In praise of the Spread

I hope you all were watching the NFL Network yesterday evening. Around 6:00pm they were showing the NFL's Top 10 Innovations. I had seen the documentary last year, but this was the first time since then. I found it intensely annoying. It's not that it was a bad piece. It's not that the list was out of whack. It's not the guest commentators on the show. Rather, I was pissed at the tremendous two-faced duplicity of the many voices we hear on the NFL Network. This documentary exposed the tremendous Janus face of the commentators on the NFL Network.

Let's begin the case for conviction with the list of the top 10 innovations:

1. The Zone Blitz
2. The West Coast Offense
3. The 4-3 defense
4. The Shotgun formation
5. The 46 defense
6. The No-Huddle Offense
7. The 3-4 Defense
8. The Run-N-Shoot offense
9. The Tampa-2 defense
10. The Wildcat formation

The innovations are evenly split between offense and defense, five each. If we remove the defensive innovations, what does this list look like.

1. The West Coast Offense
2. The Shotgun
3. The No-Huddle
4. The Run-N-Shoot
5. The Wildcat

When you put them all together, what do you have? The Spread-Option offense Flordia has been running for 4 years. Tim Tebow has been the exclusive premier pilot of this scheme for the past 3 seasons. Some would say all four.

I won't have to explain that statement to anyone who knows football. A knowledgeable football fan might already know this. Other knowledgeable football fans might suddenly have the "AH-HA!" experience and put it all together for the first time. For the sake of those who do not understand, allow me to illuminate you further.

What is the key hallmark of each of these innovations?

1. The West Coast Offense: Dink-n-dunk, nickle-n-dime short passes. It is a ball-control passing attack. The emphasis is on the short pass substituting for the run. You don't run through the brick wall. You let your running backs take 4 or 5 strides, catch the ball and run with it. There is a strong tendency to script play sequences and for receivers to run adaptive routes.
2. The Shotgun: The quarterback lines up 5-7 yards behind the center and takes a long snap. This avoids the drop back, and gives the QB better immediate view of the defense.
3. The No-Huddle: The offense runs without a huddle, calling plays at the line of scrimmage, largely predicated on the defensive formations. The offense moves at double-time or faster. The defense is not allowed to make situational substitutions.
4. The Run-N-Shoot: The quarterback lines up under center most of the time with one back behind him. He has 4 WR in a balanced formation, and no TE. The receivers run flexible and adaptive routs based on what coverage they see. The notion is to stretch the defense vertically and horizontally and make them defense a 60 yard box.
5. The Wildcat: A running back lines up in the shotgun behind the center with two running backs lined up on the wings of the OL. One RB goes in motion across the field. The RB who takes the snap has the option to run the ball himself, or hand off to the motion RB, or the jet RB. This is the old single-wing formation with an option running attack.

There is just one bit of confusion that needs to be cleared up: The classic Run-N-Shoot was executed with Warren Moon under center at almost all times. The Oilers also called plays in the huddle. It became the RedGun when Jerry Glanville decided Chris Miller should line up in the shotgun most of the time, run without a huddle, and call plays at the line.

The commentators were absolutely clear that the Run-N-Shoot is still in the league. They even tagged the Patriots with running this offense. Clear associations exist with the Bengals of 1988, the Bills of the 1990s, the Patriots of today, the Colts of today, the Steelers of today, the Cardinals of yesterday, and current world champion Saints. I would tell you that all these teams are using the Spread, but they simply substitute a Tight End for 1 receiver with much greater frequency. They use the TE to chip the blind-side DE. The Florida Gators did that also.

So where is the duplicity? All of these things are labeled the NFL's Top 10 innovations. It is reasonable to say this because they are in use every Sunday by nearly every team. All of these things have become ubiquitous. They also happen to be the components out of which the Spread is assembled. The Spread is allegedly a college offense, not a legitimate pro offense, and one which causes great difficulties for young quarterbacks coming into the NFL. The Shotgun Zebra is everywhere you look in the NFL. Everybody is doing it, but because you mask it in West Coast terminology, nobody accepts the fact that this is a slightly modified Spread.

Spread kids have been using the NFL's Top 10 innovations for years! They are using the same elements of offense we see every Sunday in the NFL! They have run offenses very similar to those run by the Patriots, Steelers, Colts, Cardinals, and Saints!?!?!?! These are a bunch of our recent Super Bowl teams.

Just the other day, I heard Petros and Money complaining, with respect to the overtime rules, that the NFL likes to posture itself in a highly elitist stance. They do not wish to adopt the college rules for overtime because that may bust the 3 hour window, but more importantly, they do not want to be seen as copying the innovation of the NCAA rules committee. This could potentially damage the NFL's elitist posture.

I want to tell all the voices on the NFL Network the following: You can't have it both ways. If the list above constitutes the NFL's Top 10 innovations, then Spread QBs are using your offensive innovations, and they are a lot more NFL ready than you say they are. They are using a fully-authentic NFL offensive scheme. You just don't want to admit it because of your elitist posture.

On the other hand, if the list above does not contain the NFL's Top 10 Innovations, you better shoot Steve Sabol and burn the digital masters of that documentary.

I want to throw a shout-out to Bill Devaney and Steve Spagnuolo: Why do we not adopt the modified version of the Spread that these recent Super Bowl teams are using? It allows a mobile and athletic QB to run when he has too, as in the Wildcat. It confronts the defense with 4 spread-out receivers (make one a blindside TE and let him chip). They run adaptive routes as in the West Coast and the Run-N-Shoot. You hit'em where they ain't. The QB lines up the shotgun, a formation Don Banks of Sports Illustrated can see no downside in. You can control the ball by throwing short as in the West Coast.

Mike Leach did all of this at Texas Tech. I have a good idea! How about if we fire Pat Shurmer and sign Mike Leach as our new offensive coordinator. Michael Vick and Tim Tebow will prosper under his administration. We will also score a hell of a lot more than 10.9 points per game.

Quick Blog about the NFL's Top 10 Innovations

So the NFL Network unveiled another masterpiece just last night: The NFL's top 10 innovations. For the record, those elements of the game listed as innovations are as follows:

1. The Zone Blitz
2. The West Coast Offense
3. The 4-3 defense
4. The Shotgun
5. The 46 Defense
6. The No Huddle Offense
7. The 3-4 Defense
8. The Run 'N Shoot Offense
9. The Tampa 2
10. The Wildcat Offense

So, here we have a laundry list of all the things we see on any given Sunday these days. As always I have a couple little quibbles with this ranking:

1. The 4-3 and the Tamp 2 are almost the same thing. The only minor adjustment is that you drop two DBs deep to ensure nobody gets behind you, and the MLB drops back and guards the middle zone of the field.
2. The Tamp 2 should be called the Steel Curtain defense. It was invented by Chuck Knoll. Tony Dungy learned it when he joined the Steelers in 1978. Dungy himself has always credited the Steelers & Knoll with inventing the scheme.
3. The 46 Defense is almost the same thing as the 4-3 defense. You merely adjust the lineup of the defensive linemen, and shift the Will and Sam linebackers over to one side.
4. The 46 Defense can't really be considered an innovation because it was more a crew of men in Chicago than a working scheme. It is said that Buddy Ryan was able to implement this scheme in Philly and Arizona. I deny that. The Philly defense was different in every respect. It was a 3-4 defense. The Arizona Cardinals never got that defense right at all. Ergo, you do not have an organized system of defense that is repeatable.
5. The 46 has not stood the test of time at all. Nobody plays this scheme anymore. As the documentary said, a certain dude named Joe Gibbs figured out how to block the thing. Also it did match well against the Run 'N Shoot at all. For those foolish enough to play 4 wide against the 46, touchdowns flowed quick and easy. You just needed a rugged QB who could take a hit.

Finally, I have to take serious issue with making the Zone Blitz the #1 innovation of all time. That's just one of those bizzaro things that make you ask "What the hell were they thinking?" Yes, it is a nice piece of trickeration. Yes, it is a recent innovation. Yes, it does mess with QBs big time.

No, the big Harrison play in the Super Bowl was not a Zone Blitz. James Harrison is an outside linebacker. It is not unusual for one of these guys to fake the blitz and drop back into coverage. I have seen this every year since 1979. If Harrison were a nose tackle pulling off the center of the line, and then made the big interception, that would have been the Zone Blitz. This is not what happened.

I am absolutely fucking amazed that the guys at NFL Films and the NFL Network promoted this play as the ultimate example of the Zone Blitz? What the fuck? Didn't you guys realize that this was a mistake?

Please, please, please don't try to tell me that this is the #1 innovation of all time because it won SB XLIII. You know that just isn't true. If the real motive is to get Dick LeBeau into the Hall of Fame, I am all in favor of it. Still, let's not make factually false statements to get him there.

One other comment: I really enjoyed the diagrams and the explanations. More please. More detail please. Diagram the plays for these schemes. Show us the common plays. You should have shown the people how the 49er triangle pattern works.