Going Back to the Spread ...

[WarriorTyme]

Question, if you are not happy with Chow now going to the Spread, would you have rather us stay in the vanilla Pro Offense?

Just wondering because I for one think this will be exciting times ahead this season.
Mix up Ewaliko, Anguay, St Juste, with the tall speedster on the outside or a TE at slot and the defense may be wondering WTH?

I stand supporting the Coaching Staff and Players.
Hold all the cards tightly under wrap until UDUB

Where was the support for Mack, Aranda, Rolo, Miano...and many more very successful...and liked...coaches at Hawaii? Coach Chow was a bit of a former-home-town-nemesis kicking our butts as part of the Cougar/Trojan machine. Well, we pull the professor out of his machine and find out there's no heart for the cowardly lion, no brain for the tin man, and no...ahh never mind.

We've been conned. Yes, it would be miraculous if we could salvage what is left of what June Jones and McMackin created. I would love to see the players June Jones inspired and McMackin recruited save this program. Would I credit Norm Chow? No. Since when are Norm Chow and Jordan Wynn experts of the spread? On defense we have an Aranda inspired coordinator. Wonderful foresight, Rainbow admins.

okay...go Bows. Feel the happiness and wonder.

What are you smoking? The roster is full of Chows recruits starting and in the depth chart on defense and offense this season. While, Woosley should keep the starting QB job, Higgins hasn't panned out. Sean Schroeder proved he was better than all Chows and Macks QB's. Woolsey and Higgins is in there 3rd season under Chow/Wynn QB guidance/development not Macks. In fact, all of Macks holdover are in the 3rd season under Chow development.


Make no mistake, Chow did the right thing fired Kaumeyers okole for having a piss poor defense scheme that gave up 500+ yards and a boat load of points. I don't care if June Jones was calling the plays with a defense that was as bad as Hawaii has been he would have lost about the same amout of games. Hawaii was spreading it out last season with 4 WR sets pretty much every play and had plenty of 500+ yard games with a ton of points. But when your in the game until the end and the defense can't stop anybody your going to have to roll the dice take risk on offense to try to win the game.

I don't believe Chow is going back to the Mack/June/Rolo Run and Shoot Offense. So to say that Chow is going back to the previous coaches offense and the previous coaches recruits to win game would be disingenuous and manipulative. To say Chow is using a Spread Offense with a Tight End (that the RnS and Mack/Jones never had) that the NFL and most College programs are using would be more appropriate.

Chow got some thing done that Mack couldn't do, Chow lobbied and got the Hawaii Football team (To include Macks holdover recruits) Gary Beemer and the teams actually has a trainer year around for a change! This season will be the first full year the team has been training under Beemers guidance, so we will see how effective Beemer has been this season. I remember Macks teams being out of breath in games in Colorado and I haven't that seen that since. Chow got local boy studs like 4 Star Kennedy Tulimasaelii, Lakalaka, Wily and we all know Mack couldn't pull that off.

Do I think Mack's now Senior Class holdover recruits that been developed by Chow and his staff (Including Beemer this full year) for 3 seasons and survived the mass cutting from the team when Chow took over will be huge for the team. Of course, Joey, Yap, Samia, Harding and maybe Woolsey (lets see if he gets the jobs first)

Plus, its good to see Chow is adapting his offense to current standards and the type of players comming put of High School. Plus, Firing Kaumeyer and adding Clune should help the defense, hopefully! But we will see what results in year 3, but I still stick to 6 wins to a bowl game this season or Chow is done.

[anthoang]

Bring back the run-n-shoot!!! Everybody knows Colt Brennan, Bryant Moniz, Timmy Chang.... nobody knows who the QB was the past two seasons.

[SundayJam]

What are you smoking? The roster is full of Chows recruits starting and in the depth chart on defense and offense this season. While, Woosley should keep the starting QB job, Higgins hasn't panned out. Sean Schroeder proved he was better than all Chows and Macks QB's. Woolsey and Higgins is in there 3rd season under Chow/Wynn QB guidance/development not Macks. In fact, all of Macks holdover are in the 3rd season under Chow development.



Chow got some thing done that Mack couldn't do, Chow lobbied and got the Hawaii Football team (To include Macks holdover recruits) Gary Beemer and the teams actually has a trainer year around for a change! This season will be the first full year the team has been training under Beemers guidance, so we will see how effective Beemer has been this season. I remember Macks teams being out of breath in games in Colorado and I haven't that seen that since. Chow got local boy studs like 4 Star Kennedy Tulimasaelii, Lakalaka, Wily and we all know Mack couldn't pull that off.

Do I think Mack's now Senior Class holdover recruits that been developed by Chow and his staff (Including Beemer this full year) for 3 seasons and survived the mass cutting from the team when Chow took over will be huge for the team. Of course, Joey, Yap, Samia, Harding and maybe Woolsey (lets see if he gets the jobs first)

Plus, its good to see Chow is adapting his offense to current standards and the type of players comming put of High School. Plus, Firing Kaumeyer and adding Clune should help the defense, hopefully! But we will see what results in year 3, but I still stick to 6 wins to a bowl game this season or Chow is done.

Both Woolsey and Higgins signed on to play the spread. Joey Iosefa is Mack's guy. There weren't mass cuts on the team, a good number simply quit coach Chow. It's hard to comment on the quality of a trainer when the team is losing so badly. This team has been consistently mismanaged from staff to ritual (Imua etc.). I'll continue to cheer the team, even as I watch this chapter of Warrior...sorry...Rainbow football come to an end.

[Makana]

Question, if you are not happy with Chow now going to the Spread, would you have rather us stay in the vanilla Pro Offense?

Just wondering because I for one think this will be exciting times ahead this season.
Mix up Ewaliko, Anguay, St Juste, with the tall speedster on the outside or a TE at slot and the defense may be wondering WTH?

I stand supporting the Coaching Staff and Players.
Hold all the cards tightly under wrap until UDUB

Not sure if you're directing this comment at me but I'll give it a whirl.

My frustrations with Chow transitioning to the Spread offense is that, there were hundreds of coaches before Chow was hired that could easily have ran the Spread for Hawaii. When Chow was hired, I got the sense that he was bringing in his big-bad offense that won Championships for USC. And to tell you the truth I haven't seen none of that since he's been at UH. There's been no Traps, Pulls, Screens, use of a Fullback, no Sluggo's, no TE drags or TE seams, instead we get a Pistol formation that does nothing but look predictable. And now it seems he doesn't wanna coach and just dumb things down with the Spread, 'hey let's line up 4-wide and look for the soft zones', nice, we should've kept Mcmackin for that at least he had it down already and wasn't blaming the players for not running his system right.

[WA Warrior]

Question, if you are not happy with Chow now going to the Spread, would you have rather us stay in the vanilla Pro Offense?

Just wondering because I for one think this will be exciting times ahead this season.
Mix up Ewaliko, Anguay, St Juste, with the tall speedster on the outside or a TE at slot and the defense may be wondering WTH?

I stand supporting the Coaching Staff and Players.
Hold all the cards tightly under wrap until UDUB

Not sure if you're directing this comment at me but I'll give it a whirl.

My frustrations with Chow transitioning to the Spread offense is that, there were hundreds of coaches before Chow was hired that could easily have ran the Spread for Hawaii. When Chow was hired, I got the sense that he was bringing in his big-bad offense that won Championships for USC. And to tell you the truth I haven't seen none of that since he's been at UH. There's been no Traps, Pulls, Screens, use of a Fullback, no Sluggo's, no TE drags or TE seams, instead we get a Pistol formation that does nothing but look predictable. And now it seems he doesn't wanna coach and just dumb things down with the Spread, 'hey let's line up 4-wide and look for the soft zones', nice, we should've kept Mcmackin for that at least he had it down already and wasn't blaming the players for not running his system right.

I agree with you! This is the reason why UH management shouldn't have made the decision to hire and should be firmly up to the AD with a verification process through the management only. The AD should know what is a good fit for the program based on recruiting history, current players, and current game climate.

[dcwarrior]

Not true. A lot of spreads are running offenses. The problem with the FB is, if he's not a threat to run, you don't have to account for him. Another defender can come into the area.

Look at how Oregon runs. You split out the H back wide, put him in motion. Then there's a question as to whether he will block or go out for a pass. In the meantime, their plain vanilla run is, as I understand it, an outside zone read-option. You get the confusion for the D because the QB can hand off, run, or pull the ball back and pass, all based on what he reads at the snap.

As you may recall, Nevada runs the ball quite well with no FBs.

The point is, not to obsess with running enough, or having enough blockers. The real trick is, whether you are throwing or running, are you threatening the entire field all at once, or are you concentrating power and trying to bull your way through. Fewer and fewer teams are able to concentrate and bull.

Well even when running from the Spread, it becomes predictable and/or one-dimensional. For one you can't utilize split-backs or broken-I's, which would make it harder for defenses to read which way a run is going or whether it is even a run play. Two, no TE formations, when used right can create tons of mismatches. That's another reason why Norm Chows Pistol formation was frustrating last year.

Also not sure where the David Graves references are coming from??

[Makana]

Yes a lot of Spread offenses in college are now incorporating an H-back in their offense, BUT, aside from Oregon/Auburn the traditional Spread Offense doesn't utilize an H-back. Spread Offenses are made to expose the depth of the opposing secondary. Reason teams are now utilizing the H-back because of the reason of looking one-dimensional, therefore taking variations of the Pro Style offense. Going back and looking at Texas Tech, Hawaii and Texas A&M who ran true Spreads or true base Spread offenses, such formations as split backs, H-backs and broken-I's were almost never used, why, because such an offense is based on scoring fast with very little clock management. You can give the defense much more or different looks with a QB under-center in a Pro style than you can in a base Spread formation IMO.

Btw I think Oregon runs a inside zone read, reading the backside C-gap defender. I could be wrong it may be Auburn, either way it's a read-option. But new age Spread offenses are still not true to the traditional base Spread offenses.

If I'm not as clear, sorry kinda having a few beers right now. Haha!!!

[dcwarrior]

What's a "traditional spread"?

Coach Johnson' offense doesn't have a TE or a blocking FB, but his is only one kind.

Coach Ault's pistol uses a TE and sometimes a HB

I think the Urban Meyer spread has no FB but it has a TE

The real trick, again, is not to obsess with a particular role or position, but to ask, is the particular offense attacking the entire defense, and how is it doing that?

The strength of the various pro-set offenses is also its weakness, particularly at the college level. Because the pro set seeks to confuse the D with multiple formations and intricately variable plays, the offense has to learn the formations, plays and variations, and the QB has to understand, call plays, make line calls, audible, all in game situation. That's why even in the pros, relatively few of the promising QBs actually make it.

What the spread and things like the run n shoot and Coach Mumme/Leach's offense try to do is get all the confusion for the D of the pro set, with fewer plays and more options based on relatively simple reads.

Note, Texas Tech's Air Raid offense under Leach was not a "spread" - it was a modified West Coast offense.

Oregon says they run both inside and outside read-option. They will run the outside option a bunch of times in a row to test the D and then riff from there.

Also, note that Coach Johnson's offense is all about clock management. The RNS is not so much, and Urban Meyers's spread is somewhere in between.

[edit] This is an instructive article - on the difference between Coach Leach and his pro-style predecessor. http://www.cougcenter.com/wsu-cougars-f ... u-football

[further edit] To add further to the hilarity, Coach Leach's base plays and concepts are taken from... Lavell Edwards and Norm Chow's offense.

Yes a lot of Spread offenses in college are now incorporating an H-back in their offense, BUT, aside from Oregon/Auburn the traditional Spread Offense doesn't utilize an H-back. Spread Offenses are made to expose the depth of the opposing secondary. Reason teams are now utilizing the H-back because of the reason of looking one-dimensional, therefore taking variations of the Pro Style offense. Going back and looking at Texas Tech, Hawaii and Texas A&M who ran true Spreads or true base Spread offenses, such formations as split backs, H-backs and broken-I's were almost never used, why, because such an offense is based on scoring fast with very little clock management. You can give the defense much more or different looks with a QB under-center in a Pro style than you can in a base Spread formation IMO.

Btw I think Oregon runs a inside zone read, reading the backside C-gap defender. I could be wrong it may be Auburn, either way it's a read-option. But new age Spread offenses are still not true to the traditional base Spread offenses.

If I'm not as clear, sorry kinda having a few beers right now. Haha!!!

[Makana]

I think it comes down to different philosophies on offense rather than how you put it together "is the offense attacking the entire defense". True fact is that different offenses now a days are incorporating variations of all different types of offense into their attack, be it Read-option, WCO, Coryell, Veer, power running no one offense is set as a real base.

Chirs Ault is famous for the Pistol-Read-option, but still Spread's their formations

Houston with David Klinger, wide-spread attack similar to June Jones, I was actually thinking of Houston when bringing up Texas Tech, but eh whatevers. Since Texas Tech has been brought up by me and you bring up the fact of how Mike Leach implemented plays from the Pro Style (correct way when referring to offenses like the Coryell or WCO, Pro Set is nothing but a formation - Split backs). Actually the WCO has taken forms of the Spread by utilizing crossing patterns and using the pass get into a rhythm on offense, WCO uses the pass to set up the run. Another difference is that WCO uses timed routes - precision passing, but still the same routes as in June Jones' run-n-shoot.

Auburn under HC Gus Malzahn is a Spread-option.

When I say traditional, I mean Shot-gun based receivers spread out wide.

Going into a base Spread how will you properly utilize Split-backs formation or properly utilize an I-formation or Broken-I??

[Hawkpeter]

There are deeper things to look at now than just the formation and the passing concepts or run selection; its the way they call their plays. 'Spread' still allows for just about every offensive football concept to be run. The personnel package might just limit the size of the blocking surface because you're not coming out in 21 personnel 80% of the game. Makana is right though, you can still pretty much run anything.

Some offenses lock the back into position with formation call, Auburn is an example of this, 'West Coast' teams also do this. Other teams will allow the receivers to set the formation and personnel package and then the backfield sets to the play. Oregon, Ole Miss and Baylor do this.

What is modernizing now, is how the play calling is getting away from what was innovative 15+ years ago. There's that classic clip of Jon Gruden interviewing Cam Newton a couple of years ago in the lead up to the draft and Gruden asks him to call a typical Auburn play and he says something like "24" and Gruden is incredulous. "24"?....... "Yeah". OC's have made a living over the last generation of component calling from extremely large playbooks. That has evolved to simpler systems, particularly at the High school and college level.

Gruden is used to "Green Right, Panther, 500 Y-option, Z Dig", teams now will signal plays in from the sideline and sometimes the OL wont even look at it. The QB will just tell them "Smoke, Smoke" and they know what that is and 4 seconds later the ball is snapped.

[tico brown]

Not for nothing but it would be a good thing if Chow runs a Mike Leach/Air Raid type offense. After all, Mike Leach did design that offense after the Norm Chow/West Coast Offense.

[RedZone]

Chow was a rookie head coach and made a lot of mistakes. It appears as tho he has learned from them. I like the coaching changes he has made. Sometimes in college football that is all it takes. I really like Clune and Gouvea. We need more production from our linebackers. I think we have the talent. Hopefully now we have the teachers.

[xer 21]

Open to change is one thing but changing your own philosophy as a HC is definitely a sign of desperation.

you just saw that now?

he's been acting desparate since half way through last year. some of the downright stupid gadget plays i saw him run in practice last year....he spent 30 minutes in a practice working on a play where St Juste was the QB and Schroeder was lined out wide.

and if nothing else, the fact that we recruited Shawley was just the biggest sign of desperation ever. we signed a convicted felon that almost no one wanted a part of.

For one I can't believe he said 'the days of a QB passing from the pocket are over'

when you look at mid major college football, this is becoming a reality though.

[xer 21]

When Chow was hired, I got the sense that he was bringing in his big-bad offense that won Championships for USC. And to tell you the truth I haven't seen none of that since he's been at UH. There's been no Traps, Pulls, Screens, use of a Fullback, no Sluggo's, no TE drags or TE seams, instead we get a Pistol formation that does nothing but look predictable. And now it seems he doesn't wanna coach and just dumb things down with the Spread, 'hey let's line up 4-wide and look for the soft zones', nice, we should've kept Mcmackin for that at least he had it down already and wasn't blaming the players for not running his system right.

that's probably because you should have gotten the sense that he was bringing in his just plain bad offenses from UCLA and Utah, where he coached AFTER he got carried by the monstrous talent levels at USC.

why do you think no one wanted to hire him? he lost any sort of creativity he had years ago. he's washed up. you're damn right there's a bunch of other coaches we could have gotten, and most of them would have had better results.

[Mr.EDGE808]

Grandpa Depends is going to use the Spread..... I hope I'm not on the work schedule to clean up that mess!