Staying Multiple on Offense

There is a lot of talk, mostly among coaches and commentators, about “staying multiple” on offense. Usually this is in regards to whether or not a particular offense is complex (when coaches are talking about it) or predictable (when commentators are). Sometimes those meanings overlap, but let me give you my opinion on the issue.

For me and many of the coaches I’ve learned from, offensive multiplicity usually doesn’t come from a whole lot of different plays, it comes from different “looks” presented to the defense. Here is how I define a “look” (you may do it differently, and that’s fine): Let’s say you have one play, whether it is run or pass – we’ll call it “Weave”. You run Weave out of six different formations, and from three of those formations you can run it with a motion. To me, that is nine different looks for a defense to digest.

Think about it….if you have (as we normally do) 8 different base formations, left and right, that’s 16 looks (for your #1, base, “go-to” play). From three of those formations, you run a motion, and in four other formations, you run another (again, both left and right). That is 30 different looks, when you combine what the defense sees pre-snap and reacts to post-snap. But it’s only ONE play for you as an offense. Think of the teaching advantage you have over a defense!

Mike Leach, in his book “Swing Your Sword” said, “If you want to screw with a defense, do it with formations, not with plays.” Multiple formations require a defense to align correctly every time or risk exposing a gap or mismatch.

As I said, we normally have 8 base formations. We also have tag words that can change each one into an unbalanced look, a wing look, or change the back alignment. Now, not every play goes well with every formation and certainly not every tag word. But the plays that we run the most, that we rely on the most, are most definitely run out of the most looks. In Week One a couple of years ago, I went into the game being able to give the defense 180 different looks. Considering we ran about 75 plays, that may be considered overkill, but you never know what will come up as the matchup you’re looking for.

The other consideration is practice time. Let’s say you have your inside zone play that is your #1 go-to play. Your game plan calls for that play to be run 20 times a game. So you’ll want to practice, over time, that play out of as many different looks as you can. Then you also have a play-action pass off of that inside zone play. Well, you have to ask yourself, “How many times am I going to call that in a game?” Three times? Four? So maybe you only run that play action out of two or three formations. The point is, even if you are multiple, you still have to be efficient.

One other way to increase looks is by your pass route structure. We have two different types of pass route structure – one is based on alignment, i.e., “the outside receiver does this and the inside receiver does that”. The other method is by position. This concept was brought in to us by Dan Tovar who coached our women’s team in 2007, and I’ve kept it in my offense ever since. I’ll break down one play to serve as an example: on Sizzle, we have the following assignments:

A – cross with Y @ 3-5 yards
Y – cross with A @ 5-7 yards
X – post
Z – 8-10 yard dig
B – get to flat, depending on alignment (could start from backfield, slot or already wide)

So no matter what formation we are in, when we call Sizzle, those assignments stay the same.  Of course, Sizzle works better with some formations than others – probably 4 of them, and then really well when we add in a B motion. But again – the point is that we’ve learned one play and the defense not only has to align against four different looks and a motion, but then react to what appears to them to be 4 entirely different plays.

In summary, “staying multiple” really isn’t as hard as it sounds. Heck, if you’ve learned anything from me in this blog, I hope that it is that *nothing* about offense has to be all that complex. It all happens on the front end, in your planning stages as an offensive staff.