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Are we running a West Coast offense this year?


ACor58

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Have the Buffalo Bills adapted to their new West Coast offense?

This system, installed by new offensive coordinator Turk Schonert, should be beneficial for QB Trent Edwards, who needs to get his completion percentage above the 60 percent mark. Yes, he finished at 56.1 percent last year, but was also guilty of having games in the 30 percent range. Edwards lacks big-time arm strength, but he is a cerebral quarterback who makes good and quick decisions. This is a system that really benefits the Bills' personnel, from Edwards to WR Lee Evans, who can make plays with the ball in his hands, to rookie WR James Hardy, who is a big target and can work the middle of the field, to RB Marshawn Lynch, who will see more seven-man fronts from three-receiver sets. Along with a maturing defense, the ability for Edwards to run this new system will go a long way toward determining the Bills' playoff hopes.

 

 

http://insider.espn.go.com/nfl/insider/col...6lid%3dtab3pos1

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That term West Coast offense gets thrown around so much these days that I am not sure that many of these pundits even know what a TRUE West Coast Offense is. Considering the plan of having a rhythm passing game where Trent is asked to make quick decisions, get the ball out of his hand quickly on 3 and 5 step drops -- and to have a heavy emphasis on the SHORT passing attack, I can see where the West Coast Offense conversation is coming from.

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That term West Coast offense gets thrown around so much these days that I am not sure that many of these pundits even know what a TRUE West Coast Offense is. Considering the plan of having a rhythm passing game where Trent is asked to make quick decisions, get the ball out of his hand quickly on 3 and 5 step drops -- and to have a heavy emphasis on the SHORT passing attack, I can see where the West Coast Offense conversation is coming from.

 

Actually, it's the 'Rest Most' Offense..

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The biggest thing about the offense Turk is bringing is that it will have two of the key ingredients of the Walsh West Coast philosophy - tying the plays to the steps of the QB and creating "triangles" on the field in order to give the QB three options of differing depths that are available to him.

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If I were Schonert I would implement the simplest thing that this team is suited for and the WCO isn't it. We more or less proved that last year.

 

Fairchild was supposedly going to try some variant of the WCO too, what the Rams ran, and we all know how that ended. That's pretty much what we had last year in one form or another. Lots of 3 and 5 step drops and quick passes to receivers. That pretty much defines the WCO. Oddly, having said that, you need to be able to do 7-step drops too in a WCO, and often simply for shorter passes too, but our pass protection broke down often on those last year. Either way, you need a deep component to the WCO or it won't work well either. Some teams run the WCO off of a 7-step drop often as well.

 

Neither Hardy nor Johnson are known for their crisp route running, but if you're going to run a WCO you absolutely need that because the passes are thrown with the notion that a WR will be in a certain spot. It's not necessarily a timing pattern, but it is sort of. So that doesn't really seem like a match. Hardy needs to be used 10 yards downfield either in front of the DBs or matched up with a LB where his size can best be used to shield and "out physical" the defense. That can be in any system really, but since Hardy's about the biggest difference that this team has we should seek to use him most effectively, and in a system where route running is key, that's not his strength.

 

The Bills should stick with a standard pro set until they prove that they have the talent to man up across the board. I'll be happy if our linemen can just prove that they can move the pile when necessary. We don't have a receiving FB on the team and Schouman isn't good as a blocker so count him out. So if this team were smart, they would use a two RB set with a blocking FB, and try to just play ball control with Lynch being the focal point of the offense taking the heat off of Edwards who is going to struggle again. We could still use 3 WRs with 5 linemen, but eventually the line will have to be able to block without all kinds of help.

 

We're also going to have to have a bunch of plays where we don't always get rid of the ball in three seconds. We need some ball movement and an ability to sustain drives this year.

 

It all still comes down to talent yet many talk as if somehow "the system" as if it's magical, will overcome a host of talent related issues. Obviously that's not true.

 

You can tweak things here and there in any system, but if your talent just isn't there it's unlikely that it will line up favorably for you across the board regardless of which one you use.

 

I'm starting to get the feeling that Schonert really doesn't know WTF he's doing.

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Krazykat,

 

I disagree with you completely on that post. Here is why:

 

1 - The offense we ran last year (and still run from a terminology and phrase standpoint) is not the Walsh West Coast, but the Zampese/Coryell style of West Coast offense. If you would like a primer on the differences and history of the name/misnaming look here - http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/inside_ga...nside_football/

 

2 - Just because we're still using some of the previous terminology, we can still add west coast principles to it. For example, the triangles. For that, read http://www.kffl.com/article/73501/488

 

"The West Coast offense uses triangle passing: The triangles refer to three imaginary sectors of the field, beyond the line of scrimmage, and the offense decides which area to attack. This includes a strong side (same side as tight end), weak side (side away from tight end) and middle. The strong and weak sides can switch before the ball is snapped, as an audible or motion often shifts them."

 

 

See the following for more on that - http://espn.go.com/nfl/s/westcoast/history.html

 

3 - By standard pro set, what do you mean? Two backs with three wides? That's a solid formation, but what plays are you going to run out of that? What system is going to determine who does what?

 

4 - Hardy and Johnson won't need anything more than a traditional NFL caliber route running lesson to learn how to run the WCO routes. Look at TO, he's by far one of the best modern WCO receivers because he can run the slants and digs over the middle better than anyone. Evans can be the Rice to Hardy's Taylor.

 

5 - The Bengals ran a WCO flavored no huddle (which we later stole parts of for the K-Gun) and it worked because it used everything good in both offenses: timing and deep passing. Just because we'll use a ton of 3-5 step passes, does not mean the 7 and Shotgun 5's are out - in fact one would assume they'd become more effective.

 

Now, your myopic history aside, I hope you can take from this a few things:

 

-Turk Schonert, despite however you may feel about it, knows more about running and implementing an NFL offense unlike anyone else here, as he's actually been a QB in an NFL system.

 

-Constantly posting to rain on the collective parades of people here should have gotten old to you by now.

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-Turk Schonert, despite however you may feel about it, knows more about running and implementing an NFL offense unlike anyone else here, as he's actually been a QB in an NFL system.

 

This is a fallacy. Being an ex-player does not mean he knows how to implement an offense.

Further, even if he does know how do it "in theory", he still has to actually do it.

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If I were Schonert I would implement the simplest thing that this team is suited for and the WCO isn't it. We more or less proved that last year.

 

Fairchild was supposedly going to try some variant of the WCO too, what the Rams ran, and we all know how that ended. That's pretty much what we had last year in one form or another. Lots of 3 and 5 step drops and quick passes to receivers. That pretty much defines the WCO. Oddly, having said that, you need to be able to do 7-step drops too in a WCO, and often simply for shorter passes too, but our pass protection broke down often on those last year. Either way, you need a deep component to the WCO or it won't work well either. Some teams run the WCO off of a 7-step drop often as well.

 

Neither Hardy nor Johnson are known for their crisp route running, but if you're going to run a WCO you absolutely need that because the passes are thrown with the notion that a WR will be in a certain spot. It's not necessarily a timing pattern, but it is sort of. So that doesn't really seem like a match. Hardy needs to be used 10 yards downfield either in front of the DBs or matched up with a LB where his size can best be used to shield and "out physical" the defense. That can be in any system really, but since Hardy's about the biggest difference that this team has we should seek to use him most effectively, and in a system where route running is key, that's not his strength.

 

The Bills should stick with a standard pro set until they prove that they have the talent to man up across the board. I'll be happy if our linemen can just prove that they can move the pile when necessary. We don't have a receiving FB on the team and Schouman isn't good as a blocker so count him out. So if this team were smart, they would use a two RB set with a blocking FB, and try to just play ball control with Lynch being the focal point of the offense taking the heat off of Edwards who is going to struggle again. We could still use 3 WRs with 5 linemen, but eventually the line will have to be able to block without all kinds of help.

 

We're also going to have to have a bunch of plays where we don't always get rid of the ball in three seconds. We need some ball movement and an ability to sustain drives this year.

 

It all still comes down to talent yet many talk as if somehow "the system" as if it's magical, will overcome a host of talent related issues. Obviously that's not true.

 

You can tweak things here and there in any system, but if your talent just isn't there it's unlikely that it will line up favorably for you across the board regardless of which one you use.

 

I'm starting to get the feeling that Schonert really doesn't know WTF he's doing.

 

 

Faitchild was a Martz system guy and they are run-and-shoot from the Air Coryell system. If you don't know it look it up. These systems are similar to Joe Gibbs, Al Saunders, and Jerry Glanville. The systems are not similar at all to the west coast.

 

I think we will have a lot of west coast elements--I just hope we are not predictable.

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This is a fallacy. Being an ex-player does not mean he knows how to implement an offense.

Further, even if he does know how do it "in theory", he still has to actually do it.

 

Being an ex player that has been a coach for almost a decade might tho.

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Krazykat,

 

I disagree with you completely on that post. Here is why:

 

1 - The offense we ran last year (and still run from a terminology and phrase standpoint) is not the Walsh West Coast, but the Zampese/Coryell style of West Coast offense. If you would like a primer on the differences and history of the name/misnaming look here - http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/inside_ga...nside_football/

 

2 - Just because we're still using some of the previous terminology, we can still add west coast principles to it. For example, the triangles. For that, read http://www.kffl.com/article/73501/488

 

"The West Coast offense uses triangle passing: The triangles refer to three imaginary sectors of the field, beyond the line of scrimmage, and the offense decides which area to attack. This includes a strong side (same side as tight end), weak side (side away from tight end) and middle. The strong and weak sides can switch before the ball is snapped, as an audible or motion often shifts them."

 

 

See the following for more on that - http://espn.go.com/nfl/s/westcoast/history.html

 

3 - By standard pro set, what do you mean? Two backs with three wides? That's a solid formation, but what plays are you going to run out of that? What system is going to determine who does what?

 

4 - Hardy and Johnson won't need anything more than a traditional NFL caliber route running lesson to learn how to run the WCO routes. Look at TO, he's by far one of the best modern WCO receivers because he can run the slants and digs over the middle better than anyone. Evans can be the Rice to Hardy's Taylor.

 

5 - The Bengals ran a WCO flavored no huddle (which we later stole parts of for the K-Gun) and it worked because it used everything good in both offenses: timing and deep passing. Just because we'll use a ton of 3-5 step passes, does not mean the 7 and Shotgun 5's are out - in fact one would assume they'd become more effective.

 

Now, your myopic history aside, I hope you can take from this a few things:

 

-Turk Schonert, despite however you may feel about it, knows more about running and implementing an NFL offense unlike anyone else here, as he's actually been a QB in an NFL system.

 

-Constantly posting to rain on the collective parades of people here should have gotten old to you by now.

 

 

I agree with most of this and based on what the coaches say publically about Trent's Trengths, it could be a good fit. My understanding is that the progression of reads in the WCO is short first, then longer. Guys like Favre, Montana and Steve Young were very successful in this style of offense because they could get to the later progressions (longer throws) with some regularity and make big plays meaning the defense could not always key on the short stuff for risk of being burned long (which helped the shorter part of the game). If this is how it works, then Trent (and the entire offense) must develop some capability to hit the longer plays in order to be more productive. Mastering only the short quick reads will allow the defense to key short which also hurts the running game. Those are the results we saw last year often with Trent at QB. The defense knew he'd keep it short, adjusted to that. The defense could focus on a smaller area of the field.

 

As far as Turk is concerned. He has to prove that he can effectively design and implement an offense that can score a lot more than last year.

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Here is how we will be similar to/ and different from WCO:

 

(1) WCO is "Use the pass to set up the run". We will use the 2-back, 3-receiver set and spread the defense out to get the matchups we want. I think we'll be more unpredictable than last year in that we'll throw on any down or distance during the game, using Lynch as well as Royal and the WR's.

 

(2) WCO passing game attacks the defense in the short-to-medium range. Last year, the Bills had more long passes completed than most teams, so look for some more of that. We'll maximize individual talents here: Evans' downfield abiliity, Reed's YAC ability, Parrish's quickness, and Hardy's ability to use his body and height.

 

(3) WCO uses all of the players on the field (TE, WR, RB) able to catch the football and make plays. This will be true with our offense. Last year, Lynch was horribly under-used in receiving, as was the TE position on check-down passes.

 

(4) WCO depends on smart play. Timing is critical. Watch for more timing plays from the Bills along the sideline, particularly to the WR's.

 

(5) Triangle passing and Pre-Snap Reads: Finally, Trent is going to have much more say about which area to attack and will audible a great deal to get out of a given play that doesn't take advantage or mismatches for the offense to capitalize on. The offense can also be run out of any formation, which will give opponents headaches as well.

 

(6) WCO has to be able to run the football. I think this will mean more zone blocking for the OL, and using Lynch as the centerpiece of the offense. Watch for Jackson to come in on occasion and do the same thing.

 

(7) WCO necessitates that the QB be smart and quick with his reads. Trent has the touch and can develop the accuracy (into the 65% range), and this offense can compensate for his lack of mobility

 

(8) WCO depends on WR's (and RB, TE's ) to make plays after the catch. The YAC yardage of Reed and Evans (and hopefully Hardy, Johnson and Parrish) is almost there already, and having more weapons will only help this year. Trent will make more check-down throws to Royal (and perhaps Schouman or Fine) this year.

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(6) WCO has to be able to run the football. I think this will mean more zone blocking for the OL, and using Lynch as the centerpiece of the offense. Watch for Jackson to come in on occasion and do the same thing.

 

Running the football.

 

This is where the offense falls apart.

 

I don 't think our OL is capable of mastering zone blocking.

 

Waay too many times last year, linemen did not sustain blocks and move to the next level. Toomany times they wewre standing around to see who to block and to see where Lynch went. (probably the wrong hole) There may have been issues with McNally in implementing his scheme. Maybe our OL may not be up to the mental challenge of anything other than drive blocking the guy in front of them.

 

We shall see - but a power running mentality is a necessity to making the offense be effective.

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The biggest thing about the offense Turk is bringing is that it will have two of the key ingredients of the Walsh West Coast philosophy - tying the plays to the steps of the QB and creating "triangles" on the field in order to give the QB three options of differing depths that are available to him.

 

 

Thats the first time I recall anybody on this board actually stating that correctly.

 

I saw an interview with Walsh where he layed it out just like that and even gave a little demo

of the QB setting up and the proceeding to shift through the different triangles or quadrants.

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Running the football.

 

This is where the offense falls apart.

 

I don 't think our OL is capable of mastering zone blocking.

 

Waay too many times last year, linemen did not sustain blocks and move to the next level. Toomany times they wewre standing around to see who to block and to see where Lynch went. (probably the wrong hole) There may have been issues with McNally in implementing his scheme. Maybe our OL may not be up to the mental challenge of anything other than drive blocking the guy in front of them.

 

We shall see - but a power running mentality is a necessity to making the offense be effective.

 

Agree that running is essential. When the other team knows you have a rookie QB that will only throw short and that the offense wants to run the ball first, the defense simply plays closer to the line of scrimmage, doesn't respect the long play and makes it tough to run. Watch the Colts. You won't see defenses lined up in a "we dare you to pass the ball" stance. Good teams defend a team like the Colts very differently than teams like the Bills. The Bills should expect the same lack of respect from opposing defenses this year until they prove otherwise.

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Krazykat,

 

I disagree with you completely on that post. Here is why:

 

1 - The offense we ran last year (and still run from a terminology and phrase standpoint) is not the Walsh West Coast, but the Zampese/Coryell style of West Coast offense. If you would like a primer on the differences and history of the name/misnaming look here - http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/inside_ga...nside_football/

 

2 - Just because we're still using some of the previous terminology, we can still add west coast principles to it. For example, the triangles. For that, read http://www.kffl.com/article/73501/488

 

"The West Coast offense uses triangle passing: The triangles refer to three imaginary sectors of the field, beyond the line of scrimmage, and the offense decides which area to attack. This includes a strong side (same side as tight end), weak side (side away from tight end) and middle. The strong and weak sides can switch before the ball is snapped, as an audible or motion often shifts them."

 

 

See the following for more on that - http://espn.go.com/nfl/s/westcoast/history.html

 

3 - By standard pro set, what do you mean? Two backs with three wides? That's a solid formation, but what plays are you going to run out of that? What system is going to determine who does what?

 

4 - Hardy and Johnson won't need anything more than a traditional NFL caliber route running lesson to learn how to run the WCO routes. Look at TO, he's by far one of the best modern WCO receivers because he can run the slants and digs over the middle better than anyone. Evans can be the Rice to Hardy's Taylor.

 

5 - The Bengals ran a WCO flavored no huddle (which we later stole parts of for the K-Gun) and it worked because it used everything good in both offenses: timing and deep passing. Just because we'll use a ton of 3-5 step passes, does not mean the 7 and Shotgun 5's are out - in fact one would assume they'd become more effective.

 

Now, your myopic history aside, I hope you can take from this a few things:

 

-Turk Schonert, despite however you may feel about it, knows more about running and implementing an NFL offense unlike anyone else here, as he's actually been a QB in an NFL system.

 

-Constantly posting to rain on the collective parades of people here should have gotten old to you by now.

As to 1/2, you're discussing nuances. We can beat that for months and that's what coaches do behind the scenes. The thing is that at the end of the day you must execute. Even with a wrong scheme if you execute on the field, you won't have a dead last unit. Our execution, other than in little micro analyses, was pathetic.

 

3. A standard pro set is the 2 WR, 1 TE, TB/FB set, yes. Not 3 WRs. IMO this team isn't suited to anything that requires mano-a-mano blocking and the closer we get to a WCO the more that will be required. We have a very good grind it out between the Ts type of runner with good vision to pick the holes. So let's use that. Let's use Lynch from the backfield on other plays too as an outlet. If they actually quit just talking about using a TE and begin employing one and used Royal as a receiver more, then we would probably get more from the offense than we will any other way this year. Hardy could then be worked in in a rotation and used in 3 WR sets.

 

As it is, all this talk of a WCO or spread offense, or anyone of dozens of variations of it is moot IMO. Our linemen after Peters are not great at singular blocking. Zone blocking may help that, but it's not the entire solution. We also haven't been good at picking up the blitz and IMO we're gonna see that and often until we prove that we can. So to me and as I see it, we're gonna need at least 6 blockers in on most plays. That limits our options otherwise. But we have Lynch, a strong inside runner and good receiver out of the backfield, so why not use him that way.

 

And as I see it, that is what Schonert is trying to do. I also don't know, as someone asked, why anyone thinks we're going with a WCO this year. It makes little sense and failed, in one form or another, last year. In spades too. You can talk about the triangles and variations of it all you want to, the basic tools are not here to have it succeed to any significant extent. They aren't.

 

4. Who knows what's gonna change in the WRs since college. I downplay what they did, positive or negative until I see them on the field in the NFL. Far too many top rated WRs never do jack. So we will see. Still, the odds of us talking about how Hardy developed into a fine #1 in three seasons, or even a #2 are less than they are that we're talking about another bust draft pick.

 

5. I agree with you here and already stated as much in another post. Don't remember which thread it was in. There's a common misperception that the WCO is all 3/5 step drops when teams can run them almost exclusively on 7SDs if they want to. But to my credit then, we're gonna need some blocking the likes of which we haven't gotten in years here in Buffalo including last year. It's nice to say "hey, this is the OL's second year as a unit, so they should really gel and play like studs," but we both know that would be foolish.

 

-Turk Schonert, despite however you may feel about it, knows more about running and implementing an NFL offense unlike anyone else here, as he's actually been a QB in an NFL system.

 

Well, unfortunately he doesn't have to know more than anyone here. He needs to be able to outstrategize the Defenseive Coordinators and Head Coaches of the 13 teams on the schedule this year, right. So talk about myopic, let me ask you, can you make the same statement inserting "the Defenseive Coordinators and Head Coaches of the 13 teams on the schedule this year" in place of "anyone else here" with equal confidence? If so, then what is your basis for that?

 

-Constantly posting to rain on the collective parades of people here should have gotten old to you by now.

 

It's a public message board for starters. Secondly my goal is not to rain on anyone's parade. And by that, what are you suggesting, that you and others here would rather just have your beliefs that we're going to the Super Bowl, and if not that, then why not, over actually trying to see what may really happen this year and look at the realities, not the fantasies, of our team's play last year? Is that it to you, as long as everyone is happy everyone else should go away?

 

Then why is everyone bitching up a storm when the predictable happens every year? I mean if it's all about just being happy, then why the griping, pissing and moaning, and bitching in week 12 when things fall apart annually?

 

And you know what gets to me, is all these people such as yourself telling people such as myself to go away and how wrong we are, when at the end of the season we will once again be more correct than you are, and you are the ones leading the B word sessions here. It gets really old watching people support something strenuously against better judgement, then hearing the whine about it after they are completely wrong. Wouldn't you say that that would be at least equally annoying!

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Running the football.

 

This is where the offense falls apart.

 

I don 't think our OL is capable of mastering zone blocking.

 

Waay too many times last year, linemen did not sustain blocks and move to the next level. Toomany times they wewre standing around to see who to block and to see where Lynch went. (probably the wrong hole) There may have been issues with McNally in implementing his scheme. Maybe our OL may not be up to the mental challenge of anything other than drive blocking the guy in front of them.

 

We shall see - but a power running mentality is a necessity to making the offense be effective.

I couldn't agree more obie. (sanity check)

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Faitchild was a Martz system guy and they are run-and-shoot from the Air Coryell system. If you don't know it look it up. These systems are similar to Joe Gibbs, Al Saunders, and Jerry Glanville. The systems are not similar at all to the west coast.

 

I think we will have a lot of west coast elements--I just hope we are not predictable.

Sorry, but we didn't run what they ran/run in St. Louis under Martz last year. If anything we ran something closer to a WCO.

 

The Rams offense under Martz was more of a run-and-shoot. But, it's entirely predicated on short passes, not the more mid-range passes that say the run-and-shoot of Warren Moon's day was predicated upon. Also, the Rams style of offense utilizes the RBs for rushing more than a typical RnS does.

 

So why did Fairchild not run that here then? Any guesses?

 

Martz did his own thing in St. Louis which was something of a hybrid of the RnS and WCO. If anything it got away from the RnS aspect of it once Fairchild took over. You will also note a corresponding dip in offensive production which I warned about when Fairchild was being considered for the job. The reason, at least partially, why they got away from it no doubt had to do with their secondary receivers getting stripped in free agency.

 

One thing you'll note about the Rams offense if you go back to when they were much better, is that Bulger/Warner often threw balls short before the receivers were even in the spot or even had their eyes fully on the ball. It revolved around a system of synchronicity that few teams have the talent to employ for one reason or another.

 

Here's a very good link to an article very briefly summing up the differences between the RnS and the WCO.

 

http://stl.scout.com/a.z?s=124&p=2&c=768773

 

Fairchild upon arriving here, seemed to try to use a WCO more with Losman, but then switched things up for Edwards when he got in there but for the life of me I can't say what he was doing since it didn't work for starters, and secondly hardly produced anything to offer up any significant trends or patterns. It honestly seemed as if the goal was to minimize sacks as if that was the end goal. Because it was tremendously limited from the value of producing much of anything to the extent that it produced a mere TD/game while Edwards was under center. It doesn't take an NFL statistician to realize that any team whose offense can't score more than 17 or 18 TDs/season really sucks.

 

So anyone stating what Fairchild was doing precisely this past season is either taking a massive stab at it or is FoS. All we know is what they say, but given their/his credibility now, I"d say that's not even worth the air that it came out of his mouth on.

 

So to get back to your point, Fairchild's offenses in St. Louis were distinctly different than the ones that Martz had there. We can argue whether it was he that made the change or Martz himself realizing that he no longer had the depth of talent to make it work, or whatever, but the two systems were different. They were also very differently productive with Fairchild's systems in St. Louis underperforming Martz's big time.

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Thats the first time I recall anybody on this board actually stating that correctly.

 

I saw an interview with Walsh where he layed it out just like that and even gave a little demo

of the QB setting up and the proceeding to shift through the different triangles or quadrants.

I've been a big fan of both West Coast Offenses and even got to add a little to our QB while coaching at a local HS. I've also had a ton of conversations with my alma mater's OC Matt Cavanaugh, who has been awesome at breaking down the heart of the WCO.

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