question about new scheme, plans, and such

Submitted by sheepman on

This may be a really stupid mgoquestion, but I want to know the answer as I have been wondering this for awhile. (I have only taken a real liking to football over the last 6 years or so, and have never played - other wise I may know the answer).

There is a lot of talk about the new defense, the new offense, the "trojan", and everything related that we are planning to do this season.

It seems strange to me that people talk so frankly about all of this. I mean, isn't there some element of surprise with the whole thing? We don't broadcast our war strategies over the TV before we do it, isn't that something like this?

I suppose there are a few possible explanations:

1) They are only leaking a very small part of their scheme leaving a lot to surprise.

2) With each scheme, there are so many different possibilities (routes, options, etc.) that it doesn't matter who knows.

3) There are only a limited number of schemes and plays and it really doesn't matter who knows as everything is already run in one form or another.

Or is there something I am not thinking of?

Thanks in advance...

PS. goodness, I can't wait for the season to start.

MichiganMan_24_

August 14th, 2009 at 7:44 PM ^

Its not WHAT you do its HOW you do it .. if a play is executed to perfection you are going to gain yardage regardless if the defense knows whats coming or not .. in my opinion

formerlyanonymous

August 14th, 2009 at 7:51 PM ^

Illinois positioning of their OLBs last year begs to differ. Not that it was hugely dominating, it really did slow down our offensive attack. So while you're right, there are some examples where if a defense more or less knows what's coming, they can at least slow you down.

Another example would be the 1997 NU game where the defense was reading the center's snap. They knew if it was a run or pass before each play occurred and could adjust accordingly.

Any one else notice RR made quotes about if we execute properly, we will win? Sounds awfully Lloyd Carr.

Tater

August 14th, 2009 at 7:44 PM ^

....we did pretty much broadcast our war strategy on TV last time; it was called "Shock and Awe." And, to make sure you all know I'm not trying to turn this into a political referendum, the war pretty much proved something that works in football, too: if you have a gross edge in talent and you are able to execute, it doesn't much matter if the other side knows what you are going to do, because they can't do anything about it.

If UM's talent level is back to normal (better than 70-80 percent of their opposition) and they can execute the offense, they will win eight or nine this year. If either element is lacking, they won't.

WildcatBlue

August 14th, 2009 at 8:32 PM ^

so I'll supply an analogy that hopefully avoids the worst controversies:

UM needs only to beat OSU senseless on the field; nobody expects Brandon Graham to keep Justin Boren placated under house arrest in the aftermath. The former can be done by an outburst of sheer force, the latter requires perseverance and an expensive supply chain that leads directly to Krispy Kreme.

BOOM! DE-POLITICIZED.

mejunglechop

August 14th, 2009 at 9:44 PM ^

That's funny, but actually not what I was getting at. What's so remarkable about Tater's post is that his example of our campaign in Iraq is shows exactly why the logic behind his greater point makes no sense. When Tater says "able to execute", he means achieve the goal. Almost always a play that works was successfully executed and one that wasn't didn't achieve the desired outcome wasn't. So looking at Iraq, we have a tremendous resource advantage and the invasion phase is successful but the occupation phase not so much. For both we had comprehensive plans and contingencies. So what was the difference? Failure to execute. This kind of reasoning gets us nowhere.

WildcatBlue

August 14th, 2009 at 10:28 PM ^

long live the actual analysis. So: the real answer is that the US did not have comprehensive plans and contingencies at the ready when the invasion took place, or for two or three years after. The more politically volatile version is that the experts whose proposals were most comprehensive and/or learned were shouted down or forced out. (Shinseki being the most famous example). In the Bremer era there was no failure to execute a plan. There was no plan.

*stops with the bullshit*

Fulling expecting negative points for falling into the political arena that I had tried to avoid, can we just agree that a Buckeye under trailer-arrest is funny?

formerlyanonymous

August 14th, 2009 at 7:45 PM ^

Most of the things discussed are easily picked out of film or watching previous games. There aren't too many "new" things introduced to football anymore, just forgotten ones. A lot of football fans flipped out when Tebow did his option inside to the tight end. It was something nobody has run in most of our lifetimes, but it was actually not uncommon in the 20s during the wing-T formations.

If people here know about it, it generally has to do with someone watching enough tape to know a coach's tendencies. Most coaches stick with a particular scheme, but the defense still doesn't know particular play will be called on any occasion. On top of that you can obviously set up opponents by running plays, like a run up the gut, then following it with a play action pass where you fake that run and then throw it over the crashing defenders.

The opposing coaches don't worry about what we say, as they have even more in depth (if not equal in some cases) scouting than most of what you'll see here.

Bluerock

August 14th, 2009 at 8:29 PM ^

I think formerlyanonymous is right, but would add,that these coaches put in different packages for every game.
After hours on hours in the film room they take weaknesses they find in their opponent and exploit it.Could be just alignment or some special blitz package.

mgovictors23

August 14th, 2009 at 9:02 PM ^

The thing is though is that Rich Rodriquez exploits weaknesses and changes his offense to attack that weakness. So we don't know what "exactly" we are going to run this season other than a spread but we can run alot of different plays out of it.

TTUwolverine

August 14th, 2009 at 10:13 PM ^

"It seems strange to me that people talk so frankly about all of this. I mean, isn't there some element of surprise with the whole thing? We don't broadcast our war strategies over the TV before we do it, isn't that something like this?"

I really don't think that we have really "leaked" anything. I mean, suppose we are going to run most of our defense with a 3-3-5 formation, and in a summer press conference Rich Rod flat out says "I think we're going to run a lot of 3-3-5 this year," that might give the opponent about a .002% edge. OSU would have discovered this within the first 2 minutes of watching our first game anyway, which will give them plenty of time to prepare. I am a firm believer that scheme is only as good as the athletes that execute it, although obviously you don't want to broadcast our entire playbook.