The trends that NFL coaches see emerging around the league

0:03Robert Mays: Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. I'm Robert Mays. Something a little different for you guys today. I'm at the end of my training camp travel. I'm actually in Minnesota right now. I'm recording this on Monday, August 18th. This is my last trip to a team. I've done 23 stops over essentially a month. When you guys listen to this on the 19th, that's I left on July 19th. At all these stops, I probably talk to two or three coaches at least at every single one. So let's say at the end of 23 stops, I've talked to 50 coaches. I've asked every single one of them on this trip, what in your mind is a trend that we might see over the course of this season?

0:41Robert Mays: What was something that was just a small idea last year that you think we're going to see more of this year? Got a bunch of different answers. Some of them are big picture kind of philosophical things. Some are as specific as like one type of play that a defensive coach or an offensive coach is worried about. So that's what we're doing today. Derek Lassen joined me just to run through all of these answers, the best answers that I got over the last month of travel. Nothing overly revolutionary, nothing that, oh my God, I never would have thought of that before, but just six, eight, 10 things to maybe keep in mind as you watch the early parts of this season, just stuff to be on the lookout for and why it might be a little bit more popular and a little bit more prevalent than it's been over the last couple of years.

1:29Robert Mays: So let's get to our breakdown of some trends to be on the lookout for in 2025 with me and Derek Klassen right now.

1:40Robert Mays: The last athletic football show before we started digging into our division previews starting tomorrow, one of my favorite times of year, we probably could be more thoughtful in how we rolled them out when it comes to doing one a day of like two hours of content every single day. But the reason we like to wait is that I like to finish my training camp travel and talk to all these teams and get as much stuff as I can before we start digging into them. And also, as I record this in a small closet like space in the Vikings facility, I like doing the division previews back at home. It's easier for everybody.

2:13Robert Mays: And so we were starting those tomorrow. But Derek, I'm very excited about this show because this is a product of the traveling that I've been doing over the past month or so. I left a month ago tomorrow for training camp travel. And so I've seen 20, I've gone to 23 teams over that time. I've talked to at least like 45, 50 coaches as part of this. And I wanted to do something where we took those conversations and, you know, did something fun with them. And so every year I always do this where I talk to every single coach I ask or every single coach I talk to, I always ask, what do you think is going to be coming this year?

2:50Robert Mays: Like, what are the trends that maybe I should be on the lookout for something that was a kernel of an idea last year that you think will be more prevalent this year? So rather than just asking people that and using it for my own curiosity, we're turning that into a show this year. I am using the answers I got on my trip to populate what we're going to talk about here for the next hour. when you kind of sent me the rundown of what we really wanted to talk about I was super excited about this because I think if I had if this was more of a I come to you this is how I want to do this type of show like half of what we were talking about would have been stuff that you just kind of pick up on watching the NFL season you know every NFL season by week 10 you're like this feels different than it did the year before and it might only be like three percentage points of whatever coverage or x y and z but it's just you start to pick up on it when you watch hours and hours of film and so I'm incredibly excited to get to a lot of this stuff.

3:37Robert Mays: Two notes before we start digging into this. One, not as many good answers this year as there have been in years past. I was going to say there's a couple on this list. So I was actually going to say there's a couple on this list that I don't want to spoil the entire show that I might have some like, I don't know if pushback is the right word, but I'm like dubious that they are actually trends, which I think makes it, it goes to the point of like, there are not that many great answers this year? And I think a couple of different things to keep in mind with this one, it, there weren't a lot of clear answers for people period this year.

4:09Robert Mays: I mean, there were coaches that I've gotten really good stuff for, from before in earlier years with this question, they were like, honestly, there's not much I'm really picking up on. Like, I think that we're going to see teams lean more into the things that they've been leaning into. We're just going to see that volume turned up a little bit. So I thought that was interesting. So that's one thing to keep in mind too. I talked to more offensive coaches than defensive coaches. Just the way that the math goes because there are more offensive-minded play-calling head coaches than there are defensive head coaches.

4:36Robert Mays: So there are going to be more offense-centric answers to this than defense-centric answers. So those are just two things. And then the last one, you know, you're talking about some of the things you might take issue with. These can go from very broad to hyper-specific because I think inevitably in these discussions, people are going to hit on stuff they've been thinking about. So some of this stuff is like very esoteric and self-contained with these teams self-scout with things that they've been trying to learn about their own roster. So there's going to be a little bit of everything here. I mean, again, I talked to probably 40, 50 people.

5:09Robert Mays: We'll probably have eight or so things we're going to dig into here. Some of it's because it came up multiple times. Some of it's because this one nugget, I thought, oh, man, that's really interesting. I can understand why they think this is going to be a bigger part of the league. Yeah. And like it really can get super specific. I remember probably the most fun I had trying to find out like what is a trend is like four years ago I was like it's going to be the year of dagger which is a very specific like one passing concept and then like it kind of it kind of caught on part of that was like you know Stafford going to the Rams I think helped open up a lot of that but it was just uh it can literally be something as small as like one passing concept that we're going to see more or it could be as wide as like this entire coverage family is going to become more prevalent or teams are really going to you know lean into the run game like that can be a more broad thing so it really can be like span the entire spectrum let's start with defense this is one of the first things i was told by a coach that i asked about what i should be on the lookout for and the answer was essentially a lot of the stuff that the vikings are doing and i don't think a lot of teams are going to be able to wholesale lean into this because it is such an extreme way to play defensive football but i think there are a couple things that have defined who the vikings defense has been over the last couple years that i wouldn't be surprised to see more teams try to at least dabble in.

6:25Robert Mays: And the first one is just how you're dictating what offenses can do by the pressure looks that you're showing. And that's something where defense is inherently reactionary. And I think that as defenses seek out opportunities to be a little bit more of the dictator, the ones that are driving the way the games are going to go, a lot of the stuff that the Vikings do puts them on the front foot in a way that defenses aren't often and it leaves you a little bit exposed and there are weaknesses to it obviously but I do think that some of those early down pressure looks and just being able to shrink what offenses are capable of because of what you're giving them before the snap it does seem like we're going to see more teams leaning into that because it is one of the only avenues for defenses to really dictate how the game is going to go the this is the one that I was the most I've been itching to talk about this like basically all offseason like kind of a lot of what the vikings were doing and then for the the part of it that i want to twist into is also a lot of what the chiefs have been doing to me when i look at what kind of makes minnesota and kansas city different in terms of how they bring their pressures is they bring a lot of they will now bring quarters with their pressure like a lot of i think for a long time it was like we're either playing cover zero or teams are playing that like three deep three under type of fire zone teams like minnesota and kansas city have played a lot more quarters behind it.

7:45So you have your four deep defenders and then you have your two underneath defenders, which again has its own problems, but I think it also presents like, okay, it's I think previously teams have wanted to take things over the top if they get blitzes. And now you get this stuff where there's four deep defenders. It's kind of hard to go over the top. And so I think what they've been doing with that is really interesting. Kansas City and Minnesota are the only two teams in the league who at least a quarter of their pressures were out of these cover four looks. The Bengals were next closest at 17 percent.

8:15So like they're kind of in their own ballpark in terms of the way that they were bringing this stuff up. And why I think it's interesting, again, is I think it does a really good job of limiting deep shots against teams that want to be with the blitz that way. I think it really does a good job of taking away the seams and it forces offenses to if you want to beat it, you either have to get really good at having like five o protection rules or you have to be really good at throwing to the back out of the backfield. And some offenses and some quarterbacks just aren't equipped to do that. And that's why I think last year you saw the game that really made me kind of hone in on this was I think week two or three.

8:50The Vikings played the Niners and Flores just beat the shit out of them with these calls. And I was like, this is going to be different.

8:57Robert Mays: You mentioned that game, I think, is really telling. And as I think about why more teams are going to seek out these ideas, I think, again, it's about, all right, how can we manipulate teams in protection? How can we manipulate them into doing what we want them to do? And I think one of the reasons the Niners have struggled with this Vikings team over the last couple of years is that they're a team that you can manipulate in protection because their protection rules are kind of rigid. And so I think we've started to see that. We've talked about that a decent amount where I think the teams that are a little bit more rigid in protection last year were the teams that comparatively relatively fell short of expectation.

9:30Robert Mays: I think the Texans were like this. The teams that have really, really good protection systems are the ones that you look at the skill position talent or some of the underlying talent on the roster like Buffalo is like this. Buffalo is just so buttoned up and it's like, well, they're scheduled to have the best offense in the league with Josh Palmer as their number one receiver. Part of that is because of Josh Allen. But I think part of that is because of just how tight a lot of the subtler elements of the offense are. And so if you can consistently take advantage of the teams that aren't that buttoned up in protection, then it gives you a huge advantage.

10:03Robert Mays: And I think that that's what we're going to see more teams trying to lean into in order to make sure they're the ones with the pen last. Definitely. And I think what like Flores in particular has done really well. And again, Spags does this also really well. They will play a lot of five man fronts. And so sometimes when they throw these pressures, it's literally just the five guys and they just let them go. but because they have guys like Andrew Van Ginkle they also do a really good job of mixing up who is coming where and like who is actually going to be our hook defender and that's why that's kind of like the small offshoot tangent of this is guys like Andrew Van Ginkle guys like even though Frankie Louvoo is more of a stack linebacker he can be kind of like a weird edge player Zach Bond who can be a little bit of an edge player Zayven Collins who is an edge player that you can drop out those guys are like they've always had a place in the league but it does feel like if you have one of those guys, you can get away with a lot more stuff than some other teams can.

10:52Robert Mays: One of the other things that Minnesota leaves and leans into pretty heavily that came up in conversation multiple different times is just disruption via pressure on rundowns, right? This is, and this has been at the core of who the Vikings have tried to be over the last couple of years, where I think conventional wisdom about defensive football is that you stop the run in conservative kind of simple ways on early downs. And then when you get into defined passing situations, that's when we see all the weird pressure shit. And I think the Vikings have kind of flipped that on its head a little bit.

11:22Robert Mays: And some of that is the amount of pressures they're sending on rundowns to kind of create negatives and explosives for them in the run game. And so I think more run pressures and just teams being able to try to seek out more answers there is going to be part of this, but it goes beyond that. I think I talked to one offensive play calling head coach who said every team we played last year, there was some sort of movement with the front constantly. You are stemming the front, you're slanting the front, you're doing some sort of movement before the snap to make it difficult to pick up where guys are going to be.

11:53Robert Mays: And I think that's something that we're going to see even more of this year. And even with teams that traditionally don't think about playing that way, right? Like these four down teams who maybe are a little bit more static before the snap, those teams that come from that Niners world where we're going to play this four down attacking fronts. I think even some of those teams are starting to become aware of the fact that if we line up and just play that way, it's too easy for teams to pick on us in the run game. So I think just run pressures, diversification of fronts that teams are using and how they're going to try to make things a little bit harder on offenses, figuring out where guys are going to be in some of these, on some of these rundowns.

12:32Robert Mays: I think that's also going to be something we see a little bit more of run pressures to me are like in the way that we always talk about a news, like zone offense kind of coming in and being like, Oh, this will kind to fix the offensive line that's kind of what run pressures i think do for a run defense like that the minnesota i know minnesota spent a lot of resources this year to kind of fix their interior defensive line but last year it was not a good unit they just did a really really good job of being aggressive on their rundowns with throwing a lot of these pressures and that's how you again you know maybe you give up some of these seven eight yard carries but if you're also getting in the backfield half the time then it all comes out in the wash and you end up where you want to be yeah i'm looking at the quote from the from the offense coach i felt every run we had last year stunts pirate pressures they're not designed to hit the quarterback but they're designed to totally disrupt the front there was just so much movement and so i think more of that and teams just trying to be harder to pin down in the run game on defense as often as possible is something that we should be on the lookout for the other defensive one that i wanted to talk about we've alluded to this a little bit when we talked about the cardinals defense in one of the units that could potentially surprise us this year and you kind of talked about it with some of the weirder players that the Cardinals have, but do teams start deploying more three safety looks in the ways that the Cardinals have, where it's these three high safety looks, because there are a ton of benefits that come for it.

13:55Robert Mays: You know, you have more defensive disguise overall. Like it's harder to pin down what sort of coverage you're playing and beyond like, you know, when you're in a quarters look and they can kind of unfold in a bunch of different ways, like that's at the core of the Fangio defense and why it's hard to play against. But when it's three safeties, it's not even just what coverage you're playing, it's which responsibilities within that coverage those individual safeties are going to be playing. And so I think one of the reasons the Cardinals can lean into that and have is because they have Buda Baker.

14:26Robert Mays: And so the question for a lot of these teams is gonna be, does this fit our personnel or is it just interesting to us? But I wouldn't be surprised if we saw more teams decide this is something with the guys that we have on this team, especially as more teams lean into having a big nickel look that they like, that we see more of that three safety stuff that the Cardinals were doing. Yeah, I think it's like, I think to me, I imagine it. If one, you have a safety like Buda Baker, where you can kind of move him around a lot, or a Derwin James, in theory, Kyle Hamlin. And the Ravens have done some of this, where they do some of their three safety stuff.

15:00So I think you have to have a move around safety like that. I also think it's good for teams that want to be in the, you know to bring up Steve Spagnuolo again it kind of is his defensive world and we're living in it now if you want to be one of those teams that does a lot of really annoying like cover two rotations having the three safety stuff is really really good for that just because again you don't know if like okay are they actually dropping the middle guy to be the pole runner here or is he going to fly off the hash and they're going to drop the other guy down to be like the the weak hook defender like you can just do so many different little rotations that way that it makes it really, really frustrating to play against.

15:32So this is the one where I'm actually not sure we're going to see that much of it. And I do think the Cardinals are kind of like a unique, they're just leaning into what they're uniquely good at, which again, there's not that many teams that have a Buddha Baker. And I think he kind of unlocks something for them that a lot of other teams just don't have access to.

15:50Robert Mays: It's an interesting one because I'm thinking back to the conversations where this was brought up and sometimes it's hard to distinguish between I'm interested in this and this is a curiosity of mine and I think more teams are going to do it and where we fall on the three safety stuff is this a camp idea that seems fun but when you actually think about how it's going to look in practice when you actually start to rep it is this going to be something that falls away or are we going to see more teams actually try it I don't know the answer to that but I can tell you this came up multiple times in conversation and again that's a great way to frame it is like in camp this sounds great when we're drawing it up and then you get to camp and you're like I don't know if we have a good third safety whereas like you know the Vikings are we're in a unique position last year where it's like yeah you have Josh Metellus you do have a good third safety or or the Cardinals were able to get away with some of that stuff the Ravens have for the last handful of years but yeah not every team I think it's going to be one where it sounds nice but in reality like their nickel their their standard nickel is probably just better than whoever their third safety is or their second linebackers is better than whoever their third safety is the last defensive one I wanted to throw out this is truly just like a kernel of a thought that one offensive coach had for me.

16:57Robert Mays: And it was essentially just, okay, now that the Eagles won the Superbowl, are we going to drift back into an even lighter box zone based world as teams look at what Vic Fangio did? And my initial response to that was kind of like, we're kind of already there, right? Like how much can we lean more into that? And then you actually look at the numbers and there was like a small reversion in 2024 back to more man and more heavy boxes. So last season, man coverage rates went from 23 % to 25%. So it was just like a slight uptick. And then boxes went from 62 % of six or fewer guys in the box in 2023 to 60 % last year.

17:41Robert Mays: So it's small. I mean, it's probably negligible, but there was like a small bump back to we're going to put a few more guys in the box and we're going to play a little bit more man coverage. I think in part because offense has become so adept. One, the run game is back. And so we're trying to be a little bit more thoughtful about how we're deploying resources there. but two as offenses have kind of figured out how to live in this too high world with a lot of air in the defense do we try to play a little bit stickier in order to combat some of that stuff so which direction we end up going based on how last year went just something to think about and something that one offensive coordinator brought up when i was talking to him that one i'm actually kind of buying you know and that one to me is like or i'm i don't know if i'm buying it on but I think the the reason we got a little bit heavier last year is again it's like think about who the best offenses were it's Buffalo who ran a lot of like six offensive line stuff you got Baltimore who's got a fullback on the field more than anyone in the league you got Philly who's running the piss out of the ball Detroit who is another team that likes to run the ball and get a little bit heavier and so I think in terms of the heaviness in the box that's where that comes from the the man coverage stuff I think is a little bit more interesting to me that I wonder if that's just with more of the quick motion that we're getting some teams are oddly more comfortable with just being like that's your guy just follow him don't like we're not going to mess with all these rules i wonder if that's part of it but but again that can also get a little bit dangerous too because if they're if they're timing it well then you just have a guy who's got a free run and and you're a little bit stuck in the mud so speaking of the motion let's get to the offensive ones here the first one i wanted to talk about this is something that wasn't really put in plain terms but as a as you talk to coaches around the league and you think about what types of coaches are getting these jobs, I think we will see more motion this year than we've ever seen before.

19:34Robert Mays: And that may not seem revolutionary, right? Like that's been the case consistently, but I think we're really gonna start testing some of the limits of this. So last year there was motion, according to NextGenStats, on 61.5 % of play, 61.4%. In 2019, that was 50%. So that's an 11 and a half percentage point uptick over the last five years in just motion of any kind. In motion at the snap, last year we were at 32.9 % per next gen. In 2019, it was 19.7%. So we've had like 11 or 12 percentage point jumps over the last five years. And I don't think that's going to stop. And when you think back to when all this stuff started really coming into vogue, like back to the early McVeigh days where we have all of these like fast jet motions from one side of the formation to the other in large part to help out the run game.

20:28Robert Mays: They've started to become smaller and subtler than that, but no less important. Like think about how many times you're watching the Rams or the Bucs, these teams that do this stuff all the time. And there's a trips look to one side and then you'll see like a quick exit motion with the number three receiver just to change the number count immediately. That's something that's happened a lot over the last couple of years. I feel like more and more offenses are going to start using it because it's just really advantageous. Like it's a small thing that gives you an advantage. And so I think we're going to see more teams lean into that.

21:01Robert Mays: And then also there are just little things you can do in the run game. Like one, the best run the Falcons have is a run they do from the pistol where they motion Charlie Warner it the Niners have done this all the time right with Kittle where or with use check where they'll do that fast immediate motion from one side of the formation to the other and just have him have him like blast out the sea gap coming across the formation it's like a flying double team yes and so and I think that changes the picture immediately and it changes the numbers in the run game very quickly right before the snap happens multiple coaches brought up to me one that Falcons thing specifically, but just how many ways can you change the picture immediately before the snap to make things a little bit harder on defenses?

21:48Robert Mays: So at some point, and when it comes to efficiency, we are kind of realizing diminishing returns. Like we're getting to a place where emotion doesn't necessarily equal good, but when it comes to how far the, what the limits are, how much of this we can actually see. I still don't think we've seen the limits. I still think this year we're going to see even more because there are teams that, and I'll use this specifically because this is something they told me. This is just something you can watch the Bengals last year. The Bengals used to be like a no motion team. Now the Bengals motion all the time.

22:23Robert Mays: The Bengals are trying to find ways to get Jamar chase into good positions. And so I think we're going to see more and more of these teams that traditionally were pretty static for one reason or another start leaning into this stuff in a way that they haven't before. And I think all the other teams that were already doing it are just going to keep doing it. And so I feel like this year, if you told me this year it was 64 % of total plays and like 35 % motion at the snap, I don't think that would be crazy. I think we could be getting close to those numbers. Well, and I think what the Bengals did and with Jamar Chase specifically is kind of why part of what the uptick in motion has been, because like you were saying, when it really started to become a thing, more of a thing that was on our minds like five, six years ago, or even again, starting with those the Kyle Shanahan Falcons teams, it was a lot of like we're jetting a guy behind the line of scrimmage to influence the linebackers.

23:15And so we can get the cutback lane. Like that was pretty much all that it was. So who you were motioning, it could be your bad wide receiver three. It didn't really matter. Like you were just kind of trying to influence the way that guys were thinking a little bit pre-snap. I think over the last handful of years, specifically, teams have gotten better about like, what if we just take our best player and get him a head start? Like that's that's what the Dolphins were doing with some of their cheat motion stuff. It's what the Bengals have now been doing with Jamar Chase. It's like, let's just get our best guy on the move.

23:41And like that is where I think at some point we might get diminishing returns with motion is like for as valuable as it can be of like getting a head start or maybe changing the number count and stuff like that. I do think it is in a way like a little bit limiting in terms of like once the guy is moving, it's pretty obvious what direction he's probably going to do. And I think once defenses get a little bit more honed in on that, especially teams that have kept the same defensive system year over year, probably will get a little bit more tapped into stuff like that. Like, I do think the Lions with Aaron Glenn had actually done a really good job of defending stuff like that for that reason.

24:14But at the same time, it's like, I don't know, Jamar Chase is so good that if you give him any amount of advantage, like he probably is going to take advantage of it. And so I really am interested to see, like, how far we can push this, because, again, I do think it is a little bit limiting. But until defenses can pretty consistently prove that they, like, are tapped into all of how this affects their rules, you can probably still keep getting away with it at the rate that we're getting away with it.

24:38Robert Mays: We've talked about a couple examples of this. You know, the Jags are the example we use when we're talking about the quarterbacks at a crossroad show and Trevor Lawrence. The Jags had motion of the snap at 15.3 % of their snaps last year, which was dead last in the NFL. The Bucs were at 40%. So that's just one example of a team that was in the box. And again, this isn't like, if you don't use motion, it's bad. Like that's not what I'm trying to say here. I just think that there are going to be tangible examples of teams that weren't doing much of it last year that are going to be doing it this year.

25:05Robert Mays: That's the easiest one to pin down because there's a change in offensive coordinator, right? Like we know just anecdotally and based on what they looked like in the preseason, the Jags are going to be doing more of this stuff. But I think there are going to be multiple teams. This is all I'll say in order to like not betray the confidence of these people talking to me. I think there are going to be multiple teams that were in the bottom 10 last year in motion rate that use it a ton more than they were last year. Not because the play caller changed, not because even the quarterback changed, But just because I think they're starting to evolve their understanding of the right ways to put their pass catchers in the best possible situations.

25:45That that totally makes sense to me. Another another like small wrinkle to this that I just thought of. A lot of the teams that use motion the best or most frequently are also teams that. Either by their initial alignment or by the snap, want to be like these tighter formation teams. Those are the ones that are using motion all the time. Like we don't really live in the spread world that we did 10 years ago where you could kind of get away with doing what the Bengals were doing three years ago. And even they are like, it's probably not the easiest way to live.

26:12Robert Mays: Yeah. I mean, and I think that ties into us just seeing more condensed formations, period. Absolutely. I think formations have gotten more and more condensed over the last few years. And I think that those trees often are like cross pollinated, like the teams that are doing that are going to be using more motion. And so I think we'll see that both of those things. I feel like we will see those on the rise heading into this year. All right, we're going to keep rolling through some of these offensive trends. But before we do that, let's take a quick break. You know that hoodie you can't stop reaching for?

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28:16Robert Mays: This next one here is more, this is like a nugget of an idea again, that one defensive coach mentioned to me, and then I think multiple offensive coaches kind of hinted at why it might be beneficial. I do think based on the teams that were really successful last year, we might see a little bit more quarterback run game for teams where it makes sense. And the, why I am pointed to that is just that the Ravens and Washington were number one and number two in the league last year in EPA per carry, right? And those are on design runs that You take scrambles out of it. Design runs, they were number one in the league last year.

28:53Robert Mays: We've just known for so long that being able to involve your quarterback in the run game changes the math for you in a positive way. There are reasons that teams don't lean into this wholesale. You don't want to get the quarterback hurt. I mean, a bunch of different things. But I do think there are teams that either because they have to or because they're looking for a new ceiling, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a little bit more of an emphasis on this because the benefits of it are just so clear if you can do it correctly. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And like the the quarterback run thing and like in terms of the volume is it's like it's almost a self-fulfilling prophecy.

29:31It's like, well, we're getting more of these guys in the league who are good at it. Well, why are we getting more of the guys who are in the league who are good at it? Because it's really valuable to do. Why is it really valuable? Because these guys are really, really good at it and they're incredibly dangerous athletes. So it's It's kind of this thing that over like the last 15 years has really built on itself. And we've gotten to the point where, again, I think 15 years ago it was like, oh, it's really cool if you can do this as like a little side piece to your offense. And it's almost getting to the point now where it's like if you don't have one of these guys who can at least give you something in the quarterback run game, you are at like a definitive disadvantage.

30:04Like in terms of like not to make this a Bears podcast, like Caleb Williams is probably like the in terms of designed running. I don't know that like 13th quarterback I would take off of the board. but you have to at least be at that bar for it or you are like at a serious disadvantage in terms of the way that you play quarterback and so i would say the teams that i'm looking for to do more quarterback run game stuff is and this is not because i i love him and think he's a great player the patriots have to do more of it with drake may but i don't think they're going to

30:31Robert Mays: i think it needs to be something i i'm curious with zero last year like none which was shocking to me so i this is the the point you get to though where it's like are we at a spot where our quarterback is too valuable for us to be doing this stuff. And I think the Patriots are early enough in this process and they may do more of it. Listen, I, that, that I could understand that, but I also could understand, I could also see them getting to a place where they say, let's just figure out what he is in a more traditional way. There's no urgency for the Patriots to like find a new layer to their offense this year.

31:08Robert Mays: It's a quarterback in year two and it's a play caller in year one. The teams that come to mind for me, we mentioned this a little bit. I think Arizona with Kyler, it's like, can we add another layer to who we are? They have not run him very much, especially when you compare his early career numbers and what his rushing volume looks like compared to other quarterbacks with his athletic skillset. And then the other one is like, if you're the Colts, right? Even without Anthony Richardson, even if Daniel Jones is your quarterback, you're going to need to do as many things as you can to make things hard on defenses.

31:40Robert Mays: And so that's one where the, the causal element of this, where like the athletes are good. So we're doing it more with the Colts. It doesn't necessarily have to be that way. It doesn't necessarily have to be the relationship. Even if it's not Anthony Richardson driving the choice, I still think it would be beneficial for the Colts to have a run game with Daniel Jones, because it makes the offense more potent overall. Yeah. They don't really have a choice. The, the, the Colts are in a situation where, yeah, you know, I kind of agree with you on the Patriots. It's like they're in a spot where they don't need to uncover every rock for how the offense is going to work.

32:12Let's just figure out if the quarterback is good. That's fine. The Colts are in like we got to we got to we got to flip every stone to make sure we've got something. So that's a good point with them. The Cardinals one is interesting with Kyler Murray because at his best, he is a get him to the perimeter runner. Like he's he's incredibly fast. He's incredibly quick. And I think in the cliff offenses, they did a good job of finding ways to spread out the offense such that he could do that. I think with the way that they built it with Petsing is just a little bit different. It's a lot heavier. It's a lot more their run game wants to be under center.

32:44So you're just not in as many gun formations that would lead into the type of running that he wants to do. So I'm going to be very curious to see how they add a little bit more to his plate in terms of in terms of running the ball.

32:56Robert Mays: There are teams, though. I mean, think about the Ravens. I think the Ravens are a really good example of how you can kind of marry those two worlds where they play with a decent amount of heavy personnel, but they're still able to live in that gun run world and weaponize the quarterback. Like I do think there are examples you could potentially steal from. And Washington, their 12 personnel is kind of wonky just because Ertz and the way that you treat Ertz. But that's a team that used a ton of 12 personnel last year and was still able to lean into a gun run game. How you cohesively marry those two things, like what the Cardinals have wanted to be and some of this stuff, that can be a challenge.

33:29Robert Mays: But I think trying to figure out how you can sprinkle in more of it would ultimately benefit them. And that's kind of part of it for me, too. It's like, so Washington, almost actually like the earlier Arizona teams, which makes perfect sense. Part of why they can do what they do is, I think, because the wide receiver screen game was so potent that it kind of helps your run game when you're attaching a lot of these RPOs and stuff. I did not get that feeling ever watching this version of the Arizona offense. And I think that's a little bit what hamstrings them compared to a team like Washington.

33:57Robert Mays: This is one of my favorite ones. This is something that came up a couple of different times. And credit to Nate. Nate has been on this in terms of a trend that we might see, but more under center, straight dropbacks in the past game than we've seen in the very long time. So obviously this is, there's no better example of how football is cyclical than teams being like, we need to do more straight under center dropbacks. And so the reason there are a bunch of different benefits to this, but here's what I'll just throw out. Last year, when teams were under center, they ran the ball on 7 ,313 plays.

34:36Robert Mays: They threw play-action passes on 2 ,350 plays. They ran straight under center dropbacks 400 times. 412. Wow. Just think about the percentages of that. And think about the pie. Think about the pie chart of what offenses will do when under center. It's almost exclusively runs and play action. So by expanding this part of your offense, you're putting one more thing on the table for defenses to have to worry about in those situations. You're just diversifying what they have to game plan for, what has to be on their mind. And the other part of this is that with defensive players now, because it's been so long since this has been a part of NFL offense or just offenses, period, defensive players don't know what to do.

35:27There's a little bit of like, yeah, you get you get so used to, especially as like a linebacker, right, where like things have to happen so fast and you can get used to like, OK, quarterback turned his head or, oh, I saw this from the offensive lineman, you know, helmets up. That means it's probably past like all these little intricacies about like, how do I determine if it's a run versus if it's play action? The straight drop back stuff ends up in a little bit of a different world. And it's like, oh, what do I do here?

35:50Robert Mays: There was an offensive coach that was telling me that his team leaned into it a little bit more last year. And he was telling me about an example last season where they did it. And because when defensive backers wired a certain way, when they were under center on early down, the corner to one side just flies out as soon as the ball is snapped. And they just had like an ocean of space to complete a pass underneath because he had no thought that there could be like a quick game snap under center. And so I just think that that element of surprise and having to add, just think about the math of that.

36:23Robert Mays: The fact that a run play is almost 20 times more likely than an under center drop back and a play action pass is five times more likely. that's it's it's extreme like it's there is there's so that's a such a defined bucket that if you can just do a little bit more of it if we get to a place where you're doing it two three times a game you can steal plays here because it is such a wrinkle so i would not be surprised at all if we saw that 412 and it's different from different sources but 412 440 if that was a 50 increase this year if there were 600 of them compared to the last couple seasons and and i really think that the quick game element of is why it's like super becoming or can potentially become a little bit more valuable is because like if teams are going to live in a little bit more of this too high world the way you want to beat it is either block it up bunch it up and chuck it over their head or hey man you've got fewer defenders underneath than when we lived in the cover three world let's just beat you underneath and pepper you five six yards at a time if we can somehow get there from under center, which I do think can be difficult timing wise.

37:34And I honestly don't think every quarterback is going to be attuned to that and be able to handle that. Cause I do think you have to be a very explosive thrower. You have to be very quick in the way that you're doing things. And I think maybe for some of the younger quarterbacks, that could be tricky, but for these guys that have been around seven, eight years and are very explosive throwers, your, your Josh Allen's, um, your Jared Goff, I think could do this. Like Jordan Love could do this. Those are the guys where it's like, okay, this could become a little nice little notch in their belt now.

37:59Robert Mays: And one of the offensive coaches I was talking to about this, he actually said that the timing of some of these drop back concepts actually marries better when you're doing it under center than when you're doing them from out of the gun, because that's traditionally how the plays were built. And so there is like a timing element that's actually accentuated by doing it this way. You don't detract from it. So I absolutely think that there is some validity to this. And I do think that we'll see more of it. Some teams who are already doing a decent chunk of it, like the ones who are kind of driving this forward, the Niners have done a bunch of it.

38:29Robert Mays: Like the Niners always have these like one or two little subtle wrinkles that, and we'll talk about another one of them here in a minute where they're doing something and teams really start to pick up on it. It's not surprising to hear that, but the Niners have done a lot of it. The Lions did a decent chunk of it. The Vikings did some of it. And then the Rams really started leaning into it in the back half of the last season. So the Vikings are really, I thought this would be more of a thing like three years ago because i remember maybe 2021 or 2022 kirk was doing a shit ton of this like they did it way more than anyone in the league like truly outlier like what is wrong with the vikings that they are doing so much of this and i that is kind of when i thought maybe some of this would catch on and it's been more of a slow burn since then but um they are definitely still a team that clearly likes to do a little bit of that all right we're gonna take one more quick break and then we're gonna come back with like two or three more of these these next ones are I think are a little bit more granular but they did come up a few different times and one that I think is particularly intriguing is all of the backfield actions that the Packers use within their run game and there are a few different things that came up in conversation as I was talking to coaches about this one is the Packers because of the way that they use jaden reed specifically and the way that they have kind of designed their run game they're kind of creating these two back runs out of 11 personnel against nickel looks right so in order to have if you line up with a fullback so like a traditional two back set you're getting base defense a majority of the time like that still is the case so it's really hard to get a nickel advantageous run look with a two back run but because of the ways that the niner the packers use some of those motions, use some of the hover motions, handing the ball off to receivers, they're able to create two back runs against nickel looks.

40:22Robert Mays: So I think that's something that we might see a little bit more of as teams are trying to figure out how can we gain numbers in the run game, but still line up the way that we want to line up is potentially handing the ball to a back and using our running back as a fullback. And you need a wide receiver that can hold up to that punishment and a running back that's willing to do that sort of dirty work. But if you have those two things, then you can do a little bit more of this stuff. And I think what's annoying about them specifically, and this is why I love Matt LaFleur. He's one of the most interesting play callers.

40:54They do a lot of this like pseudo two back, right? With with Jaden Reed, where he is in the backfield or he shifts back into the backfield or, you know, again, they'll shift them into a split back look. And then he flares out one way and they do a little RPO where they have the flare screen attached and stuff like they'll do all of these different things with him. they also more than most other teams will just put two running backs on the field and do a lot of this similar stuff with that like I went back and watched um the Miami game and I thought they did some really interesting stuff with that like they started in I think the first play that they ran they started in a split back look with uh Jacobs and I think it was Brooks was on the other side and they like motion Jacobs into what is like a very tight pistol formation like almost right behind love and then they run power with the other back leading in front of him and then on the next rep they do kind of something similar and then they just get jacobs running straight downhill and then on the third play they actually swing out jacobs when he's going behind love and then they run inside zone to the other back like they just have there are so many different ways to create chaos in the run game and again i think eight years ago it was a lot of just the jet motion stuff let's influence the linebackers now it's like let's do a little bit of the you know when you go to a baseball game and they do the find the ball under the hat the packers have done a lot of that with their run game and their two back stuff and that's how it feels trying to

42:14Robert Mays: defend them so it's so funny that you say that because that's the other kind of wrinkle on this is that the like behind the back ball handling stuff that the packers started leaning into last year when malik willis was the quarterback that's also something that came up as part of this conversation and one you get the benefit of misdirection when you're doing that with a bunch of motions. But the other part of this is that if you're a gun team, if you want to be in the gun, you're inherently limited in what you can do in the run game. There are only so many concepts you can run if the back is going to be offset a certain way.

42:45Robert Mays: Defense is game plan against that. Like if the back is one direction, they have answers for that. So some of these things where the quarterback is now turning his back to the defense out of the shotgun with some of these motions, you just make yourself less predictable and how you want to run the ball, even if you still want to be a team that primarily lines up in the shotgun. So, and the dolphins have been really good at this too. Like the dolphins ball handling is, I mean, that one of the things that Tua has done very, very well over the last couple of years. And I think that's been a wrinkle of their run game.

43:15Robert Mays: They've kind of gone away from it a little bit based on what one coach told me to the same extent, but this is a team that the coach that said this to me was really hampering on. It It was like they were a shotgun team and they were trying to figure out how can we be as diverse and as hard to deal with as possible while also being a shotgun team. And this was to them was one of the clear answers. All right. Like this is why we moved away from the, you know, 12 years ago, you could get away with just being a shotgun. We're just going to run a million inside zone reps. But it's like at a certain point, if defenses know what's coming every rep, you're just not going to know the other players on the other side are really good at their jobs.

43:48And so if you just give them the same look every time, it's not going to work. And so I think teams like the two that we've mentioned, the Niners, again, when Debo Samuel was there, did a lot of this stuff as like a it does tend to be like a breaking case of emergency option for them. But I do think specifically with the Packers last year, they realized, OK, we started to do some of this stuff when Malik Willis came in as a breaking case of emergency. But it really stuck with them for the rest of the season. I mean, that Dolphins game I mentioned was like week 14. Like it was at the end of the season where they just realized like, hey, man, this stuff is cool.

44:17we should keep doing this and I think too it's especially valuable like inside the red zone where like it's already hard enough to try to find space and really try to influence guys to go one way or the other and some of the stuff they were doing with it in the run game was important where again like Jordan Love is not going to give you that much as a runner in the in the red zone whereas like we've seen guys like Jaden Daniels be super valuable there Josh Allen Lamar Jackson when the quarterback isn't giving you as much of that it helps to find other ways to get this little mixed direction and, and other ways that the, to keep the defense off balance in the run game.

44:48So, um, yeah, they, they have been my, one of my favorite run games to watch specifically for this stuff.

44:53Robert Mays: The last backfield action thing that I wanted to mention, there was a coach who was not on the bill staff, but mentioned the bill specifically when he was talking about the ways that you could potentially use the back on passing downs to help with coverage tells. So if you go watch the bills on like third down, Ty Johnson is moving on almost every single one of their third downs and that is to give information to the quarterback whether it's the linebacker takes one step are we getting some sense of who might be coming and one of the reasons that's so beneficial to the bills is that Josh Allen is just a master at figuring out a la carte protection changes before plays now I mean it is one of the things he does best and they have just put so much on him and they really realize the benefits of that not every team has that sort of quarterback but I think more teams kind of spinning it back to what we were talking about at the beginning of the show.

45:45Robert Mays: As more teams are going to have to be dealing with these pressure looks, how do we make sure we're putting ourselves in the best possible situation to get information about these looks in order to make sure that we're not putting ourselves in a bad spot? This is such a fascinating conversation because I feel like starting about five years ago, we realized like, oh, all of the good quarterbacks are young now. Like they're just guys who have not done this for very long. But now we're getting to a point where all of these guys who were superstars when they were 23 are now like 27, 28, 29 and actually have the mental capacity to be like, wait, we can have some more protections in pass protection and I can change stuff before the line of scrimmage.

46:24And that's where you're getting to where the point where, yeah, like Ty Johnson will like they'll have him lined up like five yards away from Josh Allen just to get like that. Is the linebacker going to push out to him or not? And I think a lot of especially younger or maybe just not quite as competent quarterbacks would get a little bit itchy with something like that. They'd be like, well, I know I'm going to have only five guys blocking me in the defense kind of knows that now. And that can be a little bit scary. But when you're a guy like Josh Allen and have an offensive line like the Bills, you can get away with doing some more stuff like this.

46:52So I would like to see more teams use the back as teams that have a quarterback who can handle it. Use the back in terms of like a little bit more of a tell.

46:59Robert Mays: I also think, and I don't want to overstate this because I don't know how new any of this is, but I get a sense that the framing of it is a little bit new. I think there are more coaches building into practice. Like blitz period is no longer just how we pick up blitzes. It's how we identify and differentiate between when teams are going to bring it and when they're just bluffing out into something else. There was one coach that was telling me that, I think it was his offensive line coach was getting like annoyed during a blitz period because he's like, I thought this was the blitz period. And he's like, well, they're not going to bring every guy every time.

47:32Robert Mays: Like we need to make sure that we have answers when they bluff out into something else. Because again, kind of going back to the original conversation at the top, that's one of the things that Flores is trying to do to you. It's not just overwhelming you. It's, are you keeping one or two more guys in than you should? Now you have two, three guys out in the route and he's got five guys in coverage. And so trying to make sure that no matter what happens, if they're bringing that zero or they're playing quarters behind it, do we have the right answers to everything? And I think how you're using the back to give you some of that information is just one thing to keep in mind with that cat and mouse game that I think we're going to see continue this year.

48:10Robert Mays: This next one is incredibly specific, but I really loved it because the defensive coach I was talking to about this was like, he was so impressed with it as an idea, but also kept stressing like what it put on his guys. So it's not even like a trend. It's like one specific kind of play. The Niners started doing this a couple of years ago where they would have these kind of big play action concepts and they would, after the tight end like chipped, the tight end would release as like an escort for the check down swing into the flat. So the Niners were the first team that multiple offensive coaches told me that's where they saw it for the first time.

48:51Robert Mays: And so now more and more teams are leaning into it. The Broncos did a great job of this last year. It was like something they did consistently. And this puts defenders into a bind because if you're the corner to that side, the defensive coach I was talking to is like, you got to two gap that guy. Like you got to take on that guy in space. Like you're an outside linebacker. And the way that it works in the progression, it's really putting those defenders in a stressful position because you're now creating a space play off of what is a normal drop back progression. So now that guy's having to worry about his responsibilities and coverage and then snap his head around to potentially take on a block in space late in the down.

49:33Robert Mays: And so you're potentially getting the benefits. These mostly come off of shot plays, right? So you're drawing up a shot play. And if the shot's not there, now we have a check down that is not just a throw away. We have a check down in the right circumstances turn into an explosive play. And so the fact that this one defensive coach was like, I'm worried about this, I think tells you all you need to know about the stresses it puts on a defense and how smart and simple of an idea it actually is. He should be stressed about it because every team in the NFL kind of does this now. Not necessarily like there are definitely teams that do it more, but like every every offense, I think, has this in their playbook now.

50:12And I think why I kind of like it is it it makes solving like plan B for a shot play way easier, because I think previously when teams weren't doing as good of a job at this, you would either the tight end would just stay in. And if they weren't bringing enough guys as a pass rushing unit, you would kind of just have this guy wasted. And then the shot plays are all covered. Quarterback either has to run or throw to the back. But now there's nobody blocking for the back and I've held onto the ball for four seconds and this guy's already covered. or you would have the tight end would come out, but he would maybe do more of like a sit over the ball type of check down and send.

50:48So then the quarterback has to make a decision of like, do I want to throw to the tight end? Do I want to throw to the back? Sometimes it's hard to see all that stuff when you make it very obvious that like the only option here is we're just going to you're going to hit the running back and we're going to have a guy leading out for him. Just makes it easier on the quarterback. That's why like the Broncos are such a great example where it's like you have this first year quarterback where it's like, how do we make plan B easier for him. It's by, it's by having this, you don't have multiple checkdowns and you don't waste blockers.

51:15You just like, okay, the back's going to be out there. Just hit him. He's going to have a blocker in front of him and we'll take our six yards here and we'll be happy.

51:22Robert Mays: Yeah. I think it's just one of those plays that the benefits of it are obvious and the downsides of it don't really exist, right? Like you're protected. There is, and there's real upside to be realized by leaning into this stuff. And so I do think that we'll see more teams deployed even more often than we have over the last couple of years. Last one here, this is something that came up a couple of different times and is more about just a direction the league is kind of going with like situational decision making. But as more and more teams are going for it on fourth down and fourth and longer than we ever would have gone for it before, right?

51:56Robert Mays: Like fourth and twos, fourth and threes. How is that going to change third down play calling from some of these teams, right? So we've seen this happen now a ton over the last couple of years where teams like the Lions, teams like the Eagles, they'll run the ball on third and five into an advantageous run. Look one, because they can often pick it up because of what is being blocked up. And two, we know we're going forward on fourth and two anyway. So even if we gain three yards, this doesn't really matter. So I was talking to one offensive coordinator just about like, all right, so when does the mindset start to change?

52:31Robert Mays: like if it's third and seven, is it beneficial to us to actually run the ball where based on where we are in the field, because we know we're going to go forward on fourth and two and fourth and three, like where is the actual cutoff for when it is no longer a good idea for us to run, run the ball into what is a pass rushing front. And so just how it plays into the situational decision-making and play calling for all of these guys, because now third down plays into fourth down in a way that it never really has before. I think that's just something to keep an eye on. Like more third down runs to me is like the easy answer and something we will see.

53:07Robert Mays: But do teams start going tempo more into these fourth downs because they feel like, all right, if we get to fourth and two, we have a way to pick this up. If we just have a simple call that's like tacked on to what we were already doing. So just what is at front of mind for these play callers because of the dynamics around fourth down changing, I think that's just something to keep in mind. That to me very much feels like. If the next set of downs is going to get me into field goal range, that's where I started being like this becomes where if I'm on my own 27, it's like this probably isn't worth it and we can just try to pick it up passing wise.

53:41But I think once you start to get into like we pick this up, we can actually put some points on the board. That's where it starts to become worth it. I also think it can be like a. over the course of the game and then even over the course of the season it can be a slow build of like okay the the reason these third and six runs work is because you're typically getting what are like passing down calls and so you're getting advantageous looks well if you're a team that's going to run all the time on third and six do defenses just start treating you differently where you actually get stuff that's a little bit more like 50 50 run pass and now passing is a little bit easier on the third and six like that's kind of where i think that this stuff could get really, really interesting over the course of the year.

54:18Robert Mays: Absolutely. And so that again is like the push and the pull that you're going to have to weigh as a defensive coach in those moments, if more teams are going to start running the ball on third and medium, because they're willing to go for it on a fork down. And I, that'll be like, do I want to bring out my NASCAR package? If this team is going to run a thon third and six with a fullback on the field, it's like, well, no, I don't. But that's, I, that's so important because think about how we frame third downs. We frame them as hard downs for the offense and easy downs for the defense because the package and the menu is more limited.

54:49Robert Mays: Well, if that starts to expand and now offenses are not backed into a corner on third and seven, what does that do to the dynamics between the offense and the defense? And so I think figuring out where your limit is of like, OK, and where you are in the field is a perfect thing to bring up. It's one of the first things that this coach mentioned. He's like, listen, this is probably stuff that we're at the 50 and in. Like that's, that's when we're talking about this. And so, but that's still a huge chunk of the football field. Like the idea, if the, if a kickoff touchback is going to put us on the 35, I mean, you're kind of already there.

55:23Robert Mays: Just think about what, let's say, yeah, let's, let's say you have the ball on the plus 47 yard line and it's third and eight. what like think what would the what you would do in that situation 10 years ago is you would throw like you it would be a drop back pass like you know exactly what you were doing well now if it's third and eight on the plus 47 and that run gains four yards and now it's fourth and four on the plus 33 that's a toss-up you can go for it there and so it just it puts one more thing on the defensive coordinator's mind in terms of what is available to the offense in those moments.

56:06Robert Mays: And so often, I think this is something that when we lose the forest for the trees a little bit, and I'm guilty of that all the time, how often are we in advantageous, beneficial down and distance situations? Like that is such a priority to so many offensive coaches. And we'll talk about this when I'm in Minnesota right now, we'll talk about this when we do the Vikings preview, like being able to be in second and fives because you have Jordan Mason and like$25 million in a first round pick of interior offensive line play changes the dynamics of the offense. And so being able to make third down a down and distance situation where you are no longer at a defined disadvantage, it changes the rules of engagement.

56:52Robert Mays: Like that's so would be so incredibly important if more teams started adopting this sort of aggressive mindset. And I think we have a ton of evidence that that's already happening. That's such a great way to frame it because I think play calling is a lot of things, but play calling is ultimately what do I feel comfortable with? Like, what can we comfortably do here? And getting into those down in distances and like, even as a defensive play caller, again, five years ago, third and seven was very obvious. Like, I feel comfortable calling our XYZ blitz here, or, you know, we can bring out our NASCAR package and we're fine.

57:23But now if most defensive coordinators are going to not feel confident in what they're bringing. Like for guys like Spags, I don't think this is going to be an issue. He's seen everything like Vic Fangio. He's seen so much that he probably is going to have answers and be comfortable and confident in what he's calling. But for guys who are maybe trying to get their sea legs under them or have not done this for very long, like I can see why that would be a very scary situation to be thrown into of like I my entire coaching career was brought up that third and seven is this third and seven is no longer this.

57:51That's that could be a little bit troubling for a lot of guys.

57:54Robert Mays: All right. that's all we got nothing groundbreaking nothing revolutionary nothing that's going to like reinvent how professional football works but again it's a question i've asked 40 50 guys over the last month and these were some of the interesting answers that came back this is all off the cuff too like if you had given these guys like a day to think about it i'm sure that the answers would have been a little bit different but just wanted to kind of share what the notebook looks like at the end of this trip in like one small way and i thought that this was the right way to do it so i I enjoyed it.

58:24Robert Mays: I hope you guys did as well. That's all we got as far as non-division preview shows go for the next couple weeks here. Starting tomorrow, division previews are on tap. We're kicking things off with the NFC East. So it's going to be Wednesday, Thursday, Friday this week. We'll have some more beat writer notebooks coming this weekend like we've had in years past, like we had in the last few weeks. And then starting next week, it is going to be Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, straight division previews all the way through Labor Day weekend. So that is what we have on tap over the next couple of weeks.

58:59Robert Mays: Very excited about it. Really looking forward to those. Hope you guys are as well. For now, that's all we got. Appreciate you listening. We'll talk to you very soon.