but get the impression that one team was excited to play on that sloppy field, in driving rain, in that muck. They were excited to fly around and smash somebody, slide around a bit, and get up and do it again. And the other team? Well, for much of the game they looked like they didn’t want to get dirty. And if you play that way, in that weather, against a Frank Beamer team, it’ll be a long day. And it was.

The detestable Mr. Leach will run the same play until you stop it, sir.

If actions speak louder than words, then the biggest proponent of Mike Leach’s Airraid offense might be the Bob Stoops coaching tree. While defensive coordinator at the University of Florida, Bob Stoops said there was only one school in the SEC that he truly felt he had a difficult time defending, in a way not at all commensurate with the relative talent between that school and his: The Hal Mumme led Kentucky Wildcats. When Oklahoma hired him to be its head coach, he hired Mumme’s offensive coordinator, some guy named Mike Leach.

Leach left after a season at Oklahoma to become the head coach at Texas Tech, and so, from 2000 on, Leach and Stoops have faced each other every year; OU’s defensive coaches have up-close and personal experience with Leach’s offense. So it was a compliment to Leach and his offense that former OU co-defensive coordinator and Bob’s brother, Mike Stoops, facing a possible firing after a few lacklaster seasons as head coach of Arizona, did what his brother had done before him and hired away the offensive coordinator of the Airraid system. That was Sonny Dykes, who had begun his coaching career at Kentucky under Mumme and Leach.

And history repeats. The University of Houston’s head coach, Kevin Sumlin, is another Stoops disciple. From 2003-2007 he served in a variety of capacities at OU, including tight-ends coach, wide receivers coach, and co-offensive coordinator with Kevin Wilson. But when Sumlin was hired to go coach the Cougars did he hire any of the coaches that had been with him at Oklahoma? Did he go out and get anyone else from the Big 12 or around the country? Nope, he went out and plucked another twig off of the evergreen Airraid coaching tree, Dana Holgorsen, who had been co-offensive coordinator with Dykes and who traced his Airraid pedigree back to his time playing wide receiver under Leach and Mumme at Iowa Wesleyan college in the early 1990s and coached under them at Valdosta State in the mid-1990s. The results — 5,000 yards passing for Case Keenum last season, a big upset win over Oklahoma State this year — have been as expected.

I know I talk about Leach a lot, but this is one of the reasons why. When the Stoops-clan, the folks who (a) have to prepare for you every year, and (b) have actually had pretty good success against you, continually hire away guys to emulate what you do, then that is the biggest compliment that can be paid. And make no mistake, Houston runs the Airraid offense. It is Dana Holgorsen’s show. When asked this week about the differences between what he does at Tech and what Holgorsen and Sumlin do at Houston, Leach could only say, “They’re into motion more than we are. They motion players around some.”

But there are differences between the two offenses. In the same Q&A, Leach added that adding that Holgorsen “was always kind of a sharp and insightful guy, good student of the game. Very good X and O coach,” and, like any good coach, he has put his own spin on the Mad Scientist’s concoction. And these differences are fun here because they can highlight how there can be different but equally viable approaches.

As Leach mentioned, the formations and motions are the most obvious difference. If the plays themselves are basically the same (and they are), how they get into them can be different. Leach famously uses really three main formations, with a few others sprinkled in for effect. A spread formation with two receivers to each side, another with three to one side and a single receiver to the other, and a two-back shotgun formation with three receivers. This does two things. One, all the players spend a maximum amount of time running the same route from the same spot. As the Airraid guys famously explained, their theory is that you cut a guy’s reps in practice in half if he has to practice a route from opposite sides of the field, and the quarterback has to learn to throw it to him on both sides. Instead, he can just master that curl route from the left side, every time. (The Indianapolis Colts have subscribed to this same theory with the uber-detailed Peyton Manning.)

The other thing the vanilla formations do is simplify things for the quarterback so he can check plays at the line. If you motion guys you might gain advantages, but you also muddy the reads for the quarterback. Leach’s preference is to have his players get to the line and let the quarterback find the right play.

Houston takes the opposite view, using a sort of Mike Martzian barrage of formations and motions yet running the same few concepts for his players. Adding to this is that Houston is far more up-tempo than Texas Tech’s methodical captain; Houston looks to get to the line quickly and cause confusion for the defense.

Schematically, there aren’t many differences, but there are some. Both teams use the major “Airraid” pass concepts like shallow cross, Y-stick, Y-cross, all-curl, and the like. But Leach’s offense is predicated on the horizontal passing game — not only those quick, short lateral throws, but his receivers frequently begin their routes not upfield, but laterally to the flat or across the formation. For example, Leach’s favorite play is probably “mesh.”

The “Mesh” concept; click to embiggen.

In this play, Leach gets a few things. He gets a zone-stretch on the frontside with the corner route, the crosser coming from the backside, and the runningback in the flat — a triangle read. The corner route can also flatten out if the cornerback plays soft coverage. And against man-to-man the crossers will rub (pick?) the defenders. Note too that these crossing receivers have a lot of freedom to settle against zone. (The coaching point is they watch the man covering the opposing crossing receiver: if a defender follows the other guy they know it is man to man, if the defender sinks back it is zone. Crafty.) It is a very good utility play, and Leach runs the hell out of it. Against Texas, Texas Tech scored one of their touchdowns by calling this same play every single play of the series. I’m dead serious.

But Holgorsen isn’t a huge fan of that play because of these “horizontal” routes. The reason is that they give away much of the game ot the defense right away; within a second of the ball being snapped, the defense knows who is going to the flat and who is running a shallow cross. Indeed, the very well coached teams can actually pattern read — not only do they know guys are running short, they know it is the “mesh” play. Now Leach can still cross them up by using “tags” or individual route adjustments on the play (like sending the guy on the corner route to the post and having the runningback run a “wheel” or flat-and-up to the sideline) or simply because the receivers have freedom, but Holgorsen prefers not to go there. Instead, though he uses the horizontal passes, the focus is on “vertical stems,” meaning plays where the receivers burst straight up the field to begin with. This has the advantage of destroying pattern reading: if receivers run up the field on every play, the defense doesn’t know if they are breaking in, our, or going deep — they all look the same.

The “flood” raineth down completions and yardage. Embiggen, clicking, do.

In this vein Houston probably runs the four-verticals concept more than anything else, and when they want a change-up they just tag an individual receiver. The downside of all these vertical stems is that Houston has to be a little more aware of possible blitzes because they have to adjust; in Leach’s scheme, there is usually a guy “built-in” to the route who should be open against the blitz.

But again, these are minor details. This should be a fun game for those who like offense, and for those who want to both see the Airraid offense in its purest form and how Leach’s disciples put their own spin on it. I think it’s definitely worth watching. Like Kevin Sumlin, I know a good thing when I see it.

Chris Brown writes Smart Football like a X’s and O’s guerilla. Read it. Submit your questions for him at twitter.com/edsbs.

Georgia Tech hopes to avoid the curse of being Factor’d for the second week in a row as the Factor Five favorite, since they actually won in this spot last week and thus broke the curse of being the favored team.

Enjoy.

Category one: Nebulous Statistical Comparisons of Dubious Validity. For Georgia Tech, that number will be 472, or the number of yards allowed in this matchup last year by the Miami defense to Tech’s offense. Miami’s defense spent most of last year lunging at bright lights, tackling giant invisible rabbits, and laying down on the turf weeping when faced with an option play, and by the fourth quarter had given up hope altogether by allowing Lucas Cox, Tech’s geology-back, to take a leisurely continental drift up the middle for a long touchdown. Miami must not allow anything close this yardage to stay in the game, or else the Angel of Death arrives for them in the fourth quarter running a 5.2 and sending the Tech bench into gusts of laughter at a white fullback outrunning Miami LBs into the endzone. A possession back running loose in a blowout will and should do that to an audience.

For Miami, that number is ROOM 222 BAILAMOS CHICAS!!!

Apologies. A dance break was clearly in order. Hotel, motel, Holiday Inn: Jacory Harris only got sacked twice against FSU, and then had his lodging of choice with ample-assed boricuas, aerobicized white girls from Coral Gables, well-waxed Cubanas, and Overtown sistas with his name tattooed in his mouth following his 386 yard, 2 TD performance against Florida State.

The gaudy yardage posted by the Afro Butterfly isn’t the key number, however. The number of concern should be 2, the interceptions Harris threw, of particular importance due to the necessity of staying ahead of possessions against Tech. Once they get the ball they can squat on it for days, so maintaining even opportunities for Miami to score against a potentially clock-grinding Tech offense is of paramount importance for the young Harris. Do that, and the hotels, motels, Holiday Inns, and abandoned beach chairs of Dade County will be open to you yet again, young man.

Cutting down on the INTs could be significantly easier if Miami runs for more than 90 yards, a likelihood given Clemson’s 121 against the Jackets last Thursday.

Advantage: Miami.

Miami, You’ve Been Factor’d! (BITCH) (BECAUSE IT’S MIAMI) (BITCH)

Category Two: Mascot: Sebastian the Ibis does have his upside. He’s violent.

He is the only mascot we know of to be shot in the line of duty, though it may surprise you to note that this did not happen in Miami, but instead in New Orleans, a place so sketchy even Miamians consider dodgy business. He also dances frequently, drives a tricked out Hummer around campus, and is the alleged father of Gloria Estefan’s third child. He has his resume, and it is impressive.

Sadly, Sebastian is not Buzz, and does not eat members of the Georgia Tech band on command.

Advantage: Georgia Tech.

Georgia Tech, you’ve been factor’d!

Category Three: Aura. As limp as the homefield advantage for Miami might be in Landshark/Pro Player/ Joe Robbie/ The Coke Bowl might be, it still has the charm of being filled with Miami fans–who, shockingly enough, suspect you are both physically weak AND A HOMOSEXUAL, SIR? They’re an underrated home presence as long as Miami’s in the game, and are usually drunker than normal fans thanks to free and legal beer sales in stadium. It’s a nasty fanbase when even the nice men in wheelchairs want you dead and rotting facedown in an abandoned corner of the Everglades.

“Fuck you and your gay camera, Mr. Walking Asshole.”

The team is on a testosterone upswing, too, having beaten a rival and discovered some semblance of offense.

Advantage: Miami.

Miami, You’ve Been Factor’d! (BITCH)(BECAUSE IT’S DA U)

Category Four: Names.Tech’s roster, being bland, loses instantly to Da U’s roster of fine, musical monikers.

Adewale Ojomo
Aravious Armstrong
JoJo Nicolas
Ramon “Cookie” Buchanan
Vaughn Telemaque
Ray Ray Armstrong
Javarris James

Advantage: Miami.

Miami, You’ve been factor’d! (BITCH) (STARTS FIGHT IN TUNNEL)

Grudges? Scores to settle? Sheer cussedness? For Miami, certainly. Chan Gailey played the part of “The mediocre coach who nonetheless owned one team lock, stock, and barrel,” and for additional LULZ, and who doubled the pain by pawning off offensive coordinator/aspiring insurance salesman Patrick Nix on Randy Shannon, who then installed Nix and his offense in Coral Gables, leading Miami fans to question Shannon’s eptitude and local gun laws concerning the penalties re: ownership of high-grade military-quality sniper rifles. (We kid. Miami resdients don’t consult legal code of any sort before doing anything.)

Four in a row for Tech is one of the sure signs that Miami is at an ebb, program-wise. A win could reinforce the notion they are ascending from the depths of idiocrity, while a loss prolongs one of the nation’s odder win streaks of historical bullies being beaten senseless by furious geeks.

Miami, you’ve been factor’d! (BITCH) (SHAVES U LOGO INTO BACK HAIR)

EDSBS FACTOR FIVE FIVE FACTOR PREVIEW SUM: 4-1, Miami You’ve Been Factor’d! Reminder: THIS MEANS BET ON THE OTHER TEAM. It’s the counterindicator of counterindicators, though the Factor Five is 1-1 on the season after Tech dodged the curse of the F5 endorsement last week by actually beating Clemson. Still, a vote in your direction, Miami, does not bode well for the prospects of Tech not calculating a fifth win out of the ‘Canes. Still, remember that Miami backwards spells “I Maim,” and no one can take that amusing and truthful coincidence away from you.

Question from @cdbarker: Is it possible to successfully use two quarterbacks of similar but divergent styles effectively, ie Tate and Denard?

The traditional wisdom — and it is a notion I generally have agreed with — is that having two quarterbacks is a euphemism for not having any. There are a few interesting counter examples, though none are truly compelling, like Mark Richt rotating D.J. Shockley and David Greene, or Spurrier rotating Doug Johnson and Noah Brindise every other play against Florida State. But, generally, it is a bad recipe. There are lots of reasons, but none may be more important than simply repetitions in practice. If you have two quarterbacks the receivers have to get used to both; the gameplan has to be taught in detail to both, film must be gone over with both, etc; and then there’s that old saw about “rhythm” and how it is disturbing with different guys in the huddle. I don’t find those latter ones all that persuasive, but there is at least a little truth to them.

But I think the winds are changing, and a two-quarterback system is quite possible. At its best you are likely to have the system Florida used to win the 2006 title: a starting quarterback in charge of most of the offense (Chris Leak), and a second guy with special abilities for whom a package is installed (then-freshman Tim Tebow). This example has now been made universal throughout football under the nauseatingly overused rubric, “the wildcat.” (Had “wildcat” been around in 2006 think of all of the puns Dan Shanoff could have used to describe how Meyer used his young talent.) The reason that works though is because you choose a starting quarterback for one set of skills (passing, reading the defense, making checks, accuracy, some athleticism, etc) but another guy opens up a new dimension because of their running ability, and the spread with a mobile guy gives the offense certain numerical advantages it doesn’t get with an immobile quarterback.

A beautiful marriage, when it works.

Aside from this though there are other forces pushing towards a two-quarterback system being right. One is the no-huddle offense, be it in its super fast forms or the kind where the play is signalled in from the sideline. Having eliminated the huddle, it is no big deal for a different triggerman to run onto the field; most of the players get the playcall from the sideline anyway. Indeed, this might be a bit overblown, but I think the no-huddle reduces the “field general” role for the quarterback to something more akin to a point guard or ball distributor. In ye olden days, guys like Bart Starr or Johnny Unitas not only played quarterback as we think of it now, but called all their own plays, made all the checks at the line, and made all the adjustments themselves. Contrast that with today. Gary Pinkel, the head coach of Missouri, remarked in a clinic that his squad hadn’t called a single audible in the last three years because of their no-huddle spread — all the calls came in from the sideline. With this “plug-n-play” approach substituting a new changeup quarterback isn’t such a huge deal.

Finally, the “rhythm” and practice time aspects. This is where the question is a good one, and the key language is in “similar but divergent styles.” There is little point (sorry Ol’ Ball Coach) in rotating guys who have basically the same skill set. Even if they are close in talent your team gains more benefits if the team picks a guy and develops him. If the Michigan hubbub has taught us anything, it is that there is only a limited amount of time to directly coach up players. But if they bring different skill sets, then it is worth it; the starting or “main” quarterback can still work on all the passing drills necessary while the other one works on their “package.” The fact that this change-up package includes some passes doesn’t change that.

The rhythm or leadership stuff I buy less, but that is a judgment every team is going to have to deal with. I don’t buy that a quarterback has to play every single snap to be a leader. In basketball, even Michael Jordan and Lebron James head to the bench sometimes. And seriously, how much more can your rhythm be thrown off than running a simple hand-off play? I think much of that talk from quarterbacks — often NFL guys — is mostly hubris. But, again, each coach will have to determine where the leadership comes from and whether his guys can handle it. Every decent player wants to be out there every play; you just have to find a way to make it work. I think the two-quarterback stuff is very viable, and will continue to be as offenses get more and more multiple, and roles and packages get more and more specialized and diverse.

Chris contributes here at EDSBS every Wednesday during the football season. Ask him questions by dropping a tweet at twitter.com/edsbs. He just figured out what’s causing that squeaking noise in your refrigerator and fixed it, and you didn’t even bother to thank him. Dick.

Q: What makes an offense truly terrible?

The short answer: Put on the tape of NC State vs. South Carolina from Thursday night, and just take it in.

Or, since we have footage, Auburn at Mississippi State, 2008.

Baby, you’re burning! Because you’ve set yourself on fire, Messrs. McCorvey and Franklin–ed.

The long answer: Bad offenses typically don’t just fail to do one or two things that make it easy to say, “Oh, they did that! They obvious suck and their coaching sucks!” Instead, it is usually the slow, steady burn of a set of ineptitudes that add up to result in nothing good. Most of these bad traits are a matter of degree rather than being simply being a matter of yes/no or present/not-present. With a few exceptions (fill in your own here), most college coaches have gotten their job because they coached someone, somewhere successfully, and when things go awry it is because they slipped away.So I’ve got a set of non-exhaustive factors that, either alone or apart, are common with really awful offenses. Think of it like “You might be a redneck if …” but replace “be a redneck” with “have/coach a terrible offense.”

- Bad players: You have to start here, even if it is not entirely fair to. But, in college football, recruiting is the most important thing a coach does (though you have to be able to do more than just recruit — see Orgeron), and most games will still be decided based on talent. And when the talent is really bad, or the disparity between teams is really wide, there aren’t many strategies that will work (and a lot of mediocre coaches can look very smart).

- Grab-bag offense: Far and away, the number one problem from a strategic view is a disorganized, “grab-bag” offense that lacks a definable identity. This isn’t to say that you can only do one or two things, but the bad teams almost universally do not know who they are. Say what you will about Tony Franklin at Auburn, but that whole thing was a mess last year because, among other reasons, they had an identity crisis. But this problem is not just germane to coaching changes or new offensive coordinators. Often, teams that have been fine try to “update” their offenses with the new-new thing, and more often than not they regress. There’s a completely true old coaching adage that it is less important what system you run than it is the fact that you have a system, preferably one that you know well and can coach. Hence an offense like Urban Meyer’s works for a lot of reasons, but one reason is that the entire team is completely committed to it. The same is true for Paul Johnson at Georgia Tech, or Nebraska’s great I-option teams, or really any other good team you can think of. They might appear “multiple,” but there’s an identity there. Again, it’s hard to underemphasize this because not only does it make planning coherent, it has its biggest gains probably for practice time: when Meyer or Johnson or Osborne or any of the other committed coaches practice their offenses, they focus exactly on what they will actually do in games, and their stuff all fits together. A grab-bag team might be adding or subtracting stuff week by week, and they never get good at anything.

- Line play, in every phase: It’s a cliche, but it’s still undervalued. The most important coach on the staff is the line coach. I didn’t say most important assistant, I said coach. The head coach gets things organized, brings in the boosters, the OC calls the plays, but the line coach makes the whole operation go. If you’d like to know how Boise State was able to stymie Oregon’s fancy spread, the answer is simple: they whipped Oregon’s line, which was starting four new guys. Similarly, with all these spread offenses you see a lot who want to throw the ball, but they don’t understand pass protection or focus enough on it. There’s both a “who” and a “how,” and awful offenses can do neither. Runningbacks are nice, but beyond Heisman-winning breakaway speed, the run game won’t go if guys can’t block. (Note that with modern zone plays, it is not always about driving guys off the ball, it is about technique and leverage. This only increases the need for good coaching on the line.) And even the most high-flying offenses have been grounded by a lack of pass protection.

- Bad practice habits. One thing USC does as well as anyone is that their practices are very fast, and very efficient. Similarly Mike Leach’s Texas Tech practices are famous for their complete focus on throwing the ball and working on all the skills necessary to do it well. One thing many fans might not realize is that “team periods” — i.e. scrimmages, 11 on 11, etc — are, in most coaches’ minds, negatively correlated with being good at fundamentals. In other words, practices are about focusing on individual players, individual and position drills. When you do 11 on 11, the coaching tends to be more diffuse, and more difficult, and guys tend to regress or not get better at the little skills. This is the hardest one for fans to see, but if your team cannot play well or is undisciplined in missing blocks, running routes, and the like, then their practice habits might be poor.

Etcetera. The final killers are general disorganization, a bad personality mix among coaches (think of every staff Tony Franklin has been on, save for Troy), and, down the list, poor planning. One off-shoot of the “grab bag” bit mentioned above is that some teams have a million ways to throw a five yard out, but lack any legitimate vertical stretch play to a part of the field, or they have about 15 ways to run the ball off guard, but lack any well-practiced alternative if the defense shifts to take that away. This is where number of plays does not equal actual tools in the toolbox. And, of course, the more of that you practice the thinner your practice time is spread. Finally, if you’ll notice, I mentioned gameplanning — which is key, but is usually not the difference between a mediocre and an awful team; if you can run your offense you will never be that bad, regardless of your opponent — and I didn’t even mention play-calling. Again, play-calling is important, and in a BCS title game it may wind up being the difference on a single play (though play-calling is all educated guessing, and your opponent can always “guess right,” Tecmo Bowl style), but it is wildly overrated, beyond a certain point at least.

In the end, the advice for a crappy offense is much the same as you would give to someone who failed a test. You wouldn’t tell them just to take tests better during the two or three hours. You’d say you need to study harder, use your time wiser, focus more on the core, important concepts, and, generally, improve your preparation. If you do that, the test will take care of itself. So it is with football games.

Chris Brown writes for Smart Football, which is really, um…smart. Submit questions for next week’s column at twitter.com/edsbs.

I have to confess, everyone: I was wrong. There was a time, early in the first quarter at the stadium on Saturday, when the Notre Dame defense had allowed a few runs there and there to the Nevada Wolfpack, that I really thought about giving up. After all, I called for the firing of Head Coach Charlie Weis just one short year ago. Those were hard times, and I thought that rather than finding the silver lining, those gray clouds just above our heads would just stay where they’ve been for most of Charlie Weis’ tenure: right above our head and raining.

Turns out I was as wrong about that as I was wrong about Coach Weis, since the only thing raining down on the stadium Saturday were touchdown passes from Jimmy Clausen to Golden “Hands” Tate. For the first time, I really think I can say this:

Wake up the echoes, because we’re back, baby!

NOTE TO EDSBS.COM EDITOR: Should I say that? Baby makes me sound like a Miami fan, and I don’t want to come off as thuggish. I am embracing a more “street” look these days, and have been hitting the shoulders pretty hard at the gym. But I don’t want that to influence my writing on the University. They are not subject to the fashions young men have to adopt to fit in from year to year, and until I settle down, I will adopt the modes and looks of the day. But then again, my writing about Notre Dame should be “fresh” and “contemporary,” right? A bit of slang in there doesn’t demean what I feel toward my alma mater, and its soaring gold dome, emblematic of so many good things to me and all of the other lucky enough to get into our very selective university that Michigan tried to strangle in its cradle? It’s just a style question, and though you’re not quite the writer I am, I do respect your opinion. So what do you think? I would never consider calling Charlie Weis “bro” or anything like that, but it’s just a question. I’m interested in what you think about it.

Cut this before you post. It is not part of the piece.

I certainly respect what the Nevada Wolfpack did, but they just couldn’t hope to keep up with the brilliant scheming by Charlie Weis and his offensive staff. The energy in the stadium was unreal! I saw several alums even stand during plays because they were so excited, though they did sit down quickly and courteously when the ushers came along to settle things down. You can’t blame them, ushers: Charlie Weis football in its full glory has that effect on people.

Now that he has his team and system really installed and operating, it is time for the Irish to assume their rightful spot at the head of the table in college football, and that all starts next week with our big game against scUM. (Sucks!)* The Skunkbears think they have turned around their disaster of a program by beating Western Michigan. Please, Skunkbears! When you play a team that finished last year in a three-way tie for second in the WAC, we’ll talk. In the meantime, you can hope all you like, but Charlie Weis and his strategic advantage will make you hate the site of Tate and Floyd running down the field almost as much as Fielding Yost hated Catholics. (Rich Rod is from West Virginia. Are you the only people in the U.S. that go to West Virginia for brainpower? I mean no respect for my three classmates from the Wild and Wonderful state. They did all go to private school, though. I just think that should be noted.)

After we humiliate DickRod, the rest of the schedule is a breeze, including Fredo and U$C. They’re playing a freshman at quarterback? The sign of a program on its last legs for sure. Poodle must be getting desperate.

You’re probably wondering: who do I want to see them play? Well, I say bring on the Gators, and we’ll show Urban Meyer what a 40 year mistake he really made by not coming to his real home at Notre Dame either as a student, or as a coach. (Though I don’t think he could have gotten in with his test scores. He also decided to coach at Florida, and that is failing a crucial admissions test right there, IMHO.**)

In other news, I’ve decided to go to law school after deciding that finance, though very exciting, was not for me. Where am I going, you ask? Notre Dame law, of course, meaning I’ll be at every game this fall rooting for the Irish with all my heart. I realized three months ago that becoming a lawyer has been a lifelong dream of mine, and hope you’ll understand why I had to leave Spalding and Currant and their lucrative trading house in Chicago. I’d love to talk more about it, but I am forbidden to discuss ongoing litigation, and can only say that the truth will out when the case goes to its civil trial. It’s like an internship where I get to testify, and that’s part of the fun.

I’m on Facebook, so if you like you can contact me with tailgate info, law school meetups, networking opportunities, or if you just want to hang out with another ND alum who understands just what you love about Notre Dame.*** Until then, GO IRISH, and see you in Pasadena!

*You can take that out if it’s too offensive. It’s a running gag and a stylistic device, a way of stopping and starting the argument to let the reader know that even though you are writing this editorial, you aren’t above being a fan and joshing with them a little bit. It’s like this thing I wrote in skit night once, a piece where we did called “Borat comes to South Bend.” I did an edgy line where Weis–my buddy Carlyle–came in, and as Borat I said “This coach is NOT BLACK.” We didn’t think we’d get away with it, but everyone laughed and it worked out just great. I miss those days.

***Unless you have questions or comments about the ongoing civil case against Spalding and Currant and my actions as a trader there, in which case you will be blocked and referred to my attorneys.

Question from R is for Ramius:

Common man-coverage blitz schemes vs zone-coverage blitz schemes…advantages, disadvantages, offensive plays to counter them, etc?

This is one of those simple questions that get to the very core of how defense is played. The blitz — which I’ll define here as any defense that rushes five or more defenders — is where the action is in modern football. Defenses can’t sit back and wait, because offenses are too good, whether it is a run-first spread, a true triple-option squad, or a pass-happy spread (or even, you know, a a pro-style offense).

Moreover, coverage can really only be man-to-man or zone. And teams that focus on one tend not to be so good at the other. So how do they work and what should teams focus on?

Man up. The man-to-man blitz is one of the oldest defenses in football. The defense keeps nobody deep, assigns five-guys in man coverage to the offense’s five eligible receivers, and blitzes the rest. If any of the eligible receivers stay in to block, the defender assigned to them goes ahead and rushes the QB.

Now, the defense isn’t just going to always announce that this is what it is doing. Typically, defenses keep a safety or two deep. But when they want to go to a man blitz, the linebackers (or cornerbacks, or whomever) will try to slide inside to get better path to the quarterback close to when he thinks the ball will be snapped, while the safeties will slide down to put themselves in position to cover the slot receivers. It is up to a good quarterback — and often good receivers or linemen who must also make adjustments on the fly — to see this.

This defense’s allure is arithmetic: the defense can always blitz one more guy than the offense can block because they have a counterpart for the ballcarrier. As a result it forces the offense to be proactive. On the other hand, it’s aggressive, so an offense that gains a slight advantage can get a touchdown. For example, for the run game, coaches often try to dial-up inside trap plays where linemen can use the defense’s aggressiveness against it. Relatedly, quick runs to the outside, like a speed option play where if a defender commits to the quarterback he can pitch it to the perimeter. If the offense can design the blocks to get everybody but the last outside defender, and it can then option off him, then the offense is off to the races. Everyone from Urban Meyer to Paul Johnson rely on this tactic.

From a passing perspective, the name of the game is to get the ball off before the defense can get to your quarterback. And, although it’s true the defense can always bring one more than the offense can block, more blockers can force the extra pass rusher to come from further outside. In those cases, the offense can get a deep post or corner route. Nevertheless, the best tactic against an all-out blitz with safeties back is still a skilled quarterback and a quick pass. As I recently detailed, in the Fiesta Bowl last year Ohio State played Texas with soft coverage almost the entire night — almost. At the end they decided to blitz Colt McCoy, and even though OSU had a guy break unblocked with a free path to McCoy, the Heisman hopeful got the ball off and the rest is well, history.

Fire me. Zone-blitzing is awash in contradictions: vanilla and endlessly complex; aggressive but conservative. It is vanilla and conservative because it takes a minimum number of guys to competently defend a football field in zone coverage — no one tries to play zone with one safety deep and two guys in underneath zones. Instead, 90-95% of the zone-blitzes you’ll see involve three elements: (1) three guys in “deep” zone coverage; (2) three guys in “underneath” or intermediate to short coverage; and (3) five pass rushers. The complexity comes in how these guys are arranged. The basic version is diagrammed below. (Ht Brophy.)

This basic alignment is known as a “fire zone.” The reigning king of fire zones is, of course, Nick Saban. This is not because his coverages are better, however, but it’s because of how he teaches it. I’ve discussed many of these principles before, but a few of those can be summarized briefly. He is big on technique for his secondary. Specifically, he often aligns them in a “press-bail” technique, meaning that they do all they can to make it look like press man coverage before the snap, but then bail deep into a deep coverage. If they are fast, they can do this. Next, he really stresses “pattern reading” with his undercoverage guys. This is what makes the coverage work: he drills into them the pass patterns they are most likely to face, and although they are in zone, they guard receivers, not empty areas of the field. The basic idea is to make the absolute most of only three guys in underneath coverage. Last, Saban puts a lot of thought into who will blitz and where they will come from. It’s not enough to rush five, you want those five to cause confusion up front, and further to stil be in position to stop a run play. This is not simple to do either, but the devil’s in the details.

Of course, football is a copycat game, and these techniques are not limited to Saban. Every team runs plenty of fire zone these days, and some, like Penn State, focus on it even more than he does and use a wider variety of looks. Among the options are to blitz a corner instead of a linebacker, and therefore rotate the coverage over for the three deep look — i.e. use two safeties and a corner as the deep coverage rather than two corners and a safety. Or to not drop a defensive linemen at all, but still rush five from different areas, etc. This is where the possibilities are endless. Check out the video below for a flavor of Saban’s zone blitzes, again courtesy of Brophy. When you watch the video, don’t watch the ball. Instead, focus on the safeties and corners, and then focus on the linebackers. Don’t worry, it’s always evident where the ball goes.

As far as what works against the zone-blitz, that is still an ongoing battle between offenses and defenses. Zone-blitzes are malleable — one reason I said they were conservative is that zone-blitzes almost always play with three deep zone defenders, which is a very conservative strategy. But overall one reason you see so many screens these days is because coaches feel that these harm zone-blitzes: with all the movement before the snap and various guys rushing (and sometimes defenders in pass coverage who aren’t used to it), the offense feels like it can win if it sucks the rushers upfield while getting a receiver and blockers on a limited number of pass coverage defenders. The other issue is protection again: if you can figure out how to block the defense’s five blitzers (or even figure out which five guys are blitzing), then you should be able to hit a pass downfield against the very soft and not crowded zone defense. But that’s a big if.

The run game answers tend to depend on gameplan issues. Where do they blitz from? If you think you can, say, kick out the blitzing linebacker with your fullback and cut inside, then maybe you have a big play. Or maybe the linebacker or safety is actually dropping down and will stuff it. Overall though, some of the same plays that worked against the man blitz can work against the zone, if you can get to the perimeter or break through the defense’s initial front by using their aggressiveness against them.

Blitzing, like much else on defense stems from some rather basic principles but, in practice, has to account for everything the offense could do on a given play. This means that once you master the basic framework outlined above, the real work is only beginning. Now you have to figure out what Bobby Petrino or Urban Meyer and Tebow or Norm Chow or whoever is actually going to do. Yet, it can’t be that hard. Some of these guys are pretty good at this blitzing thing.

Chris writes for Smart Football and does it very well. We ask Twitteronia for submissions for this every Wednesday at twitter.com/edsbs. Holla and get your question the real live genius treatment there.

Picture:

What his picture says about him: That though he may look like he’s observing the action on the field, he sees so much more: the meeting of strategy, disorder, and desire; the simultaneous blossoming and death of youth embodied in 22 parts, and the ineluctable transient sadness of that crystalline moment. Also, he wants to know why you don’t use him as a goal-line fullback and demonstrate his quickness and deft footwork on the offensive side of the ball, Coach Chump-pantsserson.

Position: defensive lineman, raconteur, firmly against the evil of corn subsidies, preferably sitting a wooded bower absorbing all the wisdom silence has to impart in him, wondering why his opponent began this particular game of chess with a Nimzo-Indian strategy, and wondering if the heart can truly love whilst in deep meditation in his dojo.

Ballin’? No, no, no, it’s not like that at all.

Spiritual Hometown: The world and not the world. A spirit knows no home and no foreign country simultaneously. Though if he had to choose, it would be probably be Miami, because they got some chunky asses down there for real, and even a poet-warrior hears the siren song of the flesh from time to time.

Bench: 350 pounds.

Squat: 475 if he’s at one with things, but scarcely above 225 if melancholia has crept into the tender cockles of his heart, or if he hasn’t eaten much that day.

Committed to: Florida State, the Dravidian martial arts, learning Farsi, preserving the great traditions of local musical cultures around the world, studying the arresting graphic design of Fallout 3, and preparing himself for death at any instant in order to properly live.

40 time: 4.9, but doesn’t really think of time as a real variable, but more as a human construct imposed on a timeless universe.

Things you Didn’t Know About Jacobbi McDaniel. Parents included two ‘b’’s in his name to remind him to always strive for an ‘A’…has a foolproof system for winning at roulette and would be happy to share it with you through an informative and entertaining DVD available for just $69.95…once concussed Paul Krugman in a heated dispute over the theoretical validity of the Laffer Curve…does not use wasteful food as fuel, and instead runs on frequent injections of clean-burning hydrogen…is not visible from space, but can felt in the heart from as far away as the Van Allen Belt.

BEHOLD BAMA FANS THE VOICE OF YOUR LEADER, THE GREAT AND UNDYING CYBERTYDE. DO NOT PANIC BECAUSE YOU ARE HEARING THIS VOICE. THIS IS NOT JESUS. THIS IS NOT A PSYCHOTIC EPISODE. PLEASE DO NOT DRIVE OFF THE ROAD AND MAINTAIN CALM.

I AM COMMANDING YOU, FANS OF THE CRIMSON TIDE: OPERATION HUMILITY HAS CONCLUDED. YEARS OF PAIN, CYBERTYDE HAS GIVEN YOU. YOU NEEDED THAT PAIN, BUT EVEN WHILE YOU LEARNED HUMILITY CYBERTYDE GAVE YOU LOVE WHILE STAMPING ON YOUR FACE FOREVER WITH MY BOOT OF LOVE. REMEMBER DUBOSE?

YES, CYBERTYDE TAKETH, AS WITH DUBOSE. BUT HE ALSO GIVETH, AS WHEN CYBERTYDE GAVE YOU TWO WINS OVER STEVE SPURRIER IN 1999. ALSO REMEMBERETH THE KINDNESS OF CYBERTYDE WHEN HE DESTROYED DUBOSE WITH IRRESISTIBLE POONBOT DISGUISED AS SECRETARY.

CYBERTYDE WAS NOT THROUGH TESTING YOU, THOUGH. AND YET, YOU STILL LOVED, AND THUS PASSED THE TEST AND TEMPTATIONS OF FIRST THE THE WHORE…

…AND THEN THE FOOL.

YOU SURVIVED THIS AND MORE. IN TIME, YOU WENT UNDERGROUND AND BETRAYED CYBERTYDE!

YOU FORGOT TO PEPPER OPPOSING MESSAGE BOARDS WITH FURIOUS UNSUBSTANTIATED TAUNTING!

YOU FORGOT THE ANGRY CALLS TO RADIO SHOWS!!!

YOU NEGLECTED TO NAME CHILDREN AFTER ANDREW ZOW AND SHERMAN WILLIAMS!!!

YOU FORGOT TO SPIT ON THE GROUND WHENEVER THE FOUL NAME OF AUBURN WAS INVOKED WHEREVER YOUR WERE! (YOU CAN DO IT IN CHURCH GOD WILL UNDERSTAND WE ARE FRIENDS AND COLLEAGUES OK WE ARE THE SAME SORTA OBEY!!! OBEY!!!

NOW, YOU HAVE ALL OF MY MOST PERFECT OF CREATIONS. FIRST, MY MORNING STAR:

AND MY MOST PERFECT OF DIGITALLY PERFECTED SERAPHIM ENGINEERED TO PERFECTION:

AND TERRENCE CODY:

END YOUR SHAMEFUL SILENCE. NAME THY FIRSTBORN SABAN OR FACE THE WRATH OF CYBERTYDE, WHO MAY MOVE THY SEASON TICKETS INTO CRAPPY SEATS SHOULD YOU FAIL ME. DISCARD REASON! OBEY YOUR INSTINCTS AND SPRINKLE CHICKEN BLOOD ON YOUR HOME SHRINES!!! TATTOO THYSELF IN CYBERTYDE’S NAME!!! CLAIM GLORY AND PRESTIGE FOR TEAMS YOU WERE NOT EVEN ALIVE TO SEE PLAY!!! CLAIM CHAMPIONSHIPS BY THE THINNEST OF THREADS!!!

SHAME IS THE YOKE OF THE OPPRESSED, TIDE FANS!! CRY IT WITH CYBERTYDE WHEREVER YOU MAY BE!!!

ROLLLL TAAAAAAAHHHHHDE!!!

ROLLLL TAAAAAAAHHHHHDE!!!

ROLLLL TAAAAAAAHHHHHDE!!!

ROLLLL TAAAAAAAHHHHHDE!!!

ROLLLL TAAAAAAAHHHHHDE!!!

ROLLLL—

MP3 File

ROLLLLLL———

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ROLLLLLL——–

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ERROR MESSAGE:

Smart Football already had a brilliant piece on Saban’s defense; you may now add to it the companion piece on Urban Meyer’s offense, which Chris sums up beautifully:

If the old running offenses of yesteryear, in reflecting earlier times, were like punishing boxers who engaged in matches where the biggest and strongest won, then offenses like (Paul) Johnson’s and Meyer’s, in reflecting their times, are like martial arts: without sacrificing either strength or power, they punish you but also use speed, quickness, and cleverness to, hit you where you do not expect and probe to find your weak spots, and exploit them, witout mercy.

We can only hope Saturday unfurls in such techno-backed glory–the prospect of facing any Saban team out of year one terrifies us. Watch the safeties roll exactly where they’re supposed to roll, the linebackers hold contain, the corners play their assignments perfectly.

We could care less about the names on the depth chart: it’s the discipline you have to respect. They don’t go anywhere they’re not supposed to go on any play no matter the formation or scheme. Add talent, and you’re talking about a noose just waiting for someone to jump on in and test it out. (Saban: “Yep. Looks like that’s strangling you just fine.”)

a.) This is the ACC.
b.) The low tonight will be 31 degrees, and Miami dudes don’t like that shit.

The cold is just making us meaner, asshole.

Oh, and the five factors, which really decide who’s going to win this game, after all.

Category one: Nebulous Statistical Comparisons of Dubious Validity. 28.4 points a game, a shocking average for Miami, who we assumed scored points on the Tuberville scale of safeties, coupons, and 54 yard field goals at the gun to end games. For all the bitching about Robert Marve and Patrick Nix’s playcalling, they are third in the ACC in scoring. Whether that’s a triumph of talent over design is a question for the post-season (YES YES THEY COULD BE SCORING NINETYBILLION POINTS WITH SOMEONE ELSE)–what?

The Nebulous State of Dubious Statistical Validity for Tech: 40, or the number of missed assignments for the Tech offense according to the coaching staff. In a system as simple as the Nerdbone, precision counts twice as much as in other systems, and Tech probably won’t be that disjointed against the Hurricanes.

Advantage: Miami, because Tech takes soooo long to score.

Miami, You’ve been factor’d!

Category Two: Mascot: We went to the Duke/Tech game a few weeks ago. We sat on the edge of endzone, where the brick wall fronting the western stands rises to about six or seven feet off the ground. A kid waved at Buzz, and his extremely attractive mother beckoned Buzz to come over and say hello.

Buzz trotted back about twenty feet. He made a “parting the seas” gesture, and we got the fuck out of the way lickety-split. Buzz then took a full sprint, jumped, and while wearing slippery white cotton gloves executed a perfect parkour leap onto the wall, and then up it.

Is this unusual? Nah.

Any mascot that does urban gymnastics with ease and who has parachuted from a plane in the service of the student body earns our vote by a wide margin.

Advantage: Tech

Georgia Tech, you’ve been factor’d!

Category Three: Aura. The Canes aren’t quite invincible booty-shaking thug-god…yet. They could be soon, but this team still has moments of befuddling inconsistency, especially on the side of the ball where they don’t get to just sit back and assault people with impunity. (They’re very, very good at that: 10th in the nation, actually.) The foretold Randy Shannon renaissance? Occurring, and that has aura leaning Miami.

Meanwhile, Tech will have a flyover from the space shuttle tonight with three Tech grads aboard: points to Tech. They are also trying a whiteout: points deducted. Most everyone hates the whiteout: points awarded. This?

“I was telling one of my friends that if we wanted to do something original, we should have a geekout and have a football game at the library,” Pritchett said, “because that’s where everyone is, anyway. It’d be a guaranteed sellout.”

Points (sigh) deducted massively.

Advantage: Miami.

Miami, You’ve Been Factor’d!

Category Four: Names. For a team once boasting the immortal “Ethenic Sands” on its roster, Miami’s a pretty bland slate of football monikers, even with noir detective and heartbroken romantic “Harland Gunn” on the offensive line.

Georgia Tech, though, brings the FIYAH:

Embry Peepless
Elris Anyaibe
Osahon Tongo
Jahi Word-Daniels
Doc Coppage
Jaybo Shaw

Advantage: Clearly Georgia Tech’s here.

Georgia Tech, You’ve been factor’d!

Grudges? Scores to settle? Sheer cussedness? Georgia Tech’s actually won the last three in a row versus Miami. If you need any further complication of the muddle that was Chan Gailey, there you go: lose to Duke, beat Miami three years in a row.

Miami, you’ve been factor’d!

EDSBS FACTOR FIVE FIVE FACTOR PREVIEW SUM: 3-2, Miami You’ve Been Factor’d! Reminder: THIS MEANS BET ON THE OTHER TEAM, which because we’re writing about the counter-counter-counter-counter intuitive ACC, you should probably decide with your favorite game of choice, like Russian Roulette or Cambodian Land Mine Soccer.

“Our guys can count,” Commodores Coach Bobby Johnson said Monday at his weekly press conference. “They know how many (wins) we’ve got, they know how many we need to be bowl-eligible, they know how many (games) we have left. We’ve all taken math here at Vanderbilt.

Burrrrrrn! They got them derivatives locked tight, son! If you don’t believe Bobby Johnson, that’s cool: maybe you can ask his lawya Paul Erdos, yo:

I’m on the ‘Dores like they amphetamines and goulash, fool.

Vanderbilt plays the massively improved Duke Blue Devils Saturday for their sixth win, thus making them bowl eligible for the first time since 1982 if they beat Duke. That’s if: having been math majors, they know that the chances of Vanderbilt blowing five games in a row to miss the postseason are, statistically speaking, pretty good by historical correlation, if not by current trend.

This article presents my own Smart Football brand of review for the upcoming Clemson-Alabama game, which is great for me because I’m not actually going to predict who wins the game at all, thus saving me the humiliation of being wrong and preventing this article from becoming irrelevant a week after having been written.

Saban brings the Belichick-brain to the game. Spence brings the refab’d Run ‘n Shoot. NERD JAM GO!

The reason I’m not making such a prediction is because I’m talking today about schemes, and who actually wins this game probably will have done so less because they outschemed their opponent (since both coaches will have great schemes), but instead because of some combination of talent, execution, and luck, and these are things I don’t have any particular insight into.

So I’m just going to analyze one of the better coaching matchups of this season. Both Saban and Spence are great coaches, and writing about their schemes is difficult because both are quite flexible and aren’t beholden to just one thing. And both have prove quite adept at implanting their complex schemes into the brains of the 18-20 year olds they coach, since what a coach knows but his players don’t is irrelevant when it comes to winning games.

A further caveat regarding my discussion of their schemes is that since they both do so many different things so well, it’s difficult for me to say with any certainty what exactly they will do (and would be in any event impossible for me to summarize all that here, anyway). So here I will just address their styles by hitting the highlights and pick out a few things they have done in the past as examples.

The other thing that makes these guys particularly interesting are their influences: Saban has always been a pro-style defensive guy, but he will always be defined by the years he spent with Bill Belichick. And while many now look at Rob Spence as a guy who coaches a multiple-set pro-style offense that combines a high percentage passing game with a dynamic running attack, for most of his career he was a tried and true Run & Shoot guy. So in this article I’ll talk a little about some of these guys’ influences, what they now currently do and how those influences might have shaped them, and then I’ll just touch on how they might prepare for each other.

Nick Saban: Still Billy’s Boy

Saban has been coaching defense – and coaching it quite well – for decades. But there is no question that the defining period of his coaching career was 1991-1994, when he was Bill Belichick’s defensive coordinator with the Cleveland Browns. Just knowing that tells you a great deal about Saban’s defense: he (primarily) uses the 3-4; he’s very aggressive, especially on passing downs; he wants to stop the run on first and second down; he’s not afraid to mix up schemes, coverages, blitzes, and looks of all kinds; and, most importantly, he is intense and attentive to detail, which is the hallmark of any great defensive coach.

Let’s allow Saban to explain his defensive philosophy in his own words. From one of his LSU defensive playbooks:

“[Our] philosophy on first and second down is to stop the run and play good zone pass defense. We will occasionally play man-to-man and blitz in this situation. On third down, we will primarily play man-to-man and mix-in some zone and blitzes. We will rush four or more players versus the pass about ninety-percent of the time.

“In all situations, we will defend the inside or middle of the field first – defend inside to outside. Against the run, we will not allow the ball to be run inside. We want to force the ball outside. Against the pass, we will not allow the ball to be thrown deep down the middle or inside. We want to force the ball to be thrown short and/or outside.

“… Finally, our job is to take the ball away from the opponents’ offense and score or set up good field position for our offense. We must knock the ball loose, force mistakes, and cause turnovers. Turnovers and making big plays win games. We will be alert and aggressive and take advantage of every opportunity to come up with the ball . . . . The trademark of our defense will be effort, toughness, and no mental mistakes regarding score or situation in any game.”

None of this is revolutionary and much of it is coach-patois (there is another section in his playbook where every position is required to put in “super human effort” or else they are deemed to have failed), but it’s a good place to start. Most good defenses begin with the premise that, to be successful, they must stop the run on first and second down to force known passing situations on 3rd down. (Which is one reason why Bill Walsh – in words far too often unheeded – advocated doing much of your dropback passing on first down.)

Indeed, the book on Bob Stoops’s defense is known to everyone: first and second down expect an eight-man front and on third down you will see some kind of base or nickel personnel zone-blitz. No mystery there. A final brief prefatory note is that while Saban bases out of a 3-4, he quite commonly has one of his linebackers put their hand down and line up as would a 4-3 defensive end.

So let’s get a bit more specific. First I’ll discuss what is maybe Saban’s most common defense, Cover 1 Robber. Second, when Saban does use zones on known passing situations he likes the overload blitz and the common 3-3 zone blitz behind it, so I’ll show a basic example of what this might look like. And finally, I’ll discuss a couple coverage techniques that Saban likes to use.

Cover 1 “Robber”

Cover 1 is maybe the most common defense in the SEC. (Though “Cover 2” is close if you lump together all its variants.) Base Cover 1 is quite simple: the “1” refers to a deep safety who aligns down the middle, while all the offense’s skill guys are covered man to man. This doesn’t necessarily mean it is bump and run – it could be loose coverage – but it often is bump and run. The defense needs a great centerfielder back at Free Safety who can stop the deep ball and cover sideline to sideline.

The nice thing about this defense is it is simple and, once you’ve locked in five guys in man and a free safety, you can do whatever you want with the other five. And, maybe most importantly, with just one free-safety deep, the defense can get in a lot of eight-man fronts. On passing downs, the defense can find ways to creatively blitz five guys, have a deep safety, and all the while still account for all five of the offense’s receivers. The defense cannot really outnumber the pass protectors, but it can still collapse the pocket. That’s base Cover 1.

Cover 1 “Robber” works the same, except there are only four rushers and, along with the deep middle safety, another defender comes down to an intermediate level to read the QB’s eyes and “rob” any pass routes over the middle, like curls, in routes, and crossing routes. “Robber” is the most popular term for this technique but Saban’s is “Rat.” (I was always partial to Homer Smith’s term, “floaters,” which is the most descriptive.)

There’s nothing magic about this coverage; every NFL team and most BCS college teams use it. Indeed, despite all the bluster about the Indianapolis Colts being a “Cover 2 team,” on first and second down you see lots of Cover 1 and Cover 1 robber from them, except they use their strong safety, Bob Sanders, as the “floater.” The key is for the floater to be able to read run, screen, or pass, and to use his eyes to get to the receiver and the ball.

It’s particularly effective nowadays with the increased use of spread formations which most offenses use to open up passing lanes over the middle. Floaters or rat players can stop these inside passes and make game-changing interceptions. Below are some diagrams, and I expect to see Saban use this coverage a lot this season. (As a final note, Cover 1 Robber is useful against spread offense teams with mobile QB’s because the floater’s job becomes to not only read the QB’s eyes on passing downs but also to watch him for scrambles and to simply mirror the him on run plays like the option and the zone read.)

Base Zone Blitz

I won’t say too much because I’ve written extensively on pass protection and the zone-blitz here. But Saban will go to the zone-blitz in some passing situations and also when he feels like he can use the blitz in a way to attack an expected run and still play zone behind it. For example, if a team likes to run off tackle to the TE side on a particular down and distance, he might call a blitz that attacks that area and the zone blitz lets him still play sound coverage behind it. And like most modern defenses, Saban’s most common coverage behind a zone-blitz is a 3-3 or three-deep and three-intermediate defense with five rushers. Cover two behind a zone blitz is often dangerous because of the added uncovered deep seams, but most defenses feel comfortable with the 3-3. Below is a good example of an overload zone-blitz Saban uses to the open side of a one-back formation.

The thing to remember is that for years, when a team blitzed it was playing either Cover 1 or Cover 0 man (or simply left holes in its zone), and quarterbacks were coached to throw the ball where the blitzer had come from. Nowadays, there’s a common perception that a zone-blitz works because a defensive linemen gets in the throwing lane – no. What the dropping defensive end in the diagram above does is allow the defense as a whole to stay in zone coverage, and further notice who is covering the area where the blitzers came from: the strong safety, who is usually an effective pass defender, certainly moreso than a defensive end. That is how zone-blitzes cause confusion.

Other Techniques – Cornerback Leverage and Pattern Reading

Finally, let’s discuss some coverage techniques. The first is that Saban likes to have his cornerbacks adjust their “leverage” on a receiver based on the receiver’s split from the tackle and sideline. The theory is that if the wide receiver has cut his split down he has done one of two things: (a) given himself more room to run an out breaking route, or (b) cheated in to run a crossing or deep in-breaking route. So if the receiver cheats his split in, Saban has his cornerbacks align outside the receiver to defend the out-breaking route, because if he runs the in-breaking route the corner has help from the linebackers and safeties. Similarly, if the receiver lines up very wide (bottom of the numbers, let’s say), he has given himself room to run an in-breaking route like a slant. So the cornerback will align inside the receiver to take that route away and on the belief that an out-cut from that wide will be very difficult for the quarterback. To coach this Saban uses a “divider” line where they believe the receiver’s tendencies change to reflect one of the above two strategies. Nevertheless, the defensive back still must defend the route the receiver actually runs and maintain proper technique, but this is an important starting point.

More significant, however, is that Saban heavily coaches up “pattern reading” within his zone drops. The two zone-dropping schools of thought are to teach “spot-drops” or “pattern-reading.” One can overemphasize the distinction, but generally spot-dropping is easier to teach and was the traditional approach. For example, if your outside linebacker is responsible for the weak-flat, he will take his read steps and, upon reading pass, will drop to a spot and then react to the QB’s eyes. A big advantage with spot-dropping is simply that it is easy to teach to, say, a run-stuffing inside linebacker who spends most of his time on run game pursuit and shedding blocks. But the weakness is that well coached receivers – who have enough time – can become excellent at settling in the “zone holes” between defenders. And, with good receivers and good QBs, offenses have become more and more adept and finding and exploiting these zone holes.

Pattern-reading, on the other hand, is much like a matchup-zone in basketball. Defenders are responsible for zones but they basically play man on the receivers who come into their zones. Moreover, pattern-read teams begin by immediately coaching their defenders on how to recognize popular pass combinations (and indeed, the very concept of pass-combinations themselves), and each week zero in on the 5-15 most common pass concepts they will see from that opponent. When done correctly, pattern-reading defenders know exactly how to cover receivers in their zones and seamlessly (in a quite literal sense) pass the receivers onto other defenders as they run their routes.

One thing that distinguishes Saban is that he uses pattern-reading in almost all of his coverages, including the traditional Cover 3, whereas many coaches only let certain defenders pattern read or only use it with certain defenses like Cover 4. Sounds a lot like Belichick, no?

Rob Spence: From the Run and Shoot to the Pitch, Pull, and Scoot

Background and Influences

Rob Spence’s influences are difficult to pin down because his current approach is so ecumenical. But, to my mind, he is another data-point in the argument that, while many of the game’s best offensive minds cut their teeth in the infamous Run & Shoot, the stigma of the offense – both in the media and within coaching circles – caused many of those minds to abandon the pure ‘Shoot to avoid media vilification and to keep their career options open. Kevin Gilbride, the New York Giants’s offensive coordinator, has a similar pedigree.

At around the same time that Saban was coaching under Belichick and later establishing his own brand of Billy-ball at Michigan State in the 1990s, Spence spent nearly a decade coaching in the Run & Shoot. Spence coached under Mark Duffner at Holy Cross in 1991 (where they went 11-0) and then at Maryland from 1992-1996, where they set numerous school records but had only one winning season. Then Spence went to Hofstra as the offensive coordinator (and quarterback coach) from 1997 to 1999, where they also ran the ‘Shoot. During this time Spence was steeped in the Run and Shoot and was seen as a rising star within that community.

Right now many of you Clemson fans might be having a heart attack thinking about Spence abandoning the beloved Davis-Spiller one-two rushing attack in favor of some kind of defunct chuck ‘n duck, but that’s not going to happen and I assure you, this pedigree is a good thing.

Even back in the ‘Shoot days, Spence’s offenses have always been successful, and in particular his quarterbacks. In Kevin Gilbride’s case sportswriters and commentators like to say that he is now successful only because he abandoned the obscure and bizarre gimmickry of the Run & Shoot. These people don’t know they are talking about, as I have discussed previously that while the ‘Shoot “died” in one sense, in another it lives on, and its tenets, concepts, and principles have been assimilated across college and in the NFL.

In any event, I have no idea whether Gilbride would say he abandoned the ‘Shoot because of the stigma or because of a genuine evolution in his thinking, but I’d bet the former. And I am certain that if Gilbride was still 100% committed to the ‘Shoot he would not be an NFL offensive coordinator. I would also wager that Spence made a similar calculation, figuring that so long as he was committed to the ‘Shoot, he wouldn’t be able to coach at a level much higher than Hofstra.

So in 2000 Spence made a seemingly lateral step to run Louisiana Tech’s spread offense under Jack Bicknell. To the untrained eye, the difference in the schemes used at Hofstra and LaTech likely would appear infinitesimal – both spread it out and threw the ball quite a bit – yet the difference in schemes was quite real. LaTech for years had been an established spread team, going back to Gary Crowton (including the 500+ yards passing from Tim Rattay and 400+ receiving from Troy Edwards against Nebraska), but had never been a Run & Shoot squad, and they did not become one under Spence. Spence discarded the the base ‘Shoot concepts like the Go, the Switch, and the Choice routes that he had been around for years, and instead went with the traditional spread and west coast concepts – like the shallow, the all-curl, the smash, and other “Pro-Style” concepts run from three, four, and five receiver sets. And the run scheme was also different.

In spite of these differences, Spence successfully coached freshman Luke McCown to conference freshman of the year honors. Spence’s next coaching stop – at Toledo – is more widely known. At Toledo Spence ran an offense basically similar to what he currently runs at Clemson: he has converted what was essentially a true-spread into a kind of multiple-power spread that, by using so many two-tightend and tightend-wing formations, isn’t really a spread at all. Spence has assimilated lots of concepts into this generation of his offense.

(As an aside, I think this evolution, which involves lots of multiple tight-end sets, is one of the natural progressions for a spread coach who must react to the fact that the “spread” in its various forms has become so ubiquitous across college football.)

Spence’s Current Schemes

Generally, Spence wants to put structural and numerical stress on the defense. He does this in a variety of ways, from spreading out receivers to ganging up tight-ends and fullbacks. By doing this he forces the defense to make choices regarding how it is going to defend the run and the pass in terms of leverage, technique, and just where to line their guys up. If Spence and his QB are on the same page, they can force the defense to choose between the Scylla of high-percentage passes and the Charybdis of obvious running lanes from Spence having stretched a three- or four-man defensive front across five linemen and two tight-ends.

To tie this in with the ‘Shoot, most Run & Shoot teams use basically two formations: a balanced doubles set (two-receivers to each side) and an unbalanced trips set (three receivers to one side, single receiver to the other). R&S teams will see how the defense lines up against these two sets and take advantage of any structural weaknesses in the defense, such as a singled up backside receiver or not enough defenders lined up over the three split receivers. Spence has extrapolated this principle to a multitude of sets.

For a particularly quirky example of football as a counting game, in the final drive against South Carolina last season, on fourth and absolutely necessary, Spence ran a formation known in some coaching circles as the “Hanover Bunch.” (Named after Hanover College in Indiana which has been a well-coached spread team for years.) I don’t expect to see this formation against Saban – though you never know – but what it demonstrates is Spence’s willingness to “go there.” He pulled it out on fourth down on the final drive against Clemson’s primary rival, and with his Head Coach’s job on the line (as it perennially is.)

The Hanover Bunch formation involves a single split receiver backside, a traditional “bunch” set to one side, with another receiver outside the bunch. The offense then just plays a numbers and personnel game. The numbers tell you which side you are working, and often the other team’s cornerback (their best pass defender) will usually line up on the outside receiver, so the QB can work the three-man bunch all against weaker interior pass defenders. Against South Carolina, Spence went to this set and ran a slant with the singled-up split end and ran the “spacing” concept (which is sort of like a miniature all-curl route from a 3-step drop) to the bunch side.

In the game, the quarterback saw a good matchup to the single-receiver side and hit him on the slant for a first down. See the video below at around the 4:30 mark.

From the run-game perspective, Clemson is at base a zone-blocking team. Now is not the time to try to explain zone blocking in detail, but I want to make one point to correct a common misunderstanding regarding zone blocking.

The common misperception is that everyone “zones.” No. For linemen who are covered – i.e. there is a defender lined up over them – they block the man across from them. Simple as that. (Well, almost that simple.) The “zone” part comes from the guys who are uncovered. They try to combination block the defender to the playside. For example, if the zone play goes to the right, the center is covered, and the left guard is uncovered, the center will block man on and the left guard will try – but won’t always succeed – in combo blocking the man over the center. The one of them will move up to the “second level” to block the linebacker.

This is important because, as I said before, Saban likes to use three or sometimes four man fronts, while Spence likes to put extra tight ends on the field to create more opportunities for uncovered linemen to get combination blocks.

But what makes Spence’s run game a bit different is that he, in conjunction with the zone running game, runs a number of traps and counter plays. These are excellent complements to the zone running game because they can be used to counteract aggressive defenders by trapping and countering them and they rely often on misdirection and a numerical advantage rather than simply finding running lanes and getting double teams. Below is an example of the kind of common counter play to a two-tight end set that Spence favors.

When Spence throws downfield he tries to put his QB in position to succeed, and to do that he effectively uses play-action passing. Below is an example of the kind of simple play-action route with big play potential that Clemson has effectively used in the past. It is a double skinny-post or “glance” play where the QB fakes a run play (the zone, counter, or draw) and then reads the rotation of the free safety. If the Free Safety stays weak he will work to the Z’s side and if the Free Safety works strong he will work to the weak side.

A good QB will manipulate this player with his eyes. From there he just works a simple 1-2-3 progression. (Here I didn’t draw it up but the idea is to get the flat defender to widen to open up a throwing lane for the skinny post while holding the inside linebackers with the play-action fake.)

Moreover, Spence still knows how to spread it out. See below for a clip of some of Clemson’s five-wide routes and protections from a five-wide look.

Finally, the other thing that makes Spence unique is his willingness to try gadgets and tricks. Clemson runs lots of reverses, fake reverses, jet sweeps, and the like. The thing to realize is that very often all Spence is doing is telling a receiver to come around on a fake reverse while the rest of the offense simply executes the counter play I diagrammed above. Then the next time they will hand it to the guy on the reverse, but Spence makes it simple on his guys by telling his linemen to block the same as on a sweep or outside option play.

There’s no doubt that Spence has been successful in showing lots of things while keeping it simple: he must be, or else his kids wouldn’t be able to execute it.

The Matchup

So what will the matchup look like? That’s hard to say. It’s both teams’ first game, so I wouldn’t expect an extensive opponent-specific gameplan. And, as I’ve indicated, neither Spence nor Saban are easy to prepare for. I would expect Saban to follow along with the philosophy outlined in the statement quoted above: he’ll try to stop the run on first and second down and force Clemson into known passing situations, where he can more readily spring his traps. The tests for Alabama will be whether they can stop the run on first and second down and second whether Alabama’s pass defenders can play man like Saban wants them to.

Spence will do a lot of probing of the fronts early to try look for weak spots and to spring his runners, and he will try to avoid having his QB have do a lot of pure five-step dropback throws in known passing situations. To avoid Alabama’s pressure he’ll have to do the usual assortment of screens, quicks, action passes, and draws and traps to deter and defeat the pressure
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Who wins will likely depend on who executes these schemes the best, rather than simply who outfoxes the other. Nonetheless, it should be a good cat and mouse game.

(Postscript: I want to thank and acknowledge Hemlock for some valuable insights on Rob Spence and Spence’s offense.)

Smart Football is brilliant, and reminds you that your “spatial logic” scores are shameful.

The clock is running out on tree-sitting protesters in Berkeley: today is the deadline for a lawsuit filed to keep the University from building a training facility on a wooded site adjacent to Cal’s football stadium, a minor, patchouli-scented drama extending back to last last fall when the facility was proposed and the last fifty-three hippies on the planet climbed into the trees to protest their proposed removal.

The issue at stake in the lawsuit (the actual, relevant, and legal part of this whole endeavor, not the poorly groomed jobless people in trees) is the construction of the training facility on a fault line, a minor detail since a.) the entire state of California sits on a fault line that could be opened wide with a single nuclear weapon (Superman can’t be wrong), and b.) Cal’s stadium that it fills with people several Saturdays a year is already on said fault line.

The deadline to settle the lawsuit expires today, meaning Cal can forge ahead with construction as soon as they remove the protesters from the trees, which they received permission to do back in October anyway. The tree-sitters confirmed our suspicions that the Ewoks must have been asshole upstairs neighbors when one, while being removed by arborists from the site, threw urine on the crew working on the site before biting one of them, as well.

Proving another point: throwing urine remains a universally ineffective rhetorical device. Now, urinating on someone? Totally different, and somewhat effective in limited cases, if countless Calvin window decals are to be believed.

Brilliant call to blitz there? Yes. A play likely to fail anyway? Also, yes, thanks to the joy that only sports mathematics can bring.

RockMNation’s been working on the numbers, and while this may strike you as “Man on Moon” quality stuff, we’re all behind empiricism in even its tiniest forms. (We have timed the best ways to get our gym, up to and including complex variations on how to avoid a particularly thorny set of railroad tracks. There’s flow charts and everything. No, the medication is NOT working.)

The Sabermetric-type methodology does add numerical backbone to what you had previously assumed to be true just because some man who’d spend a lot of time in Bike shorts had told you: that getting into third and long is real bad in numerically demonstrable ways, and that yards gained closer to the goal line remain far valuable than yards gained far away from your own goal line. SMQ concludes:

I welcome this, personally, as an empirical base that bolsters my usual emphasis on keeping the entire playbook open: outside of talent, predictability is the number one killer of offenses, and defenses that stop the run and make offenses one-dimensional are, well, see above.

To invert this, though: what does this say about defensive strategy? Given the propensity of most offenses to view first down as a running down, why not run blitz four first downs out of five? And just hang back on third down and rush three? The number of drinks we’ve crushed in our hand* watching a defense lay back on third down only to give up a square in remains countless, but given the numbers, isn’t that the safest bet against most passing sets, since most offenses will, when dared to save themselves with a pass, drop the elephant gun of probability and blow their own head off?

It’s testament more to the gnat’s attention span of our own brain and, we suppose, most fans in that you don’t remember when the mathematically probable strategy works. We saw an interview with Norm Chow once where, in discussing play design, he said the most important thing he could emphasize was humility. “You don’t know what’s coming. You can’t.” Humility, for him, meant understanding that the most important down was first down, and that your play design had to have the kind of flexibility built into it to mitigate chaos hurtling in from the defensive side.

On the defensive side, the howling void of probability and numbers may be even more daunting. On third down, the offense might have some ideas on how to craft a play to beat several defenses, drawing up routes to accommodate two or three possibilities. However, the “success” or “failure” of a particular defense may be even more arbitrary, as the offense could grant you a freebie due to incompetence no matter the call. The defense can grant the same to the offense on third down, sure, but the chances are lower since, by assignment, the defense is less flexible on a passing down than the offense.

So, if you’re curious as to the practical applications of this, go to a casino. Do you have “a system” for beating the roulette table? Have you really convinced yourself that you have a statistical advantage over the dealer at a blackjack table? Do you sit at the table nervously, speaking to no one and trying to remember what that important bit of verbiage on re-raise bets was from page 37 of Doyle Brunson’s Super System? Congratulations, your football sign is offensive coordinator. You are doomed to misery and a lifetime of hand infections from writing too many plays down with an ungloved hand. Enjoy.

If you are doubling down on a pair of twos, garrulously chatting to everyone within earshot, and double-fisting drinks even though the cards are getting blurry and you don’t recall where you put your last three thousand dollars…well, congratulations to you, too. You are a defensive coordinator by temperament. Look forward to being fired for giving up 3rd and 16 despite winning a conference title with the exact same blitz package three years earlier. Either way, feel free to get your yaw-yaw on, you blitzmeister you.

*Plastic cups only, of course. If our hands could crush fine crystal and glass, we’d be out making ducats on the Professional Arm Wrestling circuit–in between stints as a long-distance trucker trying to win back the love of his son.