

Clever hack by small Bay Area high school team transforms football - theoneill
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/17/sports/football/17offense.html?_r=1&em&oref=slogin

======
fallentimes
Mike Leach (coach of Texas Tech and quoted in the article) employs similar
tactics:

[http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/magazine/04coach.html?page...](http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/magazine/04coach.html?pagewanted=print)

Edit: Never thought I'd see a sports piece atop Hacker News.

~~~
immad
It said "hack" in the title so it clearly qualifies.

~~~
fallentimes
Wasn't complaining - just observing. I run a sports ticket site you know :P.

------
jacobbijani
Everything that's abnormal isn't a "hack."

~~~
mattmaroon
This really is a hack though. It only works in high school rules by exploiting
a formation designed for kicks, but using that formation for passing plays.
Since it doesn't work at higher levels, it's actually a disservice to any
players who will want to play college ball afterward.

It's clever, for sure, but I'm fairly certain it will be eliminated quickly.

~~~
wallflower
I don't know much about football (and my friends corroborate), and you may be
surprised to learn that the forward pass itself was actually an innovation
that was introduced into American football over 100 years ago. Before the
forward pass, teams simply brute-forced the ball forward.

“John Heisman, a noted historian, wrote 30 years later that, indeed, the Tar
Heels had given birth to the forward pass against the Bulldogs (UGA). It was
conceived to break a scoreless deadlock and give UNC a 6-0 win. The
Carolinians were in a punting situation and a Georgia rush seemed destined to
block the ball. The punter, with an impromptu dash to his right, tossed the
ball and it was caught by George Stephens, who ran 70 yards for a touchdown.

Heisman wrote he was at the game standing near the action on the sidelines. He
is emphatic that Pop Warner, who was coaching Georgia, protested to the
referee to no avail. And he adds that he personally wrote Walter Camp, the
final authority on football, of the possibilities of the ‘forward pass’ making
football a new and more exciting game.”

[http://tarheelmania.wordpress.com/2007/09/13/unc-invented-
th...](http://tarheelmania.wordpress.com/2007/09/13/unc-invented-the-forward-
pass/)

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forward_pass>

------
nadim
A video of the offense in action: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJOm-IJcbg0>

------
jfornear
This happens all the time in Texas.

------
aggieben
This is old news. They've been doing this kind of stuff in six-man for ages.
My high-school six-man team had a number of formations that worked just like
this.

------
swombat
Sounds like some fun disruptive innovation at work, but as a european who
doesn't give a flying fuck about "american football" and doesn't know any of
the jargon, this was mostly unintelligible.

~~~
emmett
Basically, there are normally rules preventing most of the offensive players
from receiving a pass; by switching the starting formation they make everyone
eligible and explode the number of possible passes they can make.

It's an extremely clever hack; I don't care about football either but I'm
impressed by the thinking.

~~~
vlad
The professional Patriots team used to be well known for running creative
plays before their offensive coordinator (coach) was enticed away by a college
team (at American colleges with a football program, head coaches are typically
the highest paid employees.) The team has also been known for having the
smartest group in the entire league, a quality sought in players above
superstar skills and high maintenance demands, like a huge salary. Instead,
the Patriots pick up superstars who have already made their money and proved
themselves on another team, and now want a Super Bowl ring by playing for the
Patriots at a "regular" salary. These players tend to be older and more mature
than the reputation they used to have with their old team. This beats paying a
huge salary to a great 22 year old college player who turns out to be a bust
at the professional level, as well as immature, which is what a lot of other
teams do. These approaches have begun to be emulated across the league,
however.

~~~
iamdave
I'm not trolling, I'm just stating the facts here:

You are wrong factually incorrect on a lot of things. Nothing in what you just
typed was even close to being right, and it has nothing to do with this this
submission.

~~~
mattmaroon
Yeah, it's way off. The Patriots drafted the player most responsible for their
success. In fact, they drafted many of their top players.

~~~
vlad
Rodney Harrison, Corey Dillon, Randy Moss, and some others have been team
superstars that were proven on other teams, but chose to join the Patriots to
win a Super Bowl ring at a fair price. Rodney, who was known as, and was
recently voted again, the most dirtiest player in the league, first had a
serious conversation with Bill Belichick, the coach of the Patriots, at the
1999 Pro Bowl, where Belichick was head coach of the AFC team. Harrison was
released from the Chargers even though he had won a couple of Pro Bowl honors
in the previous years.

Corey Dillon wanted out of the Bengals. Like Harrison, he had a terrible
reputation, probably of any running back. He had won three Pro Bowl honors in
the previous years.

Randy Moss wanted out of the Vikings. He also had the worst reputation,
probably of any wide receiver. He had won five Pro Bowl honors (!) in the
previous years.

So all of these players, considered to be the whiniest or dirtiest superstars
in the league in their position by their own teammates and other teams, each
agreed to join the Patriots for a fair price--and have not caused problems
once they were on a team that valued winning.

The Patriots did draft a lot of their players, but that just proves my point
that they did not waste money on the top college players in the draft, but
traded their top picks to other teams for multiple picks. When they wanted
proven talent, they got it via players who wanted out of their current
situation in other teams, like those three.

I guess the startup lesson here is to focus the entire team on winning over
customers and fixing problems, and super stars who make a lot of money but are
discontent with their peers at their current endeavors will want to join you,
for less money, to help create something amazing together. Oh, and make sure
you also have Tom Brady, apparently.

My goal was to provide some football-related (article-related) motivation. You
guys are right about what I said regarding the Patriots being the smartest
team--I haven't been able to find any article to confirm what I had thought I
read at one point. Thanks for replying!

