The 1980s San Francisco 49ers: The Air Force attacks

The 49ers are often credited with being the first truly dominant pass-first football team. They dominated through the air. This is very fitting, because they were absolutely dominated by air sign guys.

I prepared this chart just two days ago and was shocked by what I found. This just might be the most clear-cut case of general synastry I have ever seen... were it not for one little wrinkle in the backfield.

Folks, I lived through every last moment of the 49er Dynasty. I was around when the 49ers were a lousy 2-14 football team, drafting #1 in back to back seasons. I watched Bill Walsh put these guys together. I survived all 14 seasons in which they were in the contenders for the title.

I know this story pretty damn well, and yet the chart I present to you on this blog just put an entirely different spin on that history. I was pretty amazed by what I found here.

As it turns out Head Coach Bill Walsh is a Sagittarius. This is not normally considered a good leadership sign. It's more a philosopher and world traveler's sign. The archetype of Sagittarius is the Wizard. I guess he was a wizard philosopher of sorts.

In any case, Sagittarius Bill was magnetically attracted to a Gemini kid named Joe Montana in the 1979 draft. And why not? Sagittarius and Gemini are 180 degree opposites. Do I need to mention the synastry of opposites again? Still, most felt his attraction to the kid was unjustifiable.

Joe was a skinny kid who was never declared the regular full-time starter at Notre Dame. He was an erratic gunslinger backup who had a knack for coming off the bench and giving the team a spark. As is true with an assortment of college backups these days, nobody thought Joe Montana was NFL material.

Bill did, and he took him in the 3rd round. This created quite a bit of controversy at the time in the SF media. Most thought it was a throw away pick for a team that could not afford to throw away any picks.

Fortunately, there was another Gemini dude named Randy Cross there to greet Joe when he arrived, and Walsh wanted to build a team team around his pet student. This included Gemini Mike Holmgren as his chief and best offensive coordinator. Libras like Tom Rathman and Jerry Rice. It included Aquarius boys like Keith Fahnhorst, Fred Quillan, Guy McIntyre, and Brent Jones.

Incidentally, Jerry Rice had an opposite number in Aries John Taylor. It should be noted that Libra and Aries are 180 degree opposites. Usually, there is great synastry between them. I (for one) thought Jerry and John had sensational chemistry together. Working with an Aries is usually no problem for a Gemini like Joe Montana or a Libra like Steve Young. Fire and Air go together well.

The one big wrinkle in this whole picture is the MVP of the team: The Catfish Roger Craig. I often said he was the balls of their offense. Craig often dragged Joe's ass to victory. It wasn't the other way around. I used to say, a decade or two ago, that when the 49ers start going into Canton, Roger Craig better lead the way. He better be the first.

It's a damn shame they don't see it that way. There would have been no 49er dynasty without him.

So what about this lone Cancer kid amongst a bunch of Air boys? Well, Cancer is side by side with Gemini in the zodiac. They are friendly neighbor signs. Joe is a Gemini. So too is Mike Holmgren. We also have to remember that this was and is the ideal offense for the Catfish.

I excluded the 49er offensive linemen from my diagram because there were so many of them during their 14 quality years. This unit was completely torn down and rebuild during that time. I have already noted the presence of a significant number of Air sign guys on that line.

The most intriguing thing about all of this, for me, is his choice of coordinators. I think we all recognize that Mike Holmgren was Walsh's foremost disciple and best offensive coordinator. Of course, he is a Gemini. Walsh chose George Seifert as his defensive coordinator. Seifert just happens to be an Aquarius.

Clearly, Walsh picked his people. He picked guys who we would be comfortable working with. This meant a whole slew of Air guys.

This is yet another great evidence of elemental compatibility and what it can do for your football team.

Few men are qualified to evaluate the quarterback

Michael Lombardi has quoted Bill Walsh many times saying "Few men are qualified to evaluate the quarterback position. Even fewer are qualified to coach the position." We have established that Walsh was explicitly crapping on NFL talent scouts like Mel Kiper Jr when he said this.

Jeeeze! Why do you think a nice guy like Bill Walsh would say such a nasty thing like that about a guy like Mel Kiper Jr?

You know hind sight is 20/20. I think Bill was absolutely justified in saying this because over the 28 years of my study period we had:

• 38 first round QBs that absolutely went bust
• 22 first round QBs that made it
• 6 first round QBs that are middle-of-the-road cases, partial busts, partial success stories.
• 10 drafts in which no 1st round QBs were successful
• 32 ProBowl (or better) QBs selected outside the first round
• 4 undrafted QBs who turned into All-Pro guys

When you consider this stunning pile of facts, you have to wonder if somebody blind folded these scouts, spun them round-n-round, and put darts in their hands. The darts went all over the place. Dave's Law says that NFL QB success is randomly distributed with respect to talent scout grades.

This is not to mention the 9 QBs enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame who were not first rounders.

The history of successful quarterbacks in the NFL is a true bugbear for the NFL Talent Scout. Nothing proves the tremendous fallibility of Mel Kiper Jr. better than the success rate of QBs in the first round over the course of the past 30 or so seasons.

Now that we have categorically proven that these fine chaps (like Mel Kiper Jr.) do not know what the fuck they are talking about, let us now consider the 2010 NFL Draft.

Kiper tells us that Tim Tebow is not NFL Quarterback material. Kiper tells us that Jimmy Clausen is a pro-system kid who is (perhaps) the most NFL ready QB in the draft. In view of all the facts that I have sited above, are you inclined to believe him?

I for one, do not believe him. I believe he is absolutely and completely wrong about this. I believe he is 100% wrong with a 100% chance of being 100% wrong about this. I mean to tell you he has a 0.00% chance of being even 0.001% right about this juxtaposition. I mean dead wrong and not even remotely close to being right.

I can site a stunning record of error which impeaches Mel Kiper Jr.'s credibility completely.

The difference between West Coast and Air Coryell

So, one of the most persistent peeves I have as a football fan is the East Coast notion that Bill Walsh and Don Coryell were doing more or less the same thing. Not so. These are two different offensive philosophies. They have many things in common, but in the end, they are at loggerheads.

Let's start with commonalities

1. You throw to setup the run, you don't run to setup the pass.
2. You establish your passing game first. You don't establish your running game first.
3. You will substitute a short passing attack with your running backs for a standard conventional running attack.
4. You never attempt to run through a brick wall. You throw a short pass to go around the brick wall.
5. You pass early and often to get the lead. You defend that lead in the second half with a running attack that eats the clock in garbage time.
6. You use all 5 eligible receivers in the passing game. Every back on your team must have good to excellent hands.
7. There is a tendency to go with lighter, leaner, faster, more athletic offensive linemen
8. Receivers run complementary routes to clear defenders out of zones, and to create collisions between defensive players.
9. There is a strong focus on timing of routes. Both offenses expect receivers to be in a specific location within a specific interval of time. Both offenses require the QB to throw to a specific spot before the receiver is out of his break.

In the West Coast (Bill Walsh) offense, you will see the following things:

1. Short 3 step drops by the QB. Very few 7 step drops.
2. An East-West passing game rather than a North-South passing game.
3. The QB often throws the football before his receivers are finished with their breaks.
4. The offensive line must provide excellent protection for the QB, but not for long.
5. The Quarterback frequently has a specific (low) time limit in which he must throw the football. This is most often a three count. It can be longer.
6. There is always an outlet or dump-off receiver that the quarterback can throw to if he is under pressure. This is frequently a running back to his throwing-arm side.
7. The terminal point for most routes is within 15 yards of the line of scrimmage.
8. The favorite routes are quick slants, shallow crosses, dump-offs, half-back screens up the middle, flanker screens,
9. Receivers have a route tree which determines the routes they can run based on their position in the formation.
10. Receivers and Quarterbacks are expected to read and identify coverages. Receivers can adjust both depth of the pattern and the pattern itself based on the defensive coverage they are facing. The quarterback must read according to the same set of rules and correctly predict where the receiver will go.
11. The absolute idea is a ball-control passing attack, which advances slowly through the air. It chews up yards and minutes. You create many one-on-one collisions between running backs and defensive backs. You beat up the secondary with this form of short passing so you can throw deep later if necessary.
12. There are a few key phrases that have been used to describe Walsh's offense. Nick & Dime. Dink & Dunk. Continuation of the run by other means. Pass-first. Conservative pass-first. Low-risk passing attack. Ball-control passing attack. High efficiency passing attack.

The Gilman/Coryell/Martz style of offense is different in a number of ways.

1. The first element of Air Coryell is the bomb. You go deep, break off large chunks of yardage, and stab the defense in the heart.
2. You throw Noth and South, not East and West.
3. It not about ball control. Its about explosive plays gaining more than 25 yards per pop.
4. An ideal Air Coryell drive is no more than 3 plays long, and will cover 80 to 90 yards.
5. You force the safeties to drop deep and prevent the big pass.
6. You use motion and formation to construct mismatches.
7. The objective is to put your biggest play makers against the weakest links of the defense.
8. In the final analysis the objective is to put the ball in the hands of your biggest play makers, and let them run with the ball.
9. The system is extremely player-centric. What you do is going to be predicated on the players you have.
10. There are a lot of 5 and 7 step drops.
11. What you like to do is highly predicated on the sort of players you have, the sort of mismatches you think you can create.

In the final analysis, I would tell you that Walsh's system is much more an organized system of football that is very formulaic. A West Coast offense team will play week after week with basically the same offensive game plan. Because the passing plays themselves are loaded with adaptive option routes, the change per coverage and adjustment to defense should always happen automatically... unless the defense has something really special in mind for you.

Air Coryell is much less an organized system of football, and much more an offensive philosophy explaining how you should make aggressive use of absolutely fantastic play makers, and exploit weaknesses in the enemy defenses. In the West Coast system, you take absolutely fantastic playmakers like Jerry Rice, Sterling Sharp, Shannon Sharp, John Taylor, Rod Smith, Terrel Davis, Terrel Owens, Roger Craig, Ricky Waters, etc. and you do almost the same things with them. The system rules. The system dictates to the players. The better the players, the better the results the system produces, but they must execute according to the system. Air Coryell is different. The system is rubbery, and plasticy, and will change to maximally exploit the skills of different groups play makers. The more devastating the group of play makers, the aggressive the attack shots get.

Consider the Rams the Chargers. The Greatest Show on Turf and Air Coryell are the two greatest implementations of the system we have seen {unless you want to talk about the 1950s Rams under UCLA Bruin & Hall of Famer Bobby Waterfield}. While they were brothers under the skin, they were different in many ways. I think it is reasonable to say that Kellen Winslow was Dan Foutes' biggest play maker, and his favorite target. As such, the tight end was an absolutely massive factor in the Don Coryell's scheme. On the other hand, the tight end was not such an important factor in Mike Martz's scheme in St. Louis. Roland Williams was a nice tight end, but he was not Kellen Winslow. Rather, much of the focus was on Marshall Faulk, as he was the biggest play maker on a team loaded with lethal weapons. Muncie and Brooks combined output never matched the 2,429 yards that Marshall Faulk produced in 1999.

There are some other system-oriented things. Martz's playbook relies on a Numbers System for nomenclature. The West Coast relies on code names for formations and route numbers for receivers. So you have Base, Tiger, Zebra, Eagle describing the personnel on the field. You use colors like Brown, Blue and Green to describe variations of formation. You use numbers like 69 or 54 to describe the routes your primary and secondary receivers should run. Each route has a number. The larger the number, the deeper the route. Even numbers go out of bounds towards the sidelines. Odd numbers go in towards the center of the field. So, the key point is the language of the play is different.

The NFL's Top 10 myths

As I said before I love the Top 10 series.  I usually agree with most of the list.  I may feel this guy or that thing is a bit over or under-rated, but I agree with the list as a whole.  The experts interviewed are usually frank about the controveries, so disagreements & arguments are covered well.

Never, never, never in my life have a I so vehemently diagreed with a program as I did with the Top 10 Myths.  That list was mostly bullshit.  The top two (2) so-called myths were absolute and complete bullshit.  They were controversial points on film.  The experts interviewed for the program vehemently disputed these points.  Some were for it.  Some were against it.

For the purpose of this Blog entry, I want to focus on the #1 so-called myth:  The Prevent Defense prevents you from winning.  This saying has been an axiom for years now.  Just about all NFL fans feel this way.  Most veteran defenders feel this way also.  How in fucking hell did Sabol and company managed to identify this great hueristic truth as a myth?

I want to clarify exactly why this is not a myth.  I also want to explore why this may have been a case of unqualified confusion.

What is the Prevent Defense?

The PD is a special defensive package and strategy that some head coaches and defensive coordinaters have favored through time.  When you get a big lead, say 14 to 17 points, you change your defensive formation and objectives.  

1. You rush 3 men.  

2. You drop 8 men into pass coverage

3. The 8 men in coverage play a soft-zone.

4. You make sure two of those 8 men and super-deep.  All the way back in the end-zone, perhaps.

5. You try to guard the sidelines and prevent ball carriers from getting out of bounds.

6. You never allow a deep pass.

7. You concede 6, 7 or 8 yard gains in the middle of the field.

8. You hit hard and tackle immediately.

9. You force the enemy to creep down field with the clock running

10. You inflict punishment, and try to create a turn-over.

This is the strategy of the Prevent Defense.  Conceptually, it all seems very sound.  Although it had been seen before, it was deployed massively in the aftermath of the 1978 rules changes.  Those rule changes created an offensive explosion, especially in Pittsburg, Dallas, and San Diego.  Even the Rams began to throw the ball deep in 1980 with Vince Ferragamo.  Before this we were a ground chuck offense.

In those days, teams were deathly afraid of the bomb, especially at the end of the game.  The bomb in the 4th quarter was feared because it could quickly bring you back from a sizable deficit.  Let's not forget how the Rams were defeated by the Steelers in 4th quarter of Super Bowl XIV.  Two big 60-prevent-slot-hook-and-goes to John Stallworth won the game for the Steelers.  Stallworth should have been the MVP.

Ergo, the prevent defense was praised in the late 1970s and early 1980s as a very wise, sound and conservative defensive package for the deep 4th quarter.  Typically, teams with a lead would play this package in the last 5 to 7 minutes of the game... if they had a good lead.

But history takes its turns.  A funny little thing happened in 1981 which shot the prevent defense to fucking hell, and some rationalist/anti-empircal fans and coaches still haven't noticed it to this day.  That funny little thing was called the 49er West Coast Offense.

I have found that most people don't understand the West Coast Offense at all.  It is completely misunderstood and mischaracterized by almost everyone as a high-flying and high-scoring offense.  Well... it may be efficient and high scoring (sometimes) but high-flying it ain't.  Especially not in the begining of time when Bill Walsh invented it and Joe Montana was running it.

The West Coast Offense is a piece of pure trickeration.  The objective is to fake the pass on almost every play.  Most of the time, you send two recievers deep to the endzone.  The QB looks deep.  The defense reads the QB and reacts.  The QB checks down to a running back (like Roger Craig, Tom Rathman, Edger Bennett, Dorsey Levens or Michael Westbrook).  The pass covers 4 to 8 total yards in the air.  The running back makes the catch at the line of scrimmage near the sideline.  It looks more like a latteral than a pass, even though it is a forward pass.  The running back runs through a stretched defensive field.  The back can almost always get 4 to 8 yards on such a play.  You use the short pass just like a long hand-off.  You use the short passing game just like the run.  Every play is a delayed hand off.  Every play is a draw.  Every play is a screen pass.  There were three questions to be answered by Walsh in this experiment.  Can the short pass completely replace the running attack?  Can we control the ball and march to a score consistently this way?  Can the short pass setup the long pass?

Basically, Walsh and Montana were able to answer Yes, Yes, and Maybe to those three questions.  It was a revolutionary offense for the mad-bomber era.  The 49ers controlled the ball by passing.  You couldn't sack Joe because he didn't hold the ball long.  He wanted to go short anyhow.  You didn't bother to stop the sort pass, because you wanted to prevent the bomb.  Nobody seemed to notice that Joe had no notion at all of going deep. The deep pattern was just there for deception.  25 yards was a deep pass for Joe Montana.  The 49ers beat up a defense making them run back in coverage and run forward to tackle the running back.  They kept their defense off the field too.  Everything worked.

There was another thing that nobody noticed:  The West Coast Offense utterly destroys the Prevent Defense.  The West Coast Offense is absolutely designed to take that which the Prevent Defense was absolutely designed to concede.  Therefore you put fullness against emptiness.  You telligraph a fastball to a fastball hitter.  It is like a penis penetrating a vagina.  The two were made for each other.  The Prevent Defense is pure pussy for the West Coast Offense.  The stupiest fucking thing any coach could ever attempt to do is run a Prevent Defense against the West Coast Offense for the last 7 minutes of the game.  That is enough time for 2 touchdowns.

But wait, isn't the goal to make the offense complete passes in the center of the field?  Don't we guard the sidelines?  You just fucking try it against these guys!  You just try to keep Craig and Rathman in-bounds when they catch the ball near the sidelines and know they have to get out of bounds to stop the clock.  For the Prevent theorists, life a beautiful theory, ruined by an ugly fact.  The fact of the matter is that very few teams had the sort of linebackers and corners you need to power-slam these kinds of athletes immediately in this situation (remember we're in the prevent).  The Giants and the Bears were two such teams in the 1980s.  The Cowboys were such a team in 1990s.

I don't know how many times my Rams lost to the 49ers in the 1980s when we had a lead on them with 4 or 5 minutes to go.  It happened at least 6 or 7 times.  It happened specifically because Coach John Robinson was a major advocate of the Prevent Defense (it worked at USC, didn't it?) and he loved to run it in the last 5 to 7 minutes of the game.  The Rams might be leading 19-13 with 4 minutes left.  We were willing to concede a field goal, but we didn't want to give up the 7. The 49ers were frustrated.  We bottled Joe all game long.  Then suddenly, after 56 minutes of frustration, Joe gets hot.  He completes everything he throws to Craig, Francis, Franks, Jones, and Rice.  The prevent defense concedes 4 to 8 yards every play.  With horses like Roger Craig, Tom Rathman, and Jerry Rice, they stretch that figure to 12 or 13 yards per play.  They score with 21 seconds left.  We can't comeback running the football with Eric Dickerson.  The situation was too pressure-packed for Jim Everett.  It goes down in the record books as another 2 minute drive for Joe Cool.  

Nope!  Not true!  John Robinson just served up some pure pussy to Bill Walsh.  Bill enjoyed it well.  The West Coast Offense utterly destroys the Prevent Defense.

We Ram-fans weren't the only ones victemized by this stupidity.  The 1983 Redskins almost lost the NFC championship to the 49ers in a very similar fashion.  After inflicting a defensive thumping on Montana through 3 quarters, they thought he was dead.  They went to the Prevent, and Joe got really hot.  They were lucky they profitted from some dastardly-bad calls against the 49ers.  They were lucky Rigg-o could run out the clock for them.  The Diesel won that game.  There were many, many other cases like this.

This is when the chorus began to rise from fans and coaches alike.  This is when we began to chant "The Prevent Defense only prevents you from winning." This only got louder as guys like Wyche, Holmgren, Shanahan, Green, and Gruden started coaching.  I'll tell you now:  All these guys loved it when Marty Schottenheimer ran the Prevent.  This why Marty Schottenheimer never won a single playoff game... except for the two Joe Montana QB'd for him in Kansas City.

Let's face the facts folks:  Nobody plays the West Coast as Walsh once did.  That scheme has evolved out of necessity.  The old methodology doesn't work now.  Defensive Coordinators now know they have to stop the creeping death.  They know they have to challange the short passing game.  They are certain it is leathal if left untreated.  Still, the West Coast is a part of every single one of the 32 offensive playbooks in the NFL now.  Every team has adopted the most successful aspects of this gameplan.  Almost every team uses it (at least a little) each and every Sunday.

If the DC goes to a Prevent, the enemy OC is happy to reply with the West Coast.  The West Coast dominates the Prevent.  Every single year we see several games where some stupid DC tried to go to the Prevent way to early.  In reply, the enemy OC quickly deploys the West Coast.  The result is a come-from-behind victory for the team that profitted from the stupidity of the Prevent. 

This is why we still say the Prevent Defense only prevents you from winning.  The so-called myth is not a myth, and I don't give a fuck if my favorite coach Dick Vermeil takes the other side.  I will remind you that Super Bowl XXXIV was closer than it had to be, and we weren't exactly playing a pure prevent.

There is only one situation where you should ever play the Prevent.  This is in the final 15 seconds of the game when you have a lead greater than 3 points.  Never, never, never use it any sooner than this.