Win or Develop?

Youth coaches always have an interesting choice to make as they prepare their teams and players. As Americans, we're culturally driven to win in competition, and coaches do play some determining factor in those wins and losses. As parents, we're anxious to get the best possible instruction for our children, and to see them develop in the most advantageous circumstances. But if we're honest, we'd also prefer that happen in a winning environment.

Dozens of coaches and educators have blogged about the tension between these goals. Try a google search "winning vs developing", and you'll see what I mean. In soccer, where I have a long (inglorious) background, the debate rages fiercely. Coaches at the high school, college, and national level all decry the win-at-all-costs mentality of youth coaches, and the resultant scarcity of skillful players.

Then of course, those coaches turn around and try to win at all costs. They know that is their level at which development must now take a back seat to winning.

Personally I bring eighteen years of coaching youth players to the debate. That's more than some, less than others, but probably seems a lot of time to many of you. (That's because you are young, and I am old, and yes, I resent you for it.) Anyway, I don't think of myself as win-at-all-costs guy, but those of you that know me, know that I am conscious of the scoreboard, and that I am trying to win, to some degree.

In the spectrum of the win/develop debate, I happily straddle the fence. I'll shoot you a few examples, describe my position, and sum it all up with my reasoning at the end.

Consider the issue of playing time. The choices at the extremes are

• Play everyone the same amount of time (a development-oriented choice)
• Play the best players the most possible time, and lesser players the least possible time (a win-at-all-costs approach)

We split the difference. I will play developing players well over the minimum required, but quite often not as much as the top players.

Another pro-development strategy is to move kids around to play every position in a single season, or even in a single game. The other extreme is to give a kid one position for the entire season - or his whole career.

Once again, I'm down the center. Our players almost always have two to four positions at which they play. In football that's pretty easy with offense and defense, but on our team they will actually play both sides of the ball in nearly every game. In soccer I found it a little harder to have every kid play multiple roles in a particular game, though some could manage it. But most of our kids did change positions from season to season and year-to-year.

In training you can focus on skills or fundamentals (development) or you can spend time on tactics and strategy (win the game.) We, as you might expect by now, try to do both. We do let our boys know what type of defense they will be facing in the coming game, and what, if anything, we know about the other team's offense. But we also work every practice on simple, fundamental things like blocking, tackling, center/qb exchange, handoffs, pitches, etc.

Those are just a few examples, and there are probably other decisions I make that are similarly waffled. You may criticize this approach as preventing our team from winning as much as it might - you'd be right - while at the same time impeding the development of players. You might be right about that, but I don't know if anybody knows that for sure.

Nevertheless, I happily accept that criticism, because it is true. My number one focus is not winning. And my priority is certainly not to try to make some kid an NFL player either, even if I thought I could. My number one priority is that kids have fun when they play.

The eighteen years of coaching has helped me get a feel for whether or not a kid is having fun. Kids that make progress, and do things better, and accomplish things can have fun. Kids that get to play have fun. Kids that play on a team that wins have fun, no doubt. They like winning.

Some in the debate claim that this desire to win comes from mom and dad, and shouldn't be the case, but I'm not going to join that refrain, because I like to win too. There is a scoreboard, and I prefer to have a bigger number on it at the end than the guy coaching the other team.

That's probably my parents' fault, so we can all blame them.

Here's the thing: If a kid feels like he contributed, and he made some progress, and he got some recognition, and his team competed, and his team even won some games - well, he probably had a pretty good time. And when the season is done, I hope he had so much fun and learned so much that he wants to play again next year.

But I'm also very conscious of this, and it weighs on me all the time. Some kids might be playing football (or soccer, or whatever) for the very last time in any particular season. Whether that is because they find a greater interest in some other activity, or they move away, or the time has simply come to hang them up, I still want them to have had a great experience.

I will never believe that focusing on development, to the exclusion of all else, can create the kind of memorable and lasting team experience that I remember from my own youth. And conversely, I've seen way too many kids be run off from win-at-all-costs teams to be comfortable as a parent with that approach.

Sometimes development-oriented coaches will make the strong case that they're doing what's best for the kid. But I'm always cynically suspicious of that, especially if that same coach is paid, as is often the case in competitive soccer. And win-at-all-costs coaches will clearly keep, cut, and use players in ways that engender no love for either the sport or the team. And I think that is tragic.

So we will firmly trod the middle ground. We'll develop players athletically and mentally because it is great fun to love and enjoy the game and your team. And we'll try to win because that's really fun too. And if we've been even remotely successful at achieving those goals, my guess is your kid can't wait to get started this July.

Recognizing Defenses, Part II

In Part I of this two-part series, I described five standard ways to categorize defenses. We call them 7 Even, 7 Odd, 8 Even, 8 Odd, and Goal Line.

All of those categories ASSUME that the defense will line up in a balanced formation. That is, we expect the defense to have the same number of defenders on each side of our center.

But what if we don't see that? What happens in the case of a 5-2 Monster, where the defense shows up as a five man line, with two central linebackers like an Oklahoma defense - but just one safety? That defense has a player called a Monster, that moves around to any spot on the field. Often times, youth defenses will use that extra player on the wider side of the field.

Here's a picture of our flex formation lined up against a 5-2 Monster:

The M player represents the Monster, this time lined up on our left side of the field. Note that there are five defenders to the left of our center, and four defenders to the right, with the nose tackle and safety lined in the middle.

Our first inclination is to call this defense an 8 Odd. And for our option plays, it still will be! Our option plays are well-suited to run against a Monster defense aligned this way, because we can run to either side with no change to blocking rules for any of our players.

For plays like sweeps, belly, powers, or trap, we will probably try to change the play at the line to run away from the Monster. That's not because we can't block him - we can and do against balanced 8 Odd alignments. We check to the other side against a Monster on those plays in order to gain a numerical blocking advantage on the short side of the field.

We change to the other side in our offense with an audible at the line after the players have set their splits. Some words mean 'right' as in 'run the right-side version of the play' while other words mean 'left'. Other words are false alarms, and we ignore them. So if the key word "Ringo" that day means "right", a Power 25 would become a Power 36, and we would run off right tackle instead of left.

Sometimes we will even call a 'check-with-me' type play in the huddle. "Ringo Lemon Power" would tell our players that our play will be either a Power 36 or Power 25, depending on whether they hear "Ringo" or "Lemon" at the line. As they go to the line, they don't know to which side we're running the play.

We will also often do this type of check-with-me in cases where the defensive formations are ordinary, but the individual defenders have unbalanced themselves along the line. For example, if we are trying to run a Midline Option, but the nose tackle is lined up in the A gap between our center and guards within an otherwise balanced defense, it is pretty simple for us to call a run to the opposite side at the line.

We started doing this last year, in the second week of the season, and I was absolutely amazed at how effective our 3rd graders were at understanding that the direction of the play would entirely depend upon what our quarterback saw and called.

Each time we did it though, it was because the coach in the huddle asked the QB to read the defense and react at the line, and our players were prepared beforehand for the 'check-with-me' audible. This year we will try to build on that, and give our quarterback the opportunity to change the side of the play at any time.

Recognizing Defenses, Part I

One of the things we'll work on with our offensive players this year is recognizing the defense.

In our offense, we have very specific blocking assignments for every play. Defenses can complicate these assignments by lining up in ways that our players don't expect. If the defense creates confusion about who is supposed to block whom, they've gone a long way toward ruining the play we are trying to run.

Some offenses use 'zone blocking' on the offensive line, which means the players don't have a specific defender they are blocking. Zone blocking requires blocking a specific space on the field, as opposed to a specific player. I think zone blocking is great if you have four or five great big snowplow linemen that can overwhelm your opponents.

We don't do that. We try to prepare our players for the most common systems they will see, and give them specific blocking assignments for those systems. We also execute certain procedures in the backfield designed to influence key defenders. We think that gives our blockers better opportunities to make good blocks. We believe that we end up with better blocking execution when players have very specific tasks, when they've been taught how to accomplish those tasks, and when we do everything we can to make those assignments achievable.

For the 3rd grade teams in our league, defenses are limited to five or fewer players on the line of scrimmage. Even given that limitation, last year we saw a 5-4-2 Oklahoma; a 5-2 Monster; a 5-3; and a 4-4... in the first four weeks of the season. For 4th grade, no such limit exists, so we are expecting a greater variety of defenses.

I believe that we will face a 5-4-2 Oklahoma; a 5-2 Monster; a 5-3; a 3-5 Stack; perhaps two different styles of 4-4 defenses; a 6-3; a 6-4; a Wide-tackle 6; and a Gap 8. I don't think that we will see the two popular NFL styles of defense, which are called 4-3 and 3-4, or a 7 Diamond Goal Line defense, but you never know. With two teams having eight games each, I wouldn't be surprised to see a dozen different defenses.

With all that, it seems like zone blocking would be the way to go, wouldn't it?

But with good defensive recognition, we can simplify every one of those defenses (and probably others I haven't named) to fit into one of five styles:

8 Odd

8 Even

7 Odd

7 Even

Goal Line

The number in front of four of the styles, 8 or 7, indicates how many primary run defenders are lined up on or near the line of scrimmage. The Odd or Even designation describes the number of linemen at the line of scrimmage.

If there are seven or eight or more down linemen (players crowding the line of scrimmage) the defense is a Goal Line defense. We will see some of those this season, especially in short yardage situations. The Gap 8 and 7 Diamond are Goal Line defenses.

So how do we recognize any other defense as one of the other styles?

Most defenses have two defenders that are furthest outside of our offensive alignment. They are typically called cornerbacks, and are part of the defensive backfield. Any of us can usually pick out those two guys.

Then we look furthest back from all the other defenders, at the safeties. If we see only one safety, we knows the defense is one of the 8's: (Eleven defenders, minus the one safety, minus the two cornerbacks, leaving eight primary run defenders.) If we see two safeties, we knows that the defense is a 7. (If we see three safeties, we are either WAY behind, or we may have a 5-2 Monster - more on that in Part II of this article.)

Likewise a quick count of the players with their hands on the ground can tell us if the defense is Odd or Even. If the defensive ends are allowed by their coaches to stand up, there will still be some number of players to the inside of them with their hands on the ground. If that number is two or four, then the alignment is Even. If there are three such down linemen, the alignment is Odd.

So with two quick reads, any player can determine what style of defense our opponents are playing. Two safeties gives us a 7, while one safety means an 8. Then we determine whether the number of linemen are an Odd number, or an Even number, and we're all set.

So as it turns out, a 4-4 defense, or any six-man line with one safety is an 8 Even.

Both the 5-3 and the 3-5 Stack are 8 Odd.

The very popular Oklahoma (5-4-2) is a 7 Odd, as is the NFL 3-4 defense.

The NFL 4-3, and an old-fashioned 6-3 (named for the six linemen, the one middle linebacker and the two cornerbacks) are examples of 7 Even defenses.

For visual learners - assuming you've read this far - here's a video on YouTube that shows this same thought process: Recognizing Defenses, by Coach Jim Adam

In Part II of this article, I'll try to break down special and unbalanced circumstances, and how we will treat them.

2009 Football Signups Approaching!!!

Parents - 2009 football sign ups start May 30th and continue through the summer. Please register early so we can start to get a headcount for numbers.

FCCJC Sign Up Page

Geeky Stuff

Patrick Browne asked me about new plays this year. You may be surprised to know that I've been thinking about that.  (That was a joke of course. I know that you know that I've been thinking about little else.)

We will add a spread formation and a Midline version of the option. And we want to try to accomplish a true fullback dive option with a mesh, and have our play-side linemen block at the second level. All of this is rather ambitious, but I thought that running the outside option at all last year was ambitious and the boys did it very well. These are just the next steps in the progression to becoming a true 'triple' option team.

The mesh by the way, is the hand-off part of an option where the quarterback determines whether or not a hand-off is going to happen. It might happen, and it might not. The quarterback reads the defense during the play and then he and he alone decides what will happen. One of the coolest things about the triple option, from either the wishbone or the spread formation, is that executing that part of the option correctly means we don't have to block the big giant defensive tackle that we're running toward. He will take himself out of the play by committing to either the fullback or the quarterback.

For those of you like me that get all geeked up about football, here are three different examples of what we will call the Spread Midline option that will be in our playbook.

Credit where credit is due - I saw this series originally last year on a Navy fan blog site called http://thebirddog.wordpress.com/

Below is a video of the Midline option. The quarterback sees that the "hand-off key" (an arrow points him out) is turning inside to tackle the fullback. So he keeps the ball and could have even pitched it somewhere down field if he'd wanted to run that risk. This is a great read by this quarterback, because even though the defender goes to the outside initially to the B gap, he still turns his shoulders inside toward the fullback, which causes the fake and pull. I think the fullback would have been past the defender even if he'd been given the ball, but it is still a fabulous read. We would call this play Spread, Midline Option Left
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6udfx_rutgers-midline2_sport

Here is the same play.  But this time, once the quarterback sees that the handoff key 'floats' - stays outside to tackle him - the quarterback just goes ahead and hands the ball to the fullback. So again, Spread, Midline Option Left, but with a different outcome
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6udiq_rutgers-midline4_sport

Finally, in this example, they do something a little different. They KNOW in the huddle that they want the QB to keep the ball, so they cut the motion A back (#28 I think, equal to our 2 back) immediately up the field as an extra blocker. I think he is supposed to block the hand-off key, but since that guy has taken himself out of the play by chasing the fullback, he just gets up field and cuts a safety. The lead A back (#34, would be our 3 back) looks for an inside linebacker first, but since the guard got in that guy's way and no one is there early for him to block, he goes ahead and jumps out to the other safety and absolutely destroys him. We would call this one Spread, Midline 15 Keep
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6udrh_oldmid_sport

In addition to the Midline, we'll add a Belly series and a greater, more deceptive variety of counter plays. 

If you don't love this stuff, you're just not geeky enough. 

Hannah & Oltjen Accept Ravens Trophy

I delivered the FCCJC 2008 Runners Up trophy to our sponsors, Dr.'s Joe Hannah and Jay Oltjen this morning. I thought this would be an ideal time, as I was taking in my third child for an ortho consult. (Yes, he needs them...)

Jay Oltjen is a big football fan, and was really pleased to hear of our successes this year, and that the boys had so much fun. I also presented a jersey to Sarah Fankhauser, who handles the marketing and probably many other duties for the practice as well. (Her logo design graces the front of our jerseys.) She was thrilled to receive it, and very excited to be able to display all of it in their office at 151st and Ridgeview.

On behalf of all the players and parents, I thanked them for sponsoring us, and do so again publicly here on our blog. They are first-rate corporate citizens, terrific orthodontists, and great people.

Ravens 2008 Statistics

Thanks to Coach Judd, who kept a drive chart for both offense and defense for the entire season. In addition to being the only possible way we could share these next three posts, the drive charts were really helpful demonstrating which plays were working, which were not, and where we were vulnerable defensively.

A few more statistics, that don't need a table:

Ravens Record: 6-2-0, League Runners Up

Points Scored: 116
Points Allowed: 36
Point Difference: +80, 10 points per game

Ravens Fumbled: 31 Lost: 6
Opponents Fumbled: 27 Lost: 9 (Luke W 3; Mitch C 2; Ox, Trevor A, Hayden M, Tyler R)

Interceptions Made: 2 (Tyler R 2)
Interceptions Given: 0

Season Turnover Margin for Ravens: +5

Safeties Scored: 2 (Luke W, Michael N)
Safeties Given: 0

3d Down & 4th Down Conversion Percentage

Ravens: 22 / 50 - 44%
Opponents: 12 / 50 - 24%