TIME OF POSSESSION

PS: Here are some more of Homer Smith's "misconceptions that I find interesting, & believe in. I know some of these are controversial, & I do not wish to debate ANY of them - I merely find them VERY thought-ptrovoking::

Misconceptions:

by Homer Smith March 24, 2002

On offense "you œtake what they give you".

If you do this, defenses can pretend to give you something and then pounce on the anticipated play; they can show an open door and then slam it shut with a stunt.

What puts a defender at his best is sensing from a tendency that something is coming and saying to himself, œI think I know and, if I am right, I will œnail it. Letting a defender do this is the result of poor offensive design and poor play calling.

No, you don't take what they give you; rather, you give them what you want them to take, you mix plays, you play furiously, you scare every defender with a threat into his area. You play the music; the defense does the dancing.



Misconceptions:

by Homer Smith July 3, 2002

No-huddle offense gets you ready for clock offense.

Only to a certain extent.

Clock offense requires that you snap a ball as soon as it is ready for play about 20 seconds after the previous snap. Almost all no-huddle teams seem to snap at least five seconds after the œready. Almost all are grooved and have trouble playing faster than 25 seconds per play.

Also, no-huddle offense does nothing to prepare you for the special plays that you need, like

a pass that will be complete and out-of-bounds or incomplete,

a pass that will be complete for a firstdown or incomplete,

a pass that will be complete for a TD or incomplete,

a run that will get to the boundary line where a tackle will put the ball out-of-bounds.

Certainly, it does nothing to prepare anyone for decisions on next-to-the-last plays and making sure that the half or the game does not end without the ball getting into the endzone.




Misconceptions:

by Homer Smith June 27, 2002

The ever-more popular zone blitz gives QBs problems that they had not seen before.

Not really. The blitz sends an unblocked rusher screaming at the QB while a defensive lineman backs out of a fake rush, leaves an offensive blocker standing in air with nothing to do, and tries to get into the lane of the sight-adjusted pass.

For years, on blitzes, LBs have been drawing blocks and backing out. MLBs, especially, have nullified centers and then backed out.

Granted, a defensive lineman drawing a down-block by an offensive tackle and then backing out can do more to interrupt a slant pass than a MLB can.

Regardless, the problem of the zone blitz has yet to be solved.


THERE ARE MANY OTHERS - MOST I HAVE FOUND TO BE TRUE IN MY COACHING. I THOUGHT THESE WERE INTERESTING.

I agree.

I did some research on last year's games. It is quite interesting to see what stats lead to wins and which ones did not!!

There was no correlation between winning TOP and winning the game. In one game we had the edge 28 min to 19 min. We LOST that one 42-7. We had 256 yards rushing in that game, too.

We had 252 and 256 rushing yards in 2 games and lost them both 42-7 and 30-7. So there was no correlation between having the "100 yd rusher" and winning the game.

In one game, we beat the best team (they were 9-1 on the year) in our league, 20-17. We had 12 possessions: punted 7 times, 2 interceptions, 1 fumble, and only 187 yds of offense. You would think they should have beaten us with those numbers, but didnt.

You just never know. Every game takes on it's own unique personality!