Assistant Coach and the Star fish

As an assistant you control what you can and if the powers that be will see your work its ok if not its still ok. I heard this story in church this morning:

Based on the story by Loren Eisley...

I awoke early, as I often did, just before sunrise to walk by the ocean's edge and greet the new day. As I moved through the misty dawn, I focused on a faint, far away motion. I saw a youth, bending and reaching and flailing arms, dancing on the beach, no doubt in celebration of the perfect day soon to begin.

As I approached, I sadly realized that the youth was not dancing to the bay, but rather bending to sift through the debris left by the night's tide, stopping now and then to pick up a starfish and then standing, to heave it back into the sea. I asked the youth the purpose of the effort. "The tide has washed the starfish onto the beach and they cannot return to the sea by themselves," the youth replied. "When the sun rises, they will die, unless I throw them back to the sea."

As the youth explained, I surveyed the vast expanse of beach, strectching in both directions beyond my sight. Starfish littered the shore in numbers beyond calculation. The hopelessness of the youth's plan became clear to me and I countered, "But there are more starfish on this beach than you can ever save before the sun is up. Surely you cannot expect to make a difference."

The youth paused briefly to consider my words, bent to pick up a starfish and threw it as far as possible. Turning to me he simply said, "I made a difference to that one."

I left the boy and went home, deep in thought of what the boy had said. I returned to the beach and spent the rest of the day helping the boy throw starfish in to the sea.

 

As an assistant I challenge you to throw as many starfish back as you can and I challenge the head coaches to have their entire staff throw back as many starfish as they can.

Lessons learned from the Book "The Tao of Chip Kelly:

Lesson 1 "Win the Day" 

The only thing we can control is today.  It means practice harder be Freddy Kruger like in attentiveness and focus on execution.  (Freddy Kruger= Relentlessness)

Lesson 2 "Feed the Tuna Mayonnaise" 

Become efficient No one stops to correct or explain things to one player while everyone else stands around watching.  If a player needs it explained he is substituted out of the play until he gets it while every else continues.  The goal is to get as many reps in practice as possible one rep every 20 seconds in Group, Seven on Seven, Inside, Half-Line, and Team.
http://www.footballscoop.com/news/9676-take-a-look-at-chip-kelly-s-music-playlist-for-practice

Lesson 3 Receivers are expected to block 

Receivers are expected to block on run plays and screens just as well as they catch passes.  It is a very selfish player who refuses to block for his teammates.  (See 2.32 of YouTube video bellow)

Play Calling

There are several factors involved in play calling.

• Personal
• Space 
• Defensive Structure 
• What is working
• Preparedness 

Personal this is determined by several factors your personal should be getting better right now until August rolls around.  This is off-season workouts, 7 on 7, Spring Ball (if you are allowed to do it), summer workouts, and finally having to steal for Urban Meyer high GSF.  My philosophy of personal is that you cannot control what level of athleticism that they came to you at but your job is to guide them to get as close as you can to that genetic ceiling as possible.  Remember Michael Jordan was cut as a high school freshman from the basketball team and through inhuman determination with practicing for the sport he loved became the greatest basketball player ever! You ever wonder what Mike Leach is writing down on that little index card during games? It was a hit chart that he counted how many times each of his receivers got the ball he was looking for even distribution.  The problem is that I don't live in that world I can only on campus recruit.  This coming up year I will have a couple of really good high school football players.  I am going to make sure that each one of those of guys touch the ball at least 20-25 times a game and then after that I am going to equally distribute the ball to the rest of the offensive skill guys.    

Space we are going to attack space.  In the run game look for bubbles and in the pass game look for grass.  With our offensive scheme the defense is going to have to defend 53 and a 1/3 yards wide and 18 yards from the line of scrimmage.  Also we are going to throw the post against outside leverage Un Capped and throw the go or the corner route against inside leverage Un Capped.

Defensive structure it's a mathematical equation:

2 Safeties= run the ball

1 Safety=utilize the option

0 Safeties=Throw the ball and Screens

Now of course we will run the ball, throw screens, and throw the ball against all defensive structures but as a general rule to attack the defense it is simple why try to run a play against the teeth of a defense when your hims are the same or not as good as his hims.

Do what is working try not to out smart your-self. Against one team this year we ran Counter 31 times for 260 yards for an 8.3 yards per play. Both of Bill Snyder's stints at Kansas State if his offense would find a play that worked he world run it over and over again until the defense stopped it then he would go to the next read or complement to it.

I am going to go back to my Copperas Cove days and since we run only two basic run schemes a Gap and Zone.  I am going to talk to our Offensive line coach and see what he thinks about just working Gap one day and Zone the other day.  The way we conduct practice offensive line gets a minimum of 10 5 minutes segments of individual.  That way all of his individual run blocking drills can be focused on that scheme for that day and tie in our screen game and passing game into it.  

Zone Day:

• Zone Running Stretch, Inside Zone, Speed Option and Speed Sweeps
• Sprint Out Passing Game
• Solid Screens
• Fast Screens
• 3 Step Passing Game

Gap Day

• Gap Running Game Counter and Power
• 5 Step Passing Game
• Counter Screens
• Jail Break Screens
• 3 Step Passing Game

Time and Reps last year we averaged 1 rep every 30 seconds during Group and Team.  This year our goal is going to run 1 play every 20 seconds if an athlete continually makes mistakes then his coach will pull him out put in a back up in and coach him up. We are going to have to coach off of film and coach on the run.