forums

Upon Further Review- Major Applewhite

Thanks for the two threads about a hire that never happened. Even renounced by Manny Diaz.
 
Advertisement
rokulika said:
Upon further review, the ruling on the internet is that Mallory should get moved to WR unless he wants to waste away playing as Brevin's backup.

QB Williams
RB Dallas, Davis, Lingard, Burns, George
X Mallory, Hightower, Njoku
Y Pope, Harley, Payton
X Osborn, Wiggins, Ezzard
TE Jordan, Irvin, Hodges, Polendey

11 wins
Click to expand...

If that is something hes interested in. It just sucks recruiting such great TE's and telling one your not needed. If I were the OC I would use 2 TE Sets but obviously we would need Our TE's to block enough on Blitz. If the Spread Offense is implemented correctly I see us spreading the snaps
 
Lance Roffers said:
Same formation as the earlier 3rd-and-long with two RB’s and then stacking the receivers to the field side. This time they hit them with a draw that busts for 50 yards.
View attachment 75184

Texas is having a lot of luck with that designed cutback run out of shotgun. Down block the DT, push the edge wide, LB’s are flowing too aggressively to the G action and the cutback lane is huge. It’s a simple zone play, but I’m a fan of doing the same things until the defense can prove they will stop it. This is designed to cut off the RT down blocking here.
View attachment 75185

I saw them line up and motion the H-back across the formation and no one went with him and I said to myself I hope they play-action and throw it to him because he will be unaccounted for. They did. The QB turfed it. Applewhite is doing a great job in this game, but his offense only has three points because of a red-zone fumble and the QB being unable to complete this easy throw. The only defender over there is that CB with a WR to block him. Perfect call.
View attachment 75186

Later on, Oklahoma has to call timeout because Texas showed a formation they weren’t ready for. Bob was letting his brother know he was less than pleased.
View attachment 75187

Applewhite absolutely killed it in this game with his 3rd down calls. Here is a 3rd-and-12 and he goes 4-wide slots off the line. To the field side he runs a switch concept and it turns into a wheel with the outside receiver running the post. Before you ask; Yes, it was mirrored to the other side as well. The play goes for a long TD as the defense doesn’t handle the switch well.
View attachment 75188

Notice the difference in position from the two corners. The top of the screen he is nearly even and flat footed. To the bottom of the screen he’s already turned and is running with the receiver.
View attachment 75190

Had him again on a deep post but the QB throws it up the field instead of into that open area in the middle of the field. Truly an impressive gameplan by Applewhite in this one. He’s getting his shots in when the coverage dictates, but otherwise he is controlling the game with that Inside Zone run that has a natural cutback in it.
View attachment 75191

Just about ready to move on to Houston, but wanted to highlight this play as well. He’s gone back to the stack and has almost a diamond in the backfield (missing one point). It’s another 3rd-and-long. Oklahoma is standing everyone up in the “NASCAR” package you hear so much about nowadays.
View attachment 75193

I said earlier that you stack your slot receiver to give him a two-way go and stop any press/jam coverage. Texas doesn’t know who is coming out of this pass rush, but they know someone will either step out or they’ll need an outlet if everyone comes. They run the front receiver on a shallow cross in front of the LB’s who back out. This catches the LB’s attention and causes them to step up to account for him. Look at what they did with the RB’s. They ran both to the same side this time, with the one to the left of the QB running a wheel route and holding the outside CB for just a split second. They brought the other one across and gave the QB a play-action look. Slot runs a bang-8 behind the LB’s and gets 8 yards on 3rd-and-7. This is a perfect example of having a counter to a look you give earlier and saving it for the right time. It’s not as great a play on a 3rd-and-12, but at 7 yards it’s the perfect yardage for that route combo and the way Oklahoma was showing their defenders standing.

*Side note* It’s why I started to favor Applewhite as the OC rather than Fedora, who stated how he has pre-packaged plays on 3rd downs when I’d rather have a set of plays designed to work against that specific opponent and use them when the right look is given by the defense.
View attachment 75195

Here is what the QB saw. You see the RB wheel completely pulled that CB out of the play. Shallow pulled the LB up (plus play-action). Slot is wide open on the post behind it.
View attachment 75196

Oklahoma has been squatting on the slant all day, so Applewhite waits until a big spot to call the Sluggo (Slant-N-Go). You get the should fake from the QB.
View attachment 75206

And the Go is so wide open it’s almost unbelievable that he missed this pass this badly. That receiver started well inside the numbers and the throw goes out of bounds. This is perfect play calling and the QB just didn’t even come close to executing. Should’ve been a TD, but it’s now a long FG attempt. Is that on the OC? To me, this is just excellent stuff thus far. I won’t spend a week going through every game he ever called, but this game plan- on this day- was a masterpiece. Oklahoma wins 36-20 as a big underdog after the way they’ve been dominated the years prior. I hope Mack Brown gave Major Applewhite a game ball after this one.
View attachment 75207

Houston

At this point, Applewhite has had a pretty winding road as a coach. From being the youngest OC in the country when he was at Air Force and at Alabama, to lasting only year calling plays at his first three stops, he has experienced ups and downs. In 2015, Tom Herman was named the HC at Houston after winning a national title with Ohio State as their OC and the results for Houston were immediate. They went 13-1, finished 8th in the AP Poll and smacked Florida State in the bowl game. The game they lost they didn’t have Greg Ward.

Applewhite inherited the best QB of his career when he came to Houston. Greg Ward Jr. was a WR to start the 2014 season but when John O’Korn got hurt, he took over at QB and was fantastic. Under Applewhite, Ward took the next step to superstardom. Utilizing the power-spread that Coach Herman wanted to implement, Ward ran for over 1,000 yards, scored 21 rushing TD’s, completed 67% of his passes and had a 17/6 TD/Int ratio.

After taking a year off after being let go by Charlie Strong at Texas, I wanted to see if Applewhite made changes to his offense under the tutelage of Coach Herman. The game I chose to watch was the game against Florida State for a couple of reasons: 1. It’s Florida State and it’s fun to watch them lose. 2. Florida State happens to be a team we play every year and we know that defense always has talent, so if he can coordinate an offense against that defense that had weeks to devise a game plan then it’s a good omen. Remember, this Florida State defense had Derwin James and Jalen Ramsey among others.

On the first drive, the offense is very similar to what he had run previously, but the element of having a QB who can run really opens things up. He’s run slip screens to the WR, a QB option on the edge, a jet sweep, a zone-read QB edge run. The formations are pretty much the same as what I saw at Texas but the element of legs with the QB is obvious.
View attachment 75208

I say that and the next play has a new formation alignment. They have trips to the field side and look at the space they are creating with all three receivers outside. The H-back at that offset alignment allows for a lot of different looks with motion (he stays put on this play). With a QB who can run, this alignment is so difficult to stop on the zone-reads. If Applewhite brings this formation to Miami and develops one of the QB’s, they will improve drastically on offense.
View attachment 75209

You can see the focus they have on getting space on offense to stretch the defense. This is a QB draw all the way, with the intent to simply take as many defenders outside the hash marks as possible. There is definitely a more modern element to the offense than he had at Texas. Herman said before the game he does not call any plays and he simply helps with implementing a game plan during the week of games. Major Applewhite said he came in and was very humble. He said, “Tom, teach me the offense and I’ll teach the other coaches and the players while you implement the culture.” I see it as a major positive (pun) that he learned the offense under Herman enough to teach others, which means he knows the aspects of the offense he wants to take with him.
View attachment 75211

You will definitely see more passes thrown to the RB’s in this offense. You have a shallow and medium crosser over the middle and then the RB releases out away from the motion. He’s slow, so that FSU LB ran him down, but you can see the play design worked to get the easy completion and should’ve been a 1st down.
View attachment 75212

More passes to the RB’s. #10 was lined up next to the QB here (two RB’s out of shotgun seems to be a play Applewhite likes to run). They sent him in motion just before the snap behind the QB and it’s an easy completion in space. Many of us on the board have been asking for easy completions to our playmakers in space. This goes for 12 yards as #42 is caught all the way on the other side of the field trailing the play here. DeeJay Dallas and Cam’Rom Davis are great fits for this type of formation. Brevin Jordan is a very rich man’s version of the H-back to the top of the screen between the two hash marks.
View attachment 75213

Another space-you-out formation where the QB can use his legs, you can throw the screen to the back WR, or you can confuse the defense with fake-block for the screen and go. We saw a similar play call from Applewhite when he was with Alabama against LSU for a TD. This play was for the screen, but the formation and spacing allows for a lot of options.
View attachment 75214

Gash them a few times with the QB keep and the give opens up nicely. It’s imperative that the QB keep the ball in this offense more often than they kept it last year because it has a major impact on the defense when you do.
View attachment 75215

This offense wants pace. This offense wants multiple eye-candy for the defenders to be looking at (bubble action, stack sets, bunch sets, zone-reads at the same time). It’s a pretty special offense right now, quite honestly. This is the offense I hope Applewhite brings here. Add in the power-spread elements that he likes to run and this offense will put up points at Miami. Applewhite has always run a ton of plays wherever he has been, so this isn’t all a Tom Herman approach, but it’s like Applewhite’s previous pace on steroids. They’re snapping the ball on gives, bubbles, tunnel screens with 37 seconds on the play-clock. In the Miami heat that’ll be difficult on opponents if Miami can create the depth to run it every play.

This is another play design that is new from Applewhite. They have a trips bunch to the field. H-back to that side to make formation strong. FSU has to keep a force player to the boundary or Ward will just take off running to that side. You have two defenders on three receivers. FSU hustled a DL off-the-field to substitute and Houston is snapping it now.
View attachment 75216

This offense wants pace. This offense wants multiple eye-candy for the defenders to be looking at (bubble action, stack sets, bunch sets, zone-reads at the same time). It’s a pretty special offense right now, quite honestly. This is the offense I hope Applewhite brings here. Add in the power-spread elements that he likes to run and this offense will put up points at Miami. Applewhite has always run a ton of plays wherever he has been, so this isn’t all a Tom Herman approach, but it’s like Applewhite’s previous pace on steroids. They’re snapping the ball on gives, bubbles, tunnel screens with 37 seconds on the play-clock. In the Miami heat that’ll be difficult on opponents if Miami can create the depth to run it every play.

This is another play design that is new from Applewhite. They have a trips bunch to the field. H-back to that side to make formation strong. FSU has to keep a force player to the boundary or Ward will just take off running to that side. You have two defenders on three receivers. FSU hustled a DL off-the-field to substitute and Houston is snapping it now.
View attachment 75218

That makes this basically stealing to flood that side and force an open receiver underneath. You talk about scheming a guy open. The QB airmails this throw so it isn’t converted, but that’s as simple and easy a throw, read, play for a D1 QB as you will get. What you don’t see is that the middle guy, the one running right by the defender at the 1st down marker gets let go and is uncovered for a walk-in TD if the QB sees him. You can’t set an offense up any better or easier for a play than this one but it’s just missed by a QB from a clean pocket (#14 is pushed wide then cleaned up by the H-back running back there).
View attachment 75217

Definitely a new addition to this offense is the “check-with-me” concept. I’ve wanted this for years. You don’t huddle, you run simple play calls and get set at the LOS. The QB reviews the defense and then decides to run that play or look to the sideline and “check-with-me” on what to do. It’s so difficult on the defense because they have to get set quickly and show their play early and then allow the offense to adjust. How many times did the Miami offense get to the LOS, have the defense shift or show a blitz and not have any adjustments available to them on the play? Applewhite did not do this prior to Houston and I hope that’s something he brings with him to Coral Gables.

At the end of this game, Houston had run 99 plays, ran the ball 53 times, and thoroughly confused the defense of Florida State with formations, tempo, zone-reads, and space.

Conclusion

I know by now that many of you skip to the end to get the cliff notes version of things, so I’ll wrap it up here. Applewhite has been at four different schools calling plays in his career (Rice, Alabama, Texas, Houston). At Rice he implemented a new modern spread offense from a Wing-T the year prior and got the HC promoted to another job. He then left to join Nick Saban in his first year at Alabama and it was just a poor fit, despite the fact he improved their offense significantly in his year there. At Texas he replaced an OC who was promoted to a HC job and while his offense on the season did not perform as well as his predecessor, he put together one of the best game plans I have seen in years against a much more talented Oklahoma team in leading them to a huge win. At Houston he learned the Tom Herman offense and added elements of his own experience into his play calling and was fantastic.

Tom Herman left Houston after two years and so did their dynamic QB, Greg Ward Jr. Houston decided to play more of a pocket passer in Kyle Postma, despite the fact that D’Eriq King was a much better player. Kyle Allen was a big-time recruit who came to Houston as well and he was given a shot at playing time before the full-time move to King. Hiring Kendall Briles brought the offense back to a pace-and-space offense that thrived under D’Eriq King. Merging the styles of Herman and Briles would be a great style for Applewhite to employ with Miami’s personnel.

Focusing on Applewhite as an OC there are a lot of things to like. He has learned, changed, adapted his style at every stop he has made. He has taken elements of what each coach he has coached under has wanted to do and molded them into a style his own. I’ll get into some data to close things out.

The main benchmark that teams want to get to in scoring points is 30. If Miami scores 30 points a game consistently, they will win a bunch of games. Applewhite in his career has scored 30 or more points against peer competition in 34 of the 51 games he has called plays (66.7%). At Houston, they scored 30 or more points in 16 of the 20 games he called plays (80%). Yes, Briles scored 30 in 9 of the 10 games he called plays last year, but he is a legit dude as an OC and they used D’Eriq King all year for Briles.
View attachment 75219

Applewhite gets his offenses to the 30-point threshold far more often than not. That’s a great place to start. Applewhite will also run a ton of plays.
View attachment 75220

One interesting item to note with Applewhite is that at each place he called plays, the offenses improved the year after he left everywhere except Texas. I believe much of that is Applewhite having only one year and the next year with a similar scheme allowed for improvements on already good numbers, but that is admittedly a rosy viewpoint.

Positives

  • The system is QB friendly and each stop he has seen a QB blossom in his system.
  • Uses formations to confuse the defense and get easy throws for the offense.
  • At each stop Applewhite has learned, grown, shown an ability to adapt.
  • Has counters for each formation he runs and when the defense shows an obvious aggression, waits for the time to attack it with a counter off the same formation.
  • Power running game is a part of his offense at each stop.
  • Pace-and-space is modern football and the athletes in Miami are used to running this in HS.
  • Head Coaching experience will be huge for a first-time HC in Manny Diaz to bounce ideas off of.
  • 67% scoring 30-points against peer opponents is quite good. The name of the game is to score points, so while he doesn’t always put up elite Yards Per Play numbers, his ability to hit that marker on the scoreboard is quite good.


Negatives

  • While he has put up very solid Points Per Play numbers as an OC (.482 points-per-play in his time at Houston), it still falls far below the elite teams this year. Oklahoma- .714 points per play, Alabama- .672 points per play, Clemson- .617 points per play, Ohio State- .517 points per play.
  • Some poor decisions as a HC. The OC he brought in to Houston wanted to run more of a pocket-passing system despite his success with a full-spread with a running QB and his lack of success with a pocket-passing system. Brought in D’Onofrio as his DC.
I would call Major Applewhite’s offense a Tom Herman/Kendall Briles compilation that I believe will be an excellent hire. In Richt’s time calling plays, Miami ran an average of 64.5 plays per game against peer opponents. His offenses scored 30 points in a game only 29% of the time. Applewhite, for his career, runs an average of 76.2 plays per game against peers and his offenses scored 30 points in a game 66.7% of the time.

Welcome to the modern era of offense, Miami fans. This hire is going to unlock the scoreboard for this program and set this program up for wins and recruits to want to come here again. After doing extensive work on Applewhite, I am excited for what he’s going to bring here.
Click to expand...

@Lance Roffers fantastic write up. I started reading it last night when posted, but just finished reading through it this afternoon. I was very interested to hear more about yards per play metrics than you reviewed in your article. As I understand it and as Manny has discussed in interviews, he seems to place a premium in yards per play given up as a metric for how he is doing as a defense. I would have presumed that he would do the same when evaluating an offensive coordinator.

There is a lot of merit to that approach, in my opinion. Pure yards per game or points per game are poor metrics for evaluating the efficiency of a coordinator. Almost by definition, an offense that runs a large amount of plays is also going to give the other team more plays/possessions than one who runs fewer plays. It doesn't help me to know that OC-1 puts up 30 points per game while OC-2 puts up 24 if I don't control for how many possessions each uses, and allows to the other team, in order to generate those points.

So, all in all, while I am excited about the hire, in part due to your detailed review, I am "eyebrow raised" at the scant mention of the YPP metric and the apparent indication in your article that your findings on that metric as regards to Applewhite are not especially positive.

I would bet that one of the stronger indicators/correlation in all of college football as to a team's win-loss record (along with turnover differential) will be the differential between OYPP (offensive yards per play) and DYPPA (defensive yards per play allowed). I'd bet Manny would see the world the same way. I hope that he has made the best hire possible towards achieving that end.

Curious if you have any further thoughts on the above? Thanks again.
 
DavidMiami said:
If that is something hes interested in. It just sucks recruiting such great TE's and telling one your not needed. If I were the OC I would use 2 TE Sets but obviously we would need Our TE's to block enough on Blitz. If the Spread Offense is implemented correctly I see us spreading the snaps
Click to expand...

There are plenty of ways to get two highly talented TE's plenty of snaps in an Applewhite spread, even without having them on the field at the same time for more than 10 plays a game. First of all, hopefully, we're running 80-85 plays a game instead of the 60-65 that Richt was running. There's an extra 15-20 snaps right there. When you run at that pace, you need more than one wave of guys. Mallory and Brevin also have versatile and diverse skill sets. Both can be lined up literally anywhere on the field and present a mismatch.

Only a lack of imagination can limit their utility.
 
Advertisement
thank you Lance As always, you did a great job.

I dont know, and neither does anyone here know, whether MA will be successful here, but i am pretty confident in saying that, if past is prelude, we will see a much improved and efficient offense in the next year. the offense will operate significantly better than in the last 3 years.
 
rokulika said:
Upon further review, the ruling on the internet is that Mallory should get moved to WR unless he wants to waste away playing as Brevin's backup.

QB Williams
RB Dallas, Davis, Lingard, Burns, George
Z Mallory, Hightower, Njoku
Y Pope, Harley, Payton
X Osborn, Wiggins, Ezzard
TE Jordan, Irvin, Hodges, Polendey

11 wins
Click to expand...
Great coaches adjust to personnel. I'm sure Applewhite will utilize Mallory's talents as well. No reason not to.
 
rokulika said:
Upon further review, the ruling on the internet is that Mallory should get moved to WR unless he wants to waste away playing as Brevin's backup.

QB Williams
RB Dallas, Davis, Lingard, Burns, George
Z Mallory, Hightower, Njoku
Y Pope, Harley, Payton
X Osborn, Wiggins, Ezzard
TE Jordan, Irvin, Hodges, Polendey

11 wins
Click to expand...
maybe i dont know what i am talking about but i do not see mallory as a WR. i think they can utilize both of these guys as TE's.
 
Advertisement
rokulika said:
Upon further review, the ruling on the internet is that Mallory should get moved to WR unless he wants to waste away playing as Brevin's backup.
Click to expand...

Pretty sure Miami had all four scholarship TEs out with injury down the stretch this season.

Might want to keep Mallory at TE.
 
Mallory is a tight end in the same way that David Njoku is a tight end. They're really just big receivers.

Jordan is obviously the more traditional TE and can be used at HB and in the slot in a spread offense.

You play your play makers. If that means splitting Mallory out wide or lining up Jordan in the backfield, you do it.
 
g8rh8rMD said:
There are plenty of ways to get two highly talented TE's plenty of snaps in an Applewhite spread, even without having them on the field at the same time for more than 10 plays a game. First of all, hopefully, we're running 80-85 plays a game instead of the 60-65 that Richt was running. There's an extra 15-20 snaps right there. When you run at that pace, you need more than one wave of guys. Mallory and Brevin also have versatile and diverse skill sets. Both can be lined up literally anywhere on the field and present a mismatch.

Only a lack of imagination can limit their utility.
Click to expand...

I Believe Applewhite is capable of Drawing up plays for our TE's that still have WR and HB Bail Out Options and Vise Versa. But Yea, I'm not limiting anyone to Blocking or Anyone Route Running. Balance is best. It seemed Clemson had a great idea of what Alabama was doing. Not Because of a Talent Advantage at all. Miami Should prepare to be Versatile and Unpredictable. Imagine a Formation with E.Njoku M.Pope B.Jordan W.Mallory D.Wiggins and The Best Possible Option at QB for The RedZone. Or WildCat Packages with A RB like DeeJay Dallas that has Real QB experience and will actually throw it and not just find the Gap And Run. I'm not a Homer from years of Dolphins/Hurricanes Let Down but this feels Different. Mark Richt was a Great Hire but we did get #TrickedByRicht this time we kept the good from Richt and only are Addressing the Offense so we have a known System Established
 
Advertisement
Lance Roffers said:
Same formation as the earlier 3rd-and-long with two RB’s and then stacking the receivers to the field side. This time they hit them with a draw that busts for 50 yards.
View attachment 75184

Texas is having a lot of luck with that designed cutback run out of shotgun. Down block the DT, push the edge wide, LB’s are flowing too aggressively to the G action and the cutback lane is huge. It’s a simple zone play, but I’m a fan of doing the same things until the defense can prove they will stop it. This is designed to cut off the RT down blocking here.
View attachment 75185

I saw them line up and motion the H-back across the formation and no one went with him and I said to myself I hope they play-action and throw it to him because he will be unaccounted for. They did. The QB turfed it. Applewhite is doing a great job in this game, but his offense only has three points because of a red-zone fumble and the QB being unable to complete this easy throw. The only defender over there is that CB with a WR to block him. Perfect call.
View attachment 75186

Later on, Oklahoma has to call timeout because Texas showed a formation they weren’t ready for. Bob was letting his brother know he was less than pleased.
View attachment 75187

Applewhite absolutely killed it in this game with his 3rd down calls. Here is a 3rd-and-12 and he goes 4-wide slots off the line. To the field side he runs a switch concept and it turns into a wheel with the outside receiver running the post. Before you ask; Yes, it was mirrored to the other side as well. The play goes for a long TD as the defense doesn’t handle the switch well.
View attachment 75188

Notice the difference in position from the two corners. The top of the screen he is nearly even and flat footed. To the bottom of the screen he’s already turned and is running with the receiver.
View attachment 75190

Had him again on a deep post but the QB throws it up the field instead of into that open area in the middle of the field. Truly an impressive gameplan by Applewhite in this one. He’s getting his shots in when the coverage dictates, but otherwise he is controlling the game with that Inside Zone run that has a natural cutback in it.
View attachment 75191

Just about ready to move on to Houston, but wanted to highlight this play as well. He’s gone back to the stack and has almost a diamond in the backfield (missing one point). It’s another 3rd-and-long. Oklahoma is standing everyone up in the “NASCAR” package you hear so much about nowadays.
View attachment 75193

I said earlier that you stack your slot receiver to give him a two-way go and stop any press/jam coverage. Texas doesn’t know who is coming out of this pass rush, but they know someone will either step out or they’ll need an outlet if everyone comes. They run the front receiver on a shallow cross in front of the LB’s who back out. This catches the LB’s attention and causes them to step up to account for him. Look at what they did with the RB’s. They ran both to the same side this time, with the one to the left of the QB running a wheel route and holding the outside CB for just a split second. They brought the other one across and gave the QB a play-action look. Slot runs a bang-8 behind the LB’s and gets 8 yards on 3rd-and-7. This is a perfect example of having a counter to a look you give earlier and saving it for the right time. It’s not as great a play on a 3rd-and-12, but at 7 yards it’s the perfect yardage for that route combo and the way Oklahoma was showing their defenders standing.

*Side note* It’s why I started to favor Applewhite as the OC rather than Fedora, who stated how he has pre-packaged plays on 3rd downs when I’d rather have a set of plays designed to work against that specific opponent and use them when the right look is given by the defense.
View attachment 75195

Here is what the QB saw. You see the RB wheel completely pulled that CB out of the play. Shallow pulled the LB up (plus play-action). Slot is wide open on the post behind it.
View attachment 75196

Oklahoma has been squatting on the slant all day, so Applewhite waits until a big spot to call the Sluggo (Slant-N-Go). You get the should fake from the QB.
View attachment 75206

And the Go is so wide open it’s almost unbelievable that he missed this pass this badly. That receiver started well inside the numbers and the throw goes out of bounds. This is perfect play calling and the QB just didn’t even come close to executing. Should’ve been a TD, but it’s now a long FG attempt. Is that on the OC? To me, this is just excellent stuff thus far. I won’t spend a week going through every game he ever called, but this game plan- on this day- was a masterpiece. Oklahoma wins 36-20 as a big underdog after the way they’ve been dominated the years prior. I hope Mack Brown gave Major Applewhite a game ball after this one.
View attachment 75207

Houston

At this point, Applewhite has had a pretty winding road as a coach. From being the youngest OC in the country when he was at Air Force and at Alabama, to lasting only year calling plays at his first three stops, he has experienced ups and downs. In 2015, Tom Herman was named the HC at Houston after winning a national title with Ohio State as their OC and the results for Houston were immediate. They went 13-1, finished 8th in the AP Poll and smacked Florida State in the bowl game. The game they lost they didn’t have Greg Ward.

Applewhite inherited the best QB of his career when he came to Houston. Greg Ward Jr. was a WR to start the 2014 season but when John O’Korn got hurt, he took over at QB and was fantastic. Under Applewhite, Ward took the next step to superstardom. Utilizing the power-spread that Coach Herman wanted to implement, Ward ran for over 1,000 yards, scored 21 rushing TD’s, completed 67% of his passes and had a 17/6 TD/Int ratio.

After taking a year off after being let go by Charlie Strong at Texas, I wanted to see if Applewhite made changes to his offense under the tutelage of Coach Herman. The game I chose to watch was the game against Florida State for a couple of reasons: 1. It’s Florida State and it’s fun to watch them lose. 2. Florida State happens to be a team we play every year and we know that defense always has talent, so if he can coordinate an offense against that defense that had weeks to devise a game plan then it’s a good omen. Remember, this Florida State defense had Derwin James and Jalen Ramsey among others.

On the first drive, the offense is very similar to what he had run previously, but the element of having a QB who can run really opens things up. He’s run slip screens to the WR, a QB option on the edge, a jet sweep, a zone-read QB edge run. The formations are pretty much the same as what I saw at Texas but the element of legs with the QB is obvious.
View attachment 75208

I say that and the next play has a new formation alignment. They have trips to the field side and look at the space they are creating with all three receivers outside. The H-back at that offset alignment allows for a lot of different looks with motion (he stays put on this play). With a QB who can run, this alignment is so difficult to stop on the zone-reads. If Applewhite brings this formation to Miami and develops one of the QB’s, they will improve drastically on offense.
View attachment 75209

You can see the focus they have on getting space on offense to stretch the defense. This is a QB draw all the way, with the intent to simply take as many defenders outside the hash marks as possible. There is definitely a more modern element to the offense than he had at Texas. Herman said before the game he does not call any plays and he simply helps with implementing a game plan during the week of games. Major Applewhite said he came in and was very humble. He said, “Tom, teach me the offense and I’ll teach the other coaches and the players while you implement the culture.” I see it as a major positive (pun) that he learned the offense under Herman enough to teach others, which means he knows the aspects of the offense he wants to take with him.
View attachment 75211

You will definitely see more passes thrown to the RB’s in this offense. You have a shallow and medium crosser over the middle and then the RB releases out away from the motion. He’s slow, so that FSU LB ran him down, but you can see the play design worked to get the easy completion and should’ve been a 1st down.
View attachment 75212

More passes to the RB’s. #10 was lined up next to the QB here (two RB’s out of shotgun seems to be a play Applewhite likes to run). They sent him in motion just before the snap behind the QB and it’s an easy completion in space. Many of us on the board have been asking for easy completions to our playmakers in space. This goes for 12 yards as #42 is caught all the way on the other side of the field trailing the play here. DeeJay Dallas and Cam’Rom Davis are great fits for this type of formation. Brevin Jordan is a very rich man’s version of the H-back to the top of the screen between the two hash marks.
View attachment 75213

Another space-you-out formation where the QB can use his legs, you can throw the screen to the back WR, or you can confuse the defense with fake-block for the screen and go. We saw a similar play call from Applewhite when he was with Alabama against LSU for a TD. This play was for the screen, but the formation and spacing allows for a lot of options.
View attachment 75214

Gash them a few times with the QB keep and the give opens up nicely. It’s imperative that the QB keep the ball in this offense more often than they kept it last year because it has a major impact on the defense when you do.
View attachment 75215

This offense wants pace. This offense wants multiple eye-candy for the defenders to be looking at (bubble action, stack sets, bunch sets, zone-reads at the same time). It’s a pretty special offense right now, quite honestly. This is the offense I hope Applewhite brings here. Add in the power-spread elements that he likes to run and this offense will put up points at Miami. Applewhite has always run a ton of plays wherever he has been, so this isn’t all a Tom Herman approach, but it’s like Applewhite’s previous pace on steroids. They’re snapping the ball on gives, bubbles, tunnel screens with 37 seconds on the play-clock. In the Miami heat that’ll be difficult on opponents if Miami can create the depth to run it every play.

This is another play design that is new from Applewhite. They have a trips bunch to the field. H-back to that side to make formation strong. FSU has to keep a force player to the boundary or Ward will just take off running to that side. You have two defenders on three receivers. FSU hustled a DL off-the-field to substitute and Houston is snapping it now.
View attachment 75216

This offense wants pace. This offense wants multiple eye-candy for the defenders to be looking at (bubble action, stack sets, bunch sets, zone-reads at the same time). It’s a pretty special offense right now, quite honestly. This is the offense I hope Applewhite brings here. Add in the power-spread elements that he likes to run and this offense will put up points at Miami. Applewhite has always run a ton of plays wherever he has been, so this isn’t all a Tom Herman approach, but it’s like Applewhite’s previous pace on steroids. They’re snapping the ball on gives, bubbles, tunnel screens with 37 seconds on the play-clock. In the Miami heat that’ll be difficult on opponents if Miami can create the depth to run it every play.

This is another play design that is new from Applewhite. They have a trips bunch to the field. H-back to that side to make formation strong. FSU has to keep a force player to the boundary or Ward will just take off running to that side. You have two defenders on three receivers. FSU hustled a DL off-the-field to substitute and Houston is snapping it now.
View attachment 75218

That makes this basically stealing to flood that side and force an open receiver underneath. You talk about scheming a guy open. The QB airmails this throw so it isn’t converted, but that’s as simple and easy a throw, read, play for a D1 QB as you will get. What you don’t see is that the middle guy, the one running right by the defender at the 1st down marker gets let go and is uncovered for a walk-in TD if the QB sees him. You can’t set an offense up any better or easier for a play than this one but it’s just missed by a QB from a clean pocket (#14 is pushed wide then cleaned up by the H-back running back there).
View attachment 75217

Definitely a new addition to this offense is the “check-with-me” concept. I’ve wanted this for years. You don’t huddle, you run simple play calls and get set at the LOS. The QB reviews the defense and then decides to run that play or look to the sideline and “check-with-me” on what to do. It’s so difficult on the defense because they have to get set quickly and show their play early and then allow the offense to adjust. How many times did the Miami offense get to the LOS, have the defense shift or show a blitz and not have any adjustments available to them on the play? Applewhite did not do this prior to Houston and I hope that’s something he brings with him to Coral Gables.

At the end of this game, Houston had run 99 plays, ran the ball 53 times, and thoroughly confused the defense of Florida State with formations, tempo, zone-reads, and space.

Conclusion

I know by now that many of you skip to the end to get the cliff notes version of things, so I’ll wrap it up here. Applewhite has been at four different schools calling plays in his career (Rice, Alabama, Texas, Houston). At Rice he implemented a new modern spread offense from a Wing-T the year prior and got the HC promoted to another job. He then left to join Nick Saban in his first year at Alabama and it was just a poor fit, despite the fact he improved their offense significantly in his year there. At Texas he replaced an OC who was promoted to a HC job and while his offense on the season did not perform as well as his predecessor, he put together one of the best game plans I have seen in years against a much more talented Oklahoma team in leading them to a huge win. At Houston he learned the Tom Herman offense and added elements of his own experience into his play calling and was fantastic.

Tom Herman left Houston after two years and so did their dynamic QB, Greg Ward Jr. Houston decided to play more of a pocket passer in Kyle Postma, despite the fact that D’Eriq King was a much better player. Kyle Allen was a big-time recruit who came to Houston as well and he was given a shot at playing time before the full-time move to King. Hiring Kendall Briles brought the offense back to a pace-and-space offense that thrived under D’Eriq King. Merging the styles of Herman and Briles would be a great style for Applewhite to employ with Miami’s personnel.

Focusing on Applewhite as an OC there are a lot of things to like. He has learned, changed, adapted his style at every stop he has made. He has taken elements of what each coach he has coached under has wanted to do and molded them into a style his own. I’ll get into some data to close things out.

The main benchmark that teams want to get to in scoring points is 30. If Miami scores 30 points a game consistently, they will win a bunch of games. Applewhite in his career has scored 30 or more points against peer competition in 34 of the 51 games he has called plays (66.7%). At Houston, they scored 30 or more points in 16 of the 20 games he called plays (80%). Yes, Briles scored 30 in 9 of the 10 games he called plays last year, but he is a legit dude as an OC and they used D’Eriq King all year for Briles.
View attachment 75219

Applewhite gets his offenses to the 30-point threshold far more often than not. That’s a great place to start. Applewhite will also run a ton of plays.
View attachment 75220

One interesting item to note with Applewhite is that at each place he called plays, the offenses improved the year after he left everywhere except Texas. I believe much of that is Applewhite having only one year and the next year with a similar scheme allowed for improvements on already good numbers, but that is admittedly a rosy viewpoint.

Positives

  • The system is QB friendly and each stop he has seen a QB blossom in his system.
  • Uses formations to confuse the defense and get easy throws for the offense.
  • At each stop Applewhite has learned, grown, shown an ability to adapt.
  • Has counters for each formation he runs and when the defense shows an obvious aggression, waits for the time to attack it with a counter off the same formation.
  • Power running game is a part of his offense at each stop.
  • Pace-and-space is modern football and the athletes in Miami are used to running this in HS.
  • Head Coaching experience will be huge for a first-time HC in Manny Diaz to bounce ideas off of.
  • 67% scoring 30-points against peer opponents is quite good. The name of the game is to score points, so while he doesn’t always put up elite Yards Per Play numbers, his ability to hit that marker on the scoreboard is quite good.


Negatives

  • While he has put up very solid Points Per Play numbers as an OC (.482 points-per-play in his time at Houston), it still falls far below the elite teams this year. Oklahoma- .714 points per play, Alabama- .672 points per play, Clemson- .617 points per play, Ohio State- .517 points per play.
  • Some poor decisions as a HC. The OC he brought in to Houston wanted to run more of a pocket-passing system despite his success with a full-spread with a running QB and his lack of success with a pocket-passing system. Brought in D’Onofrio as his DC.
I would call Major Applewhite’s offense a Tom Herman/Kendall Briles compilation that I believe will be an excellent hire. In Richt’s time calling plays, Miami ran an average of 64.5 plays per game against peer opponents. His offenses scored 30 points in a game only 29% of the time. Applewhite, for his career, runs an average of 76.2 plays per game against peers and his offenses scored 30 points in a game 66.7% of the time.

Welcome to the modern era of offense, Miami fans. This hire is going to unlock the scoreboard for this program and set this program up for wins and recruits to want to come here again. After doing extensive work on Applewhite, I am excited for what he’s going to bring here.
Click to expand...
Great write up!
 
g8rh8rMD said:
@Lance Roffers fantastic write up. I started reading it last night when posted, but just finished reading through it this afternoon. I was very interested to hear more about yards per play metrics than you reviewed in your article. As I understand it and as Manny has discussed in interviews, he seems to place a premium in yards per play given up as a metric for how he is doing as a defense. I would have presumed that he would do the same when evaluating an offensive coordinator.

There is a lot of merit to that approach, in my opinion. Pure yards per game or points per game are poor metrics for evaluating the efficiency of a coordinator. Almost by definition, an offense that runs a large amount of plays is also going to give the other team more plays/possessions than one who runs fewer plays. It doesn't help me to know that OC-1 puts up 30 points per game while OC-2 puts up 24 if I don't control for how many possessions each uses, and allows to the other team, in order to generate those points.

So, all in all, while I am excited about the hire, in part due to your detailed review, I am "eyebrow raised" at the scant mention of the YPP metric and the apparent indication in your article that your findings on that metric as regards to Applewhite are not especially positive.

I would bet that one of the stronger indicators/correlation in all of college football as to a team's win-loss record (along with turnover differential) will be the differential between OYPP (offensive yards per play) and DYPPA (defensive yards per play allowed). I'd bet Manny would see the world the same way. I hope that he has made the best hire possible towards achieving that end.

Curious if you have any further thoughts on the above? Thanks again.
Click to expand...

Hey, thanks for the kinds words. Excellent question on Yards Per Play, why my focus was more on Points Per Play when I focused more on Yards Per Play in the DC thread etc. Please allow me to share my reasoning a little further:

1. Honestly, I try to do a lot of research into the things I write about and Points Per Play is becoming a better metric for evaluating offenses. It measures explosiveness and ability to actually score TD's rather than an ability to move the ball between the 20's. For instance, last year, Miami had a pretty good Yards Per Play metric. They also were pretty poor in Points Per Play. I spent time on the topic and calculated the data:
1.webp


So why is Yards Per Play a better metric for defense than offense? My research indicates it ties heavily with 3rd downs. The play caller (OC) has a greater impact on keeping drives alive on that down than the DC does in preventing 1st downs. Yards Per Play is a pretty good proxy for Points Per Play, but the data suggests the way I took the study as the more prevalent factor.

*Note* These figures are in relation to their peers, so no FCS games, P5 vs. only other P5 teams and G5 teams vs. only other G5 teams etc.

2. You indicated that the highest correlation is probably with Yards Per Play, but that is not correct in my research. I didn't run a linear regression, so these figures are not correlation marks, but rather percentage of winning games.
  • Teams who won the Points Per Play metric win the game 86% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Success Rate metric win the game 83% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Turnover battle win the game 73% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Field Position battle win the game 72% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Yards Per Play metric win the game 68% of the time.
*Note* In the interest of intellectual honesty I must point out that it's fairly intuitive that Points Per Play would most highly correlate with winning games because it is the only metric that uses the only item that judges wins/losses (Points).

3. The reason I included a film review with the data is partly to help understand the amount of times the OC put players in position to succeed and they did not execute a play that should be fairly easy for a DI player. Hopefully I presented that information in a fair and unbiased way.

You bring good points- and I did try to point out that Applewhite did not fare especially great in Yards Per Play- but hopefully this sheds a little more light into why I took the OC the direction I did and the research put in. When you're writing an article designed for a specific audience you are looking to present information in an easily digestible way without going too heavily into the "why." Imagine the length of the post if I were to add this much detail to the methodology before I even got into the review. I get a lot of feedback about "Too Long;Didn't Read" already as it is.

PS- Forgot a question- The reason 30 points per game is important is the percentage of a team winning while scoring 30 points a game goes up exponentially, it's a nice round number, and it's the number that most coaches state they want to average. That part wasn't mean to be super scientific and I didn't point that out, so that is my bad.
 
Sorry if i missed the explanation, but it looks like there's still a gap between Applewhite's offenses and the top tier of CF. What do you chalk that up to? Better athletes? Better execution?
 
Advertisement
dukemv said:
Sorry if i missed the explanation, but it looks like there's still a gap between Applewhite's offenses and the top tier of CF. What do you chalk that up to? Better athletes? Better execution?
Click to expand...

Better everything. It's not like hes more experienced or more Innovative than Anyone but hes got a decent(Not Out Of This World) resume. He might do so good he gets bought out of his contract by someone. If he does bad it'll most likely be from not being able to Gel or get his Vision Out, Kind of like Adam Gase. Some people are Strictly Successful In Certain Situations. He has alot of people who Credit Everyone Else for the good and Box him in on the Bad. We'll see, You Cant Consistently run a good Offense without a GOOD Offensive line. Pay the Coach
 
Lance Roffers said:
Hey, thanks for the kinds words. Excellent question on Yards Per Play, why my focus was more on Points Per Play when I focused more on Yards Per Play in the DC thread etc. Please allow me to share my reasoning a little further:

1. Honestly, I try to do a lot of research into the things I write about and Points Per Play is becoming a better metric for evaluating offenses. It measures explosiveness and ability to actually score TD's rather than an ability to move the ball between the 20's. For instance, last year, Miami had a pretty good Yards Per Play metric. They also were pretty poor in Points Per Play. I spent time on the topic and calculated the data:
View attachment 75307

So why is Yards Per Play a better metric for defense than offense? My research indicates it ties heavily with 3rd downs. The play caller (OC) has a greater impact on keeping drives alive on that down than the DC does in preventing 1st downs. Yards Per Play is a pretty good proxy for Points Per Play, but the data suggests the way I took the study as the more prevalent factor.

*Note* These figures are in relation to their peers, so no FCS games, P5 vs. only other P5 teams and G5 teams vs. only other G5 teams etc.

2. You indicated that the highest correlation is probably with Yards Per Play, but that is not correct in my research. I didn't run a linear regression, so these figures are not correlation marks, but rather percentage of winning games.
  • Teams who won the Points Per Play metric win the game 86% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Success Rate metric win the game 83% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Turnover battle win the game 73% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Field Position battle win the game 72% of the time.
  • Teams who won the Yards Per Play metric win the game 68% of the time.
*Note* In the interest of intellectual honesty I must point out that it's fairly intuitive that Points Per Play would most highly correlate with winning games because it is the only metric that uses the only item that judges wins/losses (Points).

3. The reason I included a film review with the data is partly to help understand the amount of times the OC put players in position to succeed and they did not execute a play that should be fairly easy for a DI player. Hopefully I presented that information in a fair and unbiased way.

You bring good points- and I did try to point out that Applewhite did not fare especially great in Yards Per Play- but hopefully this sheds a little more light into why I took the OC the direction I did and the research put in. When you're writing an article designed for a specific audience you are looking to present information in an easily digestible way without going too heavily into the "why." Imagine the length of the post if I were to add this much detail to the methodology before I even got into the review. I get a lot of feedback about "Too Long;Didn't Read" already as it is.

PS- Forgot a question- The reason 30 points per game is important is the percentage of a team winning while scoring 30 points a game goes up exponentially, it's a nice round number, and it's the number that most coaches state they want to average. That part wasn't mean to be super scientific and I didn't point that out, so that is my bad.
Click to expand...

****. Thank you, sir. Really appreciate the explanation and education.

One question left: Texas was the only job where Applewhite had a lower PPP metric than the prior OC. Why do you think that was?

Again, thanks. Just amazing stuff.
 
g8rh8rMD said:
****. Thank you, sir. Really appreciate the explanation and education.

One question left: Texas was the only job where Applewhite had a lower PPP metric than the prior OC. Why do you think that was?

Again, thanks. Just amazing stuff.
Click to expand...

Keep in mind he was Co-OC but didn’t call plays. The guy calling plays got promoted to a HC job, so he obviously was well-thought of.

It’s difficult for me to parse how much credit to give to Applewhite for the prior OC success, but given he was a Co-OC I would venture to say he at least deserves SOME credit for the success in game planning and communication of that plan within the box.

Since I didn’t know much to give/not give I simply treated the previous play caller as the OC and attributed it all to him as I felt it was the most straightforward way.
 
Advertisement
Back
Top