In college and in the NFL, offenses continue to operate on a pass-happy basis. With the amount of power running teams dwindling, the spread offense has become a go-to option for coaches at all levels. Highland Park (Texas) High School Head Football Coach Randy Allen, who groomed Detroit Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford, delved into the intricacies of the spread at the 2010 NFL/USA Football Youth Football Summit in Canton, Ohio. Before giving his speech, Allen spoke with USA Football about the spread offense, and afterward, College Football Hall of Famer Chuck Klausing and former NFL coach and USA Football Coaching Expert Tom Bass took a few minutes to share their thoughts on the spread offense.
What will you focus on in your speech to youth and high school coaches?
Allen: I'm talking about how to train the quarterback and receiver in the spread offense, and since Matthew Stafford was the number one draft pick a year ago, I thought they might be interested in seeing some video of him doing some drills in high school and how we trained him.
Can you still run the ball physically in the spread?
Allen: Well you can, but you have to base everything on reacting to what the defense gives you. The reason you have to have balance in the spread is because they can put more people in the box than you can block, and you've got to be good enough to beat somebody throwing it if they do that. If they drop people and leave four in the box, you've got to be good enough to beat them running, so you've got to have a quarterback who can throw, but if he can run, it really helps your offense.
Klausing: I think you've got to be able to both run and pass. If you're efficient running, it'll set up passing. If you're efficient passing, you're going to set up the running offense.
Bass: What allows you to run the ball is how the defense lines itself. If they want to go out and double cover outside receivers a lot and widen the field, then there are running lanes you can get through, but you've lost that lead blocker, which really helps you run the football
Can you still run the spread if your quarterback doesn't throw the deep ball well?
Allen: What we say is we want a quarterback who can run as opposed to a running back that can throw. If we can't beat you throwing the football, we're probably in the wrong offense because people can stop the run in the spread if they decide to do that, so you've got to be able to beat people throwing the ball.
Klausing: It's dependent on their offensive linemen protecting the passer, and if you haven't taught good techniques, you're in trouble. You have to have receivers that can run good patterns and catch the ball and run after the catch, and you need a quarterback who can read the coverage and see who's open and throw it to them.
Bass: I would say not very well. I think that he's got to be able to throw the ball down the field or they're just going to crowd up and take the medium and short routes away.
Are there any advantages to having smaller players in the spread?
Allen: Only at the skill positions. You can isolate a smaller player in space who's very fast or quick, and he can get a mismatch on a linebacker, and so that's a big advantage. As far as pass protection, our linemen are usually pretty big, and it just helps you because you widen the front so that the edge rusher is the one you worry about. The smaller your linemen, you reduce the amount of distance the edge rusher has to get to the quarterback. So you'll see a lot of spread teams who have huge linemen, and the reason for that is they're trying to increase the width so that edge rusher has further to rush to get to the quarterback.
Bass: No, I don't think there's an advantage, but I think it allows smaller players to play those positions, especially the inside slot positions because there's a lot of stuff coming across the middle, quick movement, in-and-out type of patterns. It affords the smaller player an opportunity to get on the field and make an impact on the outcome of the game.
What is the biggest advantage in running the spread?
Allen: I think the biggest advantage is stretching the defense. I'm going to give you several advantages, but probably number one is your ability to stretch the defense horizontally and vertically. I think the next thing about the spread is that you get speed in space, which is what I was talking about. If you have a really good skill player, you get him in space where he can make plays. We feel like the defense has to tip its hand in the spread. We [Highland Park] are a shotgun, no-huddle team, so we're an up-tempo team, and it forces the defense to get lined up. By being able to define the defense and force them to show us what they're doing, we think that's an advantage in play calling. And then you've got to have answers, and that's what we were talking about with balance. You've got to have answers for the blitz, you've got to have answers for man coverage, you've got to have answers if they want to drop everybody and force you to run the football. You have to have balance to be good in the spread. And then I think it's easier for the quarterback to read the defense in the spread and it's harder to blitz him because he's further away from the line of scrimmage.
Bass: I think it's exciting; it's exciting for the fans. It's causing defenses to make adjustments. It'll be in vogue until the defenses catch up with it. That's the way football runs - somebody does something on offense, the defense stops it, and then somebody comes up with something else.
What is the biggest disadvantage?
Allen: The closer you get to the goal line and the less space you have to operate in, the tougher it gets to move the football. Our answer in short yardage has been a two-back, three-wide receiver set, and we don't attach a tight end. So what happens in short yardage/goal line is that that edge is faking blitz or they bring an end down very tight off the tackle's tail, and they make it very difficult to run off tackle. So I think short yardage/goal line is where the difficulty is in running the spread.
Bass: If you play a team that physically can match up with you, you've got big problems, especially protecting the quarterback if they have the ability to put pressure on him.
What defensive coverage matches up well with the spread?
Allen: Well obviously if you can man cover us and you're better than we are, that's the hardest thing that we have to beat. Man coverage with better athletes is the toughest thing.
Bass: I think the 3-5-3 is probably a good way to do it, which is just a variation of the old nickel or dime defense. Man-to-man is a great matchup if your men are better than their men. Man-to-man is not too good if my man runs 4.7 and yours runs 4.5.
USA Football Coach Members can design plays for their spread offense using USA Football's Click 'N Create Playbook.
