DRC Wilson best option at QB for NT

mad dog · September 18, 2006

I like the idea but only have 2 issues with it. The first is that we are in 2006 now and many of the players are different.
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Man... ain't that the truth. I think that difference, especially along the O-line, between then and now is the biggest reason why we've seen what we have this year.

The second is that it takes 10yard to get a first down and I'll take 4 passing downs to get 12 and the first like Tulsa did over 3 rushes to gain 3 yards and a punt like we did.

Given those two choices, I'll pick the same one you did. But I would also, personally, take 10 yards and a first down on the ground than 10 yards and a first down through the air (unless, of course, there are 2 minutes remaining and we're down by 7). Personal preference really... I'd rather beat the hell out of my opponents on the ground than finesse it through the air.

In the absence of either one, however, I'd like to see the other. That, to me, is what has to change.

GoMeanGreen1999 · September 20, 2006

Brett Vito: Wilson best option at QB for UNT
07:26 AM CDT on Monday, September 18, 2006
“I thought Woody made a few plays early,” Dickey said. “We have to go back and look at how much we are asking each player to do at each position from an assignment standpoint and maybe water it down to where we don’t do as many things until we come along and get a little more comfortable out on the field in executing our assignments. We may also see that it’s not that we have too much. We have to take a hard look at it and go from there.”
UNT’s season depends on it.
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Is Darrell "keep 8 men in the box" Dickey really serious about "watering it down?" How much more can one really water down this offense?

chrisfisher · September 20, 2006

Is Darrell "keep 8 men in the box" Dickey really serious about "watering it down?" How much more can one really water down this offense?
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These continuous DD "watering it down" comments are the one's that really scare me. How much more watered down can you get? I am so tired of posting this, but why is it that our boys have problems remembering assignments while the rest of D1A football can run dynamic play books? Makes no sense! will someone PLEASE ask DD in a news conference??? I'd love to hear the answer.

FirefightnRick · September 20, 2006

Our coaches must pull their heads out of their butts and start game planning based on what our personel is. Offensive line can't block 9 guys? Don't run it up the middle every play! Have an extremely athletic QB? Get him on the move through rollouts and options! Stop beating your players' heads against the wall and give them a chance to be successful. A balanced offense keeps the defense from stacking the line or dropping back against the pass. Make the defense work a little bit. Which doesn't mean we have to be a big time passing team. Just change up the play calling and keep the defense off guard.
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Looking at what you posted here bone reminds me of the '99 TCU game and the famous "THROW THE BALL" chant in which our team, TCU's team and everyone in the stands started to laugh because it had become so very damn apparant to all that we were trying to prove something that wasn't there. We were going to "RUN THE BALL" regardless of the outcome.

Someone help me out with this, but we were 2-6 at the time and only averaging something like 10 points a game. Although we had won against Tech and Boise earlier that year it was evident to all that we were seeing what amounted to the epitome of "CONSERVATIVE GAME PLANNING" at NT. That day we were down only something like 17 -3 in the third quarter and we had the ball near mid field. We ran our patented 4 yard delay hand off between the tackles for zero gain two straight times when it finally forced someone in the NT section to snap out of frustration. All of a sudden what started out as a couple of people quickly grew to 10, then 20 then 100 on up to the entire NT section, maybe 2,000 to 3,000 people. At the same time the band had completely shut off and there was a quiet in the stadium so that immeidiately EVERYONE at Amon Carter could tell what was being yelled: "THROW THE BALL, THROW THE BALL!!!!!", over and over again. Our players started to look up, many laughing as well as TCU's defense and most of the Horned Frog fans near the NT section. All had smirks on their faces, some in disgust, some with sarcasm, some for whatever reason because NT ran into that defense for a full half and refused to throw it. I can't remember how many times we had punted at that point, but it was extremely obvious to everyone that we were going to run it. So what about the series from the middle of the field? As the chant got louder everyone realized that it was now 3rd and 12 or something to that fact. "THROW THE BALL, THROW THE BALL!!!!" got louder and louder and everyone was thinking, "You know we will throw it here because what have you got to lose since the ball is near mid field?". So I'll be damned if not after all that, on third and 12, at a point in the game in which we were heavily the underdogs and had maybe 3 first downs if that much..........WE RUN THE BALL AGAIN UP THE MIDDLE FOR NO GAIN! Everyone started laughing and I remember several around us looking up or over to the person next to them and saying things like, "Well I guess he show us?". It was beyond rediculous and it still is. It's just that now we have gotten numb to it. Yeah, we finally had some success with it, against the other worst teams around, but mainly we did it with a top 10 defense that Coach DeLoach built. Without a defense winning the field position battle we will struggle to score. Doesn't anyone remember '02 and what we LOOKED FORWARD to seeing that year? It was to see our defense shut people down. It didn't matter how many points we scored because we knew we were not going to score any in the first place. The most fun thing to look forward to was to see us shut Texas down in the second half, to see Nicholls State from seeing one whole other end of the field etc. I literally convinced myself I was there to see if we could post a shut out, not actually go out and oustcore someone. That is sad and the general college football fan is turned off to that. Turned off to the fact that we play to keep a game close at the end, then hope for a play or two to win.

We need fans, money, supportive alumni and as many as we can get. No one wants to see a punt fest. Marshall understood this, Boise understood this, Fresno State understood this, Louisville understood this, Central Florida understood this, South Florida understood this. Why can't we?

Rick

Edited September 20, 2006 by FirefightnRick

LonghornScott · September 20, 2006

As an outsider, I’ll try to pick my spots. I think this a thread where I might have a few meaningful things to add. I should warn you that this post is going to be an ungodly length. Toilet painting material.

I don’t have the opportunity to watch UNT games very often so my comments will be fairly general.

I have to preface my post by saying that many of you have been following the program for a while and know Dickey’s personality better than I… so I will try to stick to general offensive football philosophy.

From what I am reading it sounds like UNT is trying to install a zone-read package out of the shotgun. There are a couple of questions I have if someone who was at the game can recall, it would be much appreciated:

1. Is UNT running the zone-read primarily out of the Shotgun 3-wide set? If not, what formation are they running it out of?

2. Did UNT ever pass out of the same formation?

3. Was the QB handing off more or keeping more?

So there are a couple of topics that I wanted to touch on: First, I want to make a few points about UNT’s current situation and offensive identity and then later at little on Shotgun Spread football.

From what I can gather, UNT is trying to install a spread package to take advantage of the specific talents of Woody Wilson. As I indicated to in my first post, I think that is a very good thing. However, it won’t be without some hitches. It sounds like their first attempts did not go well against Tulsa… especially on the offensive line. I know it’s hard to stomach, but this should be expected to a certain extent for any team that is trying to install a whole new package mid-season. The greater question to me is why a package hadn’t been prepared for Wilson in the off-season. There’s just no way that his skills weren’t evident. Anyhow, water under the bridge at this point. I could tell you that you should be glad because it took UT’s coaches a season and a half to really get their shit together with Vince Young and fully modified the offense to take advantage of his skills, but that’s another story. Suffice to say, at least they are trying to do something to take advantage of Wilson.

Back to the current situation, I consider the offensive line is the most important indicator for success for any football team. In any team sport, it’s more important to have a cohesive team than a team full of badasses… this is never in more evidence than in how an offensive line performs. I think center is the most mentally demanding position in football. The center has to identify the defense, call out the blocking scheme and pick out the blocking key so that everyone gets on the same page. He has to see the blocking for the whole play before it unfolds, and if he sees it wrong he hangs his unit out to dry.

Usually a team’s offensive package is installed and in place well before the first game. Then each week they have a chance to tweak the assignments of their bread and butter plays to defenses they expect to see and install a few wrinkles to try to take advantage of favorable matchups. Sometimes this means running the plays out of a different formation (to get a favorable defensive alignment) or installing a few new plays to catch the opposing defense with something they haven’t seen on film yet. The point here is that the offense isn’t starting from scratch… they are building and adapting incrementally from week to week.

Compare that to installing a new core offense. That means all new assignments, reads, and keys for every new play in the core package. Back to that poor center: even a very salty player is gonna want a few take backs in the first game making all new line calls for plays that have never been executed live before. Even if he makes the right calls, it’s a coin flip if his unit is going to identify and execute their assignment from his call! And to really execute effectively it needs to be automatic for the unit, not cerebral. The only way that happens is with a shit ton of reps in practice and in live action.

I hope that sheds some light on why Dickey may be commenting that they are thinking about simplifying the package for next week. It also explains why they were running a couple plays with a lot of frequency… they were trying to get the offense, specifically the oline, some reps with the new core plays and get a look at how they are executing on film. The good news is that I think that you will see the biggest delta of improvement from last game to the next. Hopefully, Dickey is committed to the change. From the way they treated the Tulsa game (like a first game of the season), it seems like he is.

There were some comments earlier in the thread about offensive identity and UNT’s comparative rankings. I haven’t followed UNT closely enough to comment on how they compare to other offenses, but I will share my thoughts on the broader topic of offensive identity.

First of all, an offense is most quickly identified by what it does on first down(the most important down in football). Often times, people want to distinguish a team by whether they pass or run on first down. I think this is a mistake for a couple reasons. First of all, ideally the offense is going to approach the line and identify the defensive alignment. Many offenses nowadays don’t call a single play, but actually call a branch of plays and the specific play is determined at the line. So what you really want to look at is what formation is most prevalent on first down and what plays are available in that formation to determine what identity an offense has. Is the package designed to bunch the defense up an outrun them to the open spaces? Is it designed to spread them out? Is it designed to challenge them horizontally (sideline to sideline) and vertically? What route adjustments does the package favor toward different types of coverage in the passing game? Do the blocking angles in the run game create favorable situations for the blockers? And perhaps most importantly, does the offense force the defense to commit to stopping one play and have a counter-punch waiting when they do? I think answers to these questions will tell you a lot more about an offense than number of rushing attempts or offensive yardage, etc.

Now on to the zone read spread offense: its intent and implications (or at least my interpretation). Let me start with a diagram of a shotgun 3-wide set and a typical 4-3 defensive alignment (with the strongside linebacker rolled up):

-----------------------S-------------------------

-------S-------------B-----B----------------C----

C-------------E---T-----T-------E---B------------

X--------------T---G---C---G---T---E-------------

-------Z------------------------------------Y----

----------------B------Q-------------------------

Obviously, the specific assignments for the offense will depend on what defense they are facing, so I will try to give the general gist of some of the different plays in this offense and what the offensive package is all about.

The Zone-Read play is a modern day option play. It’s intent is to give an offense post-snap running options from a formation that forces the defense to be spread out. It takes advantage of the defense by forcing it to cover a lot of horizontal territory and crossing its running options to force the defense to play honest. There are many different running plays that fall under the “zone-read” moniker. Zone-read refers to the fact that there is a zone blocked running play, with a QB read that determines whether or not the option is chosen.

The most common version is a zone stretch play with a QB backside keeper option. The stretch play is a running play that is designed to string a defense out laterally, creating vertical lanes for the running back to exploit. If you’re referring to my diagram, the zone stretch is going to call for the five offensive linemen and tight end to take a blocking zone to their respective rights.

In the particular alignment I have shown that might call for the tight end to get to the outside of the strongside linebacker, the right tackle to get outside the playside defensive end, the right guard might combo on the 0 shaded defensive tackle before trying to get to the middle linebacker, the center needs to get to the right shoulder of the defensive tackle with help from the combo block, and the left guard and tackle will try to pull a similar number on the weakside defensive tackle and linebacker. All of this takes place as the ball is snapped and the running back runs toward the hands of the quarterback. If all goes according to plan the field will look something like this when the running back gets to the quarterback:

-------------------------------------------------

--------------------------S----------------------

-------------------------------------------------

-------S---------------B-----B--------------C----

C-------Z-----E------T----T------E---B-----Y-----

X--------------------T-G---C--G---T---E----------

-------------------------------------------------

----------------------BQ-------------------------

There’s a couple things to note at this point. At this point, the middle linebacker has got to haul ass if he wants to prevent the running back from getting outside on the stretch to the right, but if he overcommits, he’ll leave a huge gap with the safety on an island and the right guard roaming free. If he wants to make a play he’s gonna have fight through a block. The weakside backer has a lot of traffic between him and the ballcarrier and he’s got a left guard to contend with. He’s got a shot to make the play if he can shoot a gap and disrupt the running back on the stretch before he makes his upfield cut. But he’s got other problems that we’ll discuss in a minute. Essentially, the offense has shifted everything to the right and thinned out the defense forcing each defender to cover more ground and fight through a blocker to get to the outside. But they gave up something to make this happen. They left the backside defensive end completely unblocked. I’ve left him in his original position for now to show the decision tree for the play.

The backside defensive end has the best chance to make the play on the stretch by crashing down the line and getting to the running back in the backfield. This is where the QB read comes in. If the defensive end does crash down to defend the stretch, the QB keeps the ball and runs it into the vacated backside of the play. Any one of the defensive end, weakside linebacker, or deep safety could make the play on the QB, but all of them will have to reverse field if they have committed to stopping the stretch.

-------------------------------------------------

--------------------------S----------------------

-------------------------------------------------

-------S-----||--------B-----B--------------C----

C-------Z----||------T----T------E---B-----Y-----

X-------------\\---E-T-G---C--G---T---E----------

---------------\\--------B-----------------------

----------------\\====Q--------------------------

If the defensive end stays at home then the QB hands off to the RB and the offense continues with the stretch play.

With the right player at the QB position and the right balance of plays around it, the zone-read stretch play can be devastating. The main ingredients you need are a legit running threat at QB, a quick running back, and a well coordinated offensive line. The stretch play requires some finesse on the part of the offensive line and it definitely requires timing. It’s a complicated play from a blocking standpoint that requires precise footwork and spacing. It takes time to get those in place.

In terms of the rest of the package, I’ll make a few points. Most defenses are going to sellout to stop a play once it has hurt them (sometimes before it has). It’s absolutely crucial to complement the zone stretch play with a package of plays that take advantage of this. Many teams will try to neutralize the zone read by having a safety or corner back commit to stopping the QB on the backside, taking away his running lane and allowing the defensive end to crash down on the stretch. There are a couple of ways to counter this.

The most obvious and best one is to add a play-action pass version of the play. I personally like a passing play that will send the X receiver on a deep route and then drag the Y receiver or tight end across the field behind the safety or corner who has committed to stopping the QB keep. This forces the defender to decide between attacking the passer and giving up the passing lane or sitting back in coverage and giving up the running room. Either way the defender has to give up something.

I also think any good zone-read package should include a zone read counter play to punish defenders who are teeing off on the stretch play. They’ll think twice about jumping upfield after getting ear-holed by the offensive lineman blocking down on them. If it's desired I could draw up some diagrams of this and some of the other common plays run with this package as well (like a QB draw, speed option, etc.).

Some defenses will try to blitz against the zone read to try to take away decision time from the QB. The appropriate response is a hot route adjustment or a couple screen plays that take advantage of the vacated defensive territory.

Anyhow, I’ll try to wrap this up. I just wanted to share a little bit about the zone-read offense and hopefully give you some things to be on the look-out for. I do think it’s the appropriate package to build from with UNT’s personnel… but there are going to be some growing pains. If your offensive line can start to get into a groove in the next few weeks, you may be able to do some damage in the latter part of the year.

There’s a lot of information in that post and if you want clarification on any point just let me know. I hope that, in the least, there are some points worth discussing. I have gotten away from public boards in the past few years, but hopefully this is one that is ripe for some football talk =]

SilverEagle · September 20, 2006

With the right player at the QB position and the right balance of plays around it, the zone-read stretch play can be devastating. The main ingredients you need are a legit running threat at QB, a quick running back, and a well coordinated offensive line.

This is the main thing that I can comment on in your presentation. We have two QB's who are legitimate running threats(Wilson and Meager), and at least two quick RB's. It seems that our OL struggles every year to get coordinated. I don't understand that still being such a big issue this year, since just about everyone on the current O-line started at one time or another last year, and they've been together since the spring.

LongJim · September 20, 2006

Good take on the zone.

Here's some more info on it--and the potential difficulty running it:

Zone Play

UNTLifer · September 20, 2006

Thanks, but the zone read is not our problem. DD has threatened to open up the playbook for the last two years, and then we get into the season and he has to "water down" the gameplan because nothing is working. Sorry, but this isn't a new system problem, this is a teacher problem.

FFR's thread says it all. DD is too hard-headed for his own good. Let SMUt have him. This 9 year experiment is failing.

FirefightnRick · September 22, 2006

LonghornScott,

I know you spent a lot of time presenting that on the inside & stretch zone play's. Just wanted you to know I really appreciate the info and I for one am all ears on anything you have to add.

With regards to the link LongJim posted, I noticed the author had this to say:

The zone is a fantastic play, but can be greatly disrupted by one or two talented defensive linemen. Inside penetration kills the play, as does a failure to communicate among the offensive line.

We have faced Tulsa who runs the stack three, and Akron will too. If you can, can you show how we are expected to affectively block the stack three with a zone blocking package.

And if I had a second question it would be how many teams are successfully using the zone blocking scheme, and if so how often? Is it their base offense as it seems to be for NT?

As I have posted before, offensively, NT has been miserable averaging as the 107th ranked O nationally for over 8 years now. I have no doubt the zone read is great when all cogs are meshing, and I've seen our O lines work it to perfection in the past at times, especially against lesser talent(ie SBC play). But against equal or greater talent it's terrible, or at least we have performed it that way. Given that, I think what most MeanGreenNation members would like to see is something, whatever that be, to be tried that gives us a better shot at performing at a higher level, especially against our OOC foes. If zone blocking is so very difficult to hash out, why stay with it? Who in this country has a game in which they can't get 90 yards of offense other than North Texas? And it's not just this season, it's every season. For me that spells a greater need to redesign our offensive system that best fits our level. There are others who might favor this offense but our history speaks loud and clearly for itself.

As an addition, we can win the Belt again this year with this system and I still won't feel good about our offense next year in OOC play. I've not felt comfortable about it since '99 and haven't since. I will however look forward with confidence that our Mean Green defense is on the rise, but that is about it.

Rick

Edited September 22, 2006 by FirefightnRick

September 23, 2006

We seem to be on a quest of epic proportions to develop an offense that can succeed even when the other side knows what we will do and that we will only do that one thing. Meanwhile ......... it must be very easy for the other side to prepare when they know what we will do and that we will only do that one thing.

It seems like a quest for perfection that is idealistic and not suited for the real world.

Nonetheless, I hope the Mean Green can achieve perfection - or at least close enough to it - tomorrow.