I had an epiphany on the bus this morning. While listening to some tunes and contemplating life and what I was going to do at work today my mind drifted back to the H-back/Magic 3. I really liked this posting but was always wondering if an athletic 46 defence could successfully throw a wrench in Denver’s plans of world domination. Then I started to think about a book I read last summer on Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant who was one of the greatest football coaches that ever lived. Bryant was most famous for being the head coach at several university but specifically Alabama. Another interesting fact for you football history junkies was that while playing for ‘Bama in the 30’s he was the other Flanker (WR) across from Hall of Fame Receiver Don Hutson. While at ‘Bama Bryant brought in the wishbone offense after copying it from the Darrell Royal, Head Coach at Texas and it was a huge success in of the 70’s and 80’s in college. A number of teams who used the offense won national championships with it.

 I'm guessing that most readers are not fimiliar with the wishbone offense so I will start somewhere at the begining of its inception.

Flexbone Offense

 (I have pictures but can't figure out why they won't paste)

Refer to this site for Pictures

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Option_offense

Flexbone Offense

The Wishbone is a modification on the Flexbone Formation, which is an option offense. For those of you unfimiliar with the option here is link tha might help (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Option_offense). The jist of it is that the QB has the regular options to pass or hand off the ball but it also allows for them to run with it and toss it to another player. Currently the best known team to run this type of offense would be the Florida Gators. The Flexbone would put the RB’s closer to the line of scrimmage almost in a ‘trips’ look being just outside the OT. The RB would be called Slotbacks or SB in the Diagram above. Out of the option formation you can run different types of running plays with the ball being passed out behind the line of scrimmage. You can get the ball to the outside much faster creating mismatches amongst players. If you have ever seen or played rugby think about the Scrumhalf getting the ball out quickly to the backs and then moving it on down the line. The wishbone is very similar but it moves the RBs behind the FB so when the QB turns he knows where the RB will be: visibility of your RBs was a major concern in the

Flexbone formation. In the flexbone the RBs are usually in motion before the snap and move in and behind the QB who will hand it off to them on running. Whilemost Option formations are primarily running formation you can set up big passing plays with play action fakes. The spread offense also has options that can be run out of the Shotgun or pistol formation (but that's getting off point).

Now for the Wishbone offense which as I said before is very similar to the Flexbone but has some destinct characteristics that have made it more effective. The Wishbone evolved from problems that teams were having with the Flexbone and other formations because the QB didn't know where his Back was going to be. The Wishbone rectified this problem by putting all the backs behind the Quarterback so he could turn and find them.

Wishbone

                                                             Same idea here

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Wishbone

The benefit with the Wishbone was that in college you could freeze the Linebackers for a couple extra second because they would be afraid of the FB gaining 3 to 4 yards in a cloud of smoke. This gave the QB, RBs and WR the extra second or two get to the outside and start gaining yards. The reason it never transcended from college to the Pros was that it didn’t freeze the LBs when the FB rushed the ball at the pro level because they were athletic enough to make both the outside and inside stop without fear of the FB. Also, note that you don’t need to have two WRs: you can interchange a TE on the opposite side of the WR to catch and block. The limition of the Wishbone is that there are only so many formations (2WR,0TE), (1TE, 1WR), (0WR, 2TE) you can line up in because of the amount of player you need on the line of scrimage. Mind you there are countless numbers of plays you can run within a specific wishbone formation because of the fakes and routes you can add in.

What does this all mean for the Broncos? Simply put I think we could successfully run the wishbone because of some of the players we have on the roster. Primarily, the RB/FB on nearly everyone’s mind is Peyton Hillis. If you were to line Hillis up in the Wishbone FB position, not only could he block, run and catch outside but, as we know, one of his biggest strengths is his straight up the middle ability. Also, between the dozen or so RBs we have on the team, each with their own skill set, we could mix and match combinations of player to fit the play and really mess with people. Also it is important to note that a Zone blocking system which Dennison runs (Denver O-line Coach) would make the Wishbone even more potent because of the O-linemen's ability to block on the move.

The Wishbone has been so successful in college because you can move players around in it so well that it would be a great addition. Denver’s offense could be so explosive from the wishbone and magic three that teams won’t know what to think. Defences have a hard enough dealing with same old plays that when something new comes along, even if it’s been around a long time (like the Wildcat), they will have hard enough time adjusting.

Finally I was trying to find a good example of the wishbone offense at work and this is best that I could find (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cukCQWqaYE). It's not that great showing what I'm trying to get at with the wishbone but it gives you a prespecive beyond the X's and O's. Notice the fake to the FB which slides out the defense and then the RB drives it home.

A big thanks goes out to Broncobear who helped edit and gave helpful sight with this post. If you are looking for helpful insight before you make a post, send him a e-mail at MHRTales@gmail.com and I'm sure he will be a great help to you too.