A Fundamental Problem With This Offense.

[desertfox59]

At this point I find it hard to believe that anyone would be impressed with Al Saunders and Joe Gibbs's offense.

Here's why:

1. No matter how many plays you have; NO matter how effective your scheme had been; It is pointless to have any offense if your players do not execute the basics of the game.

From a fundamental stand point we are not run or pass blocking very well. This is what we are missing in the debate of what has gone wrong with this offense. You must start with the basics of blocking first. Only when you have solid consistent perfection in these basics do you start to work on your play book. Can anyone really say that we have looked sharp in the fundamentals of blocking?

2. Football is played in increments of 1 to at a max of 15 seconds. At nearly every position you have less than a second to read, react and attack. You are in trouble when you have to read, think, react and then attack. The more thinking you have to do in that time the less effective your physical action becomes. In short, if you are thinking, you are not doing.

Lets take a look at the thinking that must go on in one play. It doesn't matter what play it is. The blocking assignments for just one play range from a minimum of 4 different options: 4-3, 3-4, 4-4, 5-2. That is a minimum and not factoring in defensive shifts and blitz’s. Lets just assume that these are the only options the defense has that means there are 2800 different blocking options one position has in a 700 page play book. Take that times 10 and you get how many the QB has to know (28,000). Now granted, many of the assignments will be the same (and in the case of the QB often times pass routes not blocking assignments) but I hope you get my point.

3. Many people have suggested, in their defense of the o-line, that this offense is not geared to the strengths of our o-lineman. If that is true, I have to question the wisdom of any offense that doesn't design its plays to play to the strengths of its players. If Jansen and Samuals cannot pass block 1 on 1 against d-ends then shouldn't we choose one of the 700 plays that has them get help? Isn’t Clinton Portis one of the best blocking backs in the league? Perhaps Samuals and Jansen should practice basic footwork and leverage advantage (again a basic of the game) if you are going to leave them out on an island.

In conclusion:

If the players are not practicing these basics than This is the fault of the HC and the OC and how they run their practices. (I won't bore you with the physiological reasons for having Professional athletes practice the basics) If they are practicing these yet are failing to execute them in game situations because they are thinking too much then I blame the players. As professionals who get paid millions of dollars to play a game, I expect them to know exactly where and who they are supposed to block And then execute the basic fundamentals that make a block successful. With the understanding that if you make a mistake you do it a full speed with intensity and not tentatively .

The Fundamental problem with this offense is that we are throwing a 700 page play book with multiple reads and shifts at players who are not executing the simplest of blocking fundamentals.

I guess If I had Joe Gibbs's ear, I'd ask him why we gave these guys the keys to a Lamborghini but didn't teach them how to drive a stick shift. They may get it into gear every now and then but they will probably end up on the side of the road with a busted transmission.

I'm sure some of you have heard of the saying, Keep It Simple Stupid. or K.I.S.S. I just don't understand why we didn't start this whole offensive switch with less plays run to perfection instead of more plays run imperfectly. We'd better start K.I.S.S.-ing these players before we kiss our season goodbye.

:helmet:

[GrimReefa]

1. No matter how many plays you have; NO matter how effective your scheme had been; It is pointless to have any offense if your players do not execute the basics of the game.

From a fundamental stand point we are not run or pass blocking very well. This is what we are missing in the debate of what has gone wrong with this offense. You must start with the basics of blocking first. Only when you have solid consistent perfection in these basics do you start to work on your play book. Can anyone really say that we have looked sharp in the fundamentals of blocking?

2. Football is played in increments of 1 to at a max of 15 seconds. At nearly every position you have less than a second to read, react and attack. You are in trouble when you have to read, think, react and then attack. The more thinking you have to do in that time the less effective your physical action becomes. In short, if you are thinking, you are not doing.

Lets take a look at the thinking that must go on in one play. It doesn't matter what play it is. The blocking assignments for just one play range from a minimum of 4 different options: 4-3, 3-4, 4-4, 5-2. That is a minimum and not factoring in defensive shifts and blitz’s. Lets just assume that these are the only options the defense has that means there are 2800 different blocking options one position has in a 700 page play book. Take that times 10 and you get how many the QB has to know (28,000). Now granted, many of the assignments will be the same (and in the case of the QB often times pass routes not blocking assignments) but I hope you get my point.

3. Many people have suggested, in their defense of the o-line, that this offense is not geared to the strengths of our o-lineman. If that is true, I have to question the wisdom of any offense that doesn't design its plays to play to the strengths of its players. If Jansen and Samuals cannot pass block 1 on 1 against d-ends then shouldn't we choose one of the 700 plays that has them get help? Isn’t Clinton Portis one of the best blocking backs in the league? Perhaps Samuals and Jansen should practice basic footwork and leverage advantage (again a basic of the game) if you are going to leave them out on an island.

Points 1 & 2 are realted. The team is having problems with the fundamentals because of the amount of thinking involved when LEARNING this offense.

#3 is a waste of breath. The offensive line has to get used to the scheme, it is not something they simply can not do.

The reason you have a 700-page play book is because the offense was top 5 in the NFL every year for the last 5 years. Getting it down is hard, but once you do that, there is not a better offense in the National Football League than the one Al Saunders runs. We can give up on it now and try learning a new system - AGAIN - or we can allow the team to keep at it, and watch for improvement as the season goes on. You'll have to get used to the fact, however, that the point of the 2006 season is to set the team up for 2007.

[LoudMouth12thMan]

Good Post. I agree that I think the fundamentals have been lost b/c of over-thinking. Actually the way the O is set up, the RB's have a lot of reads like a qb. Betts wasn't getting it done initially in pass pro. Why Portis isn't in is beyond me. Something tells me its his shoulder and the fact that hes been tapping his helmet a lot and getting spelled.

This is a two year plan with this offense. I think we all see that its going to take a while, but thats not to say we can't win with what we've been doing if we change a couple of things. Portis needs more touches in between the tackles IMO.

HTTR

[wildbill]

year after year it's the same thing. New scheme, new players, new coaches etc.

And every year we blame it on the coaches. A change in scheme cannot be so significant that our O-line forgets how to block.

We're totally out of sync on offense..

[Geneva]

At this point I find it hard to believe that anyone would be impressed with Al Saunders and Joe Gibbs's offense.

Here's why:

1. No matter how many plays you have; NO matter how effective your scheme had been; It is pointless to have any offense if your players do not execute the basics of the game.

From a fundamental stand point we are not run or pass blocking very well. This is what we are missing in the debate of what has gone wrong with this offense. You must start with the basics of blocking first. Only when you have solid consistent perfection in these basics do you start to work on your play book. Can anyone really say that we have looked sharp in the fundamentals of blocking?

2. Football is played in increments of 1 to at a max of 15 seconds. At nearly every position you have less than a second to read, react and attack. You are in trouble when you have to read, think, react and then attack. The more thinking you have to do in that time the less effective your physical action becomes. In short, if you are thinking, you are not doing.

Lets take a look at the thinking that must go on in one play. It doesn't matter what play it is. The blocking assignments for just one play range from a minimum of 4 different options: 4-3, 3-4, 4-4, 5-2. That is a minimum and not factoring in defensive shifts and blitz’s. Lets just assume that these are the only options the defense has that means there are 2800 different blocking options one position has in a 700 page play book. Take that times 10 and you get how many the QB has to know (28,000). Now granted, many of the assignments will be the same (and in the case of the QB often times pass routes not blocking assignments) but I hope you get my point.

3. Many people have suggested, in their defense of the o-line, that this offense is not geared to the strengths of our o-lineman. If that is true, I have to question the wisdom of any offense that doesn't design its plays to play to the strengths of its players. If Jansen and Samuals cannot pass block 1 on 1 against d-ends then shouldn't we choose one of the 700 plays that has them get help? Isn’t Clinton Portis one of the best blocking backs in the league? Perhaps Samuals and Jansen should practice basic footwork and leverage advantage (again a basic of the game) if you are going to leave them out on an island.

In conclusion:

If the players are not practicing these basics than This is the fault of the HC and the OC and how they run their practices. (I won't bore you with the physiological reasons for having Professional athletes practice the basics) If they are practicing these yet are failing to execute them in game situations because they are thinking too much then I blame the players. As professionals who get paid millions of dollars to play a game, I expect them to know exactly where and who they are supposed to block And then execute the basic fundamentals that make a block successful. With the understanding that if you make a mistake you do it a full speed with intensity and not tentatively .

The Fundamental problem with this offense is that we are throwing a 700 page play book with multiple reads and shifts at players who are not executing the simplest of blocking fundamentals.

I guess If I had Joe Gibbs's ear, I'd ask him why we gave these guys the keys to a Lamborghini but didn't teach them how to drive a stick shift. They may get it into gear every now and then but they will probably end up on the side of the road with a busted transmission.

I'm sure some of you have heard of the saying, Keep It Simple Stupid. or K.I.S.S. I just don't understand why we didn't start this whole offensive switch with less plays run to perfection instead of more plays run imperfectly. We'd better start K.I.S.S.-ing these players before we kiss our season goodbye.

:helmet:

[Geneva]

Good post. I agree with everything you said. I have posted like statements myself. This is the reason we have Ray Brown back.

[christopher44]

I find it hard to believe that a 7 year 49 million dollar qb cant show ant signs that he can make it work.Dude,please,wake up no more excuses for Boonell,He is 15 -18 as our starter.IT starts with him.He is the cancer on offense.

[PeterMP]

First, this learing the offense thing is a myth. If that was really an issue wouldn't the offense look better in week 6 than in week 1. They did not.

Second, the coaches have implicitly admitted this team does not have the personal to run this offense. In KC and with the Rams, the back was frequenlty flanked out like a reciever. We throw the ball a lot to Betts, but he always starts out in the backfield, and they are dump offs, and Portis the (#1 back) has very little role as a reciever. You will never see one of are backs on the line of scrimmage like a reciever or running routes greater than 10 yards down the field, which was common with Faulk and Holmes.

The other biggest problem with the offense is that we don't have mobile offensive linemen. Running wide (not between the tackles) is a key component to the offense as run with the Rams and St. Louis. Our most mobile OL is Thomas, and he is coming off of a broken leg. Aikman pointed out early in the Colts game that we were not going to be able to run outside against their front seven because of their speed. Most front sevens are faster than our OL so that will be a problem most weeks.

What has to happen?

Gibbs has always been excellent at changing according to his personal (a passing offense was run in SD, he came here and ran a power running offense, and then with the posse went back to more of a running offense, and 1992 the top RB on the team were an aging Byner and a small Ricky Ervins). Already, you have seen some changes (Portis does not end up in the slot). I expect coming out of the bye we will see more:

1. power running, straight ahead and between the tackles. This will help the OL

2. more motion by players like Cooley and Sellers (not a true H-back, but something of a hybrid between the TE of the Saunders offense and the H-back of the Gibbs offense). This will Brunell do a better job of making pre-snap reads.

3. more end a rounds and reverses. The play makers on this team need to get the ball more. The WR screens are not working as well because teams are expecting them and are not afraid of Brunell throwing the ball deep so the CBs are playing close to the LOS. Off of that, you will see more passes thrown by the backs and WR (so far neither ARE or Port have thrown a pass). There probably will not be one against Dallas, but expect one against the Eagles.

4. designed roll outs. This was always a common theme in the Gibbs offense. Even Rypien who was pretty immobile was rolled out. This makes protection easier, and Brunell can not use the whole field anyway.

I expect the offense to improve in the coming weeks because of such changes, but everybody will talk about how the offense finally learned the plays.

[SFCASPER]

I find it hard to believe that a 7 year 49 million dollar qb cant show ant signs that he can make it work.Dude,please,wake up no more excuses for Boonell,He is 15 -18 as our starter.IT starts with him.He is the cancer on offense.

This entire scenario comes down to "You can't run Al Saunder's offense with Joe Gibb's quarterback" - It's like buying one of the new Shelby look alike Mustangs and getting the 4 cylinder engine... Either buy the GT or get a Ford Focus.

Our GT is waiting on the bench - we need to change engines.

[flexxskins]

Good post. I agree with everything you said. I have posted like statements myself. This is the reason we have Ray Brown back.

Huh?

[skinzplay]

Great point, SFcasper. I'll quote what you said here:

"You can't run Al Saunders' offense with Joe Gibbs' quarterback"

Nothing could be more true, and I think this has been shown. And from what I've been hearing, Saunders has called PLENTY of down-the-field passes, but Brunell simply keeps checking down to Betts or Cooley or someone nearer the line of scrimmage for a high percentage pass. Get him outta there!

[bbuzz1962]

If all we needed was someone to hand the ball off, this team would be fine. I think the fact that there is never a deep ball threat has ruined any chances for this offense. You bring 8 in the box for run, or our passing game, and you win. You stop the run effectively, and the passing game of Brunell. It's that simple. Yet this team and a lot of fans want to come up with hundreds of reasons we are failing. How simple of a defense do you need to stop this team? Very basic 8 man box. Any team can do this, and that is why we are losing. When the deep ball, hell, the intermediate ball comes back to this team, things will change. Come Sunday, if we play the same old bs, we will lose.

[planter]

I agree.

Skins Offense may have attempted to do too much too soon. Lots of penalties, missed blocking assignments, etc.

Another fundamental problem with this Offense, is this Defense.

[chow184]

the effort of the O-line hasn't been great run blocking,but brunell has screwed the offense in the passing game.

[Taylor 36]

I agree.

Skins Offense may have attempted to do too much too soon. Lots of penalties, missed blocking assignments, etc.

Another fundamental problem with this Offense, is this Defense.

:applause:

[desertfox59]

To all that have replied so far I thank you for the quality of your posts. Most grateful am I, to you, for not trying to micro-argue my overall generalization of our whole offensive teams blocking woes with alot of partisian taintable-to-whatever-you-want-them-to-mean Stats.

[brunell]

not to mention we could have used more of Saunders' offense in the preseason. That is 4 fewer regular season games with players and coaches trying to adapt.

[desertfox59]

not to mention we could have used more of Saunders' offense in the preseason. That is 4 fewer regular season games with players and coaches trying to adapt.

I totally agree with this. I don't think our "vinalla" preseason was not at all the right way to go. Get the timing down. Run your stuff. Use motion. Practice your real plays.

So what if you show 160 of your real plays in the preseason, you still have 540 for the regular season. Heck if you average 40 plays a game that will still get you through 13 games without running the same play twice in any game.

[ProBowler]

I honestly think Gibbs has over estimated the OL wich df's original post eludes too. I hear people say let's run it with Portis down their throat. We can't do that. Our O line isn't good enough. It's not terrible but it's not a OL that is going to dominate you either to where you can run when ever you want and have all day to pass, but it is good enough to win with. It's not the hogs of old and Portis is not a power back and Brunell is not a mobile Theisman or a good deep passer like Rypien or Williams. Clinton want make it another 2 years trying to be a power back and Brunell shouldn't even be playing.

I think the real problem is we have an offense with no idenity. We don't run very well and pass even worse. This is getting to the point of unexcuseable with the playmakers we do have. I like Gibbs and I believe in his system and I question Saunders but I'm also starting to agree with the people who are critizing the coaching. I think we are trying too much of everything and getting nothing done. The stats are decent on offense but really don't reflect production or other things like losing the field position battle and TOP battle most of the time wich helps the defense.

Let's imagine a perfect Redskin world and we are doing well on offense. I just don't think there is no way of us beating a Colts or Patriots team doing what we do in a Super Bowl. In a perfectly Gibbs exectued offense it takes us too long and too much perfection to score. Just one bad play in any series and the offense comes to a hault and out comes the punter. We can't convert short 3rd downs running the ball and we can't get big plays in the passing game. I think he got Saunders to expand on the offense and make it more modern but the thing is it's still the same philosphy except it hasn't won Super Bowls like Gibbs original offense has. In my opinion this is why things are completely backfiring.

I have always wondered what would happen if we put JC at QB and spread the field out and make teams match up with our playmakers. Basically construct an offense around the QB and other players we have instead of trying to get them to conform to a set play before the snap that just has WR's audibling their routes during a pass play. You can watch what we do and see we never appear to audible between the pass to the run. We don't have time with the shifting and motion. We may audile from a run to a play action but we never change the formation when audibiling.

I still thinks Gibbs has been great for the orginization and we can be alot better and even possibley win a SB someday but it has to be without Saunders. I just wish if Gibbs was going to change things on offense he would have went the way of doing what the Colts or Patriots do.

[MumboSauce]

Well I'll be darn glad when they finally "get it" and execute with consistency.

[nicety65]

At this point I find it hard to believe that anyone would be impressed with Al Saunders and Joe Gibbs's offense.

Here's why:

1. No matter how many plays you have; NO matter how effective your scheme had been; It is pointless to have any offense if your players do not execute the basics of the game.

From a fundamental stand point we are not run or pass blocking very well. This is what we are missing in the debate of what has gone wrong with this offense. You must start with the basics of blocking first. Only when you have solid consistent perfection in these basics do you start to work on your play book. Can anyone really say that we have looked sharp in the fundamentals of blocking?

2. Football is played in increments of 1 to at a max of 15 seconds. At nearly every position you have less than a second to read, react and attack. You are in trouble when you have to read, think, react and then attack. The more thinking you have to do in that time the less effective your physical action becomes. In short, if you are thinking, you are not doing.

Lets take a look at the thinking that must go on in one play. It doesn't matter what play it is. The blocking assignments for just one play range from a minimum of 4 different options: 4-3, 3-4, 4-4, 5-2. That is a minimum and not factoring in defensive shifts and blitz’s. Lets just assume that these are the only options the defense has that means there are 2800 different blocking options one position has in a 700 page play book. Take that times 10 and you get how many the QB has to know (28,000). Now granted, many of the assignments will be the same (and in the case of the QB often times pass routes not blocking assignments) but I hope you get my point.

3. Many people have suggested, in their defense of the o-line, that this offense is not geared to the strengths of our o-lineman. If that is true, I have to question the wisdom of any offense that doesn't design its plays to play to the strengths of its players. If Jansen and Samuals cannot pass block 1 on 1 against d-ends then shouldn't we choose one of the 700 plays that has them get help? Isn’t Clinton Portis one of the best blocking backs in the league? Perhaps Samuals and Jansen should practice basic footwork and leverage advantage (again a basic of the game) if you are going to leave them out on an island.

In conclusion:

If the players are not practicing these basics than This is the fault of the HC and the OC and how they run their practices. (I won't bore you with the physiological reasons for having Professional athletes practice the basics) If they are practicing these yet are failing to execute them in game situations because they are thinking too much then I blame the players. As professionals who get paid millions of dollars to play a game, I expect them to know exactly where and who they are supposed to block And then execute the basic fundamentals that make a block successful. With the understanding that if you make a mistake you do it a full speed with intensity and not tentatively .

The Fundamental problem with this offense is that we are throwing a 700 page play book with multiple reads and shifts at players who are not executing the simplest of blocking fundamentals.

I guess If I had Joe Gibbs's ear, I'd ask him why we gave these guys the keys to a Lamborghini but didn't teach them how to drive a stick shift. They may get it into gear every now and then but they will probably end up on the side of the road with a busted transmission.

I'm sure some of you have heard of the saying, Keep It Simple Stupid. or K.I.S.S. I just don't understand why we didn't start this whole offensive switch with less plays run to perfection instead of more plays run imperfectly. We'd better start K.I.S.S.-ing these players before we kiss our season goodbye.

:helmet:

:applause: Wow I'm pleased to see someone on the boards that knows football, good post

[CustomApparelDirect]

Points 1 & 2 are realted. The team is having problems with the fundamentals because of the amount of thinking involved when LEARNING this offense.

#3 is a waste of breath. The offensive line has to get used to the scheme, it is not something they simply can not do.

The reason you have a 700-page play book is because the offense was top 5 in the NFL every year for the last 5 years. Getting it down is hard, but once you do that, there is not a better offense in the National Football League than the one Al Saunders runs. We can give up on it now and try learning a new system - AGAIN - or we can allow the team to keep at it, and watch for improvement as the season goes on. You'll have to get used to the fact, however, that the point of the 2006 season is to set the team up for 2007.

:applause: Great assessment!!!

:mad: However, Brunell weighs-in HEAVILY, with regards to this offense's 'inefficiency'!

:2cents: EVERYONE, at The Columbia Lighthouse for the Blind, even agrees therewith!!!