Unbelievable!

[Maxie the Taxi]

If someone else posted this, I apologize. I'm catching up on my reading and come across this article by Lori Nickel: "Easy as Pi, Think football is simple? Try learning the playbook"

http://www.jsonline.com/sports/packers/65106982.html

The gist of the story is that McCarthy's play-calling verbiage is super-complicated.

A couple quotes from the story:

Donald Lee: "I really have to have my thinking cap on because that play I don't go out on a route, I have to protect the quarterback's backside," said Lee. "If I'm not paying attention, the D-end's got a free route to hit the quarterback in the back. If I happened to have a brain fart on that play, then the quarterback can get knocked out of the game."

"There are an estimated 300 to 400 plays on offense and all of them have a different name. A few are straightforward; some are just outright bizarre.

"Forget skinny post 85 or bailout check down 32. No that would be way too obvious.

"One play is grizzly exit red left triple scat three zebra Y whip Z base.

"And red robin plus cross outside fire zone; wing right over flop wallaby wide dog; exit blue slot left box 300 X ray corner; and red right flop V left 96 boomer tag.

"And everyone on offense has to know the difference."

GIVE ME A BREAK!

I knew the NFL was complicated, but come on! No wonder our QB is almost killed each game.

Are the players we have on the Packers smart enough to handle all this?

Does it have to be so obtuse?

Again, I'm Old School, so this runs against my grain by nature. But doesn't anyone else get the feeling sometimes that today's coaches tend to over-think the game? What happened to "Keep It Simple, Stupid!"

This may be another reason why the scripted plays in the beginning of the game work so well -- everybody's on the same page!

It may also be the reason why there are so damn many penalties with this team. And maybe it contributes to the lack of flow and continuity in Packer's offensive plays I've been noticing.

(Sorry for the rant. But I thought it was an interesting article.)

[bobblehead]

yea, line up, run it down their throats, and win. Sometimes you can out think yourself.

[bobblehead]

PS...could thinking about all that crap have something to do with all our false starts. Although I think many teams have similar # of things to learn so its still no excuse vs. the rest of the league.

[HarveyWallbangers]

We've been a pretty damn good offensive team under McCarthy.

Points per game

2007 = 4th in the NFL
2008 = 5th
2009 = 8th

[The_Dude]

I'll assume that everyone should know the offense since we have been running the same offense for 3 years now.

I don't know about this being part of the penalties on offense, since holding is holding no matter what play is called and players should know how to line up on the line correctly. Now if we had a bunch of delay of game penalties that would be a different story.

Having a very young team and a complicated playbook could lead to missed assignments though.

[Bossman641]

I'm pretty sure that is common for most teams in the league. Besides, don't they scale back the playbook every week? I don't think they trot out their every week utilizing the full playbook.

[Rastak]

I'm pretty sure that is common for most teams in the league. Besides, don't they scale back the playbook every week? I don't think they trot out their every week utilizing the full playbook.

I don't recall where I heard it but West Coast offenses have really long calls because they detail out every route in the call. From what I have heard this is very common to this offensive scheme.

[Zool]

I'm pretty sure that is common for most teams in the league. Besides, don't they scale back the playbook every week? I don't think they trot out their every week utilizing the full playbook.

I don't recall where I heard it but West Coast offenses have really long calls because they detail out every route in the call. From what I have heard this is very common to this offensive scheme.

I don't know if they still do but I think the Holmgren O was X Y Z for the recievers and they had odd names for the formations like zoom, razor laser etc with another indicator for which side was strong etc. The backs had a designation at the call but Brett would tell the back what his blocking assignment was at the line. There's just a ton of things for everyone to know.

Then Brett could just change the whole damned thing at the line if he didn't like what he saw from the D. I wonder if they sent in 2 plays just in case or if they drill it so much during the week that a simple line command is given?

[red]

its not mccarthey, its the west coast offense. almost all of the west coast guys use the same terminology, and they're all insanely complicated

i remember an old video of gruden sending in a play to chris sims during practice. sims must have asked him 4 times to repeat the play before gruden blew up at him for not understanding

its ridiculous

[Fritz]

I still wonder who is responsible for protection calls. I always thought it was the center, but now I read occasionally that Rodgers is.

So who is it?

[Rastak]

I still wonder who is responsible for protection calls. I always thought it was the center, but now I read occasionally that Rodgers is.

So who is it?

Normally it's the center but the QB can certainly override it with his own call to his blockers.

[MJZiggy]

I still wonder who is responsible for protection calls. I always thought it was the center, but now I read occasionally that Rodgers is.

So who is it?

Perhaps you've discovered the problem!!

[pbmax]

I still wonder who is responsible for protection calls. I always thought it was the center, but now I read occasionally that Rodgers is.

So who is it?
Both. Rodgers and the Center both call who they are designating as the Mike (middle) linebacker, and then everyone counts left or right from that guy. Either can change it, though Rodgers gets the last say by virtue of not having to duck his head.

Center calls out the protection. But Rodgers can change this if defensive personnel change positions or a blitz is coming. Even after calling the Mike, he can slide it left or right and send an extra blocker to the opposite side if necessary. Rodgers can also being in a TE or WR from the pattern to lock. Like when you see Donald Lee motion to the backfield.

[Fred's Slacks]

We ran a version of the WCO in college and it's really not that bad unless you're the QB.

Most people only have to listen to a couple of the words and can for the most part ignore the rest. I played WR and it was very simple. We had to know the formation, route combination and then any motion. So usually 2 sometimes 3 words. We didn't even need to hear the snap count because we went off the ball movement (but we usually did so we could anticipate and get an extra step). TE's and backs had to listen to a little more since they could be involved in the protection call as well. I'd imagine it was pretty simple for lineman. They don't care about the routes or the motion or the formation. They just need to know the protection call and where their help is coming from.

The hardest part is the QBs have to remember the whole thing and communicate it clearly in the huddle. To help with that our QBs had wrist bands with the longest plays on them numbered. So if our coaches wanted to run one of those plays they just tell the QB "run number 5". And he'd read it off the wristband in the huddle.

[cheesner]

Its not as complicated as it sounds. Each word is a part of the whole. A WR only needs to hear 2 of the words to know exactly what to do. AR is the only one who really needs to know the whole thing.

[Maxie the Taxi]

Thanks everyone for the input.

Here's an interesting article on Vince Lombardi's philosophy with regard to playbooks. I agree with Vince.

http://financecareers.about.com/b/2009/09/22/vince-lombardi-on-management.htm


What were the key features of Lombardi's methods? I would summarize the article this way:

•Do a few things extremely well rather than many things moderately well.
•Everyone should understand the big picture, not just his/her own tasks. Share responsibility.
•Hands-on learning methods and repeated drilling bring superior comprehension.
Regarding point 1, Lombardi cut the team's repertoire of offensive plays to under 40% as many as the average opponent had. With fewer plays, the Packers could practice each more intensively. They won through superior execution rather than through the element of surprise.

On point 2, Lombardi relieved the quarterback of the responsibility to remind each player of his assignment in the upcoming play. The signals that the quarterback called out were thus simplified and shortened. The other players, meanwhile, were expected to remember their duties, as well as those of their teammates. One player remarked that this gave everyone greater "ownership" of the offense.

Concerning point 3, Lombardi did not hand his players a preprinted playbook with diagrams of each play. Instead, in training camp they had to copy precisely on blank paper his blackboard diagrams. He also made sure not to move to the next lesson until the slowest player in the class fully understood the present one. The process was repeated from the start during training camp each year, even for veteran players.

[Guiness]

I don't know Maxi - I understand the viewpoint, and follow it myself in some sports at a lower level.

But I think the reality of the NFL, with the parity that they have, is that a 1% advantage makes all the difference between the top and bottom of the league. Just executing perfectly is no good, because you've got players who lit it up at all levels of play on the other side of the ball, so you have to look for advantages other ways.

Not to say you can't overdo it...