Take Care of the Ball!

 I watched a couple of scrimmages this weekend and one thing that stuck out was how many fumbles I saw. I saw teams putting the ball on the ground far too often. If you want to win more games, start by not turning the ball over. John Heisman had a quote that resonated with me about fumbling. It might sound harsh, but it is also very true. 

A young OC reached out to me to look at their offense after the 2021 season and figure out how to make improvements. He wanted to talk about their scheme, but the real issue was that they turned the ball over too often. They lost 21 fumbles in 11 games. 10 of those were in the red zone. They fumbled 31 times and lost 21 of them. I asked what they were doing to coach ball security. He said they "talk about it" all the time. Talking about it resulted in 21 giveaways. Let's find a better way. 

My dad is a retired coach, and he used to tell me all the time that talking isn't coaching. You can talk about things all day long. What are you doing to coach the skill? Scheme wasn't their issue. Their issue was making a commitment to coaching the details. We started by focusing on taking care of the football. 

We put a plan in place to teach ball security. First, we defined ball security. You must define ball security for your coaches and your players. If they don't know the definition, they don't know what ball security is. Our definition is "Wrist about the Elbow, Elbow tight to the body, ball glued to the chest." We show them pictures of good ball security and bad ball security. Then we have them hold a football properly and coach them through this in a stationary position. 

Second, we have a coaching cue. This is a two or three word phrase that communicates the definition. We used "Chin the ball." Chin the ball reminds them that the wrist is above the elbow, the elbow is tight to the body, and the ball is glued to the chest. 

Call The Touchdown Play

There are two things every man thinks he can do. Every man thinks he can run the BBQ grill, and every man thinks he can call offensive plays. Most people don't understand the preparation that offensive coordinators put into calling plays. They think its like Madden, where you click a button and the play is executed perfectly. Most people don't understand what goes into installing and building an offense, or the work that goes into preparation. Everyone wants to call the touchdown play, and hopefully I can give you some insight today that will help you all more touchdowns. 

What I want to help you with today is being more efficient with your game planning, and ultimately, using your preparation to call more explosive plays. A lot of coaches I talk to and work with are overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data that is available, and they get overwhelmed. That can be a difficult struggle when you are trying to prepare a game plan. There is so much data, that it becomes difficult to know what is important.

I talk to coaches who love my game planning resource. They love how it helped them to be more organized, but they sometimes struggle with the call sheet. They don't know what to put in the call sheet, or how to manage it during a game. That struggle comes from not having easily accessible data that you can easily understand. Data always tells a story, but there are times I felt I was illiterate. 

A big part of great play calls is about having great data. I am going to make a much better play call if I know what the defense is going to do. If I know when they are going to bring pressure, I am going to make a better play call. If I know what coverage they are going to play on a particular down and distance, I will give us a better chance of calling the "touchdown play."

For several years I spent hours on end putting together excel spread sheets and trying to manipulate the spreadsheets to determine what a defense is going to do. In 2018 I ran into Danny Davis, who was a field artillery officer. He was taking data and analytics used in the military to make strategic decisions, and working on applying that to football. We got hooked up with him, and it revolutionized what we did. I want to show you how it saved us hours on the weekends, while giving us actionable data that helped us become more explosive. 

The data we got from Danny gave me a very clear picture of what we were going to see from our opponent. We were able to know what front they were going to be in, what pressure they were bringing, where they were bringing it from, and what coverage they were playing behind it. It helped us call more touchdown plays, without having to spend hours putting the data together. 

He built two dashboards for offensive coordinators that helped me to desegregate the data in a way that it made sense. It made it easier to understand what the data meant, and more importantly, gave us a much clearer picture of what the defense was going to do. No longer did I need to filter, sort, use VLookup, or any other excel function. I wanted to share this with you to help you to be a better play caller this season. If you want to schedule a demo with Danny, Click Here 

Before I fill out my call sheet, we need to enter the data into our video program. We are going to enter all of the typical data, Down, Distance, Hash, Yd Line, Play Type, Result, Gain Loss, etc. We need that data to be able to build tendencies. The next part of labeling is we are going to add the formation, motion, and play name for every play run against the defense we are scouting. The reason we do this is we want to be able to look at what defense they played against each formation. 

Once we label those three columns, we are then going to label the defensive information. We create some custom columns to get the data we need. We label the Front, Stunt, Blitz, Coverage, and then # of Blitzers. We then add some blitz direction data. To/Away is to the back or away from the back. Strong/Weak is strong or weak. Field/Boundary, is a blitz from the field or boundary. Those columns only get labeled if they blitz a second level player. 

We divide and conquer to input the data, and we try to do at least three games. We want at least 180 plays if possible. The bigger the sample size, the more reliable the data becomes. Once we enter the data, we export the data to an excel spreadsheet from our video program and upload it into Recon. Once the data is in Recon, the magic happens. 

This is what the Blitz Dashboard looks like, giving us a complete picture of the defense. This was from an opponent that we had broken down four games on. On the left we can see how many times they were in each field zone and what hash they were on, and we can see how many times they faced each down and distance situation. In the middle, we see their coverage and stunt percentages. On the right we see the number of times they brought 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 rushers. On the bottom right shows where the pressure came from. They are an odd front team who bases out of 1 high. 

Go Beyond the Results: 3 Keys to Success This Season

Today I want to talk to you about something very important to consider during games, practice, and watching film. 

One of the biggest mistakes I have seen made by coaches, and I have made as a coach, is focusing too much on the result. Sometimes you will have a very poorly executed play work out because your opponent jacked things up on their end. You might miss two blocks on a run play, but your running back breaks a tackle and ends up in the open field for a 75 yard run. Everyone gets so excited for the result, that they don't correct the mistake. 

When you don't correct mistakes, it is going to be harder and harder to replicate success when all things are equal. I see this a lot with teams that are loaded with talent, or they have one or two really good players. They will have a bunch of big plays because they have players who are just better than everyone else. They are able to break tackles in the open field. Or they have a defensive lineman who is unblockable for most high school offensive linemen. 

To avoid this issue, it there are a couple of things every head coach and coordinator should do. First, give your guys specific jobs during games. During a game, it is very important that every coach know what they are looking at, and actually look at that. Every coordinator should have guys assigned to watch different things. I have a sheet for each coach telling them where they should be during the game (sideline or box), and what they should be looking at. One simple rule is to have guys in the box watching away from our sideline, and having guys on the field watch the side nearest our sideline. 

When you have specific roles, you don't miss anything. If everyone is watching the game, no one is going to see when a mistake is made. Game Planning Packet for OC's

In addition to looking at mistakes, guys are looking at what the defense is doing. If you don't have a coach assigned to watch their secondary, you won't know if they are playing sky or cloud, and how they are reacting to certain routes and run actions. On defense, you need to have someone watching the offensive line, and someone watching the receivers on each side of the field. There is nothing worse than giving up a deep pass, and no one saw the route that was run. If you don't know what route was run, you don't know who made a mistake.

When you have a great play, celebrate, but if there was a mistake on the play, don't let the result keep you from fixing the mistake. If a lineman missed a block but the back broke a tackle, fix the mistake. If a receiver ran the wrong route, but the QB scrambled and had a big gain, correct the mistake as soon as possible. This means every coach must have a job to do and they must do that job. If someone wants to watch the game, they can buy a ticket. There is nothing worse than having a player make the same mistake, but no one correcting the mistake until film on Saturday morning. That mistake should have been fixed during the game. 

The same thing is true on the defensive side of the ball. You can't have everyone watching the game. You need to have guys assigned to watch different aspects of the offense. There is nothing worse than giving up a big play, and not knowing what route they ran, or what blocking scheme they used. You have to have specific roles for each coach and have those roles clearly laid out. You need to be able to correct mistakes immediately, not the next day. Defensive Game Planning Resource

Implementing RPO Concepts

Back about 15 years ago we started to experiment with RPO concepts. RPO stands simply for Run-Pass-Option. We were talking about how we would call a run and the defense would load the box. The corner over our single WR, however, was playing 8 yards off the ball with no underneath help. I really wish we had called a stop route.

Fast forward a couple of years and we were playing a team that was crowding the box again when we were in 2x2 sets. They were playing cover 3, with the OLB's playing 1x1 on our tackles. Below is a diagram that shows the defensive alignment.

We built in some uncovered rules, and told the QB to alert "BOZO" if the defense showed this alignment. We would rise up and throw to the #2 WR. Regardless of what the play call was, if the defense showed this look we would check BOZO. This worked well, and eventually the defense adjusted and started to cover our #2 receivers. 

During our off-season meetings we started to talk about building quick game concepts into the call. We began to tag our run concepts with a quick game concept. Once we saw the defense was not honoring our perimeter skill players, we would tag the quick game concept. If we tagged it, we were telling the quarterback to throw it. The QB would fake the run and throw the quick. This was great until we added the tag and the defense lined up to take the quick game concept away. Below shows the defense aligned to take away the bubble.

We told our quarterback, if we tag it, you throw it. Our bubble screen got hit in the mouth. This was not very good. At some point we saw a coach at a clinic mention they were having their quarterback make a pre-snap determination of whether he would throw or run based on defensive alignment. This, to me, was very intelligent. From here, our RPO system was born.

We would build in pass concepts to our runs, and if the defense lined up to take the run, we would throw the pass. If the defense lined up to take the pass away, run the ball. There is nothing magical about this approach. It was sound in principal and in practice. 

When we implemented this initially there were some growing pains. We learned we had to have specific criteria of when to throw and when to run. We had to determine how we would communicate our concepts. We had to train our quarterbacks to be able to make a good pre-snap determination. We also had to make sure we had the "right" guy at quarterback. We couldn't have a guy who was selfish. We had to have someone who would be able to make the right read because it was the right read.

Below is an example of a simple RPO concept off our inside zone read. 

Over the last few years we have greatly expanded our RPO package. Every run now has a pass. When we call the run we are calling the pass. This has greatly helped our offense to be more explosive and more balanced. It has forced the defense to defend the entire width of the field while having to remain gap sound. 

Perhaps the biggest benefit was the fact that we could get our skill players the ball in open space. The touches for our X and Z receivers increased tremendously. Below is an example of our inside zone read concept before we implemented our RPO concepts.

If our QB got a pull read we had to hope our #2 WR was able to block the OLB. If the OLB blitzed from depth or walked up late, our QB basically had to give the ball regardless of what the defensive end did. Our quarterback got hit in the mouth more than once. 

Once we added our RPO concept, if the OLB did not honor our #2 WR, we simply threw the tagged quick game concept. This allowed us to have a high percentage throw the protect the run. Below is a diagram of the same concept with the built in RPO.

If the outside linebacker aligned over our #2 WR, we would execute the run. If the OLB aligned inside our #2 WR, we would throw the quick concept. The QB would catch and throw. If we executed the run and got a pull read, we still had to deal with the backer. The QB would replace the read and get his eyes on the OLB. If the OLB widened, the QB would keep. If the OLB attacked him, he would throw the ball to the #1 WR, illustrated in the diagram below.

Essentially we were playing triple option football, just with a twist. And if you consider our pre-snap process, we would playing quadruple option football. The quarterback could throw the quick game pre-snap based on alignment. If you look to the tight end side, our Z WR is running a stop route. If the defense gave us the stop route, the QB could throw that as well based on pre-snap alignment.

This is just one example simple quick game concept that can be built into a base run play to give you a manageable RPO. You can implement this in a couple of days of practice time, and it will lead to some explosive plays. We now have a multitude of RPO concepts in our offense. 

A couple of questions I get are: Do we have lineman downfield? At times we do, but this is a concept thrown just behind the LOS, so we can have lineman downfield. Does our QB ever mess up the read? They do, but more often than not they are conservative on throwing the quick concept pre-snap. 

We complete this concept at a 98% completion rate, and we average over 6.8 yards every time we throw it. It is essentially a toss sweep to a good athlete. It has helped greatly to improve our run game as well.

 Last year I got hooked up with CoachTube, and put together three courses for offensive football coaches. I put together two courses on RPO's, and a course on Building An Elite System of Communication. All of these courses will help you to score more points! 

https://coachtube.com/users/coachvint

All three of these courses are detailed, with everything you need to be more explosive and to score more points. 

The course on communication gives you a detailed approach to your gameday communication. I give you a system and a process to improve the quality of conversations, leading to improved play calling on game day. This course has received outstanding reviews from coaches at all level of football. A coach with multiple state titles told me this course helped them to be much more efficient and explosive this season. 

My two RPO courses take you through a systematic process of installing RPO's into your offensive system. RPO's put the defense in conflict, forcing them to defend all 53 yards of width and all 6 skill players every single play. I not only give you a system, but I teach you the methods to develop your own RPO concepts. 

https://coachtube.com/users/coachvint

After speaking at clinics on RPO concepts for several years, and helping several schools install RPO concepts into their offenses, I decided to write a book. It is available on both ibooks and on Windows and Android based systems through the Kindle App.

The book covers everything you need to implement RPO's into your offense. Whether you want to add RPO concepts to your entire run game, or you want to start with one or two simple concepts, this book will show you how to do so with confidence. I cover everything from pre-snap to 2nd and 3rd level post snap concepts and reads. The book is written with a very systematic process to installing RPO's. Regardless of your system, this book will give you a method and a plan.

The apple version on ibooks has video embedded. Their are clips of all of our RPO concepts. The Kindle version has everything but the video clips. Both books are chalk full of diagrams and explanation. The biggest thing is that this book is a manual with a very systematic process of installing RPO's into your system. 

Here is a link to the ibooks version: http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1078061959 These iBooks are truly innovative as the video brings the concept to life. If you have an iPad or iPhone, or a Mac, this is the way to go. 

If you don't have an apple device, you can order the paperback version! It is available on Amazon!
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1520447485

Here is a link to the Kindle version for all Android and Windows devices: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01B12YSCG?keywords=james%20vint&qid=1453738070&ref_=sr_1_4&sr=8-4