Football LNBS: Calling options / Adding reverse action downfield

Offense in the NFL is evolving rapidly, and outpacing Defense at a record pace.

Watching the close games the past few weeks, I’ve seen two “hook and lateral” plays, and it got me thinking:

If you can predict with a reasonable degree of certainty what the safety or corner will do in a particular coverage, you should be able to determine what they will do post-completion as they track towards the ballcarrier. At this point, you could anticipate - and plan for - where the next pocket of space will open up.

For so long it’s been a one hit approach: find the open man, and he runs in space until he scores, gets tackled, or goes out of bounds.

What if it was a combo approach? Find the open man, gain yards, and provide him with an option to lateral to a crossing receiver who should be able to get another chunk.

You see this with rugby runs all the time. Why not more often in football?
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Biggest risk: turning the ball over.

If you trust your team to execute, be smart and make the right decision in space, this could be a disgusting next level of dominance.

You could even run a crosser by the ballcarrier as a diversion to freeze the tackler. The mere threat of a downfield reverse would be terrifying to account for.
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Originally Posted by JakeF:
When it goes wrong you turn the ball over. That's the last thing coaches want to happen.

I agree. BUT you can mitigate this risk a bit through practice and coaching the players to make the proper decisions.

You could have the crosser come close enough for it to be a handoff instead of a lateral, as well.

I mean, can you imagine Kelce on a slant, who then hands it to Tyreek running the opposite direction?
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What if the Chiefs put Tyreek in the backfield and Kelce inside (either next to Fisher or Schwartz; doesn’t matter which).

Fake the handoff to Tyreek to Kelce’s side. Kelce releases into the flat and Tyreek follows him. Dump the ball to Kelce.

The speed option is then set up in the flat. The corner has to either try to bring down Kelce or stick with Tyreek.

The turnover possibility is still very real and the play will never happen, but it’s fun to think about.
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Originally Posted by dlphg9:
It doesnt happen because it's really ****ing dumb.

So is passing it to your OT in the red zone, or having your DT throw a jump pass.

Why do they do it late in games when they need a huge play? The element of surprise.

If it was a regular package defenses had to prepare for, it could be a strategic advantage.
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Originally Posted by smithandrew051:
What if the Chiefs put Tyreek in the backfield and Kelce inside (either next to Fisher or Schwartz; doesn’t matter which).

Fake the handoff to Tyreek to Kelce’s side. Kelce releases into the flat and Tyreek follows him. Dump the ball to Kelce.

The speed option is then set up in the flat. The corner has to either try to bring down Kelce or stick with Tyreek.

The turnover possibility is still very real and the play will never happen, but it’s fun to think about.

EXACTLY.

Layered options downfield. Defenses would be so fucked.

DE’s get destroyed on having to pick poison on read options in the backfield. Imagine a CB having to do this for the first time.
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I think the continued evolution of the offenses will primarily be based on getting the ball into space as fast as possible to make the offensive line less and less important.

It’s really hard to have 5 good AND healthy linemen. That’s also 5 guys that you have to pay eventually. You can have a revolving door at RB or WR and you’ll be just fine. The more unimportant you can make the the line, the better from a contractual and health standpoint.
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I could see something like that being used a couple of times a year out of a normal offensive formation as a trick type play. Anything more is asking for trouble. NFL defenders are to fast and to good at reacting to regularly get beat by those plays. Even the fluky, "Miami Miracle" plays are extremely rare. For every one that works there are 20 that end in fumbles recovered by the defense/kicking team
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Originally Posted by Why Not?:
I could see something like that being used a couple of times a year out of a normal offensive formation as a trick type play. Anything more is asking for trouble. NFL defenders are to fast and to good at reacting to regularly get beat by those plays. Even the fluky, "Miami Miracle" plays are extremely rare. For every one that works there are 20 that end in fumbles recovered by the defense/kicking team

It's one thing when the defense knows something like that is coming because there's 5 seconds left, it's another when you bust out out on 2nd and 3 in the 3rd quarter.
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Originally Posted by Mecca:
It's one thing when the defense knows something like that is coming because there's 5 seconds left, it's another when you bust out out on 2nd and 3 in the 3rd quarter.

Yep.

The most similar concept I can compare it to was the inside pitch packages we had last year. We ran the same line up like four times and had a different variation on it each time. It was crisp, everyone knew their assignments and executed it really well.

Or, like when the dolphins busted out the Wildcat on the Patriots. They had no clue what to do.

Or, like when Kaepernick destroyed the league with read-options.

This year, it’s the ‘QB as a receiver’ trend after both the Pats and Eagles ran it in the SB.

If we have the same focus and have a handful of successful double-action plays (downfield options, route + lats, downfield reverses) we would crush in the playoffs.
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