The Football Brainiacs

For the last couple of weeks you’ve heard me and others talk about how the offensive line has some talent but with so few starters as a collective unit, they need some time to put it together. Part of refining the execution is blocking but part of that is figuring out who to block.  The Sooners had a lot of success against Tulsa. But I went through a few plays to show that they could have had even more success had they cleaned up the mental aspect of the game, and been a bit more crisp in some execution.

Below I want you to note the blue line that shows to the left there are four defenders, and to the right there are seven.  The obvious weakness in the defensive alignment is to the left.  The o linemen on the left side goes Brown(T), Farniok(G) and Alvarez(C).  If you notice, the defensive ends on the both sides of the line are stood up, and their body language shows they are coming, as you would expect down on the goal line.  Pre-Snap body language is a big deal, and something you have to know and understand both as a QB, and as a Tackle. In this instance, there has to be a hot call for Brown to make, or for Mayfield to check to a better play.  The Sooners did go to the left side where there were less defenders, but made a big mistake.

 

 

This is a bust by someone, depending on how it’s taught.  The way I was taught, because the play is going to the left, the tackle has to make a fan call.  Fanning out means that you spread or fan out to block on that side. Here, Brown gets the defensive end, but if you note the top blue arrow, Farniok leaves Alexander unblocked, and makes him look like Dick Butkus down on the goal line.  The bottom blue arrow is pointing out that while Farniok blocked the wrong guy, the double team ends up a yard deep in the end zone.  So again, had the fan call been on and Farniok simply blocked Alexander, and left Alvarez one on one with the nose, Samaje, can take the red arrow route, and walk into the end zone, as the corner has Westbrook in man on the outside and is turned to the play.

Perine ends up getting smacked by the red x, and it looked a lot worse than it was, because the bottom defensive end got in on the play too due to the bust.  One guy does it different, and it’s 7-0 good guys early on. Farniok may have found his calling as a guard too though as he’s a road grader in there.

 

Here is another bust that is cleaned up relatively easily.  Tulsa was very aggressive in forcing the issue.  They ran stunts, blitzes and attacked the line of scrimmage.  Going back to pre-snap body language, the linebacker on the outside whom i’ve pointed out with the red arrow, and the linebacker next to him are showing that they’re coming pre snap.  St. John has to see this.  We called it a storm call, and if I’m at tackle here I’m yelling Storm! Storm! Storm!  What that means is that the outside linebacker is blitzing, so for the defense to stay gap sound, the D-Tackle over St. John is coming inside.  The Storm call alerts the guard, Nila to be ready for me to pass the D-Tackle off, since as a tackle, I’ve gotta get out there and pick up the linebacker.  If it’s a fake, at least Nila’s ready for it.

 

 

St. John stays with the D-Tackle, and leaves the OLB unblocked having not called it out.  Samaje (Blue Arrow below) is working inside out and is going to pick up that inside linebacker I pointed out as he should.  If St. John simply calls out this Storm call, then he gets the OLB, and Andrews probably has a big play down the seam, as you can see Baker is looking right at him, and the defender who is covering Andrews is beat right now.  Since there was a bust with the protection, Baker has to scramble and gets about six yards, but it could possibly had been six points if it had been executed correctly.  Again, ability vs. execution shows that with the people that were blocked, the protection looks solid, minus the one miss.

 

Pre-Snap body language is something you have to have to have to pay attention to as an O lineman.  If this gets cleaned up, this is a really big play, since the two linebackers I’ve pointed out are coming, and the middle linebacker is on his horse right now and coming first.  Farniok has to see this.  While he’s supposed to block down, and in this case that means the nose in between him and Alvarez, the linebacker is showing he’s coming A-Gap.  What that means is that his nose is going to slant away from him.  He has to see the linebacker coming, and pick him up, and leave Alvarez one on one with the nose.

 

 

While that makes it a tough block for Alvarez, by Farniok not picking up the linebacker, it makes it almost impossible for Nila, since he’s pulling around, and the linebacker is at top speed pre-snap.  Had Farniok picked up the A gap, the first guy that Nila sees coming into the gap is the linebacker who’s still back a few steps, so then you’d have Brooks following St. John through the hole, with St. John just looking for someone to block.  Even still, Nila has to be ready for anything here, and kick his guy out hard, while St. John gets up on the linebacker.  With Brooks’ speed, this could have been another running TD, and had the play down on the goal line got blocked correctly early, it’s 14-3 with the run game being the bell cow.

 

 

So finally, what has to be understood by Sooner faithful is that it’s very possible, and quite likely for this to get cleaned up quickly.  Coach Bedenbaugh is gonna wear these guys out on the details this week and next week since when you look at the tape, guys aren’t getting pushed around or knocked back.  There’s just a lot to process, and you have to know exactly what to do, and understand that might change at a moment’s notice as an o-lineman.

You have to stay gap sound and arrive angry and physical.  So when I sit back and say just keep the faith and hold on, the stuff that’s being missed isn’t an ability issue.  Keep in mind that three guys are brand new starters, and Saturday, Nila was the only one who was a starter a year ago.  Even with all of that, as the game wore on and the speed of the game got familiar, the guys cleaned a lot of this up and were flat out mashing people in the second half.  The extra week of work should help keep some of these finer points ironed out. Once it’s cleaned up, the run game should pop and the offense should take another step forward.