Coach Vass Fundraiser

A great thing about being a Coach is the fraternity of coaches that exist to help one another and take care of each other. One of our brothers, Coach Vass, could use some help to pay for his Mom's funeral expenses.  Coach Vass has done so much to help other coaches with his podcast and the online clinics that he does.  Please consider helping out.  God bless and Happy New Year 2020.

NCAA Analytics - Adjusted Yards Per Play - 10/11/19

A book called, Football by the Numbers, 1986, said that Total Offense and Total Defense were not the best statistics for determining which Offense or Defense was actually the best. The authors, George Ignatin and Allen Berra, determined that an Interception was worth -50 yards in field position and a Fumble was worth -40 yards (Int's are worth more since they are usually returned back for more yards than Fumbles). They took Total Offense/Defense minus the 50 yards for each Interception and minus 40 yards for each Fumble, and then divided that by the Number of Plays. This gave the value of Adjusted Yards per Play.

2019 Purdue Offense vs. TCU Defense

X & O geeks have been waiting all off-season for this match-up between two of the best in the business: Purdue's Jeff Brohm and the nation's top passing Offense vs. TCU's Gary Patterson and his 4-2-5 Defense.  It will be a classic Offense vs. Defense chess match extraordinaire.  

Play-Action H-Sneak Throwback

A nice Red-Zone play to have in your back pocket for a big game is the Play-Action H-Sneak Throwback.  The play starts out with a Play-Action fake and is designed to look like Waggle Smash to the frontside.  The X WR or the TE to the backside will run a Pin route and try to take both the Corner and the near Safety with him.  The Back will fake getting the hand-off and then slip through the line past the LB who will have him in man coverage in the Red Zone.  He will run a Wheel route and he is the first read for the QB.  

Power Screen

I am going to the other side of the ball and talk Offense for this post. One of the best looking Screens I have seen on film is the Power Screen. I haven’t seen much of the newer Purdue film, but I have studied a lot of Jeff Brohm’s Offense while at Western Kentucky and I think that is the best Screen team I have seen. They didn’t necessarily have the best playmakers but the timing, blocking, and execution was extremely crisp and their Offensive Linemen moved quickly to block 2nd and 3rd level defenders.

The Power action with the backside Guard pulling will change up your Screen blocking rules as opposed to the regular Tunnel Screen but it provides good misdirection vs. teams using their backside LB to chasing the pulling Guard on Power.  It is easy to run out of a 2x2 look but it can also be run to Trips as well as to the 1 WR side. 

Here is the play out of 2x2 vs. a standard 4-2-5 look with the Will LB just outside the box eyeing the boundary Slot WR.  The teaching to the skill guys is ridiculously simple.  The Back is set to the boundary and the QB and Back are faking Power.  The QB will fake the ball and throw it to the boundary Slot WR without any footwork.  The Slot WR will take one step and turn to the QB, catch it, and run.  The other WRs simply block the man in front of them.

Smoke Creeper/Simulated Pressure

I recently did a post on the Fire 3 Creeper/Simulated Pressure which is an edge pressure coming from the Field or wide-side.  Smoke is the same pressure from the Boundary, or short-side of the field.  I want to show Smoke being run from different Fronts, pre-snap looks, bluffs, and coverages to help coaches who are looking to install Creepers and Sim Pressures into their defensive package.

Creepers vs. Simulated Pressures

I have been studying Creepers and Simulated Pressures all summer, but I have to admit that I have not really known the difference between the two. These two similar concepts are not new to football but they are very new to the majority of us coaches who are looking to install them for the first time. There is little universal terminology in football but if we are to adopt some terminology, it might as well be from those who are the best in the business at using these concepts. LSU DC Dave Aranda and Alabama DC Pete Golding are two of the best at running these replacement pressures and they were both mentored by the same person, ULL DC Ron Roberts. I need to give a big thank you to the great @CoachRonRoberts for taking the time to helping me to learn the difference between the two. 

Both Creepers and Simulated Pressures are pressures that bring a 2nd or 3rd level defender, a LB or DB, in exchange for dropping a 1st level defender on the DL. These “extra safe” pressures only require 4 rushers and do not sacrifice coverage in pressuring Offenses. Also, Creepers can be either Man or Zone and Simulated Pressures can be either Man or Zone. 

Coach Vass

If you are not on twitter, I need to make you aware of the opportunities for growth as a football coach.  If you already are on twitter, then you are well aware that my man Chris Vasseur, @CoachVass, has absolutely crushed this off-season and is doing so much to help out other coaches.  He has put out some video pop-up clinics this on Periscope.  They are fantastic and you can check them out on his new website, coachvass.com.  He did a phenomenal series with USA Football called Deep Dive on Defense and his new podcast is called Make Defense Great Again.  He is interviewing some of the top coaches in the country and sharing a wealth of information to help coaches to get better.  He has had some amazing guests so far: ULL Defensive Coordinator Ron Roberts, Michigan Defensive Coordinator Don Brown, Mississippi State Head Coach Joe Moorhead, and more.

Fire 3 Creeper/Simulated Pressure

I want to go in-depth and talk about some of the specific Creepers and Simulated Pressures.    A Creeper or Simulated Pressure is a pressure that brings a non-traditional rusher (a LB or DB) in exchange for dropping a traditional rusher (DL).  The great thing about them is that they are “extra safe” pressures that do not require any additional rushers.  This means they do not sacrifice coverage in pressuring Offenses by getting to the QB and disrupting the run game. 

Most coaches are now becoming familiar with the idea of Creepers and Simulated Pressures, although they are not a new concept, as I have discovered in my research from my last article, Origin of Simulated Pressures.  I will talk about how to run these pressures from multiple fronts and from different pre-snap looks and bluffs to help coaches who are beginning to install Creepers and Sim Pressures into their defensive package.

Origin of Simulated Pressures

The Simulated Pressures have been all the rage this off-season as the newest innovation in football, but how new are they?  I dug deep into some old film and many old playbooks to investigate this question.  I will veer off and talk a little football history along the way, so I hope you don't mind.

What is a Simulated Pressure?  It is pressure that brings a non-traditional rusher (a LB or DB) in exchange for dropping a traditional rusher (DL).  They are generally 4 man pressures, although they can also be 5 man pressures by "adding" the rusher assigned to cover the Running Back when he blocks.

Read Tags in the Shotgun Run Game

There is often confusion about the different types of reads in the Shotgun Running game that I wanted to talk about and clarify.  I will be talking about Zone, Power, and Counter and these four primary read tags off of those concepts: Read, Flash, Bash, and Toss.

Read

"Read" by definition means that the QB will be reading the backside DE or EMLOS (end man on line of scrimmage) to the play.  So, "Zone Left Read" means I am reading the DE on the right.  Read is used so much as a tag on the Zone play that many coaches don't even use the tag anymore.  So when I call "Zone Left," it is an automatic read.  The Double Teams are so gorgeous on these two clips.

Origin of Power Read

The topic of the origin of the Power Read play came up recently and I will investigate the beginnings of this play that has become a powerful weapon in the Spread Offense this past decade.  Brandon Lechtenberg was a recent guest on USA Football's podcast, Deep Dive on Defense with Chris Vasseur (if you haven't checked this out yet, you are really missing out with my man Coach Vass killing it).  Coach Lech told the story of how his brother, Adam Lechtenberg, was the first one to suggest the idea to run Power Read while he was a G.A. at TCU in 2009.  TCU unveiled the play in a stunning win vs. Clemson early in the 2009 season.  QB Andy Dalton was the leading rusher for TCU in that game with 19 carries for 86 yards and he had a lot of key 3rd Down conversions with the Power Read play.   TCU also featured this play in their epic Rose Bowl win over Wisconsin that year.

Power Read

NCAA Analytics - Adjusted Yards Per Play

I stumbled upon a book called, Football by the Numbers, 1986 when I was growing up that changed how I look at the game.  It made an excellent argument that Total Offense and Total Defense were not the best statistics for determining which Offense or Defense was actually the best.  The authors, George Ignatin and Allen Berra, determined that an Interception was worth -50 yards in field position and a Fumble was worth -40 yards (Int's are worth more since they are usually returned back for more yards than Fumbles).  They took Total Offense/Defense minus the 50 yards for each Interception and minus 40 yards for each Fumble, and then divided that by the Number of Plays.  This gave the value of Adjusted Yards per Play.

New Website Logo

I have been meaning to update my website logo for a long time and I have recently been inspired by the courage and selflessness of a man who gave his own life, Coach Aaron Feis.  I wanted to write a bit about these coaches that have inspired me to try and follow in their footsteps.

Top row: left to right

Aaron Feis – Stoneman Douglas HS (FL) – I started my coaching career at Deerfield Beach HS in south Florida and Douglas was in our District.  Coach Feis is an amazing hero.  John 15:13 says, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”

2017 UCF Clinic - Scott Frost notes

I didn't know much about Scott Frost until I got to hear him in person at the UCF Clinic last March.  I knew that he ran the Chip Kelly offense that I have always been a fan of, so I made the trip to Orlando.  There were some audio-visual technical difficulties after the first speaker, so he went off the script and just starting talking ball and fielding questions.  You can tell when someone has complete mastery of what they are talking about, and I was really blown away.  Here are the notes:

Defensive Points and Stats Sheets

I posted a pic of my Defensive points leaders for last week and I got a question about how I did my points system.  I originally got this from when Charlie Strong was at Florida and I tweaked it a little.  I tweaked it some more after getting some feedback from Sam Nichols at X&O Labs as well, who made an excellent argument that Missed Interceptions should be even more penalized.

Film Study: 2016 Clemson Defense vs Louisville

Clemson vs. Louisville is the Saturday night game and I want to take a look at the film of last year's epic battle and see what Clemson DC Brent Venables did to try to slow down Heisman Trophy winner Lamar Jackson and the explosive Louisville Offense.  Louisville scored 36 points with 295 yards passing and 273 yards rushing (573 total) and was a yard away on a 4th down inside the five-yard line from winning the game at the end.  There were a number of things that Venables and the Clemson Defense did well to pressure the Louisville offense into some mistakes and keep them off-balance.

Stalk & Go RPO

The Stalk & Go RPO (Run-Pass Option) is a good addition to any playbook against defenses that become undisciplined with their Defensive Backs versus the run.  The play below is Zone Read with the QB reading the DE.  The H-Back arcs around the DE to the CB but he fakes a block on the CB and sneaks behind the CB.  Most Quarters defenses will check to Cover 2 vs a Nub set to the Boundary with no Wide Receiver and this is the case here.  The CB is the Force player and he must come up quick to play the run.  The Safety is not a regular Cover 2 hash Safety, he is cheated to a C-7 (C gap, 7 yards deep) alignment to help versus the run.  However, he is still a Pass-first player, but he is in a difficult position to cover the H-Back with full run action.

Football Tool Chest

Wow, just found Toys-R-Us for football coaches.  There is a TON of FREE stuff here:
Football Tool Chest

2009 Florida Clinic

I did a previous post on just Bill Belichick's outstanding portion of this clinic but here are my notes from the entire clinic, including Urban Meyer, Jon Gruden, and passing game notes from Scot Loeffler.