Different trends characterize the current season: The defenses dominate, many teams have problems in the offensive line – and a trend reversal can be seen in the offensive balance. The Run Game is increasingly dominating, and this in different ways. In other words, an old formula for success recovers the NFL.
“Exotic Smashmouth. When freshly head coach Mike Mularkey took these words into his mouth in the spring of 2016 to sum up his seemingly antiquated plans for his own offences, reminiscent of the 1970s and 1980s, one thing was certain: the media mockery.
In the 2015 season just ended, twelve quarterbacks had broken the 4,000 passing yard mark (2016 was 13, and the injured Derek Carr missed the 4,000 by 63 yards) and everyone knows that the NFL is a passing league. Rules are advantageous for the pass, quarterbacks and receivers determine the picture.
Tennessee’s CEO Jon Robinson almost felt compelled to justify the statement of his head coach at MMQB:”Teams are now playing a lot of sub-defense, with more defensive backs. To counteract this, we can set up a “bigger” game and, if you like, eliminate some of the smaller opponents. and at the same time, you shorten the games and limit the options for the opponent’s offense.”
In theory, all well and good, but the practice seemed to be yet another story. And yet, one and a half years later, we stand at the very point: The Run Game, which in recent years has been treated almost neglectfully in some cases, is on the rise and is regaining its place as a formula for success. After years of focusing on the pass game, we could be at the beginning of another turnaround in the NFL.
No other current example summarizes this better than the Chicago Bears. On 16 passes and 54 runs at the victory in Baltimore two weeks ago followed seven (!) passes and 26 runs in the victory against the Panthers last Sunday. Even Mularkey may not have had this extreme interpretation of his vision in mind.
Of course, the Chicago process has its own cause. The Bears are now betting on rookie quarterback Mitchell Trubisky, but they want to relieve him as much as possible. The intense focus on the Run Game makes this possible and makes it much easier for rookie quarterbacks in general to make the step from college to the NFL more or less accident-free.
On average, one team scored 241.5 passing-yards per match in the pre-season. A hurdle that only twelve teams are currently able to overcome – 17 of them in 2016. In addition, 19 teams have so far recorded fewer than 35 passes per game, compared with only eleven last season. And you can tell by the balance.
In the 2015 season, the Panthers (526 runs, 501 passes), Bills (509/465), Seahawks (500/489) and Vikings (474/454) still had more runs than passes. Last year this only applied to Dallas (499/483) and Buffalo (492/474), but this season we see a trend back up. Jacksonville (238/199), Chicago (212/190), Buffalo (191/169) and Houston (188/187) are currently running more runs than passes.
This list also shows a certain commonality, namely that teams make a virtue out of necessity. Elite quarterbacks are not available on every street corner, teams without a top passers-by have to find other ways. And at the moment, many very well occupied defenses and massive deficiencies of offensive lines in pass protection characterize the picture, the combination of these factors is currently responsible for the lowest score at points per game (43.8) for the past five years.
“It’s too difficult to just have the quarterback thrown all the time,”said Steelers-Guard David DeCastro,”You can’t become one-dimensional, at least there must be a serious threat from the Run Game. The Steelers themselves are perhaps the best example of how the Run Game conquers offensive game plans: in the last three victories against Cincinnati (43 runs, 25 passes), Kansas City (37:25) and Baltimore (42:30), the run was the clearly dominant means of choice.
“I think it’s a great formula to win the NFL games,”says Pittsburgh defensive coordinator Keith Butler,”if you can run and control possession of the ball, you can reduce the turnovers and all these things. Steelers-Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger still stands with a record of 40 victories and 12 defeats, when he has less than 200 passing-yards, while over 300 passing-yards stand? 28 victories, 22 bankruptcies.
The Steelers’ approach is anything but coincidental. Despite Roethlisberger, Antonio Brown and Co. the combination of Le’ Veon Bell and the Offensive Line is the strength of this team. Arizona’s offense seemed to have changed for a week when Adrian Peterson took the pressure from Carson Palmer against Tampa Bay and a team like the New Orleans Saints showed much more balance in the play-calling than usual.
A further pattern can be seen – the return to the Bellcow-Back, which receives the majority of the carries. In the pre-season, only two running backs had more than 20 runs per game: Bell (21.8) and Ezekiel Elliott (21.5). Currently, this value is more than doubled, and Leonard Fournette (21.7), Jay Ajayi (20.8) and Todd Gurley (20.8) are also above this mark in addition to Bell (24.1) and Elliott (21.8). Jordan Howard (19.9) barely misses it.
In May, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll explained in an interview with ESPN that “we will definitely run more,”saying:”Last season we had about 100 runs less than last year. That was basically the story of our season. That’s why things have turned out this way. The defense had to play more, we had to throw more and we had more passport protection snaps. It’s all because we had problems in the run game.”
So far the Seahawks aren’t on course for 500 runs, but it’s clear why Carroll wants to go back there: A good run game makes an offense difficult to predict, especially if you have a 3-down back that can also be used in the passing game. It facilitates passport protection and allows the offense to perform more short second and third downs. The whole play calling gets a completely different flow, as you can see in the NFL again and again.
The Seahawks rushing offense over the years:
In addition to the numerical differences and an apparent process of philosophical rethinking in offensive coordinators all over the NFL, there are other trends that make the run game not only more exciting, but also more entertaining and versatile: Open Scenes allow more creativity to flow into their run designs.
This began in the very first game of the season. When the Kansas City Chiefs surprised the patriots at the start, this was also achieved on the basis of a spectacularly creative run game. Option-Plays, Quarterback-Runs, Option-Runs with the Tight End set up as a quarterback, End Arounds over the fast receivers, which were also positioned in the backfield – and all this from different formations and constellations.
The Panthers are again using more planned quarterback runs, whether as a power-QB run or out of spread formations at third down. They also have creative option play calls to include Christian McCaffrey. The Cowboys and Titans have intelligently used option- or zone read-plays for their quarterbacks to capitalize on the fact that Defenses have enough and want to stop the running back. The Bills are strongest when the Run Game runs over LeSean McCoy and Tyrod Taylor.
All this can be combined with elements such as play action, screen and shovel passes based on the formations and play designs. That’s exactly what you can see with the Chiefs, for example, because this mixture is one of the main reasons why Kansas City still has the most explosive offense of the league. Run-pass options are also playing an increasingly important role in the current season, including Houston Texans and Deshaun Watson.
The bottom line is that this results in an exciting development. Teams are not only more willing to back on the run – a more creative use of option and read moves also makes it a more dangerous weapon and simply more exciting to watch. A certain “exotic” element is actually given, the times when a running back feels like 30 times per game stubbornly running straight out, certainly won’t come back.
Although the NFL may be facing a historic quarterback market, the evolution of the Defense makes the passing game increasingly difficult, while never all 32 teams will have a premium quarterback solution. This makes the Jaguars and, in the more extreme case, the Bears a very exciting test case this season to see how far an offense can go as it tries to hide its quarterback.
And so the circle to Titans boss Jon Robinson closes when you listen to Ben Roethlisberger these days:”These are the developments of the game. A few years ago, all teams wanted to use the receiving tight end and set up as many receivers as possible. Defenses had to react to this and put together the squad accordingly. Now teams have the feeling that you can play a running game against a less physical team. So the game will keep going back and forth.”