Broncos Won Again Today!!!!

[samparnell]

Sam - You and I are on the same side on this one. The Wing-T is before my time, but I love the Novocaine quote.

I am absolutely all about having 3/4 of the plays look like runs.

My comment was simply meant to imply that I hope we can continue the commitment to the run, even if we're down by a bit. Until the clock is absolutely working against us and we don't have time to run, we need to continue to run. It's easy to run when you lead by two digit scores. It's more difficult to stay committed when down by a touchdown or more. Just need to not panic too early, which it has felt like we have at times.

Let me ask you, because you do have better knowledge on this stuff... I think I someone mention that Stink was commenting that we were using a different style of run blocking compared to how we had been previously. Is that something you noticed, and could you elaborate on anything we may have done differently besides just staying committed to the run?

It was particularly impressive given how beat up our line is/was, IMO... The RBs looked great out there and they were finding and hitting holes well, but we really seemed to be getting those holes on a much more consistent basis, and again, despite being well into our depth chart.

Not sure to what Schlereth was referring. He played four years under Joe Gibbs in Washington ('89-'92) Gibbs' rushing attack was the Counter Series which is an angle blocked attack with lots of down blocks and pullers. Mark won a Super Bowl blocking in that offense. Joe Gibbs said he stole the Counter Series from Tom Osborne, who ran it from the I, while Gibbs usually ran it from Single Back with an H-Back often in motion.

In 1995, Shanahan's first year in Denver, Schlereth joined the Denver Broncos. Shanahan had learned the WCO in San Francisco. His "innovation" was to marry the WCO passing attack to Alex Gibbs Zone Series rushing attack. Alex Gibbs was Schlereth's O-Line coach the whole time he played in Denver, and the rushing attack was 100% zone steps.

Those two styles of run blocking are quite different and Stink excelled in both. Seems like most college offenses today, especially FBS, use zone blocked rushing attacks probably due to the widespread use of Option. Nowadays NFL teams use both angle and zone in their rushing attacks. I've thought it would be easier to take an angle blocker and teach him zone blocking rather than the other way around. This partly due to the large number of types of blocks O-Linemen must master in an angle blocked rushing attack (i.e., Drive, Base, Base Away, Down, Fan, Double, Double Down, Chip, Double Down Chip, Reach, Scoop, Fold, Pull to Trap, Pull to Kickout, Pull to Seal, Pull to Escort, Pull to Lead, Influence)

There are a lot of ways to run Trap. Chuck Noll's Steelers ran every kind of Trap I've ever seen. The most common Trap play may be Guard hole Trap run with the ball carrier at Fullback depth (e.g., I Formation, Wing-T) It was a common play at the high school level up to about the beginning of this century. It's a tight, quick play with a lot of moving parts and it takes a lot of reps to get it down.

Schlereth tells a story about Gary Kubiak and Super Bowl XXXII. During practice before the game, Kubiak put in a play he called "Trap Pass". At the end of the third quarter Antonio Freeman fumbled the KO return and Denver got the ball at the +22. Kubiak called "Trap Pass" and it was intercepted. Green Bay took the ball down the field and scored at 13:54 in the 4th quarter to tie the game at 24. It wasn't until 1:47 in the 4th that Terrell Davis scored the go ahead TD to win Super Bowl XXXII.

After the game on the bus Kubiak was whooping it up with everyone when Schlereth told him, "Before you run "Trap Pass", you need to run Trap." As a 100% zone step rushing attack, running anything like an angle blocked play action wasn't going to have any effect unless the actual Trap play was established first. Schlereth said Kubiak walked away mumbling to himself.

So, all I can guess is that Mark Schlereth is talking about angle blocking vs. zone steps. Every time Denver runs the ball, I check to see if it's angle or zone. Think I'll revisit the 41 rushing attempts at Dallas and see how many were angle and how many zone. Gordon's 1st quarter TD was angle and thought it looked like Wham G, because it was from the I and included down blocks, Risner pulling and Beck leading. Williams' 30 yard run in the 3rd quarter had both Guards pulling to the left with Risner and Saubert kicking out, Anderson driving and slightly reaching with Meinerz leading and pushing Williams who kept driving his legs.

[lvbronx]

I wonder if Albert O starting instead of Fant had anything to do with running the ball more often and better? I thought i saw somewhere that AOK played almost every down?

[samparnell]

Sam - You and I are on the same side on this one. The Wing-T is before my time, but I love the Novocaine quote.

I am absolutely all about having 3/4 of the plays look like runs.

My comment was simply meant to imply that I hope we can continue the commitment to the run, even if we're down by a bit. Until the clock is absolutely working against us and we don't have time to run, we need to continue to run. It's easy to run when you lead by two digit scores. It's more difficult to stay committed when down by a touchdown or more. Just need to not panic too early, which it has felt like we have at times.

Let me ask you, because you do have better knowledge on this stuff... I think I someone mention that Stink was commenting that we were using a different style of run blocking compared to how we had been previously. Is that something you noticed, and could you elaborate on anything we may have done differently besides just staying committed to the run?

It was particularly impressive given how beat up our line is/was, IMO... The RBs looked great out there and they were finding and hitting holes well, but we really seemed to be getting those holes on a much more consistent basis, and again, despite being well into our depth chart.

OK, went back and looked at all the rushing attempts at Dallas. Team stats say 41 attempts for 190 yards. The last two attempts were Victory, so actually 39 attempts in earnest. Of those, 10 were angle blocked and 29 were zone. The angle blocked attempts produced 70 yards and two TDS.

[samparnell]

I wonder if Albert O starting instead of Fant had anything to do with running the ball more often and better? I thought i saw somewhere that AOK played almost every down?

Albert O. had 63 out of 78 offensive snaps and Eric Saubert had 49. They were in 12 personnel at least half the snaps. The first TD was from 23 personnel; Wing I left.

[LordTrychon]

Not sure to what Schlereth was referring. He played four years under Joe Gibbs in Washington ('89-'92) Gibbs' rushing attack was the Counter Series which is an angle blocked attack with lots of down blocks and pullers. Mark won a Super Bowl blocking in that offense. Joe Gibbs said he stole the Counter Series from Tom Osborne, who ran it from the I, while Gibbs usually ran it from Single Back with an H-Back often in motion.

Thanks for the detailed breakdown. I enjoy reading stuff like this. If you do go back and review further, I'd definitely be interested in what you find.

Sunday *felt* like more zone to me, but I attribute that largely to the fact that the backs weren't getting hit so close to the line of scrimmage as often and the holes where there and getting found and it was successful.... that makes it *feel* more like zone automatically to me just because I grew up watching TD, etc. Dunno if it actually was or not.

I will say that I didn't hear Stink's comments, I had a friend who mentioned it to me, so it's third hand info, and could very well be incorrect.

Thanks again for the knowledge drop.

Edit: I had this window open last night and then got called away. Didn't think to look for refresh before responding

[jmz313]

We played Washington after Cleveland.

And we lost because our offense was poor. Defense only gave up 17 points.

Ugh, look at me repressing an ugly win. And i agree

[DENVERSB50CHAMP]

So I watched the Dallas game thinking that they were going to Blow us out of the water. So instead of being down on this Team I decided to just watch the game no matter what the outcome may be and I was going to try and find the Positives from this Team and WOW Was I stunned. There was not just one or two Positives however the entire game was a True POSITIVE moment from start to finish wow I did not expect Denver to Destroy Dallas however they did and what a Surprise it was !! Now the question is does the OC stick to this game plan that worked by using the RB's the entire game or will the OC revert back to the Cleveland Game? The Washington Game? I just hope not because we have seen what this Team is capable of. Going into the Philly Game I am once again for all of the remaining games just going to sit back and just enjoy the show weather that is Great or yes even Bad just to see the Positives and not the Negatives. I just do hope that Denver can get back to 6-4 by winning at HOME !! Philly by the way is not going to be easy so I just hope Coach Vic Fangio has this Young Defense ready to go the entire game!!

[Njbroncofan1]

I wonder if Albert O starting instead of Fant had anything to do with running the ball more often and better? I thought i saw somewhere that AOK played almost every down?

Absolutely. Said it at beginning of the year. If Albert O can stay healthy he is better than Fant. Fant can't block. Never breaks a tackle when you need it on a third and 5. But because he's a first rounder we "need" to play him. Look at all the young kids making a difference now. Cooper, Sterns, Meinerz...all later round picks.
Would be best to play Fant in a limited role.