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How Packaged is Tim Beck's Offense

[Promoted to FP for afternoon discussion - JJ]

If you're not jacked about the season (due to the lack of spring game, lower expectations than other years, whatevs), this should help. It's a well articulated review of the transition from pre-snap read (letting the defense set then making checks & reads based on their alignment) to the post-snap read; in the author's terms, from "Tecmo Bowl Model" to a completely different paradigm of running an offense.

The post-snap read was first broadly introduced to Cornhuskerland in the 2010 season when we first started hearing the announcers explain how a freshman Martinez was running the zone-read.

The zone-read is just the tip of the iceberg. I have not been studying film long enough to determine how many layers Beck's offense includes. I can see 2-3 options in play most of the time, but I am still not sold that a couple of the options aren't true option, but rather just decoys. By decoy's I mean even though we're showing read, maybe Martinez, or Beck for that matter, have already determined where the ball will be doing ahead of making the read. We saw this several times in 2010 when we'd be showing read, but then find out later that Beck was either calling for Martinez to keep or for him to give it to Burkhead (hello quick-decisions for Martinez running wild, goodbye pause/react). Later in the season, the increase in fumble rate between Burkhead & Martinez may have been caused by moving more toward "true" reads. Then a progression in 2011, where even more true reads appeared to be happening. One more set of camps working on true reads under a more seasoned offense, has to yield more comfort & quicker decisions, amiright?

Another interesting dimension are the assignments of the offensive line (did someone say offensive line?)

One of the most interesting aspects of these concepts is the effect on the offensive and defensive lines. Although the offensive line is able to block the run play — and doesn't have to pass block, thus avoiding one of football's toughest tasks — unblocked defensive players don't pose much of a problem because they are reading the offensive linemen, and as a result, don't rush.

Who could have thought that never asking your o-line to pass block could open up the passing game, but it appears to be effective. Understandably, most of us have opinions on how the O-line is being coached up, buy maybe this is coming into play with the outflow of top tier talent not feeling like they are being given the opportunity to showcase their versatility.

To leave you with some questions:

1) Can a Pelini-driven defense, based on attacking & process, stop (or at least slow) a packaged offense of the Okie State, Houston, Oregon, Baylor variety? (In other terms, is the complication of defending this why Ciante Evans can't remember what to do at corner when he's been playing nickel?)

2) How many layers is Beck currently running with? By my count, he has play-makers at all four key positions (QB3, RB22, WR80, & TE25) to be running as many layers as the guys on the field can comprehend, but do we have the talent to execute?

3) Could the advancement of Beck's packaged offense be impacting our recent O-line issues?

4) It's apparent to me that the Husker offense is trying to move toward the packaged model, but on a scale of Tecmo Bowl to Full Package (hehe), where are we?

This FanPost created by a registered user of Corn Nation.

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