Lance Roffers
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Let’s take a look at what potential OC candidate Major Applewhite could bring to the role at Miami. At his press conference, Manny Diaz promised, “We will have a fantastic offensive coordinator, a great quarterbacks coach and a great scheme.” Coach Diaz also promised, “An offensive coordinator on the cutting edge.”
Does Major Applewhite fit the bill? I wanted to look through the years at the previous stops for Coach Applewhite in which he called the plays and review the system he ran and some of the context surrounding each of those stops. Context such as his very first stop as an offensive coordinator at Rice. They were transitioning away from a wishbone offense and into a more modern offense. He was there one year and was offered two different opportunities to leave Rice, ultimately choosing to join Nick Saban at Alabama in his inaugural year with the program. The scheme at Alabama was mandated by Coach Saban as one that would run pro-style and run the football. That marriage was not a good fit at all, and Applewhite was replaced after one season. From there, Applewhite returned to his alma mater, eventually working his way back into a play-caller role at Texas in 2013. Charlie Strong took over the program and Applewhite was not retained, eventually turning up at Houston under Tom Herman in 2015.
How has Applewhite evolved over the years? Does his offense fit the promises from Coach Diaz of “attacking, being on the cutting edge, and winning with toughness?” Find out here, at Upon Further Review.
Rice
Applewhite joined Rice in 2006 as their OC/QB coach after serving as the QB coach at Syracuse the year prior. He joined the staff of Todd Graham, who was with Rice for only season before leaving for Tulsa. In 2005, Rice ran the ball 600 times and passed only 210 times as they went 1-10. Applewhite installed a more modern offense that moved away from the wishbone and showed his QB development skills with his tutelage of Chase Clement. The year prior- as a freshman- Clement completed 42.7% of his passes and had a 5-to-6 TD/INT ratio. Applewhite helped improved those numbers to a completion percentage of 57.7, and a very good 21-to-5 TD/INT ratio. Clement injured his thumb in the opening game and the backup- Joel Armstrong- had to be moved to QB from WR and play the next three games against vastly superior competition (UCLA, Texas, Florida State). Clement returned the next week against Army and completed 75% of his passes for 5 TD’s/0 Int’s. In games that his starting QB Chase Clement played, Rice scored less than 30 points only once (24 points) and went 9-2 in those games.
How did his offense work on film, though? The only two games that I was able to find were games in which Rice did not have their starting QB available. Their backup QB was a WR converted to QB to run the wishbone, so the offense had to be heavily modified to accommodate that change.
Even back in 2006 Applewhite was a proponent of the spread offense. He started under center, moved back to shotgun, the back motioned out to the boundary and the inside slot came in motion with a “jet sweep” motion you would see today.
Here is he, looks just the same. They say he is excellent at Texas recruiting. Apparently he also likes warm weather (who doesn’t).
Texas was simply much too big and fast for Rice in this game. Jamaal Charles just ripped off huge gains on most plays early and it put Rice behind in a big way. The QB simply couldn’t throw the ball, the Applewhite did a good job of trying to get him on the edges, use space to create running room to make plays, and used motion on nearly every play.
In this game, anyway, they really liked to motion their RB’s out of the backfield and play without a RB with the QB in shotgun. They used motion to get a threat in front of the QB who would often run a variation of the read-option and would ride the ball in the backs stomach until he made a decision to pull or give (this QB almost always kept).
The game got ugly, but Applewhite absolutely runs a full spread with power concepts and will incorporate some option into things as well. That makes sense, as the personnel with Rice was already used to running that system. He had a smart gameplan to get his QB outside of the pocket, cut the reads in half, give him a lot of throws along the sideline and try to keep things simple. Gene Chizik’s defense was simply another level.
For the season, Applewhite and his offense improved to 26.9 points per game (0.40 points per play), after the Rice offense averaged only 21.9 the year prior (.29 points per play). That’s a 37.9% increase in production in points per play.
Alabama
The next year, Graham left to go to Tulsa and offered to bring Major Applewhite with him, but another coach moved from the NFL back to college and asked Applewhite to join his staff and run his offense. At the time, Nick Saban was a believer in tight formations, power football, and running the ball. The fit was odd right from the beginning due to Applewhite’s system being a full-spread.
I’m interested to see how the offense looked under the direction of Nick Saban to see the differences from when Applewhite was at Rice, to when he moved to the SEC. The game I’ve chosen is the LSU game (a loss 41-34) because LSU got the lead, Alabama came back, then LSU won it late. It’s also interesting because it was the first game back for Saban against his old team, and you know he put a lot of pressure on his staff coming into that game. I’d like to review how he handled the ebb-and-flow of the game. Not only do I hope that he learned from within the game itself, but also in subsequent stops I hope it helped him grow as a play caller.
First play of the game and Alabama is in 5-wide with a TE split out. The first thing that stands out is look how far to the top of the screen the WR is spread. That is absolutely causing LSU to cover a ton of space to the field side. If we want a “cutting edge” guy, he was definitely that in 2007.
So one of the biggest issues that Miami had on offense this season was an inability to beat a blitz on 3rd and long. Here, LSU sends guys on the pass rush. All eight of them come and the WR in the middle slot to the top of the screen has a sight adjustment. The outside WR runs a deep route to clear things out, the inside slot motions into the backfield to help with protection and the middle-slot has an out route that he has to break off as a hot-read for the QB to have somewhere to go with the ball.
The WR catches it with space and beats the defender to the sticks for the 1st down.
After the 1st down Alabama substituted and brought in double TE’s. They motioned the outside WR behind the QB to give him an end-around option and the QB was under-center. The inside give is the call here.
Called a screen pass to the RB on 2nd down and it was absolutely there, but the DE knocked it down when the T didn’t get his hands down (Tyson Jackson). Not shown.
Another 3rd and long against a blitz. Alabama staggers trips to the field side with one WR to the boundary. The two slots run a switch concept with a post route and a wheel route for the underneath man. The outside WR runs a stop route, which draws up the outside defender. The post holds the LB and then draws the middle safety, which clears up the wheel route down the sideline.
The RB leaks out and gives the QB an underneath option. He would’ve picked up the 1st down if the QB decided to check it down. This was a nice play-design that gave a switch concept, an outside short option, a middle short option, a middle deep option and two outside deep options. LSU had to defend the entirety of the field on this play.
Running play on 2nd-and-10, which most play callers love to do despite the inefficiency of it. This one should’ve worked as you can see they run a power concept and pull the LG. The TE is crashing down on the end and the puller is supposed to take out the OLB. For some reason, he hits the same guy that #68 is crashing down on just fine and the OLB is unblocked and runs up and makes the tackle.
Another 3rd-and-long and LSU only rushes 4 this time and plays coverage. You can see that Applewhite likes to have a stop route on most all 3rd down pass plays somewhere on the field. He is open on this play and has a chance to make a play, but the QB throws this one so high the WR doesn’t even jump for it. FG time.
Here was an interception. From under center, they roll out Wilson to the left (usually the worst direction for a right-handed QB to throw from). The inside slot runs an out route and the outside receiver runs a deep route to occupy coverage. Wilson tries to hit the inside slot who was open early, but he throws it late and it’s picked off.
Zone defense and LSU had it covered deep. The CB reads the eyes of Wilson, but if he throws this earlier and to the outside it’s still a completion. Instead, he throws it inside and it’s intercepted. There was no pressure, it was just a bad throw. I’m not a fan of this play because it cuts the field in half, but the pass rush of LSU is causing Alabama to need to move the pocket.
Alabama has tried lead drive, QB-read, end-around give off motion, OZ, power concepts (gap) and they are simply unable to block to LSU. The problem is they also have a one-read QB who cannot run, so he just stares down his first read repeatedly. Here he is staring down the outside stop and LSU is just running zone and running up when the QB stares it down. If he’d come off this read and saw the stop on the other side, he had an easy completion. Instead, as soon as that first read isn’t there he pulls his eyes down and tries to run and gets sacked. This QB is a Junior and his eyes still bring the defense to the ball nearly every play.
Nearly every play, even from a clean pocket, they are just reading his eyes. The OC is gonna need to call some things to get the defense to back up some instead of just squatting. One-read QB. This guy might be worse than the QB’s we had this year. He actually tried to throw this pass and was lucky it wasn’t picked off again. QB, you’ve got a WR on a LB right in the middle of the field. This is an example of a play caller getting what you want and the QB not seeing it.
3rd-and-12 is not a recipe for making money, but this is an interesting play design. They are going to run a switch to the top of the screen and the receivers are getting mugged to the bottom and not getting off press. Alabama gets a roughing the passer called to extend the drive. This QB completely shelled up on this play and threw the ball as he was turning his back from a hit.
I totally did not know what was going to happen in this game when I wrote the OC is going to need to see them squatting on those routes and get them off the line, but here it is just a few plays later. First the pump to pull that outside corner up:
Then the go to get behind the defense: Touchdown. Good job, Coach Applewhite. I like to see my OC noticing these things and taking advantage of them.
Another subtle tweak from Applewhite here. You could see in previous screen shots that the offense lined up inside of the hash mark out of the slot. Now, with the ball on the complete opposite hash mark, the slot is still outside of the hash and the field WR is on the numbers. Creating more space for LSU to cover will hopefully open up the run game more. (sure enough it was a running play)
A wide look at the route combinations on a 3rd-and-long. This is back when you could mug the receivers and not be called.
Something I noticed, that could be nothing, but each time they’ve gone to this trips formation on a far hash, if the slot is inside the hash marks it has been a pass play. If he’s been outside the hash marks it has been a run play. This was a pass play that got called for pass interference on a slant. I’m sure it’s nothing, but just something I noticed.
The next play was a run play on IZ and the RB ran straight into the defense but had a lane if he stretched. Then on 2nd down they went trips, with the slot inside the hash marks and it was a pass play. (Not pictured)
It is true that Wilson is really bad at QB, but I’d like to see them give him more simple throws and screens. Everything is in the intermediate area and LSU is just destroying their receivers. Lots of corners, lots of outs, but not much in the way of any type of screen game at this point. It helps that Alabama cannot block LSU up front at all. It will be interesting to see what they do in the second half, but to this point Wilson is 4/17 for the one big pass and an interception.
This is how bad Wilson is: he has the stop route to the outside open. He is staring right at it. For some reason he doesn’t throw it and instead runs backwards and right into #49 at the 30-yard line.
But it’s nice when you can throw into double coverage and have your receiver make a play. TD.
Trips. Slot receiver outside of the hash mark. Run play. It has been every time thus far.
They go 4-wide on the next play and it’s finally a screen to the RB who cuts outside for a big gain. They lined him up right and ran the screen left. (Not pictured)
Next play after a stop route for 7 is trips with the slot outside of the hash. You guessed it, a run play. It’s been every single time thus far. (Not pictured)
Applewhite runs one of my favorite plays on 3rd-and-short. It is called a stick-play and it’s when you have three receivers to the same side. The two inside slots run out routes and the outside guy runs a clear-out route deep. The stick guy is the inside slot who can stop or run the out route depending on what the LB does. It’s difficult to defend on short yardage plays.
In the second half Alabama moved to more 4-wide sets, they started running out of shotgun (with better success), and threw more screens. LSU came back to win the game, but it wasn’t because of the OC. Alabama scored 34 points, but lost 41-34.
So far, through two stops we have seen the ability to tailor an offense to his personnel and coaching preferences. Alabama scored 352 points on 962 plays (.37 points per play). The year prior, Alabama scored 297 points on 848 plays (.35 points per play). A marginal increase of 6%.
With everything that Alabama had coming back on offense, and the late season swoon they had (12, 14, 10 points last three games) you can see why this marriage was short-lived. Alabama had four turnovers and missed a FG in the infamous loss to LA-Monroe (21-14).
Texas
Applewhite then made his way to Texas, to coach RB’s for the coach that he played for, Mack Brown. The next season, Applewhite became Co-OC, but did not call plays. Finally, in 2013, Bryan Harsin left to become the HC at Arkansas State and Applewhite was elevated to call plays and return to being the QB coach. In 2011, Manny Diaz came onto the Texas staff as the DC.
This was again the only season for Applewhite to call plays at a stop in his coaching career, which makes it difficult to really excel without ever getting the chance to work multiple years with the same players.
I wanted to review the Oklahoma game because it is such a big game for that program. Generally, you get a pretty good view of a play caller in their biggest games because they are holding things back specifically for big moments- such as a rivalry game. Prior to the game, Mack Brown is quoted as saying he told his QB not to try and win the game. He wanted him to be a game manager and not lose the game. He was also quoted as saying with the OC calling plays in this game for the first time, he wanted to be sure and have no turnovers above all else. It seems right from the beginning the OC has his hands sort of tied with Mack Brown playing not to lose after Oklahoma had won the previous two first halves by a combined score of 70-12, and having outgained Texas 722-163 in yardage.
It has now been three years since Applewhite was at Alabama, I wonder if he will have the same “tell” in his trips formation where if the slot lines up outside the hash marks it’s a run, and if he’s inside of them it’s a pass? The first play, they line up with that formation and the slot is outside the hash and it’s a run.
The actual run play is new though in the games I’ve watched for Applewhite. It’s a counter run with a bubble motion to pull the SAM LB out of the cutback lane. The action of the OL is moving away from the intended spot and the Mike and Will run to that action with the bubble pulling the SAM out of the cutback it’s a nice gain on the run. Enjoy seeing growth in the run game, because to this point in my analysis, the run game is the issue with his offenses.
Next play and Applewhite is doing that “pop pass” that is all en vogue with offenses today. I really like to see him running modern wrinkles in 2013. I never understood how this play wasn’t something Miami could’ve manufactured to get Jeff Thomas the ball and into the games early.
To this point in my review, Applewhite loved to run double outs on 3rd-and-medium so on the first 3rd down of the game he runs the same formation but runs a stop route rather than an out and gets the 1st down easily.
Another formation that you see regularly in college football these days is to motion the slot to the other side and stack him behind the WR on that side. Larry Fedora and North Carolina have loved this formation for several years now. It gives a two-way go to that slot receiver (who are generally shifty) and removes the jam/press from the equation for the defensive back. It just makes their lives easier in getting into their route. If you have a great route runner like Jaxson Shipley was, it’s a smart technique on 3rd downs.
They got a false start on the formation above so on 3rd-and-even-longer they bring out a formation that could play well with the personnel that Miami has. They have backs to either side of the QB and still stack the receivers up top. This gives the offense extra protection if they send the blitz. If they back out, it allows the offense to get both backs into pass patterns and occupy the LB’s. That’s exactly what happens here. The left RB goes out into the left flat and the right RB goes out into the right flat. This moves the LB’s up a step and the seam route is open behind them.
It’s the days before HD on everything and the picture is not good, but you can see Oklahoma is in Tampa-2 coverage with the Mike turning and running to cover the middle-deep and the post gets open because the SAM LB took a step towards the RB underneath. Nice throw and catch for the big conversion.
Run out of that trips set, slot outside the hash, run. Thus far it’s still 100%. I’ve seen a split zone, a counter, a power run. It’s definitely a bit different offense than it was at Alabama, but Applewhite still runs a lot more power concepts than he does zone/finesse concepts.
I talked above about the changes we’ve seen in Applewhite’s offense, but the biggest change is the implementation of tempo when they catch an advantageous personnel package against the defense. On the subsequent 3rd-and-2 they had Oklahoma with a nickel defense on the field and snapped the ball in less than 5 seconds and got the first down run. Impressive to get that done so quickly, which means they’ve practiced it and have a call/signal to just Go! On those types of plays.
Inside the hash out of trips run! This doesn’t really count though since they had 4-wide and sent one in motion, but at least it was a bit of a tendency breaker. Applewhite uses motion, but not really multiple motions or any sort of motion one way and reverse the other way at snap to this point.
Power lead-draw run for a 1st down pickup. Applewhite has run more IZ in this game than any game I’ve reviewed. This is the first time I’ve seen this power play. The C down blocks and washes the DT down, the LG stones the other DT and then the FB leads through a huge hole.
Tendency-breaker here as the Texas QB looks to the stop route and the RB flairs to that side. The play is a throw-back slip-screen to the #2 and the slot WR needs to come down and block that CB. If he makes this block it’s a huge play, but the aggressive CB blows the play up. Still a nice play-design as the OL released and had the LB’s and the deep S blocked for a big run if the CB didn’t beat that block. Really liked the early-game scripting that Applewhite did for the Oklahoma defense.
Texas is driving down the field with a nice game plan of runs and play action passes, but they fumbled it in the red zone. Tough play as the RG misses a block that would’ve sprung the RB for a huge gain and then the RB fumbles on top of it. Texas then had a pick-6 to get the score anyway.
Just a reminder that Mack Brown had not fared well against Oklahoma.
Does Major Applewhite fit the bill? I wanted to look through the years at the previous stops for Coach Applewhite in which he called the plays and review the system he ran and some of the context surrounding each of those stops. Context such as his very first stop as an offensive coordinator at Rice. They were transitioning away from a wishbone offense and into a more modern offense. He was there one year and was offered two different opportunities to leave Rice, ultimately choosing to join Nick Saban at Alabama in his inaugural year with the program. The scheme at Alabama was mandated by Coach Saban as one that would run pro-style and run the football. That marriage was not a good fit at all, and Applewhite was replaced after one season. From there, Applewhite returned to his alma mater, eventually working his way back into a play-caller role at Texas in 2013. Charlie Strong took over the program and Applewhite was not retained, eventually turning up at Houston under Tom Herman in 2015.
How has Applewhite evolved over the years? Does his offense fit the promises from Coach Diaz of “attacking, being on the cutting edge, and winning with toughness?” Find out here, at Upon Further Review.
Rice
Applewhite joined Rice in 2006 as their OC/QB coach after serving as the QB coach at Syracuse the year prior. He joined the staff of Todd Graham, who was with Rice for only season before leaving for Tulsa. In 2005, Rice ran the ball 600 times and passed only 210 times as they went 1-10. Applewhite installed a more modern offense that moved away from the wishbone and showed his QB development skills with his tutelage of Chase Clement. The year prior- as a freshman- Clement completed 42.7% of his passes and had a 5-to-6 TD/INT ratio. Applewhite helped improved those numbers to a completion percentage of 57.7, and a very good 21-to-5 TD/INT ratio. Clement injured his thumb in the opening game and the backup- Joel Armstrong- had to be moved to QB from WR and play the next three games against vastly superior competition (UCLA, Texas, Florida State). Clement returned the next week against Army and completed 75% of his passes for 5 TD’s/0 Int’s. In games that his starting QB Chase Clement played, Rice scored less than 30 points only once (24 points) and went 9-2 in those games.
How did his offense work on film, though? The only two games that I was able to find were games in which Rice did not have their starting QB available. Their backup QB was a WR converted to QB to run the wishbone, so the offense had to be heavily modified to accommodate that change.
Even back in 2006 Applewhite was a proponent of the spread offense. He started under center, moved back to shotgun, the back motioned out to the boundary and the inside slot came in motion with a “jet sweep” motion you would see today.
Here is he, looks just the same. They say he is excellent at Texas recruiting. Apparently he also likes warm weather (who doesn’t).
Texas was simply much too big and fast for Rice in this game. Jamaal Charles just ripped off huge gains on most plays early and it put Rice behind in a big way. The QB simply couldn’t throw the ball, the Applewhite did a good job of trying to get him on the edges, use space to create running room to make plays, and used motion on nearly every play.
In this game, anyway, they really liked to motion their RB’s out of the backfield and play without a RB with the QB in shotgun. They used motion to get a threat in front of the QB who would often run a variation of the read-option and would ride the ball in the backs stomach until he made a decision to pull or give (this QB almost always kept).
The game got ugly, but Applewhite absolutely runs a full spread with power concepts and will incorporate some option into things as well. That makes sense, as the personnel with Rice was already used to running that system. He had a smart gameplan to get his QB outside of the pocket, cut the reads in half, give him a lot of throws along the sideline and try to keep things simple. Gene Chizik’s defense was simply another level.
For the season, Applewhite and his offense improved to 26.9 points per game (0.40 points per play), after the Rice offense averaged only 21.9 the year prior (.29 points per play). That’s a 37.9% increase in production in points per play.
Alabama
The next year, Graham left to go to Tulsa and offered to bring Major Applewhite with him, but another coach moved from the NFL back to college and asked Applewhite to join his staff and run his offense. At the time, Nick Saban was a believer in tight formations, power football, and running the ball. The fit was odd right from the beginning due to Applewhite’s system being a full-spread.
I’m interested to see how the offense looked under the direction of Nick Saban to see the differences from when Applewhite was at Rice, to when he moved to the SEC. The game I’ve chosen is the LSU game (a loss 41-34) because LSU got the lead, Alabama came back, then LSU won it late. It’s also interesting because it was the first game back for Saban against his old team, and you know he put a lot of pressure on his staff coming into that game. I’d like to review how he handled the ebb-and-flow of the game. Not only do I hope that he learned from within the game itself, but also in subsequent stops I hope it helped him grow as a play caller.
First play of the game and Alabama is in 5-wide with a TE split out. The first thing that stands out is look how far to the top of the screen the WR is spread. That is absolutely causing LSU to cover a ton of space to the field side. If we want a “cutting edge” guy, he was definitely that in 2007.
So one of the biggest issues that Miami had on offense this season was an inability to beat a blitz on 3rd and long. Here, LSU sends guys on the pass rush. All eight of them come and the WR in the middle slot to the top of the screen has a sight adjustment. The outside WR runs a deep route to clear things out, the inside slot motions into the backfield to help with protection and the middle-slot has an out route that he has to break off as a hot-read for the QB to have somewhere to go with the ball.
The WR catches it with space and beats the defender to the sticks for the 1st down.
After the 1st down Alabama substituted and brought in double TE’s. They motioned the outside WR behind the QB to give him an end-around option and the QB was under-center. The inside give is the call here.
Called a screen pass to the RB on 2nd down and it was absolutely there, but the DE knocked it down when the T didn’t get his hands down (Tyson Jackson). Not shown.
Another 3rd and long against a blitz. Alabama staggers trips to the field side with one WR to the boundary. The two slots run a switch concept with a post route and a wheel route for the underneath man. The outside WR runs a stop route, which draws up the outside defender. The post holds the LB and then draws the middle safety, which clears up the wheel route down the sideline.
The RB leaks out and gives the QB an underneath option. He would’ve picked up the 1st down if the QB decided to check it down. This was a nice play-design that gave a switch concept, an outside short option, a middle short option, a middle deep option and two outside deep options. LSU had to defend the entirety of the field on this play.
Running play on 2nd-and-10, which most play callers love to do despite the inefficiency of it. This one should’ve worked as you can see they run a power concept and pull the LG. The TE is crashing down on the end and the puller is supposed to take out the OLB. For some reason, he hits the same guy that #68 is crashing down on just fine and the OLB is unblocked and runs up and makes the tackle.
Another 3rd-and-long and LSU only rushes 4 this time and plays coverage. You can see that Applewhite likes to have a stop route on most all 3rd down pass plays somewhere on the field. He is open on this play and has a chance to make a play, but the QB throws this one so high the WR doesn’t even jump for it. FG time.
Here was an interception. From under center, they roll out Wilson to the left (usually the worst direction for a right-handed QB to throw from). The inside slot runs an out route and the outside receiver runs a deep route to occupy coverage. Wilson tries to hit the inside slot who was open early, but he throws it late and it’s picked off.
Zone defense and LSU had it covered deep. The CB reads the eyes of Wilson, but if he throws this earlier and to the outside it’s still a completion. Instead, he throws it inside and it’s intercepted. There was no pressure, it was just a bad throw. I’m not a fan of this play because it cuts the field in half, but the pass rush of LSU is causing Alabama to need to move the pocket.
Alabama has tried lead drive, QB-read, end-around give off motion, OZ, power concepts (gap) and they are simply unable to block to LSU. The problem is they also have a one-read QB who cannot run, so he just stares down his first read repeatedly. Here he is staring down the outside stop and LSU is just running zone and running up when the QB stares it down. If he’d come off this read and saw the stop on the other side, he had an easy completion. Instead, as soon as that first read isn’t there he pulls his eyes down and tries to run and gets sacked. This QB is a Junior and his eyes still bring the defense to the ball nearly every play.
Nearly every play, even from a clean pocket, they are just reading his eyes. The OC is gonna need to call some things to get the defense to back up some instead of just squatting. One-read QB. This guy might be worse than the QB’s we had this year. He actually tried to throw this pass and was lucky it wasn’t picked off again. QB, you’ve got a WR on a LB right in the middle of the field. This is an example of a play caller getting what you want and the QB not seeing it.
3rd-and-12 is not a recipe for making money, but this is an interesting play design. They are going to run a switch to the top of the screen and the receivers are getting mugged to the bottom and not getting off press. Alabama gets a roughing the passer called to extend the drive. This QB completely shelled up on this play and threw the ball as he was turning his back from a hit.
I totally did not know what was going to happen in this game when I wrote the OC is going to need to see them squatting on those routes and get them off the line, but here it is just a few plays later. First the pump to pull that outside corner up:
Then the go to get behind the defense: Touchdown. Good job, Coach Applewhite. I like to see my OC noticing these things and taking advantage of them.
Another subtle tweak from Applewhite here. You could see in previous screen shots that the offense lined up inside of the hash mark out of the slot. Now, with the ball on the complete opposite hash mark, the slot is still outside of the hash and the field WR is on the numbers. Creating more space for LSU to cover will hopefully open up the run game more. (sure enough it was a running play)
A wide look at the route combinations on a 3rd-and-long. This is back when you could mug the receivers and not be called.
Something I noticed, that could be nothing, but each time they’ve gone to this trips formation on a far hash, if the slot is inside the hash marks it has been a pass play. If he’s been outside the hash marks it has been a run play. This was a pass play that got called for pass interference on a slant. I’m sure it’s nothing, but just something I noticed.
The next play was a run play on IZ and the RB ran straight into the defense but had a lane if he stretched. Then on 2nd down they went trips, with the slot inside the hash marks and it was a pass play. (Not pictured)
It is true that Wilson is really bad at QB, but I’d like to see them give him more simple throws and screens. Everything is in the intermediate area and LSU is just destroying their receivers. Lots of corners, lots of outs, but not much in the way of any type of screen game at this point. It helps that Alabama cannot block LSU up front at all. It will be interesting to see what they do in the second half, but to this point Wilson is 4/17 for the one big pass and an interception.
This is how bad Wilson is: he has the stop route to the outside open. He is staring right at it. For some reason he doesn’t throw it and instead runs backwards and right into #49 at the 30-yard line.
But it’s nice when you can throw into double coverage and have your receiver make a play. TD.
Trips. Slot receiver outside of the hash mark. Run play. It has been every time thus far.
They go 4-wide on the next play and it’s finally a screen to the RB who cuts outside for a big gain. They lined him up right and ran the screen left. (Not pictured)
Next play after a stop route for 7 is trips with the slot outside of the hash. You guessed it, a run play. It’s been every single time thus far. (Not pictured)
Applewhite runs one of my favorite plays on 3rd-and-short. It is called a stick-play and it’s when you have three receivers to the same side. The two inside slots run out routes and the outside guy runs a clear-out route deep. The stick guy is the inside slot who can stop or run the out route depending on what the LB does. It’s difficult to defend on short yardage plays.
In the second half Alabama moved to more 4-wide sets, they started running out of shotgun (with better success), and threw more screens. LSU came back to win the game, but it wasn’t because of the OC. Alabama scored 34 points, but lost 41-34.
So far, through two stops we have seen the ability to tailor an offense to his personnel and coaching preferences. Alabama scored 352 points on 962 plays (.37 points per play). The year prior, Alabama scored 297 points on 848 plays (.35 points per play). A marginal increase of 6%.
With everything that Alabama had coming back on offense, and the late season swoon they had (12, 14, 10 points last three games) you can see why this marriage was short-lived. Alabama had four turnovers and missed a FG in the infamous loss to LA-Monroe (21-14).
Texas
Applewhite then made his way to Texas, to coach RB’s for the coach that he played for, Mack Brown. The next season, Applewhite became Co-OC, but did not call plays. Finally, in 2013, Bryan Harsin left to become the HC at Arkansas State and Applewhite was elevated to call plays and return to being the QB coach. In 2011, Manny Diaz came onto the Texas staff as the DC.
This was again the only season for Applewhite to call plays at a stop in his coaching career, which makes it difficult to really excel without ever getting the chance to work multiple years with the same players.
I wanted to review the Oklahoma game because it is such a big game for that program. Generally, you get a pretty good view of a play caller in their biggest games because they are holding things back specifically for big moments- such as a rivalry game. Prior to the game, Mack Brown is quoted as saying he told his QB not to try and win the game. He wanted him to be a game manager and not lose the game. He was also quoted as saying with the OC calling plays in this game for the first time, he wanted to be sure and have no turnovers above all else. It seems right from the beginning the OC has his hands sort of tied with Mack Brown playing not to lose after Oklahoma had won the previous two first halves by a combined score of 70-12, and having outgained Texas 722-163 in yardage.
It has now been three years since Applewhite was at Alabama, I wonder if he will have the same “tell” in his trips formation where if the slot lines up outside the hash marks it’s a run, and if he’s inside of them it’s a pass? The first play, they line up with that formation and the slot is outside the hash and it’s a run.
The actual run play is new though in the games I’ve watched for Applewhite. It’s a counter run with a bubble motion to pull the SAM LB out of the cutback lane. The action of the OL is moving away from the intended spot and the Mike and Will run to that action with the bubble pulling the SAM out of the cutback it’s a nice gain on the run. Enjoy seeing growth in the run game, because to this point in my analysis, the run game is the issue with his offenses.
Next play and Applewhite is doing that “pop pass” that is all en vogue with offenses today. I really like to see him running modern wrinkles in 2013. I never understood how this play wasn’t something Miami could’ve manufactured to get Jeff Thomas the ball and into the games early.
To this point in my review, Applewhite loved to run double outs on 3rd-and-medium so on the first 3rd down of the game he runs the same formation but runs a stop route rather than an out and gets the 1st down easily.
Another formation that you see regularly in college football these days is to motion the slot to the other side and stack him behind the WR on that side. Larry Fedora and North Carolina have loved this formation for several years now. It gives a two-way go to that slot receiver (who are generally shifty) and removes the jam/press from the equation for the defensive back. It just makes their lives easier in getting into their route. If you have a great route runner like Jaxson Shipley was, it’s a smart technique on 3rd downs.
They got a false start on the formation above so on 3rd-and-even-longer they bring out a formation that could play well with the personnel that Miami has. They have backs to either side of the QB and still stack the receivers up top. This gives the offense extra protection if they send the blitz. If they back out, it allows the offense to get both backs into pass patterns and occupy the LB’s. That’s exactly what happens here. The left RB goes out into the left flat and the right RB goes out into the right flat. This moves the LB’s up a step and the seam route is open behind them.
It’s the days before HD on everything and the picture is not good, but you can see Oklahoma is in Tampa-2 coverage with the Mike turning and running to cover the middle-deep and the post gets open because the SAM LB took a step towards the RB underneath. Nice throw and catch for the big conversion.
Run out of that trips set, slot outside the hash, run. Thus far it’s still 100%. I’ve seen a split zone, a counter, a power run. It’s definitely a bit different offense than it was at Alabama, but Applewhite still runs a lot more power concepts than he does zone/finesse concepts.
I talked above about the changes we’ve seen in Applewhite’s offense, but the biggest change is the implementation of tempo when they catch an advantageous personnel package against the defense. On the subsequent 3rd-and-2 they had Oklahoma with a nickel defense on the field and snapped the ball in less than 5 seconds and got the first down run. Impressive to get that done so quickly, which means they’ve practiced it and have a call/signal to just Go! On those types of plays.
Inside the hash out of trips run! This doesn’t really count though since they had 4-wide and sent one in motion, but at least it was a bit of a tendency breaker. Applewhite uses motion, but not really multiple motions or any sort of motion one way and reverse the other way at snap to this point.
Power lead-draw run for a 1st down pickup. Applewhite has run more IZ in this game than any game I’ve reviewed. This is the first time I’ve seen this power play. The C down blocks and washes the DT down, the LG stones the other DT and then the FB leads through a huge hole.
Tendency-breaker here as the Texas QB looks to the stop route and the RB flairs to that side. The play is a throw-back slip-screen to the #2 and the slot WR needs to come down and block that CB. If he makes this block it’s a huge play, but the aggressive CB blows the play up. Still a nice play-design as the OL released and had the LB’s and the deep S blocked for a big run if the CB didn’t beat that block. Really liked the early-game scripting that Applewhite did for the Oklahoma defense.
Texas is driving down the field with a nice game plan of runs and play action passes, but they fumbled it in the red zone. Tough play as the RG misses a block that would’ve sprung the RB for a huge gain and then the RB fumbles on top of it. Texas then had a pick-6 to get the score anyway.
Just a reminder that Mack Brown had not fared well against Oklahoma.
