Fee Fi Foe Film: Maryland Offense
[Guest author: Seth because Ace has bouncy hoopy ball season to preview]
this got charted as “LOLx”
Hi there. How you doing? Have you watched the above yet? Are you done laughing? It’s cool, you can watch it again. Here, have another angle. No, it won’t get old.
-----------------------
So as you may recall, last year D.J. Durkin and his OC Walt Bell inherited a roster of interception-prone quarterbacks and zero viable receivers tall enough to ride a roller coaster. Their answer was to stack the wee little guys as far away from the play as possible.
just go away
Sure, having all of your receivers bunched together limits the passing game to screens, but given that throwing downfield is more like playing “500” than football, that’s was fine. The payoff for this was fewer defenders in range to stop their two excellent scatbacks. I gave Walt major props for this. This is being the best you.
This year they’re down to their fourth string quarterback, and not even bothering to have one of those receivers eligible. Who needs five potential pass-catchers when the quarterbacks aren’t going to look for more than one or two reads? Every unit placed further from the running game is one less defender who can beat a bad blocker and corral the boys.
I watched the Wisconsin game, which featured an uncharacteristic surfeit of 5-wide sets and deep balls to their various Lilliputian receivers. This is not who you are, Maryland. You know who you are. The most success they had was running the same run play four times in a row from an unbalanced set.
Personnel: My diagram (click to enlarge):
yes their base is unbalanced
(Michigan things: Solomon draws into the starting lineup since he’s been there more or less the last two games. Winovich gets flowing beautiful blonde locks by way of apology for having his number wrong all year.)
So, about the above. In early 2017 the Terps tried having a quarterback do more than hand off to Ty Johnson and Lorenzo Harrison, and throw screens in the direction of D.J. Moore. Like run, maybe. Or pass.
[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the breakdown]
-----------------------
For this grievous presumption, Durkin awoke Angry Maryland Quarterback-Hating God, and lo he’s been wroth. Tyrrell “Piggy” Pigrome and Kasim Hill, both went down to ACLs in the first three games. Third stringer Max Bortenschlager is officially a game-time decision after leaving last week’s loss to Rutgers with a shoulder injury. If Bortenschlager can’t go (and it appears he hasn’t been practicing) they’ll turn to walk-on Ryan Brand, an Air Force transfer who grew up in Detroit, is listed at 5’11”, and is really 5’9”. FWIW Brand was a high 3-star whose rating is easily explained by his stature; he got an Elite 11 invite, and looked okay in place of Bortenschlager in the 4th quarter vs. Rutgers:
yes the holding on the left tackle was legit, O’Neill haters
On the other hand, Brand was behind THE BORTENSCHLAGER, who’s terrible. Punt.
I didn’t like any of their offensive linemen, though PFF likes the tackles and RG Terrance Davis, a former Michigan target. The scouting on Davis is correct: he’s very heavy, and he contributes the most of the five to the run game. The tackles are both former 5-stars; LT Derwin Gray is a decent pass blocker when not facing elites, while RT Damian Prince is basically a guard forced to play right tackle—backups there are all true freshmen. OC Brendan Moore and LG Sean Christie were abused by Wisconsin’s front. Christie is a stiff lunger. Moore is an okay run blocker but he was mentally overwhelmed by Wisconsin’s 3-4 blitzes—this might be a good game to take the 3-3-5 back out of the garage. Moore’s snapping was such an adventure that I had to make it into a clip video:
When they weren’t in jet formations he was hitting THE BORTENSCHLAGER in the belly so this might be a “put it over the motioning 5’9” guy” coaching instruction. But it wasn’t always, and a few of these were close to getting away, or messed up the timing for a mesh. Then there’s the direct-to-RB snaps that made those guys jump. And if the new QB is really 5’9”, well..
D.J. Moore was PFF’s top national receiver for a time but has been quiet lately—they do just about everything with him including making him the covered guy. He’s their best screen target, best screen blocker, and only real downfield threat other than a poor man’s Gesicki TE Derrick Hayward (Hayward’s blocking adventures could have made their own lowlight reel). Taivon Jacobs, once a Draftageddon target, Jacquille Veii, who transferred out then back to Maryland, and Jahrvis Davenport all take snaps at the slot, with Davenport otherwise lined up at wide receiver—they’re all tiny and mostly there to draw defenders away from the run game. I have 10 targets for Jacobs in this game, and half of them got notes like “if he wasn’t 5’9” and “stop heaving it to the little people!”
-----------------------
Spread, Pro-Style, or Hybrid? Spread. In this game they were in a 4- or 5-wide half of the time. That’s formation; personnel-wise they leave their starters out and just have Hayward and the running backs line up as receivers. They also used an unbalanced formation on half of their non-passing downs, and it appears that’s been a feature all year:
From this Maryland will jet motion the slot to keep a viable outside threat alive to that side, and run the boys.
A quick refresher on the general football rules affecting unbalanced sets:
- Anyone lined up >1 yard behind the line of scrimmage (light blue) is in the backfield. There can be four of them and they are all eligible receivers.
- Last man on either end (maize) of the line is an eligible receiver.
- Five guys in between them (navy) on the line of scrimmage are not eligible receivers.
- Eligible receivers also have to wear #s 1-49 or 80-99. So if this guy (red outline) is wearing #55 he’s not an eligible receiver this play (this is why M puts #97 on their 6th OLs)
An ineligible receiver can’t go downfield on a pass play, but Maryland ignored this constantly and the refs let them do so. They also managed to back off the outside receiver to confuse defenders into defending the would-be-covered slot without getting an illegal formation. This happened too with the tackles on passing downs—everybody tries to stretch the meaning of a yard in those circumstances but Maryland takes it to Spurrieresque extremes. Since I’m already bitching, there’s also Cincy-level OPI going on. Here’s the one that finally drew a flag:
-----------------------
Basketball on Grass or MANBALL? They’re actually running quite a bit of gap blocking, though not always pulling. Maryland has been doing the thing that Georgia’s had so much success with this year that for lack of a better term we’re calling “power without a puller.” A canonical example:
It looks like split zone but after staring at it I’m convinced they’re man-blocking and just using the TE as a puller. This is also an RPO with a throw to the jet, though against Wisconsin THE BORTENSCHLAGER never tested that. They also run more normal gap-blocking stuff like counter trey and this nifty version of the Inverted Veer:
They ran this multiple times, with a backside G and frontside T pulling as they would on a sweep.
-----------------------
Hurry it up or grind it out? Hurry up and wait…till the clock is almost out. Maryland keeps the same personnel out there no matter the play and is good at getting to the line quickly after the snap to lock the defense on the field. Then they stand around talking to the sideline. Their Adj Pace to footballoutsiders is zero; they’re precisely average.
-----------------------
Quarterback Dilithium Level (Scale: 1 [Navarre] to 10 [Denard]): They didn’t run THE BORTENSCHLAGER much except for one zone read keeper that was rumblesome but not Tom Brady-ish. He gets a 3. Brand is your standard Air Force running back who happens to be able to pass; he’s an 8.
-----------------------
Dangerman: We’ll get to the running backs, promise, but the biggest threat on this team is wide receiver D.J. Moore. Earlier this season Moore was collecting stats and hype from all the right places. As of mid-October PFF was noting Maryland quarterbacks, which I remind you are two running dudes and THE BORTENSCHLAGER, suddenly became Drew Brees when the ball went Moore’s way:
Despite the loss yesterday - Maryland WR D.J. Moore was a very reliable target for the Terrapins against Northwestern. pic.twitter.com/pxxbcadUul
— PFF College Football (@PFF_College) October 15, 2017
He’s already up to 820 yards and 8 TDs on 91 targets (9.0 YPT) despite getting 45% of Maryland’s passes going his way. The good news is there’s a ton of YAC in that. The other good news is that good secondaries are able to shut him down. Ohio State kept him to 2 catches for 11 yards, and Indiana 4 catches for 77 yards and a TD the week after this. In this game he caught 3 for 44 yards, this being the only one downfield:
When not getting run by in Cover 2 and getting DO+’d by THE BORTENSCHLAGER, Wisconsin’s largish cornerbacks were able to smother the weirdly frequent fades and body the smallish Moore into the sideline. Don’t take this as a knock: Moore is more Odoms than Gallon; if every other receiver wasn’t also a smurf Moore would be an excellent field-stretching slot, complete with mountain goat blocking.
They do work him in there. When they go 4- and 5-wide they like to get him matched on safeties and spacebackers by running deep switch routes with the tight end; to the inevitable guy in the comments who wants a star on Khaleke Hudson after last Saturday, this will be an interesting test of how he holds up against a mighty mite. We’ll also get to see if the tunnel screen bugaboo from earlier this year is cleaned up.
Then there are the running backs. Ty Johnson is now the lead back, and will kill you with his ridiculous acceleration:
I still don’t know what that play is called with the weird pulls but just like in the first one you can see the defensive end set up like he was playing the back and then NOPE. This time Johnson also jetted between a safety and a linebacker. That’s how you get 6.57 YPC without your line really moving guys off the ball.
Lorenzo Harrison has just two fewer carries on the year but is down to just 4.10 this year after 7.19 YPC in 2016. He still rotated in almost equally with Johnson in this one. Harrison’s thing is you can’t give him any space:
When Harrison is in they run a lot of draw plays from all of their formations, because he operates very well in close quarters and doesn’t go down until you get him corralled. He’s also their screen merchant, e.g. the above; Wisconsin was usually really good at defending these by dropping a DE. Harrison’s YPC are down because opponents are more comfortable this year leaving safety help over the middle of the formation. They just can’t break him loose as often as they used to.
-----------------------
BORTENSCHLAGERChart that probably won’t matter because of his shoulder injury.
Player | DO | CA | MA | IN | BR | TA | BA | PR | SCR | DSR |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
THE BORTENSCHLAGER | 2 | 8 (6) | 3 | 6x | 4xx | 2 | x | 4 | 1 | 51% |
There were several that might have been PR or BA that turned into bad reads, and I will defend that decision because this is a decision:
He threw a pick six on the opening drive and a linebacker dropped another. On the other hand he dropped that Moore pass into a bucket, and several of the MAs were balls where he gave his player a chance but his player is a member of the Lollipop Guild. He’s the third string for a reason. He locks on to his primary read, throws it when he shouldn’t, and defenses seem to be aware of this:
Okay, smart eyes, look up again and watch the receiver at the top of the screen.
OVERVIEW: Another week after Penn State, another spread offense run by a supposedly good coordinator hampered by his quarterback problems. This one is more severe:
Formations | Run | Pass | PA | RPO |
---|---|---|---|---|
Gun | 15 | 34 | 3 | 4 |
I-Form | x | x | x | x |
Ace | x | x | x | x |
Pistol | 10 | x | x | x |
Wildcat | 2 | x | x | x |
Some of those Pistol plays—90% of which featured jet motion—were probably RPOs but THE BORTENSCHLAGER ignored pass options all day to the point where I wasn’t charting them as RPOs anymore.
Down | Run | Pass | PA | RPO |
---|---|---|---|---|
1st | 13 | 8 | 1 | 2 |
2nd | 10 | 11 | 2 | 2 |
3rd | 2 | 14 | x | x |
When Maryland got six or more yards on first down they’d run it again. That was only about half the time, and then the second half was a lot of dink and dunking in comeback mode. They averaged 3.55 receivers in the formation on 1st and 2nd downs.
This offense is still short on talent, especially at QB, and is thus very good at knowing who they are and who should have the ball. Out of 67 plays I charted they were 25% Johnson, 22% Harrison, 19% Moore, 15% Jacobs, 12% accidentally BORTENSCHLAGER, and <6% everybody else. Beat their playmakers and it’ll be The Usual.
November 9th, 2017 at 5:31 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 5:46 PM ^
in his Unverified Veracity article that Hurst is the only one who will probably be drafted in the first round. Cole is getting some feint mention and that's it.
November 9th, 2017 at 7:12 PM ^
There are more future first round draft picks on the team.
November 9th, 2017 at 8:27 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 9:20 PM ^
If Gary was eligible to come out after this year, he would likely be a first round draft pick.
November 10th, 2017 at 8:37 AM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 8:46 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 9:26 PM ^
I'm not nearly as bothered by shields as I am by your username. I guess the NY Giants need fans too?
November 9th, 2017 at 9:22 PM ^
We're seeing that level of production and so is PFF and so are other coaches. Gary's playing better than Winovich. Winovich is playing at an All-American level. I'd put those guys up there with Bosa as tops in the country at their position right now.
November 10th, 2017 at 6:24 AM ^
The NFL is full of scouts who judge purely on measurables. The best college player is often not a 1RDP, although it's safe to bet all 1RDPs are All-Americans.
I understand the shield's purpose as a means of separating "mere" Dangermen from those who turn football into a video game. Either way, what the NFL thinks doesn't matter and mentioning the NFL draft keeps bringing up these discussions.
November 10th, 2017 at 8:50 AM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 5:31 PM ^
I'm expecting a couple of TD drives where Maryland blatantly ignores the rules of football yet again and the Big Ten shrugs and pretends the game never happened.
November 9th, 2017 at 5:34 PM ^
November 10th, 2017 at 9:01 AM ^
November 10th, 2017 at 11:27 AM ^
All they did was run jet sweeps.
November 9th, 2017 at 5:36 PM ^
As hilarious as the pass was that lead off this post, it appears to have earned an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Free 15 yards. Good play!
November 9th, 2017 at 6:01 PM ^
Welp, if there is a mushroom cloud of Hudson rage over Maryland Stadium on Saturday, I guess we'll understand why.
November 9th, 2017 at 6:52 PM ^
Seth predicted this comment, man
November 9th, 2017 at 6:24 PM ^
One game does not a superhero make. If Hudson does it this weekend against scatbacks,then the storyline changes for the blogger. Having said that, we want our writers to be Meeechigan homers without any objective at all, right? Go Blue!
November 9th, 2017 at 6:30 PM ^
I don't disagree; that was Khaleke's first ++ game and it's reasonable to wait for a few more before awarding a star.
But personally, if I set the Big Ten TFL record, and my teammate got a sweet blonde flow watermark and I got nothing, I might be pissed.
November 9th, 2017 at 11:27 PM ^
I hear ya, but one game. Poor damn Lavert Hill still doesn't have his shield, and he's been doing it all year!
November 9th, 2017 at 6:23 PM ^
Everyone in red?
November 9th, 2017 at 6:53 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 8:23 PM ^
since Winovich has been awarded the long, blond locks, Bush should be awarded long black dreds because to me it is the easist way to identify him on the field. Just sayin'.
November 9th, 2017 at 8:22 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 9:20 PM ^
i've got nothing to go on other than a quarter against Rutgers that I couldn't cap because it was on a janky BTN2Go replay. I try to save the marks for guys I have at least some scouting on, unless like the RT situation this summer there were numerous arrows pointing toward it being a thing.
November 9th, 2017 at 9:34 PM ^
November 9th, 2017 at 11:24 PM ^
Jesus, what does Khaleke Hudson have to do get a dangerman star?
November 10th, 2017 at 6:27 AM ^
This will be an interesting test of how he holds up against a mighty mite.
November 10th, 2017 at 9:44 AM ^
I logged in to ask the same question slightly differently. Hudson had one game at super dangerman levels. How many games do you need at a dangerman level to be a dangerman?
Google Images had pretty lame DangerMan images.
November 10th, 2017 at 5:48 AM ^
"to the inevitable guy in the comments who wants a star on Khaleke Hudson after last Saturday, this will be an interesting test of how he holds up against a mighty mite."
You son of a gun, how did you know?
November 10th, 2017 at 6:41 AM ^
It's sad that my life consists only of work, football, and being able to identify Moana references from being forced to watch it 400,000,000,000 times.
November 10th, 2017 at 7:05 AM ^
What can I say except you're welcome.
November 10th, 2017 at 8:23 AM ^
Do we honestly expect him to be serviceable as a 4th stringer?
November 10th, 2017 at 3:13 PM ^
He's actually 5th, they had another higher QB go down for the year preseason.
November 10th, 2017 at 8:37 AM ^
This is really good stuff Seth, thanks.
"Just go away" is my new favorite caption this season
November 10th, 2017 at 10:10 AM ^
In the "every high snap" video, it looks like Wisconsin's NT gets blown back off the ball on almost every play. Sometimes he has a good first step, but then stops and ends up 2-3 yards off the line. Sometimes he even gets his back turned to the play.
That seems like a better sign for Michigan than any of this info about Maryland.
November 10th, 2017 at 1:01 PM ^
Talking about Sly and the Family Stone in that video clip of the high center snaps. Nice work!
Comments