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Post by blueswarm on Mar 14, 2012 22:24:59 GMT -6
I really didn't know what to title this post, so hopefully people read it and it brings out some good discussion. I recently went and spent some time with a coach who has been very successful at all levels of HS and has won multiple state championships (BTW, he just happens to be a rival coach in our league, but he has been very good over the last two years of talking football). He was very good to talk to and was not secretive at all with anything we asked him. I share his philosophy because even though I am a young coach I love talking football and I believe most good coaches can get most of what they need by properly breaking down film. One of the topics that came up was how they prepare their offense during the week. The topic came up because they lost in the Semis this year to the team that won the state championship and the DC of the opposing team had spoke at a clinic and said that they had "really schemed them up" and that's how they were able to beat them. Anyway, he started laughing and said that they were not schemed up because of the way they prepare each week offensively. He showed me two binders- one of even fronts and one of odd fronts. In it he said he had a drawing of every front and blitz combo he had ever seen (he had 3, 4, 5, and 6 man fronts) and that when they prepare for a team in their run and pass game, they don't prepare especially for the scheme they plan to see, they prepare against everything from the books. When they make their practice schedules they just script a different call each play and never see the same scheme twice in one practice. At the end of practice, if they have trouble with something, they go back over it to re-inforce how they should block it. He says that they do this starting in spring ball, through the summer and all season long. He said early in the season, they may not block things well because they are seeing so much in practice, but their whole goal is winning state championships so by the time playoffs come around, they have seen it all and have practiced it all season long. He says that it really cuts down on their surprises on Friday nights and that they have no issues blocking things because they have seen it all.
My question for all of you guys is have any of you seen or done this yourself. After talking to my staff we are debating doing the same thing. There are some aspects of it that make it seem like a great idea, but there may be some issues (some would argue that you may not be as good as you could be against a defense because you have seen so much) but by the end of the year it would be hard to deny that you could make adjustments much easier because there really are no surprises. What do you guys think? I am curious to hear your responses.
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Post by bigm0073 on Mar 15, 2012 6:51:26 GMT -6
In August - Summer we scheme offensively against the following fronts
4-3 / 4-4 - Even
3-4/ 5-2 - Odd
3-3 / 5-3 - Odd Stack
Under/Eagle
Bear
We do rep this is well. We actually start this in the spring (right now) and do it through the summer.
When we play against an established program/defense we will go off our breakdown and what they have done in the past.
When we play against a "Slappy" DC That is blitz/slant happy with a lot of man coverage and does the defense of the week thing we give the offense ALL KINDS of CRAZY scenarios. Prepare them for these worst case scenarios in practice so in the game they are ready.
I would say on our schedule there about 2-3 teams that will jump around and play the "defense of the week".
First 6 games of the season we will see it all
5-2 / 3-4 Odd
4-3/5-2 Under/Eagle
Bear sprinkles in...
We have to be ready for it all...
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Post by jgordon1 on Mar 15, 2012 9:07:26 GMT -6
Although we do practice against many fronts, we try to teach a "concept" approach...This, IMO, eliminates different things defenses can do to you..we teach a common language so kids are blocking looks...so when a kid comes off the field, I can ask him was it, red or white..he says coach it was white, now I can correct hiim in a common language that we have been using from day one.. for instance, if we are running power and you are the play side guard..its red duece, or white down
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Post by veerman on Mar 15, 2012 9:58:34 GMT -6
We have done something similar when running option. We practiced against different fronts and looks all wee from spring, cause the same as the coach said, you never know what your going to get.
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Post by fantom on Mar 15, 2012 10:03:35 GMT -6
Defensively we do something similar. We have a short Adjustments period in which we quickly have the defense adjust to the different looks that we expect to see. Instead of drawing up each formation each week we have an formations book with just about every formation that can be run. I just give the scout team coach a list of the card numbers that I want to see and we're off.
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Post by wingtol on Mar 15, 2012 10:18:50 GMT -6
We try and keep it as close to what we think they are gonna throw at us during the game. Now of course we get some crazy stuff every now and then, but that is why we use a system of rules for each play. Add in a few calls for situations where the rules get a bit cloudy and we feel pretty confidant going against most fronts/d's we see. No need to throw the kitchen sink at them each week IMO.
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Post by coachwoodall on Mar 15, 2012 11:01:42 GMT -6
Defense, we do a formation period every week, even if it isn't something we have seen on film.
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Post by fantom on Mar 15, 2012 11:35:28 GMT -6
Defense, we do a formation period every week, even if it isn't something we have seen on film. Yeah, we'll always throw in an empty and an unbalanced even if we haven't seen it on film. |
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Post by coachwoodall on Mar 15, 2012 11:39:27 GMT -6
We throw in any kind of formation we might have seen in the last 10 years, just so they can't do a 'gotcha'. Base look verses ______ and the coverage behind it.
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Post by gdf on Mar 15, 2012 13:31:36 GMT -6
We're a DW offense that bases 95% out of DBL TE. We take a somewhat similar approach due to the fact that we often see something different than a teams base look. Typically teams will get into a 6-3, 7-2, or 5-4 look. These are the 3 looks we rep for a majority of our offensive prep. We especially like this against new opponents. Obviously we're able to do this based our limited use of formations, but I do like the strategy.
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Post by Chris Clement on Mar 15, 2012 20:05:55 GMT -6
Back to the OP, that sounds like a huge burden on your scout team. I throw the kitchen sink at our offense because it's either a wonky youth league or the nearest opponent is two hours away. But it isn't super organized like that, I just give a lot of freedom to do wacky things once were ready to face the basics.
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Post by blueswarm on Mar 15, 2012 22:11:26 GMT -6
The coach I talked to said that when they are running their offense against all the looks, they have the base calls already in their defense, so they are essentially running their defense out of many different looks. They are a 4 front team, but they have a 3 front package so it is fairly easy to get into a 5 or 6 out of a base 3 or 4 look. Then, adding the blitzes or DL movements, they just call their own stuff. So, they never actually use cards, they just have one coach with a script and he calls the defensive call vs the offensive play they will be running and he says it works for them. They have had a ton of success so it makes me wonder if there is something to it.
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Post by blueswarm on Mar 15, 2012 22:13:04 GMT -6
big m and fantom:
Do you guys have scout cards with all of the different possibilities or how do you run that? Curious how you guys do it compared to the coach we talked to.
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Post by fantom on Mar 15, 2012 22:18:13 GMT -6
big m and fantom: Do you guys have scout cards with all of the different possibilities or how do you run that? Curious how you guys do it compared to the coach we talked to. We use cards all the time. There are reasons they're on scout team and one reason is that they don't know their plays or defenses. I certainly wouldn't trust them to remember somebody else's plays. |
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Post by blueswarm on Mar 15, 2012 22:37:26 GMT -6
fantom,
I didn't mean to make it seem like a stupid question. I actually misread your post. I thought you were talking about it from your offensive perspective! Thanks. I got it now.
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turney
Junior Member
Spread'em and Shread'em[F4:coachturney]
Posts: 279
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Post by turney on Mar 15, 2012 22:40:41 GMT -6
Very rarely has a team linked up the way I thought they would. When they do it's bc they know they are better and don't need to out scheme themselves. So when we show up Friday only to see something we hadn't prepared for our kids pee down their leg.
I like this! I like it a lot but think I would mix in a little more of what I think I'll see. Maybe 30%.
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