The Spread offense

I'm gonna talk about the spread offense. Because we run the Spread at West Salem and i've come to know quite a bit about it. There are a number of misconceptions that I want to take some time to clarify.

Whenever I talk with people about the logisitics of football and I say something the to effect of, "we're a smash mouth team--that's why we run the spread." They usually think i'm talking out of my butt and feel like I threw my credibality into the front of a movie train. I can hear the gears turning in your head, "how is that?"

A little bit about the spread offense; There are a few different styles of what people consider the "Spread Offense". For example, in the 70's and 80's the Houston Oilers ran a version that's come to be known as the 'Run 'n' Shoot'. This version of the spread is very pass oriented and designed to determine the passing routes based on how the defensive coverage develops during the play. This offense focuses on a lot of choice routes instead of your typical 'set in stone' patterns and takes a great degree of mastery before recievers and QB see the same thing. It's usually ran with the QB in the gun position, no Tight End, and a single Running Back (desired Runningback types depend on coaching but can range from a small agile reciever type to a large blocking type).

This version of the spread is very different than what Texas Tech ran in the mid 2000's which is different than what modern day Oregon runs. Along with the Houston Oilers high powered Run 'n' Shoot, there was the development of deep attacking Air Coryell offense. Which featured similar formations but was focused more on finding the tallest fastest guys you could find, lining them up on the perimeter and making them run faster than the Cornerbacks and jump higher than the Safety's.

These two offenses arguably made way for the West Coast [which has no connection to the West Coast outside of that fact that it was first installed by a west coast team] Offense which was perfected by the legendary 49ers coach, Bill Walsh. This is also the snowball that helped project QB salaries. The West Coast offense put the decision making solely into the hands of the QB, who coincidentally enough had the ball in his hands every play of every game. At the time Walsh had a smaller undersized QB that didin't feature a rocket arm but had accuracy. His name was Joe Montana. Smaller and undersized but a field commander with a comptitive spirit and had the intelligence to throw the ball where te defender was not.

The Run 'n' Shoot offense was focused on knowing, pre-snap, where the defense was going to be while the Air Coryell offense was to find the open reciever through progression and get him the ball. The West Coast offense was a novelty at the time because it took these two concepts and combined them. The idea of the West Coast offense was for the QB to identify the basic idea of the coverage he was seeing and check to the best recieving option (determined by the coverage).

Now the moder era Spread. The West Coast offense not only helped pave the way for modern offensive concepts but it forced defenses to re-think their personnel and strategy. Defenses were forced to find Linebackers that were able to cover rush the passer AND drop back into coverage. For the pre-West Coast era football players this required two very different skills. Because defenses were required to respect the 4 reciever threat, Linebackers were usually the most likely defenders put in charge of defending the shallow routes (usually < 10yds). When defenders are forced to leave what's known as 'the box' (the 10yd x 10yd area around the Center) this opens up the running game. It's basic mathematics, less defenders makes for less guys to block which makes for more room to run. Here enters the moder day spread.

Texas Tech runs a more pass oriented spread with more Coryell concepts than the type of Spread that Oregon runs. This entry is aimed more at talking about the Oregon style spread and it's affect on the running game. Spreading out the field and taking guys out of the box leads to better run opportunities and mixed with good run game schemes it's a force multiplier for the run game. Think of the most basic Zone run. The Zone is an Option type concept. The QB either keeps the ball or hands off the ball based on what the defender does. In this picture QB is reading the red highlighted Defensive End. The QB is going to watch what he does during the play, if the Defensive End comes at him he's going to hand the ball to the Running Back, if the Defensive End stays shallow and follows the Running Back the QB is going to keep it.



This way of playing the spread puts a great deal of emphasis on exceptional QB coaching and Offensive line coaching. It also gives a greater degree of freedom for the QB. Playing this style of offense it's not neccessary to have a tall QB with a big arm much like Texas Tech. At the college level that means you can go after smaller more athletic guys without as much competition in recruiting. At the high school level this means you can open up and diversify your offense. You don't need to rely heavily on the Running Back playing from the I-formation.

The true strength of the run oriented Spread Offense is that it evens out the responsilbility among the team. Before the Spread became vogue, you needed a good set of triplets [refering to the Cowboys cliche term], a solid dependable Running Back, a tall fast Receiver, and a prototypical QB. With a Spread scheme you can take an athlete, put him at QB and let him shine doing what he does best; being an athlete. It allows a team to rely more on it's athleticism and solid fundamentals than being elite and physically superior by way of height, weight, and overall size.

This of course, will lead to defenses re-aligning how they do things and in-turn will perpetuate the cycle of football evolution.

The NFL's Money: Player salaries

I had this idea of writing about the NFL and where the money comes from and how it's distributed. My degree minors in Sport Management so i've taken a number of classes that discuss the financial aspect of major sport leagues. There's a lot to be learned and I think a lot of people aren't real savvy to it, I think this will help a lot of people get a better idea of what the NFL work stoppage is all about as well. So the next few entrys are going to be about basic financial concepts in the NFL, this going over player salaries.

First off a little bit of history about professional football, you have to know where it came from before you can understand where it's going...right? In the late 19th century (1800's) professional football began as a student operated venture of one school versus another school with little more scheduling than a, "Hey, you  wanna play a game next week?" These games were played primarly by the 'good ol' boys' from schools like Yale, Harvard, Princeton, etc. Mostly schools that are now part of the Ivy league. These were the schools that had been around the longest and had the capital to do such things.

(i'm going to begin being vague with dates, they are of little consequence and I don't want to have to source my information)

As popularity of the sport slowly grew more schools became interested and the first instances of recruiting were seen. In the day in age when college football was beginning, professional football and collegiate football was not different. It wasn't until the 1920's and 30's that schools began distancing themselves from what could be considered professional football. This is also about the time that the adminstrative boards at the schools required a more concrete and organized approach to the sport. The sport was growing as were fatal injuries. There was also pressure from the government, the first Roosevelt if i remember correctly was threatening to ban the sport if something wasn't done to make it safer.

From 1930 to the early 60's there was massive reform in the sport. Professional and Collegiate had made significant strides away from one another. MANY teams had been fielded and folded under severe financial obligations, unsecure income, and bankruptcy via flaky owners. By this time the NFL had also become a central figure of football and spent the 50's financially squashing rival leagues, even though the NFL itself was very unstable and wasn't even able to dream about their fiscal future that was in store.

In steps Pete Rozelle. (Rozelle did far more than build the modern day NFL, but this blog will be reserved primarly for the modern day finances of the NFL)

Because so many teams would come and go the league was very unpredictable. Rozelle instilled in the owners a "League think" concept and was able to convince owners to sacrifice a little for the betterment of the league as a whole, eventually building them all a greater fortune. Rozelle was also able to build the NFL a more stable financial income. TV contracts. He negotiated gate and ticket incomes between teams. As I write this I keep coming up with things that Rozelle did for the NFL and realize that I could just keep going.

Now on to modern day.

NFLPA is the National Football Players Association, a lot of syllabuls for 'labor union'. I hear a lot of people talk about NFL players as though they don't need such things. On the contrary. almost 90% of NFL players are dead, bankrupt, or divorced within 5 years of retiring. These same players that make lucrative amounts of money don't make nearly as much as one thinks they do. Their contracts are also set up to minimize the amount of money that they make. Let's use simple numbers to make things easy. You want a player on your team, we'll say his name is Adam. Adam is good. Really good.

When a player is brought in to sign his contract they will levy his participation and roster spot with a signing bonus, this is a kind of guarantee to the player that whe won't get cut. The signing bonus is paid to the player regardless of his playing time, status on the team, and regardless of how long he's on the team. Therefore the team isn't going to pay a $10million signing bonus to someone they are unsure of. Now onto the actual salary of the player. Adam is a younger guy who has yet to hit his prime in the league and could really be an impact player for a few years to come so the team wants to sign him to a 5 year contract. With the projection of success in ticket sales, his jersey sales, and other apparel the team will say that he's worth $100 million over the next 5 years.

This is where many people lose scope of what a player really has to deal with. Adam's deal is 5 years $100 million. NFL contracts are heavely back loaded, meaning that, the major of his money is made his last year, so this is more appropriately what his salary will look like:

Year 1: $2 million
Year 2: $8 million
Year 3: $15 million
Year 4: $25 million
Year 5: $50 million

Back loading the contract is the way that the teams are able to sign such huge contracts that may never be filled. See, if Adam gets into his 3rd year with the team and hasn't lived up the expectations that team had for him when they first signed him, they have the right to cut him in which case they aren't obligated to pay him for the last 3 years in his contract.

On top of that I think people neglect to realize the expenses of an NFL player as well. I'm not talking about the cars, the houses, or personal bills-i'm talking about their financial obligations. Labor unions cost money, they have labor dues just like Safeway employees or Lowe's employees, except they are more expensive, significantly more expensive. NFL players pay taxes just like anyone else, they also pay for agents, personell/media reps, nutrtional guidance, personal training during the off-season, etc. I've never read a statistic on this but I have read some sources that suggest that a typical NFL player will only see about 20-35% of his salary. That percentage goes up as salary increases, because higher profile players make more money and therefore require more services, such as financial counseling, financial lawyers (to protect from that best friend in 3rd grade that claims he taught the players everything he knows), investors, etc.

I know that many people don't care about this and still feel that they make far too much money and they have little sympathy for their problems. I'm merely trying to enlighten people about the topic. I also have a question for those nay sayers, rarity many times constitutes a higher price. These men get paid as much as they do because they're incredibly physically gifted and put their health on the line and commit themselves to something they love for 24/7, literally eating, breathing, and living the game. If any one person were to do that they too would probably also make a lot of money doing something they love but most people don't truly love anything enough to do it as long as NFL players do.

Let's try this again.

Since my last blog was deleted for some reason or another [which I'm still investigating] I have to start over. It's a bit frustrating due to that fact that I was veyr satisfied with my first entry. I felt a good segway coming on for another entry about onside kicks, at the request of Sara Seed via Facebook, but no I'm left with little to no transition from one topic to another.

Either way, I've gotta start over and there's no point in complaining about the situation.