Auburn Analysis

aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

Auburn football analysis, with some basketball sprinkled in

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Why Auburn’s offense sucks, in four gifs

(Quick programming note: no review for the Georgia game because I was out of town for work and no review for the LSU game because I’m going to sound like a broken record; in lieu of this, I’m going to do a much more succinct version that still covers everything.)

Auburn was unable to recreate the magic of 2021 on Saturday in Death Valley and picked up their third straight loss to open SEC play. While I think most of us expected to lose this game, probably by a significant margin, that doesn’t make the offense’s performance any less embarrassing. Even with the luxury of a bye week, Freeze and Montgomery couldn’t manage to find a solution to get Auburn’s offense to execute consistently. I think that’s a pretty clear indication that the problems with Auburn’s offense are pretty much baked in at this point.

To illustrate the core of this problem, let’s take a look at what are supposed to be the foundation of Auburn’s offense: RPOs. Auburn’s RPO volume has been much lower than I expected it to be going into this season, which was surprising until I started watching the film and saw a pretty consistent issue with Auburn’s failed RPOs.

First, though, let’s take a look at how this is supposed to work. On this play, Auburn is running a counter play to the left, with the wide receiver on that side running a glance route. The idea is that if the playside safety comes down to fill a gap against the run, giving the defense an extra man in the box, Thorne will pull the ball and throw the glance route into the space the safety vacated; if he stays home, he’ll just hand the ball off and the offense should have favorable numbers to run the ball. Here, you can see that the safety triggers hard on the run, leaving a wide open space for Thorne to hit the receiver on the glance route.

However, while RPOs are great, they do come with a caveat: they really only work against zone coverage. That’s because RPOs rely on putting a defensive player in conflict between pass and run responsibilities. In zone coverage, there will always be players (usually outside linebackers or safeties) who have a dual responsibility for covering a gap in the run game and a zone in the passing game, so the offense can always make them wrong.

Against man coverage, however, all of the defenders are either responsible for covering a particular receiver or filling a gap in the run game. There’s nobody who’s in conflict, so there’s nobody the offense can read. Thus, the defense can cover both phases of the RPO without compromising their coverage scheme or their gap assignments.

Here’s an example where the defense is in man coverage and completely locks down the pass phase, forcing Auburn to run the ball against unfavorable numbers in the box. Auburn is running an inside zone scheme combined with a stick route by the slot receiver. Usually, Thorne would be reading an outside linebacker in zone coverage here, but since LSU is in man, he has no choice but to hand it off, and the run gets stuffed for minimal gain.

Generally, when there’s man coverage, the QB will hand off, since throwing an RPO against man coverage is asking for trouble unless your receivers can just win one-on-one, which isn’t really the point of an RPO. More on that later. But first, here’s an example of trying to throw against tight coverage. I don’t think LSU is actually in man here, but it’s the same effect. Auburn is running an inside zone read paired with an arrow route by the H-back, creating a form of triple option. Robby correctly reads the DE crashing on the dive and pulls the ball, only to find the H-back locked down and pursuit in his face. He probably does the best thing here and just chucks it away. I want to add that this is also bad play design; as the telestrator so helpfully notes, the DB lined up over the inside receiver on the unbalanced side of the line (who is ineligible to receive a pass) and just chases down the play. Too easy, especially for a talented defensive playmaker like Perkins.

So what do? How does the offense deal with man coverage in the RPO game? A common way is to build a man-beater into the play. This is sometimes referred to as a pre-snap look (PSL), where a receiver on the backside of the play runs some sort of route to take advantage of the leverage of the guy covering him. Usually this is something like running a quick hitch against a soft corner or (in this case) running a fade route against a corner who is pressed up.

Of course, this assumes that the WR can actually win that one-on-one, and as you can see, that’s not the case here. This has been a problem for Auburn all year, and it continued against LSU. Auburn is running a counter play with a stick route paired on the backside. LSU is in man, which Thorne correctly identifies, so he decides to work the PSL. Of course, the receiver isn’t open at all (and Thorne overthrew him so badly the ball probably landed in Lake Pontchartrain anyway).

That’s how the defense thwarts all three phases of the RPO game. Man coverage is a perpetual problem for teams that build their offenses around their RPO games, which requires these teams to carry solutions to man coverage (which Brent Dearmon, a former GA under Gus who’s now the head coach at North Alabama, calls “manswers”).

Generally these consist of one of two things. The first is man-beating pass concepts, like the late Mike Leach’s beloved mesh. (For more on that, see the Cal review from a few weeks ago.) Of course, that still requires your receivers to be able to beat defenders if the concept can’t engineer an open receiver, something Auburn obviously can’t do with any consistency.

The other is to involve the QB in the run game, reading the extra defender in the box who would usually be unblockable because the offense doesn’t have enough blockers available. This has been the most consistent source of offense for Auburn all season, but the coaches seem weirdly hesitant to commit to it even though both QBs have proven pretty proficient in it. I think this is because orienting your offense around the read option game requires building the rest of the offense to protect the read option game. In particular, this means having play-action for when the defense inevitably brings additional defenders down to stop the run, something has often struggled with after having some success in the QB run game because teams just don’t fear the Tigers’ downfield threats.

The good news for Auburn is that their conference schedule was heavily front-loaded. They should have a talent advantage over the rest of the teams on the schedule until the Iron Bowl against a Bama team that looks like it could be vulnerable to some Jordan-Hare voodoo. However, we’ve already seen Auburn’s receivers struggle to win consistently against inferior teams before (particularly against Cal). Maybe Auburn can finally get things rolling in the RPO game and establish something of an offensive identity over the final few weeks to create some momentum going into the future. There are still plenty of wins on the table if the offense can just be competent, but more than anything, the new coaching staff needs some proof of concept to get recruits and fans to buy in. Can they manage that? For now, color me skeptical.

aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

i thought this was interesting and not behind a paywall. we need something new to chew on. the reaction was some loved it and some laughed.

aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

they have one for aTm and the cal game but ya gotta let me know if you are interested. i believe for some it is too much reading? silence means no updates on the others........

AUpreacherman22 · October 24, 2023

14 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

they have one for aTm and the cal game but ya gotta let me know if you are interested. i believe for some it is too much reading? silence means no updates on the others........

Good stuff Fiddy!

AUGoo · October 24, 2023

LIke it!

aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

Auburn @ Texas A&M Film Review: Game of Thornes?

Auburn’s second road trip of the season looked a lot like its first, with an absolutely hideous offensive performance that almost required the Ludovico technique to watch a second time.

I managed to sit through it though, and if you’re reading this, then I guess you’re willing to as well. If you’re not, this is your last chance to click away.

For those lucky enough to have missed it or to have spent Saturday on the golf course the way I wish I could have, Auburn struggled to get anything going on offense for the entire game and put up one of its worst offensive performances in recent memory, even worse than the leanest of the lean during the Potato Famine. I was hoping that rewatching the film would show a clear problem that we could fix and immediately turn things around, but it wasn’t just one thing. Almost everyone shoulders some degree of blame here, suggesting that there are systemic issues that are gonna take more than one season to fix. I think we all knew that going into this season (or I hope we did anyway) but it was still frustrating if not outright dismaying to see it play out in such an extreme fashion on a national stage.
This review is going to focus exclusively on the offense because this loss is entirely their fault. Blaming the defense for this loss would be like blaming the bulkheads on the Titanic for failing instead of blaming the crew for driving it into the iceberg. The only thing I can fault the defense for is Eugene Asante deciding to score a meaningless touchdown in a game we were gonna lose anyway instead of sending Jimbo Fisher to the shadow realm and becoming an instant college football legend. I can even picture the Asante-trucking-Jimbo statue on the Jordan-Hare concourse, right between Bo and Cam.

Anyway, enough metaphorical disasters, let’s get into a real one. Auburn won the opening toss, deferred, and held Texas A&M to a field goal after a long, weird, meandering drive. On their opening play of the game, the Tigers offense goes with a variation of counter we’ve seen them use a few times this season, with the center rather than the guard trapping the playside defensive end. The H-back runs to the flat on an arrow route and Thorne is reading the defensive end to either hand off or keep and then the slot defender to keep or throw the arrow. Texas A&M sends the nickel on a blitz, and after Thorne gets a pull read from the DE, the nickel is in his face before he has a chance to throw the arrow. Texas A&M DC D. J. Durkin clearly came into this game with a plan to bring the heat and it paid dividends from the very first play.

After Thorne was tackled for little gain again on second down, the Tigers faced the first of many third and longs in this game. Auburn starts in a trips look before motioning to a 2×2 look. This is a shallow cross concept, where the X receiver runs a shallow crossing route with the Y receiver running a dig route from the opposite side. The idea behind this concept is to either get the LBs to bite down on the shallow, opening up the dig, or to get the LBs to sink on the dig, leaving space for the shallow. It’s coupled with motion and a switch release to combat man coverage, although A&M is in some type of zone here (I think cover 4). Both the shallow and the dig are open here, and either of them probably would’ve gotten the first down. I’m not sure which of them Thorne was actually trying to throw to (I’m not sure he knew either), but either way he misses and it’s a punt.

After another A&M field goal, Auburn’s second possession got off to a much more promising start than the first. On first down, Auburn goes to one of its bread and butter concepts, GH counter with a stick RPO tag. Thorne hands it off and there’s really not much there up the middle, but Jarquez Hunter bounces it to the outside and gets a first down.

Rather than pushing the tempo, Auburn uses a strange tactic they’d return to over and over in this game for reasons that are unclear to me. They align in a 3×2 empty set before shifting to a 3×1 wing alignment. If this was supposed to elicit some type of reaction from the Aggie defense, I’m not sure what it was. To me, it just looked like a waste of time. The actual play goes well though, as Auburn brings the Z receiver in motion and runs a similar concept to their first play of the game, this time pairing a split zone run with the arrow to the motion man. The motion across the formation enhances the split flow action in the backfield and Jarquez has a wide open cutback lane for another first down. Note that A&M brought the nickel blitz again but the H-back is able to take him out of the play. I’m not sure if that was a conscious adjustment to the first drive or if this was still the pregame script, but it made sense.

The Tigers returned to the same concept two plays later and again, they’re able to cancel an Aggie blitz and pick up another first down.

And then we get to this. Auburn runs a play that I honestly hate: a toss read off of GT counter action. I have a long, abiding hatred for shotgun toss sweeps that goes back to a fumble in a high school game 17 years ago that I doubt anyone else remembers, but even when it does work, it looks hideous. This play…does not work. The idea is similar to a standard read option play: the QB reads the DE and will either run the counter or toss the ball to the RB depends on what he does; the H-back is supposed to arc block the corner with the WR cracking the run support player (I assume), but Texas A&M brings the corner on a blitz and Brandon Frazier has no chance of picking him up, allowing him to blow the play up. Thorne makes the correct read and is very, very fortunate that his toss was ever so slightly forward, leading to it being ruled an incompletion rather than a scoop-and-score. I’ll spare you the runback that didn’t count and the interminable review (alas, the NCAA has yet to implement my proposed official review pitch clock).

Having been given new life through Auburn Jesus’ first appearance of the day, the Tigers immediately decided to waste the opportunity. I’m honestly not sure what the pass concept is here; it looks like a quick out or stick route, combined with a post-wheel or scissors concept, something Auburn ran a few times out of 3×1 sets in this game. However, it barely matters what the receivers are doing; A&M comes with a six-man pressure, and Auburn is unable to pick it up with six protectors; Jarquez does his best but gets blown up, leading to a sack and a (near disastrous) punt that nets…six yards, despite an incredible effort from Oscar Chapman to even get it off in the first place. Bizarre game management there, especially considering that Alex McPherson was allowed to attempt (and converted) a field goal from roughly similar distance later in the first half.

Auburn came out on the next drive and went back to the air, this time deciding to move Payton Thorne out of the pocket and away from the teeth of the A&M pass rush. This is a simple flood concept: three receivers running at different depths on the same side of the field, hoping to create a three-on-two overload against a zone defense. Thorne isn’t exactly great at throwing on the run and doesn’t deliver the best ball here, but he gets it to Battie in space, which is always a good idea, and he’s able to scamper out to the 40 for a first down.

However, on the next snap, Auburn decides to try to use Thorne’s legs directly and it doesn’t go so well. Running a draw when you’re getting pressured makes sense in general terms, but it should have been obvious pre-snap that this wasn’t gonna end well. Auburn motions the H-back out of the backfield and the Aggie nickelback comes down the line to the edge of the box showing blitz. Thorne either doesn’t see it or doesn’t recognize the problem here and goes ahead with the called play, which predictably gets blown up to put Auburn behind the chains yet again.

After Thorne overthrew a receiver who wasn’t really open anyway, the Tigers offense was looking at another third and long and a passing situation. I’m not exactly sure what Auburn is running here (thanks TV camera angles). This time, Thorne makes one of the few good decisions he made in this game, seeing and avoiding the pass rush, escaping the pocket, and finding Shane Hooks at the sticks for the first down.

On the ensuing first down, Auburn goes with another tactic that we’ve discussed before here: stacking the outside receivers to create confusion among the defenders about who is responsible for covering whom. In this case, it’s just a simple RPO with Auburn’s base inside zone run and a quick receiver screen; A&M matched the numbers but Thorne likes the leverage of the DBs (I assume) and throws the screen for positive yardage. This was one of the few times during the game where I thought that we were actually doing a decent job of consistently executing our core concepts. It was also one of the last, so don’t get used to it.

After a good run picked up another first down, Auburn found themselves back in scoring territory. On first down, the Tigers used that weird shift followed by the receiver motion again, but the Jarquez Hunter does a good job of being patient and making a decisive cut for another first down…that was subsequently wiped out by a hold. Longtime readers of the blog (aka people who read the last post) will know that this has been something of a theme for Auburn this season: get a drive going, get to the edge of scoring territory, commit a stupid penalty and kill the scoring opportunity. More to come.

Thorne managed a short completion on the replayed first down, and then on second down, Auburn went back to that post-wheel concept they had run earlier in the game. This looks like the way Mike Leach would run the stick concept out of 3×1 sets, with the #1 and #2 receivers running a post-wheel and the #3 receiver running the stick.

(Shoutout to Millennial Football for the image)

Despite Auburn already having run it a couple of times, A&M completely busts this coverage and leaves the wheel wide open for a walk-in touchdown…but Thorne throws the ball into the next county. The #1 rule of playing QB is that you never overthrow a wide open receiver. If that ball is anywhere near him, it’s an easy touchdown. Maybe the fact that he’d already been under significant pressure much of the game got to Thorne, as it looks like he’s got happy feet here and never really sets to throw, which was a frequent problem early in the career of another Auburn QB who has since gone onto bigger and better things elsewhere. No ambiguity here, this one is 100% on Thorne.

After a false start, Auburn was right back in the same place they’d already spent much of the game: third and long. Here, Auburn opts for some type of double post concept (could be mistaken for outside choice but I’m almost certain it’s not). For once, the pass rush is actually picked up pretty well, Thorne stands in the pocket and delivers a catchable ball to the receiver on the post route that would have been close to the first down and he…drops it. The throw was a bit high, but if you want to be a starting WR in the SEC, you’ve got to catch those types of balls.

Auburn and Texas A&M exchanged punts again, netting a loss of about 20 yards. On the first play of the next series, Auburn goes with some type of play action concept (not sure what it was, thanks again TV camera angles), Thorne actually gets through his progression, finds his checkdown, and he manages some great yardage after the catch to get the Tigers out to midfield.

Once again, instead of pushing the tempo and getting the next snap off as quickly as possible, Auburn opts for that weird shift from 3×2 to a 3×1 wing set. This is just baffling to me and I can’t really discern any explanation for it. The playcall is the same as it was on the previous plays where they used that shift, a split zone play with an arrow to the backside. This one is dead in the water though as the TE completely whiffs on his block and the LB stuffs the run for no gain.

On the next snap, Auburn tries another QB draw and actually finds some success…but it’s wiped out by a holding penalty. This is really a nice microcosm of the game here, because even when the other parts of the offense are working well, someone manages to make a mistake that undoes all of that good work. Sometimes it was bad playcalling from the coaches. Other times, it was Thorne making bad decisions or missing open receivers when he wasn’t under pressure. Still other times, the offensive line missed an assignment in run blocking or pass protection or committed a penalty that negated a good play. The plays where all three of those parts of the offense came together and avoided mistakes went well, but those were few and far between.

Thorne ate a sack on the replayed second down where he stepped right into pressure against a three-man rush even though he had an open receiver and time to hit him, followed by a give-up run call on third down that actually got the Tigers back into A&M territory. Here we have more bad game management from the coaching staff. 4th and 4 at the opponent’s 44 midway through the game is a bit of a gray area, but the math says that you’d increase your win probability by about 2.5% by going for it and converting here. I can understand their lack of faith in the offense to get four yards, but the defense was playing well and the amount of field position you gain from punting there is relatively small. They should have gone for it here. I didn’t end up changing much since they got the ball back in identical field position after the exchange of punts, but it was still the wrong call.

Auburn opened its last possession of the half on the fringes of scoring territory and on the fringes of the #MiddleEight. For the first time in this game, the Tigers offense started under center, shifting from a heavily unbalanced set and then motioning to create a bunch to the right. There’s only one play I’ve ever seen Freeze’s offenses at Ole Miss and Liberty run out of this type of set, and it was a toss sweep (incidentally, that’s about the only thing Gus ever ran from the under center bunch sets he used out of fire alarms). And what do you know, toss sweep. Not much doing there. Kind of predictable. I like the idea of shifting the TEs across the formation to flip the run strength (one of the very very very few good ideas that we saw on offense during the Potato Famine) but it works better if you snap it as soon as they’re set rather than giving the defense time to reset their front.

However, that toss sweep did set up an interesting fourth down call. Auburn got a good gain on the ground on second down, followed by getting stuffed on 3rd and 1. On the ensuing fourth and short, Auburn showed that toss sweep and ran a naked bootleg to the backside. If you’re old like me, you might remember another famous naked bootleg in short yardage: Stan White’s game-winning fourth-and-goal touchdown run against Indiana in the 1990 Peach Bowl. Thorne’s relative lack of speed shows on this play, but he manages to helicopter his way to a first down. Good call, maybe not the exact personnel you’d want running it.

Following that conversion, with about two minutes left (the tempo on this drive was oddly slow given the situation), Auburn went to the air looking for a big chunk. This looks like some kind of dagger concept with a wheel route to the outside and a shallow from the other side, maybe hoping to elicit the same kind of coverage bust Auburn got on that post-wheel concept where Thorne overthrew an easy touchdown earlier in the quarter. It’s actually an interesting design, combining the post-wheel on the frontside with a levels read on the backside and I don’t think Auburn went back to it, which is a shame. However, once again, it hardly matters what the receivers were doing, as the RG whiffs on the DE, forcing Thorne to take evasive action and allowing the fifth rusher to get home.

Auburn managed to get a bit of the sack yardage back on a second-down run to set up third and 8. Not ideal, but shorter than the average third down yardage for Auburn in this game if you can believe it. Auburn uses a bunch set for the first time in this game (one of the first times all season I think), with the idea being similar to the two-receiver stack: create confusion about coverage responsibility and create rubs against man coverage. This is a drive concept, which is a variation of the shallow cross concept we discussed earlier; in this case, though, the shallow crossing route and the dig route come from the same side of the formation. However, and stop me if you’ve heard this one before, Auburn fails to pick up a six-man blitz with six pass protectors.

By this point, A&M has realized Auburn’s pass protection is a sieve and they were bringing the house on almost every passing down, knowing that Thorne wasn’t going to make quick enough decisions to punish them. Alex McPherson was nonetheless able to convert the field goal and prevent the Tigers’ offense putting up a bagel in the first half.

For those hoping to see some second-half adjustments, I’m afraid you’re out of luck (although I’m generally not a believer in the idea of second half adjustments and I doubt Auburn’s problems in this game were something you could adjust your way out of). On the first play of the second half, A&M picked right back up where they left off, bringing the heat with impunity and once again creating a negative play, as the backside rush is able to get to the RB from behind.

Following a sack and a false start, Auburn was once again in a third and very long situation, backed up against their own end zone. In this situation, A&M was content to drop eight defenders into coverage, figuring that it wasn’t necessary to apply pressure in that situation. They were completely right, as the nose bullies his way right through a double team, forcing Thorne to bail out and try to find his checkdown, which he was unable to do (probably for the best because he would have been tackled for a loss and gotten lit up in the process had he caught the ball). I know I’ve been critical of him, but I feel for Thorne here. It’s hard to play QB when your line can’t even pick up a three man-rush.

On the next series, now down 13-0, the coaching staff enters the “throw stuff at the wall and see if it sticks” phase of the contest, bringing Robby Ashford off the bench in place of Payton Thorne, presumably hoping his legs could provide enough of a spark to reignite a stagnant offense. Except…they didn’t really use his legs on this series? Very weird sequence here.

On first down, Auburn lines up with two backs and a tight end, which already raises questions since having that many players in the backfield is just inviting more defenders into the box, which makes no sense when you’re struggling to block even against light boxes. I don’t think this counter play even had a read component, which makes it even weirder. The RB doesn’t really give the blocks time to set up on the playside, and it’s stuffed for no gain. (Not sure why the video gets dark there, I assume it’s something like the part of the crucifixion story where the sky turns dark because God has to turn away from the sight of the embodiment of sin.)

This was followed by an incompletion where Ashford overthrew a receiver who may have had a step on the defender on a deep post route by about 10 yards, followed by another false start and a play that would have been a coverage sack if it weren’t for Robby’s legs, and where it wouldn’t have mattered anyway since Auburn still managed to get called for a hold. Shaky QB play followed by a comedy of errors from the offensive line. The more things change, the more they stay the same. No need to sit through any more of it. Onward.

Auburn went three and out again on the next series, but got the ball back with four seconds left in the quarter. Here, for the first time all game, Auburn goes to a vertical choice concept. I can kind of understand why they hadn’t run it before, given that Auburn could barely protect long enough to throw short passes, but this again calls into question whether Auburn has the personnel to really make vertical choice a significant component of the offense. It should go without saying that even though the receiver managed to stack the corner, the ball was underthrown and incomplete. After a short run by Robby and a debacle of a play by Thorne that nearly ended as the most embarrassing fumble ever, Auburn punted the ball away yet again.

The next Aggie possession gave us the hilarious Asante scoop and score for Auburn’s only touchdown of the game, followed by a punt that left Auburn backed up on their own 10 yard line. On the ensuing series, Auburn was essentially at a make or break point in the game, where they had to score or the game would have been over. Thankfully, the Tigers finally decided to run plays that properly used Robby Ashford’s skill set. On the first play of the series, Auburn brings a receiver in motion to use him as an extra blocker on a zone read play. This is known as arc read, where the extra blocker pulls around the end to care of the run support player on the perimeter (i.e. arc blocks, named for the shape of his path) in case the QB pulls the ball; this was a staple of Gus Malzahn’s offense during the Nick Marshall era and it works well here too.

Two plays later, Auburn went to a concept I had been begging the TV for since Robby entered the game. This is what’s known as a bash concept (an abbreviation for “back away”). Many even-front (four-defensive-lineman) defenses will respond to shotgun sets by setting the strength of their defensive line to the side where the back is lined up, usually with a defensive tackle in a 3-technique (on the outside shoulder of the guard) and the defensive end in a 5-tech (on the outside shoulder of the tackle) or a 6-tech (directly over the tight end), since this tends to be a difficult look to run core plays like inside zone and power against. Bash concepts take advantage of that by having the RB show run action across the formation while the QB runs to the side where the defensive line set its strength (i.e. where the angles are favorable for gap runs like power and counter).

Here, you can see A&M has loaded up the left side of the line. Auburn runs its basic GT counter scheme, leaving the defensive end to the wide side of the field unblocked; Robby will either hand it to the RB on the sweep to the right or pull it and run the counter based on what he does. In this case, he crashes down (as defensive ends are usually coached to do in response to the tackle pulling away), opening up space for the sweep and Auburn’s longest run of the game (that probably should’ve had another 15 tacked on but whatever).

After that big gain, Auburn does something else that I’d been clamoring for: exploiting the defense’s disorganization by pushing the tempo after an explosive play. This is a pretty basic idea in any hurry up offense, but Auburn scarcely did it at all in this game, often stopping to substitute instead (a common source of frustration during the late-stage Gus era as well). Here Auburn goes back to the first play of the series, running an arc read off of WR motion and it’s another successful first down run (and may have gone for six if not for a shoestring tackle). One thing I don’t like is how Robby just stands there after handing off; he should continue his fake past the line of scrimmage to try and hold the second- and third-level defenders as long as possible. Not a huge thing but one of those little details that coaches and players on good teams pay attention to.

On the next play, the coaching staff keeps the good times rolling, doing yet another good thing. This is really RPO football 101: you use the pass component to punish a defender for playing aggressively to stop one of your base runs by throwing the ball where he came from. Auburn shows outside zone action with an arrow route to the backside; A&M brings a blitz from the field and Robby correctly dishes the ball out to the arrow for a first down. Not exactly great mechanics on the throw but as I often say on the golf course, it’s not how, it’s how many.

However, for whatever reason, the coaching staff decides to go to the air on the ensuing first down. Yes, I know that the analytics say that passing on first down is almost always optimal, but we were running the ball well at tempo, and the pass they called makes no sense. This looks like a screen-and-go route, which is designed to punish the defense for crashing down aggressively on the ubiquitous quick WR screens that most teams use in their RPO game. But up to this point, I think Auburn had only thrown one receiver screen and it went for a good gain, so there’s no reason to try to run a play that exploits the defense doing something that it wasn’t really doing (i.e. jumping the screen). Robby makes something out of nothing and gets five yards on the scramble, but it was still a weird call.

After a successful second down run, Auburn had a first down at the Aggie 28, the farthest Auburn had advanced into Aggie territory all day (with less than seven minutes in the game, yikes). I think this is another vertical choice concept, again a single choice. The receiver looks like he has outside leverage on the defender, but Robby throws it to the inside. Not sure if it’s a bad read or a bad throw, but he’s probably lucky it wasn’t picked off. The receiver nearly manages to manufacture a miraculous catch and make something out of nothing, but it falls incomplete.

Following a run that was blown up by a heavy blitz and a holding penalty, Auburn was backed way up into third and 25 at the Aggie 43. A decent gain here would give Auburn a shot at a field goal to cut it to a one-score game with more than enough time to get the ball back and score again. I assume this was the coaching staff’s rationale, but the playcall here is just bad. The Tigers bring the X receiver in motion behind the QB to pull the defense to the right so they can throw a slip screen to the RB to the left (with a bit of a statue-of-liberty action, which I assume was Brother Hugh’s way of pouring one out for his departed homie Gus). This play hasn’t worked at any point this season (or any other season), and it doesn’t work here either. Quelle surprise.

This really felt like a give-up call rather than one that was trying to set up a field goal attempt. Even more baffling, however, is the decision that followed it: Freeze elected to punt the ball back to Texas A&M. Yes, it would be a long shot to convert that fourth down, but you’re probably not getting much more than 20 yards of field position here, which is meaningless when you’re down two scores with just over five minutes left in the game. The folly of this decision was exposed on the second play of the next drive, as the Aggies busted an 80-yard run against an exhausted Auburn defense that finally reached a breaking point after a valiant effort at keeping Auburn in this game to the very end. The Aggies scored a touchdown to make it a 17-point game with four minutes to go and sent Auburn packing with their first loss of the season.

From an offensive perspective, there’s no amount of lipstick that’s gonna pretty up this pig. This was one of the worst offensive performances in the recent history of Auburn football. The Tigers never reached the Aggies’ red zone, much less threatened the end zone. There were a myriad of problems: the offensive line was very poor in pass protection (although surprisingly good in run blocking), giving Payton Thorne very few real opportunities to make plays down the field. When those few opportunities did arise, Thorne overthrew open receivers. The playcalling didn’t do him any real favors either, with a number of inefficient run-run-pass and run-pass-pass sequences; once Robby entered the game, it took the coaches a couple of possessions to reorient the offense to his skill set, which made no sense and allowed Texas A&M to build a three-score lead before they got things figured out. The vacillation in schematic ideas really looked like an offense that was experiencing an identity crisis, with no discernible logic to the playcalling or use of personnel.

So where does Auburn go from here? I don’t think there’s much cause for optimism over the next couple of games, as the Tigers are likely to take two beatings at the hands of Georgia and LSU before a home date with the coach who might be regretting his offseason decisions right now. That game feels like the make or break point, as Auburn has two more winnable games after that, hosting Mississippi State and then traveling to Vanderbilt. Each of the last six games on the schedule looks winnable if Auburn can get its act in gear on offense, but it’s hard to see how that’s going to happen right now. The offense looks every bit like the MacGyvered unit that it is, none of the QBs looks especially confident or competent, nobody has stepped up to become a go-to guy in the receiving corps, and the RBs haven’t been able to pick up the slack because defenses don’t fear Auburn’s passing game at all.

I don’t know if there’s really a schematic quick fix to this. It feels like something of a vicious circle: Auburn (ostensibly) wants to build the offense around vertical choice concepts and RPOs, but both of those struggle against man coverage if your receivers can’t win one-on-ones consistently. With the defenses playing man coverage, they can get +1 in the box to stop the run game and there’s no pass option available to equalize the numbers (as we discussed after the Cal game). The easiest way around that would be to run man-beating pass concepts, but our offensive line struggled to protect even a three-step drop and teams aren’t afraid to bring the heat because they know it’ll get home. Bringing Robby in to run some read option helped alleviate the +1 in the box issue and seemed to be a solution until A&M realized there was little threat of the pass with him in the game and sent 6 and even 7 on blitzes to blow up those runs in the backfield. Every possible solution to our problems is short-circuited by a shortcoming somewhere else.

Whatever optimism the first three games had engendered is gone and we’ve been brought down to earth. There’s not going to be a preposterous 2013-type run here. This really is a year zero, and the real way forward is probably going to come down to improving the roster over the long term and doing whatever we can to keep our heads above water in the meantime. My own thoughts have gone from wondering if we could muster a bit of Jordan-Hare voodoo against Georgia this week to wondering what will be higher: the number of points we give up or the number of passing yards we manage. I’m…not optimistic it’ll be the latter. Eat at AUrby’s.

September 27, 2023

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aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

Auburn @ Cal Film Review

Auburn defeated the Cal Golden Bears 14-10 on Saturday night/Sunday morning, because the rules of football state that one team has to win the game even if neither team deserves to. Congratulations to those of y’all who were smart enough not to stay up until 2 a.m. watching that. Before you go any further, you should acquire one of those lead bodysuits the Chernobyl liquidators wore, because otherwise you’ll receive a lethal dose of radiation from this film. It’s already too late for the rest of us.

OFFENSE

After a pretty encouraging performance (with some caveats) against UMass, the flaws in Auburn’s offense were on full display against Cal. The Tigers’ offensive output was a pitiful 230 yards on just 55 snaps, with 5.5 yards per attempt in the passing game and fewer than four yards per carry on the ground. It’s hard to single out any one aspect of Auburn’s performance that was particularly bad when almost none of it was good, but I think I have an idea of what the core problems are with Auburn’s offense at the moment, and I’ll try to elaborate on those more as we go through these clips.

One of the biggest issues for Auburn over the last two years was the total lack of any sort of identity on offense. The hires of Hugh Freeze and Philip Montgomery brought in two coaches with defined offensive styles, and there was some question as to whether those styles could come together to create a cohesive identity. In the UMass game, we saw some of Montgomery’s fingerprints on the offense with the use of vertical choice concepts, but those concepts were almost absent from the Cal game. This wasn’t necessarily an identity crisis for Auburn’s offense, but it did hearken back to some of the questions I raised in my season preview article as to whether Auburn had the personnel at WR and OL to run those concepts effectively.

Cal’s defense is exactly the type of defense that can frustrate an offense that wants to build its identity around vertical choice concepts and RPOs. Justin Wilcox has never been afraid to play man coverage and dare the opposition to beat his secondary one-on-one, even against much more talented teams. If your receivers can’t win one-on-ones, it’s very hard to run vertical choice, because those concepts are premised on beating the opposing DB deep.

Man coverage also poses a problem for RPOs, because RPOs depend on attacking defensive players who are in conflict between run and pass responsibilities; if the defense is playing straight man coverage across the board, then nobody is in conflict because they’re either playing run or pass, so there’s nobody to key for an RPO read.

Cal was generally playing man free coverage, also known as Cover 1, where the defensive backs are all in man coverage, aside from the free safety, who plays deep zone coverage to provide help over the top. By using only one deep safety, the defense allows itself to put an extra defender into the box to stop the run. Thus, for much of the night, Auburn was faced with the prospect of a defense that was +1 in the box and had all of the receivers locked down in man coverage.

So, what do? In this situation, there are a few possible solutions. The first is to just beat them in man coverage, but as we’ll see, Auburn’s receivers struggled to do that. The second is to run pass concepts that are designed to attack man coverage, which we’ll discuss later. Finally, you can involve the QB more in the run game, which will equalize the numbers in the box and allow you to run the ball again.

The conundrum caused by facing a loaded box and man coverage really exposed Auburn’s lack of a clear go-to player on offense. This extended both to the receiving corps (where, thankfully, Rivaldo Fairweather finally stepped up) and the QB position, where Freeze and Montgomery spent much of the second and third quarters re-enacting the 2016 Clemson game, trying to figure out whether either of Auburn’s QBs could make something happen and largely failing.

However, with that criticism of the coaching staff established, I do want to add that a lot of Auburn’s problems on offense were self-inflicted wounds. Four turnovers, three sacks, and seven penalties will sink you, no matter how good your gameplan is. If the Tigers hadn’t shot themselves in the foot several times, they could have made the score much more comfortable (although the same could be said for Cal’s kicker doing his best Cade Foster impression).

Okay, enough rambling, let’s get to the film and see how these problems played out and how Auburn managed to do just enough to survive. The comically bad conclusion to Auburn’s first drive illustrates a lot of what I was talking about above. Auburn lines up in a 3×2 empty formation and Cal sets up to play man free (which is easy to see as they align a defender over every receiver and a single safety deep). Cal only rushes three here, dropping the other two box defenders to spy Payton Thorne or disrupt short routes. I can’t really tell what Auburn is running here concept-wise, but it’s some kind of vertical/curl thing. Thorne has time, but nobody gets open and he’s eventually flushed out of the pocket. He doesn’t switch the ball to his outside arm, and he’s very lucky this play was blown dead because it should have been a touchdown for Cal. Yikes.

After the first of many heroic efforts by Auburn’s defense to limit Cal to just a field goal, the offense immediately provided another lowlight. Facing a third and 6 from their own 9, Auburn lines up in a 2×2 set and runs what looks like some type of sail route after motioning the Z receiver into a stack alignment. Again, Cal is in man free here, and again, nobody is able to get any separation for Auburn, leading to another coverage sack (that was nearly a safety). Sensing a pattern yet?

Following another excellent defensive stand and the first of many missed field goals by Cal, Auburn’s offense briefly showed a bit of a pulse on its next possession. On second and 5 from their own 30, Auburn uses one of the options I mentioned above to counteract a defense that’s determined to play man and keep +1 in the box: getting the QB involved in the run game. Obviously Payton Thorne isn’t Robby Ashford, but he’s fast enough to do what you need him to in this situation: pull the ball and get five yards if the defense gives it to you. This is a basic zone read with the TE arc blocking the run support player on the perimeter; the DE pinches, so Thorne pulls it and gets an easy first down. (Note, however, that Cal actually wasn’t in man here; this looks like some type of Cover 3 match.)

But after that, it’s right back to the same old problems. On third and 8, Auburn goes to the vertical choice concept for the first time this game, in this case running outside choice to the #1 receiver on the right. Cal shows press man, but the corner bails hard at the snap and the receiver can’t win deep. Thorne tries to look elsewhere with the ball, but since the backside receivers on vertical choice are told to do nothing, there’s nowhere for him to go, and he just has to throw it away, leading to another punt.

After an exchange of punts, the subsequent Auburn possession brought a rare bright spot: a successful RPO. Auburn lines up in a tight bunch set with three receivers and the RB to the left. This is an outside zone run combined with a bubble screen; it’s a weird-looking design, but it makes sense, because the outside zone scheme allows Auburn’s OL to get leverage on the pinched-in defensive line and the bunched receivers have good angles to seal the other defenders inside, opening up some space for Ja’Varrius Johnson to work on the screen and pick up the first down.

At the start of the second quarter, Robby Ashford made his first appearance, because the offense was getting into too much of a rhythm and we had to put a stop to that. While Robby was effective in the red zone last week, bringing him in like this is too predictable, because the defense knows the QB run is coming. This lands Auburn behind the chains and on third and long, the coaches don’t seem to trust Robby to throw downfield, so Auburn sets up a screen, which is ineffective due to Cal’s man coverage (and some poor blocking by the OL), forcing yet another punt.

Basically the sole bright spot for the Auburn offense in the first three and a half quarters came on the next possession, after Auburn’s defense forced a fumble and recovered it inside the Cal red zone. This is one of the few times Auburn really went to a true man-beater, which is funny because Cal was actually in zone on this snap (some type of quarters it looks like). This is the mesh concept, made (in)famous by the late Dread Pirate.

The premise is simple: two receivers run crossing routes from opposite directions, hoping to rub off each other’s defenders. If the mesh is tight enough (Leach taught them to slap hands on the way by in practice to make sure they were close enough to one another) it should be impossible for the defenders to stay with the receivers without re-routing, which makes it the ultimate man-beater concept. You can see in this clip that Rivaldo Fairweather is basically just setting a pick on the defender covering Fair (although again, Cal is in zone here and that shouldn’t have mattered).

Auburn combines this with a post-wheel concept on the front side of the play, something Leach also liked to do; Mississippi State scored three touchdowns on Auburn in the second half of the 2021 debacle on this exact play. I’m not really sure what Thorne’s progression was here, but I find it hard to believe he was supposed to read the mesh before the RB on the wheel route, which would have been an easy touchdown; the corner in quarters chased the post even though the safety had it covered and there was nobody to pick up the wheel; Kaylin Moore (#4) kind of tracks the wheel but then sees Fair running into his zone and tries to get back to cover that too, but he ends up not covering either of them and both of them end up wide open. Really strange defensive playcall and uncharacteristically poor execution as well by Cal.

After forcing another Cal punt, Auburn continued to roll with the old Mike Leach staples, in this case the Y Stick concept.

This is actually a very common concept that isn’t unique to the air raid; most teams run it in some form or another. Like mesh, it’s a triangle read, with the #1 receiver running a deep route, the #2 receiver running a 5-yard option route, and the RB releasing to the flat, creating a triangle of receivers on the playside. The QB will peek at the deep route, then throw either the stick or the flat based on what the outside LB does; option football through the air. This is really more of a zone-beater concept, but that’s rendered moot here as the Cal LB on that side blitzes, leaving Damari Alston wide open, as the inside LB has no hope of catching him. Thorne recognizes his hot read and gets the ball out on time for an easy first down.

Two plays later, we see a bit of adaptation from the coaching staff to try to get the RPO game rolling. Auburn is again in a 2×2 set, and they’re going to run an outside zone into the boundary tagged with a stick route by the backside receiver. However, they bring Rivaldo Fairweather in motion from the slot to kick the backside DE, creating a split zone look; this has the added benefit of triggering a rotation from the Cal safeties, so the playside safety, who would have been in good position to make the tackle, actually runs himself out of the play and isn’t able to make the stop until Alston has a first down…and then he fumbles the ball. This is why I said earlier that the Tigers’ struggles on offense weren’t solely on the coaches. This was a good design and playcall, from a coaching perspective you won this play…and then you just drop the ball. C’mon, man.

After another interminable review, Cal was awarded the ball, and finally decided to cash in one of Auburn’s gifts, scoring their only touchdown of the game. On the ensuing possession, Auburn faces a manageable third and 2, but this play really encapsulates the issues the Tigers had in the RPO game for most of the night. This is a split zone run (inside zone with the TE kicking out the backside DE to open up the cutback lane), tagged with a stick route on the backside. The single receiver on the playside is running a fade/stop, which was apparently Thorne’s pre-snap read. I guess he liked the leverage of running the fade against press man, but I can’t imagine the coaches were happy with that decision, especially given what an awful throw it was. That said, both of the other phases of the RPO were busted as well; Cal’s man coverage negated the stick and the extra defender in the box would have blown up the run if he’d handed it off. It’s generally not great when the defense is able to take away all three phases of the RPO with no tradeoffs!

After another exchange of punts, Auburn got the ball back with about a minute and a half left and all of their timeouts, and the coaching staff for whatever reason decided to try to get points before the half when their offense hadn’t done anything for two quarters. The game management was suboptimal, but the failure of this drive is entirely on Thorne. On first and 15 after another dumb penalty, Auburn runs a curl-flat concept from a 3×1 set, anticipating (correctly) that Cal would be in some type of Cover 3. The idea behind this concept, which is as old as the modern passing game, is that you have five receivers underneath and only four zone defenders, so someone should always be open, and indeed, the curl is open to the wide side of the field. Thorne sees the open receiver and…airmails it straight into the arms of the defender. There’s not much to analyze here, this just an awful throw by Thorne. Auburn was once again lucky not be punished for a brutal mistake thanks to Cal’s special teams woes, in this case a penalty wiping out an actual made field goal, and went into the half down three.

After Cal burned off about half the third quarter on a drive that ended with a turnover on downs, we got a Jarquez Hunter sighting. Hunter was underwhelming in this game and looked pretty rusty, but he gets some good blocking here and is able to pick up a first down. This is a weird counter variation, run with the center and tackle instead of the more common guard-tackle counter. We’ll revisit this concept later.

Of course, Auburn’s offense, realizing it was in good field position and had a great chance to retake the lead, immediately set about squandering that opportunity. For whatever reason, the coaching staff decided it was time for another Robby cameo at midfield, and it turned out about as well as it did before. I’m not going to break these two plays down in detail, but note that in both cases, the defense has the line stacked and the offense hopelessly outnumbered in the box because they weren’t afraid of Robby throwing the ball. This was too predictable for the defense, and if the coaching staff wants to keep Robby involved outside of the red zone, they’ve got to get him involved in the downfield passing game or the opposing defenses will just do this all season with the same result.

After, and stop me if you’ve heard this one before, a missed Cal field goal attempt, it’s Robby time yet again. In this case, it’s actually a good play design for getting the QB involved in the run game and it works pretty well. Auburn lines up in a pistol set and runs GT counter with what’s known as a bash scheme. “Bash” is derived from the abbreviation “BA” or “back away”, which means that the offense will fake the RB carrying the ball to one side and then run away from that side with the QB. This isn’t really new (it was a staple for Gus Malzahn a decade ago and my high school was running it in the mid-2000s), but it’s a good way to attack a defense that shifts the defensive line over toward the RB. Robby fakes the sweep to Jeremiah Cobb and then runs the counter with Damari Alston leading for him and it’s a successful run on first down.

On the first play of the fourth quarter, Auburn finds itself in a familiar spot: third and long. In desperation mode, Auburn lines up in a 3×1 set and goes with another old Mike Leach staple: four verts (“6” in air raid terminology). This is exactly what it sounds like: all four receivers run vertical routes with the back check-releasing. Generally, receivers are told to win deep, and if they can’t, to put their foot in the ground to allow a back-shoulder throw, which happens here.

Auburn motions the back out of the backfield for some extra eye candy, but Thorne is looking down the seam to Ja’Varrius Johnson here, but he’s absolutely blanketed by Cal’s man coverage. It’s hard to run verticals when you can’t win those one-on-ones.

But then….

The only times that an Auburn receiver really, convincingly beat man coverage came on the final drive and they both came from Rivaldo Fairweather. On this play, on 3rd and 17 following a sack, Auburn goes back to the well with the 3×1 four verts concept from before, but with a twist (literally). The #2 and #3 receivers (Fairweather and Ja’Varrius Johnson) take a switch release, which is a common tactic against man coverage, and it looks like Cal is in man free coverage here, so that makes sense. Fairweather isn’t able to get over the top of the defender, but he does a good job of slamming on the brakes and using his big body to shield the ball from the defender and makes the catch (while getting interfered with).

On a critical 3rd and 2 later in the drive, Auburn goes with yet another of the air raid staples: Y corner (which some coaches call snag, Leach called it “8”). This is my favorite pass concept in all of football. It’s a triangle read for the QB. The #1 receiver runs a slant route and settles in the hole in the zone coverage; the #2 receiver runs a corner route, and the back runs a swing, setting up a triangle of receivers, which creates both vertical and horizontal stretches on the defense. In this case, though, the wide receivers basically just picking the interior defenders trying to get outside to cover the swing route and it’s successful since Cal is in man coverage here.

And now we’re going to go from my favorite pass play in all of football to my least favorite: the goal line fade. It looks like this is an RPO, with Auburn running that C/T counter concept they kept running out of the pistol with a fade route tagged to the backside. I really don’t like the goal line fade, and the numbers agree with me; it’s just not a very successful play most of the time. However, it can still work if your dude is better than their dude, which is the case here, as Fairweather just straight up Mosses the Cal DB for the game-winning TD. Can’t scheme hops.

Auburn, of course, couldn’t make this easy, fumbling on the first play of their next possession and forcing a final, dramatic defensive stand, which culminated in a fourth-down interception. After that back-breaking pick, the Tigers’ offense was able to pick up a first down on the ground and ice the game. Now that I’ve subjected you to some truly Tubervillian offensive ineptitude, it’s time to turn our attention to the real star of the show, the defense.

DEFENSE

Going into this game, I was somewhat concerned about how Auburn’s offense would match up with Cal’s man-heavy defense, but I was absolutely terrified thinking about how our defense would hold up against Cal’s ground game. Their passing game was a mixed bag against North Texas (thanks in part to the same kind of QB carousel that hamstrng the Auburn offense), but their run game, led by RB Jaydn Ott, gashed the Mean Green. Ott, of course, decided that he was going to run his mouth in the leadup to the Auburn game, which I personally would not do if my team had gone 4-8 last year, but to each his own.

Cal’s rushing success against North Texas was largely based on their execution of their dart concept, which is essentially a standard one-back power play, but with the tackle pulling and blocking the playside LB instead of the guard. So, of course, being the brilliant offensive mind he is, first-year OC Jake Spavital…barely ran it at all against Auburn. Admittedly, dart is mainly used to attack odd fronts and Auburn spent most of the game showing four down linemen, but still a very weird gameplan.

After the aforementioned Thorne fumble on Auburn’s opening possession, the Golden Bears managed to pick up one first down via a short fourth-down run, but quickly found themselves right back in third and long. They dialed up…a screen to Ott. While Auburn defenses of yesteryear often overplayed these screens, which was a key contributor to the Third and Auburn meme, the Auburn linebackers (particularly Eugene Asante) are very disciplined here and are able to stop Ott for basically no gain with some excellent pursuit. This will be a theme.

After a made field goal and a bad Auburn punt, Cal once again had great field position to start their second drive, and once again did nothing with it. They picked up one first down, but then found themselves in another third and long and Spavital again opted for a coward’s playcall, this time a QB draw with the not-especially athletic Ben Finley. One of the keys to Auburn’s defensive improvements against UMass was aggressive playcalling, rushing five or more on almost every snap and making life miserable for Taisun Phommachanh. The Tigers channel that same energy here, rushing five and bringing a delayed stunt with DT Marcus Harris, who blows the play up in the backfield, forcing the first of four missed field goal attempts.

After another Auburn punt, Cal faces another third down, and again, it’s another cowardly playcall from Spavital: a double screen that mirrors the one Auburn would later have blown up on a third and long (see above). They fake the bubble screen to the right and run a slip screen to the left, which is once again read beautifully and blown up by Eugene Asante. If Asante seems to have come out of nowhere, that’s because the Potato Posse had him playing on the scout team last year. Shoutout to ~~Scientologist Doug Barfield~~ Bryan Harsin, who stole every cent Auburn ever paid him.

After yet another Auburn punt, Cal finally decided to go to their bread and butter from the North Texas game, the dart concept, but it backfired in a big way. Donovan Kaufman was a big play machine against UMass, and he kept it up in this game. Jalen McLeod, who had an excellent debut in his own right, does a good job of stringing this play out, allowing Kaufman to come flying up from his safety position, rip the ball out, and recover it inside the Cal 20. Thankfully, Auburn’s offense didn’t waste this spectacular effort, cashing in a touchdown two plays later.

On the ensuing Cal possession, the Golden Bears again got themselves into a third and long. At least this time Spavital tried to get the ball past the sticks, running a post-wheel concept off play-action. Of course, as the great American philosopher Homer Simpson taught us, trying is the first step to failure; the lesson is never try. Auburn’s DBs do a great job of pattern matching and the front six get pressure with a delayed blitz, leaving Finley with nothing to do but throw the ball into the Auburn bench and bring up another punting situation.

After Damari Alston’s fumble, Cal finally found a way to generate a couple of explosive plays with their second QB, Sam Jackson V. This drive saw some of Auburn’s bad tendencies from the UMass game rear their ugly heads again. On this play, the Tigers only rush four and are unable to get pressure with Cal basically in max protection, leaving Jackson time to find an open receiver downfield.

Two plays later, Cal gets its first big play on the ground. This is a zone slice scheme, with the H-back pulling across the formation to lead for the zone run. Wesley Steiner creeps too far inside, allowing himself to get outleveraged and sealed inside by the H-back and leaving lots of space for Ott to scoot around the end. Zion Puckett makes a touchdown-saving tackle, but it’s another first down for the Golden Bears.

On the next play, Cal gets into the end zone for the only time on the night. This is a basic zone insert play, where the H-back inserts himself into the interior blocking scheme, in this case taking out the playside LB. Auburn brings a blitz off the backside with Puckett, but he doesn’t get there in time, and the backside LB, Cam Riley, is unable to get over the top quickly enough to prevent Ott from bursting through the gap and into the end zone.

On the ensuing possession, we see once agan the Tigers struggling to get pressure with four rushers. Cal is running some type of curls concept and Jackson has plenty of time for his man to get past the sticks and find him with a back-shoulder throw for a conversion. However…

…on the next set of downs, Cal again faced a third and long and went back to the well with the same concept. This time Auburn is able to hurry the throw a bit and has much tighter coverage as well. The Cal sideline tried to beg for a flag but there’s no way they’re getting that call and it the Auric Ursines were forced to punt.

After Payton Thorne’s brutal interception with just over a minute left in the half, the bears once again had great field position, and once again they squandered it completely with a combination of inept offense and shambolic special teams. The Golden Bears line up in an empty set and bring Jaydn Ott in motion from the slot to run a power read concept. This concept should be familiar to Auburn fans as one of the preferred weapons of the Tigers’ 2010 offense. It works a bit better with Cam Newton and Onterrio McCalebb than with Sam Jackson and Jaydn Ott though. Jackson gets a keep read but both of Auburn’s interior linemen, Marcus Harris and Josiah Nakili-Kite are able to get off their blocks and disrupt the play. Cal somehow managed to get called for holding on a field goal, wiping the points off the board and forcing an unsuccessful Hail Mary, totally wasting an opportunity to extend their lead before the half.

Cal received the second half kickoff and went on a lengthy drive that consumed almost half of the third quarter, converting a fourth down and then a third down to reach Auburn territory, where they faced another fourth down. Spavital continued his trend of oddly passive playcalling with another screen, this time motioning the RB out of the backfield to run an F swing concept. Jalen McLeod, who was dropping into zone coverage, read this play the whole way and was able to get out and make the tackle well short of the marker and get the ball back to the offense.

After stopping Auburn on fourth down, Cal got the ball back near midfield. I want to look at two similar plays on this Cal drive and the next one, neither of which, and I know I sound like a broken record at this point, ended with missed field goals. These two plays are basically identical and they’re good examples of Cal exploiting Auburn aggressively blitzing third-level defenders. Both of these are inside zone runs tagged with an arrow route; it looks like split zone, but instead of blocking the end, the H-back releases to the flat, and the QB reads the first defender outside the box for give or throw. In both cases, Auburn brings heat from the secondary (Jaylin Simpson in the first case, Donovan Kaufman in the second) and in both cases, Jackson makes the correct read and gets the ball out to the H-back for a first down (although I will note the refs missed a pretty blatant block in the back on the second play). Auburn’s pressures have generally been a net positive this year, but it’s undoubtedly a double-edged sword.

And now we get to see the other side of that sword. On the second of these two drives, Cal made its way down to the Auburn red zone, but found itself in a third and 10. I’m not entirely sure what Cal is running, maybe some type of smash concept with a jerk route in the middle? In any case, it doesn’t really matter. Auburn brings the house, with six rushers; although Cal has six pass blockers, the RB totally whiffs on Eugene Asante coming off the edge, and he takes Jackson down for a huge loss, setting up a field goal which Cal missed.

After Auburn finally managed to retake the lead with the touchdown pass to Rivaldo Fairweather, Cal faced a crucial third and 3 on their ensuing possession. They line up in a pistol set with an H-back and the Z receiver in tight to block. There’s little doubt it’s going to be a run play, and there’s little doubt it’s going to be an inside zone, since that’s all Cal ever ran from the pistol, to my knowledge. Auburn has no compunctions about putting seven guys down in the box and bringing in an eight after the snap, overwhelming the offensive line and blowing up the play. Cal decided to punt here for whatever reason, but it ultimately worked out, because, of course, Auburn fumbled again, giving the Golden Bears one last chance to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

On the first play of that drive, Cal ran some type of flood concept and Jackson was able to get the ball to his receiver on a deep out. The Golden Bears got an extra boost from a dumb penalty by freshman corner Kayin Lee. Yeah, it’s a soft call, but you can’t do that over on the opponent’s sideline and give the ref a chance to be swayed by the opposing coaches’ whining.

However, after that penalty, Auburn’s defense bowed its back, pushing Cal back into a third and 19 situation. Spavital, with an opportunity to redeem himself for a night of cowardly third down playcalls, instead gets one more for the road. The Golden Bears bring a receiver (or tight end?) in motion behind the QB and run an RPO with a GT counter paired with a swing pass to the motion man. The not-especially-athletic receiver is easily corralled by DJ James and Eugene Asante, setting up a fourth and long. Baffling playcall.

Facing fourth an game, Spavital is again oddly conservative. Cal only sends three receivers out into the pattern, and they run the play into the boundary, giving them limited space to work with and making the task of Auburn’s zone defenders much easier. Despite the max protection, however, Auburn is still able to rush Jackson’s throw a bit. I’m not entirely sure what this is supposed to be, but it looks like a variation of Mike Leach’s old H wheel play, where the #1 receiver runs a deep curl and the #2 receiver runs a wheel. Usually the idea is for the wheel to open up the curl, but here, Jackson throws the wheel into basically triple coverage, and DJ James makes the easiest pick of his life to ice the game.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Last week, I came out of the UMass game feeling okay about the offense and concerned about the defense, but after this game, it’s the other way around. There’s no sugar-coating this one: it was an ugly performance for the Auburn offense, which struggled to execute its vertical concepts and RPOs against Cal’s man coverage, and I’m worried that they’ve given Auburn’s SEC opponents the blueprint for how to shut down the Tigers’ offense. Auburn will have to find some answers against man coverage if they’re going to be successful down the stretch. It would really be nice if they’d pick a QB as well, since the series with Robby at QB outside the red zone were a total failure. The turnovers and penalties have to get cleaned up as well, but you didn’t need me to tell you that.

The defense performed admirably given that they were put in several bad situations by the offense. Had Cal’s kicker been even decent, they would have won the game, but that’s more of a product of the great field position the offense repeatedly gifted them than the defense’s performance. They were occasionally burned due to their aggression, but they managed to rattle Cal’s QBs and, apparently, their OC, whose conservative playcalling hampered his team’s ceiling. I’m still not entirely convinced by Auburn’s run defense, but it was much better in this game largely thanks to a significant improvement in the LB corps, which was a big red flag last week.

The Tigers have a body bag game against Samford coming up this week, which won’t tell us much, and I might not even bother to write a review article for it unless the Bulldogs manage to make it more interesting than it should be. Barring disaster, I’ll see y’all in two weeks to recap the aTm game.

September 13, 2023

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aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

Auburn vs. UMass Film Review

Auburn opened the 2023 season and the Hugh Freeze era with a mostly-comfortable 59-14 home win over UMass. I think I speak for all of us when I say that it was nice to see Auburn take care of business against an inferior opponent instead of letting them hang around for three quarters and tying all of our stomachs into knots. Obviously the disparity in talent and stature between the two programs makes drawing definitive conclusions about the team’s performance difficult, but let’s take a look at the film anyway and see what we can learn about the new-look Tigers.

OFFENSE

UMass won the opening toss and deferred to the second half. Auburn got a great return from Brian Battie (who I’m told is good at this) and started with decent field position at their own 38. On the opening play of the season, the Tigers demonstrated one of the RPO concepts that I discussed in the preview article I wrote a few weeks ago. Jay Fair, lined up as the Z receiver, comes in motion behind Payton Thorne. The run call is GT counter, where the backside guard will pull and kick out the playside defensive end and the backside tackle will pull and block the playside linebacker, which is paired with a simple swing pass. I’m not entirely sure who Thorne was reading here, but Auburn had the numbers on the perimeter because UMass is in zone coverage and nobody follows the motion man to the left side of the formation, so Thorne pulls the ball and tosses it out to Fair for a solid gain on first down.

The next play I want to look at from Auburn’s opening possession includes the other key component of the new offense that we discussed in the preview article: the vertical choice series. In this case, Auburn runs slot choice, with the #2 receiver running the choice route, while the #1 receiver runs a curl route. When the defense is in zone coverage, the #1 receiver’s curl is designed to pull the deep zone defender down to open up deep space for the vertical choice runner. However, in this case, UMass is in man coverage; in man coverage, the curl has a similar effect of holding the corner so that the vertical choice receiver has the option to work outside in the vertical space behind the corner. That’s exactly what happens here. UMass actually isn’t lined up correctly because of Auburn’s tempo and if Thorne had gotten the ball out faster, Fair could have walked into the end zone. Nonetheless, Fair makes the correct read and runs a fade, exploiting the fact that he has outside leverage on the defender and following the old Art Briles mantra: “find grass, run fast.” This should have been a touchdown, but Thorne underthrows it and gives the defender time to recover and break up the pass. Auburn actually went back to the well with this exact play on the next possession, which was also incomplete but drew a defensive holding penalty.

The next play in this series includes another RPO action, but also another subject I didn’t really touch on in my last post (mainly because the QB competition was still ongoing): the QB run game. Of course, when Auburn fans have talked about the QB run game going into this season, they’ve mainly been talking about Robby Ashford, but here Auburn gets Payton Thorne involved in the run game too, just to keep the defense honest. This is basically the simplest RPO there is: the RB motions out of the backfield, and the QB just looks to see if a defender follows him. If nobody follows him, the defense is probably in zone and the offense should have numbers to block the swing route on the perimeter; if a defender follows him, the defense is probably in man and the offense should have the numbers to block the box defenders. The LB follows the motion, so Thorne recognizes the defense is in man and carries up the middle on the draw for a first down.

Auburn’s first touchdown isn’t really anything interesting schematically but touchdowns are fun, so let’s watch it anyway. Auburn lines up in the pistol and runs an inside zone read. The edge defender stays home, so Thorne hands the ball to Damari Alston, who does the rest. It’s nice to see Auburn be able to line up and just punch the ball in in the low red zone instead of getting cute or just getting blown off the ball.

After UMass marched right down the field on Auburn’s defense (more on that later) and another solid return from Brian Battie, the Tigers moved efficiently down the field, reaching the edge of the Minutemen’s red zone in eight plays. On this play, we see the first hint of what was to come for Auburn’s red zone offense with Robby Ashford’s first carry of the game. This is just a basic counter scheme, a staple of Gus Malzahn’s Auburn offenses; it’s blocked the same as the GT counter play I mentioned earlier, but with the H-back replacing the tackle in wrapping to the playside LB. This play adds the RB to the blocking scheme as a lead blocker. Robby shows a quick pass drop (I don’t think there was any pass tagged on the backside), almost like a QB draw, which allows the blocking scheme to set up before he takes off for a big gain. More of this to come.

On UMass’ subsequent possession, the Auburn defense forced a three and out, which was followed by a great punt return by Keionte Scott, setting Auburn up with great field position at the UMass 16. After a good gain on first down, Auburn had 2nd and 4 at the 10. Here the Tigers line up in an unbalanced set with two receivers and a tight end to the left. The H-back on the backside of the formation motions over to the strong side as well, giving Auburn a big numbers advantage, which they then used to run a QB sweep with Robby. The Tigers had so many extra blockers, in fact, that the RB doesn’t even have anyone to block, and Robby takes it into the end zone untouched. (Sorry for the gif being not great, blame ESPN not me.)

Auburn’s defense forced yet another punt which yielded good starting field position, but the offense was set back by a holding penalty. On the ensuing 1st and 20, Auburn goes to the air, running some type of crossing concept from a trips set (TV camera angles suck for analyzing the passing game but I don’t have an all 22 of this game so it’ll have to suffice). There’s really nothing there for Thorne, but he does a good job of eluding the rush, escaping from the pocket, and keeping his eyes downfield. He delivers a good ball throwing across his body and hits Shane Hooks along the sideline for a first down.

Two plays later, the Tigers faced a 2nd and 8 at the UMass 47. Here they went back to the vertical choice series, but this time it was single choice. Shane Hooks seems like the prototypical X receiver for this type of offense, a big guy with great range and enough speed to take the top off of a defense. This time, he isn’t able to get over the top of the corner in man coverage, but he does a good job of throttling down and using his body to shield the defender and Thorne delivers a good ball to his back shoulder for a first down.

Later in that possession, with Auburn in the low red zone, the Tigers once again turned to Robby Ashford’s legs to get the ball across the goal line. They line up in an unbalanced formation with an extra tackle over on the left side of the line, along with three receivers bunched to the left. This is a zone read play with what basically amounts to a pre-snap RPO. I think the read here was just to count how many defenders they put out on the bunched receivers; if you have numbers, throw the screen, otherwise it’s dead. UMass matches the bunched receivers three for three, so Robby runs the zone read, the edge defender is so far out of position it barely even looks like an option play and he walks in untouched again. It’s also worth noting that Auburn had run this exact same play on the previous play, exploiting UMass’ vulnerability through tempo.

After the Tiger defense got a strip-sack on Minutemen QB Taisun Phommachanh, the offense was set up at the UMass 35. On second down, the Tigers once again go with the slot choice concept, and again because UMass is in man coverage and Ja’Varrius Johnson has outside leverage on the safety, it turns into a slot fade. (It’s possible that this was just a called slot fade concept, I’m not entirely sure since it’s the same result.) Thorne actually delivers a good throw on the fade route for once and Johnson is able to hold on to set the Tigers up with a goal to go situation.

Following a couple of unsuccessful running plays, Auburn found themselves in a 3rd and goal from the 4. Unlike the other situations where Robby was in the game in the low red zone, the Tigers put the ball in the air here, or at least planned to. Working from the pistol, Auburn ran a bootleg off of arc read action using a flood concept, where the goal is, as the name suggests, to flood zone coverage with more receivers than it has defenders; in this case, UMass is in man, so the goal for the receivers is just to beat their man. Nobody is really open, but Robby makes the best of it and is able to sneak inside the pylon for six.

In the second half, UMass threw a pick six on their second play from scrimmage, then committed a penalty on the ensuing kickoff, backing them up against their own goal line. After a three-and-out and a poor punt, Auburn had prime field position at the UMass 30. The Tigers wasted no time taking advantage of their good fortune. The offense is lined up with trips to the left. The call here is a variation on the four verticals concept (in real time I thought this was a vertical choice, but after further review, I don’t think it is). The #2 and #3 receivers, Jay Fair and Jyaire Shorter (I think), take a switch release, which means they cross over one another’s route stems (switching vertical lanes), with Fair on a post route. UMass is in some type of match-quarters coverage, where defensive backs will play quarters by default but with special rules telling them to match particular routes by the receivers near them. The boundary safety decides, for reasons known only to him and God, to close down on Damari Alston checking down underneath, leaving his zone vacant and leaving Jay Fair wide open. A total coverage bust, and Thorne delivers a good ball here and hits Fair in stride for the easiest touchdown toss of his life.

Following an exchange of punts and a UMass turnover on downs, the Tigers took over yet again in UMass territory, and yet again it was a one-play touchdown drive. Jeremiah Cobb got a lot of hype for a freshman fourth-string RB this offseason and this play gives us an idea of why that was the case. The kid has wheels. This is a basic inside zone read. Robby is reading the backside defensive end, while the two tight ends on the backside of the play block the perimeter defenders (known as an arc scheme), lead blocking in the event of a QB keeper. However, the DE stays home, so Robby hands the ball off to Cobb and he does the rest. This wasn’t even a bad run fit by UMass, he just found a small crease and hit it.

Skipping ahead a bit to the fourth quarter, after UMass found their second touchdown of the day on a one play drive of their own, third-string QB Holden Geriner checks into the game, and he immediately impressed. On 1st and 10 from their own 22, Auburn goes with the third part of the vertical choice series, the outside choice. As we’ve discussed before, this play goes to the two-receiver side of the formation, where the outside receiver will run the choice route and the slot receiver will run a bender to the middle of the field to pull the playside safety away from the choice route. Malcolm Johnson, Jr. isn’t really able to get a lot of separation from the corner in man coverage, but Geriner delivers a perfect ball to his back shoulder, and MJJ uses his body to shield the corner and make the catch for a big gain.

Two plays later, the Tigers cashed in on the ground again for their final touchdown of the game, with Sean Jackson doing the honors this time. Auburn is in a standard 11 personnel set and runs GY counter, one of their most-repped run concepts in this game (unlike Gus, Freeze and Montgomery seem to know that it’s legal to run counter to both the right and left). Jackson follows his blocks through the hole, but then he sees that the LB has overpursued and the strong safety has taken a bad angle, so he cuts it back and finds himself with only the free safety to beat. He whiffs the tackle completely and Jackson is off to the races, becoming the fourth different Tiger to score on the ground in this game.

I don’t want to spend much time looking at garbage time plays, but there’s one more nice Geriner-MJJ connection that’s worth watching. This time, MJJ is lined up as the single receiver, and Auburn runs single choice in his direction. Much like the outside choice they ran on the earlier possession, MJJ can’t beat the corner deep, but again, Geriner delivers a beautiful back shoulder throw for a first down. Interestingly, the backside receivers run a bubble screen here rather than the usual “do nothing” on the backside of vertical choice, but I don’t know if Geriner actually had the option to throw it.

Anyway, that’s enough offense for now, let’s take a quick look at the other side of the ball before we wrap things up.

DEFENSE

On the Tigers’ first defensive rep of the game, we see an indication of some of the problems that were to come for Auburn’s run defense, which surrendered more than 5 YPC in this game. I’m not entirely sure what UMass is running here, as the run blocking looks pretty discombobulated. Auburn gets good penetration at the point of attack, but the defensive linemen overpursue, and Ole Miss transfer Austin Keys does as well, allowing the RB to cut back and comes up just short of a first down.

On the next play, Minutemen QB Taisun Phommachanh (who continues the tradition of Clemson transfer QBs with impossible-to-spell names) drops back for his first pass of the game. I can’t tell what concept UMass is running, but Phommachanh sees a lot of open grass in front of him and takes off; Auburn is in man or pattern-matching coverage and leaves the middle of the field wide open. North Texas transfer LB Larry Nixon III, playing the “jack” (overhang) position, has a chance to bring him down, but Phommachanh slips the tackle and gets the first down.

Two plays later, Phommachanh gashes the Tigers on the ground again. UMass lines up in a two-back set and runs the same arc read concept we discussed above. The DE pinches, giving Phommachanh a pull read, and LB Cam Riley, who I assume was supposed to take the QB, gets sucked inside and is an easy target for the arc blocker, allowing Phommachanh to break free for a big gain into Auburn territory.

On the next play, UMass again goes to the arc read concept, this time from a pistol alignment, motioning a receiver to block on the perimeter. This time, however, Phommachanh hands the ball off. The RB bounces the ball to the outside and, stop me if you’ve heard this one before, DJ James overplays it, allowing the RB to bounce to the outside and get down the sideline to set up first and goal. The Minutemen would punch it two plays later on a QB sneak to tie the game (I’m not going to break down a QB sneak because it isn’t really interesting).

The rest of the first half isn’t really worth going through in a ton of detail. Phommachanh hurt his leg/knee, which limited his mobility and took away the most dangerous part of UMass’ offense up to that point. The first drive illustrates the problems with Auburn’s defense well enough: misfits against the run, poor pursuit angles at the second and third levels. However, I do want to look at a couple of clips that demonstrate Auburn’s solution to the problems that they encountered on the Minutemen’s first drive, which was also my typical solution to defensive struggles in NCAA Football when I was a kid: send the house.

Midway through the second quarter, UMass finally got another drive going, picking up a couple of first downs and getting into Auburn territory. On 1st and 10 on the Tigers’ 46, Phommachannh drops back to pass. I don’t know exactly what this play was, but it looked like some type of curl-flat concept. Nickelback Donovan Kaufman, with his side vacated by the motion man, comes on the blitz off the edge, beating the UMass tackle with pure speed and hitting Phommachanh from his blindside, forcing a fumble which was recovered by Auburn safety Jaylin Simpson.

Another good example of the Tigers’ aggression paying off comes on the second play from scrimmage in the second half. UMass had good field position after Auburn kicked the ball out of bounds on the opening kickoff, desperately needing a score to keep any hope of a comeback alive. This is an RPO where UMass combines split zone (an inside zone run where the H-back comes from the backside to kick out the playside end, creating split flow) with a quick out route by the slot receiver. UMass is keying the nickelback, Donovan Kaufman, to decide whether to hand off or throw. Kaufman comes on the blitz here, giving Phommachanh an automatic throw read. However, Kaufman manages to get to Phommachanh, unable to sack him but forcing him to rush the throw enough that it’s behind the receiver, allowing Jaylin Simpson, who had rolled down to cover the slot receiver after Kaufman blitzed, to pick it off, and from there it was taillights.

The last defensive play I want to look at is the second UMass touchdown, a one-play drive against a heavily-rotated Auburn defense. This is an RPO with an inside zone run paired with a bubble screen. The H-back goes in motion to the flat to serve as an extra blocker for the bubble screen. Phommachanh sees that he has the numbers on the perimeter, so he throws the screen. Freshman corner Colton Hood overruns the play, so the receiver cuts it back and flies past LB Robert Woodyard, Jr. and Baylor transfer safety Griffin Speaks (who takes a poor pursuit angle) and is off to the races.

Kind of a sour note to end on, but it wasn’t a great performance for the defense overall, at least during the brief window where the game was in the balance.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Obviously, all of this analysis comes with the caveat that this was a season-opening bodybag game against UMass, which was one of the worst teams in the FBS last season. That said, I do think we have some general trends to watch for the rest of this season.

First of all, on the offensive side of the ball, Auburn’s run game was impressive, as was the performance of the Tigers’ offensive line in general, which handled UMass’ pressure-oriented defense well, giving the Tigers’ QBs plenty of time to throw and opening gaps consistently in the run game. We knew that the RB room was a strength of this offense, and this game showcased the depth at that position with Jarquez Hunter unavailable. The Tigers’ QB play was less convincing, with Thorne in particular missing some opportunities and throwing balls that might well have been intercepted by SEC defenders. He’s still learning the ropes of the offense, so I don’t want to rush to judgment, but it wasn’t a sterling debut for the Michigan State transfer. Robby Ashford, on the other hand, did well in his role as the Tigers’ red zone weapon of choice, but Freeze and Montgomery will have to figure out a way from keeping the two-QB system from becoming too predictable.

In terms of scheme, the Tigers’ offense looked much like we anticipated it would. Tempo, primarily 11 personnel with some two-TE and four- and five-WR sets thrown in, RPOs, read option plays, and the occasional vertical choice pass. I would’ve liked to have seen more from the Tigers’ passing game in general, but it sounds like the coaching staff chose to keep things close to the vest and keep running the ball when it was working, which makes sense in a game like this. We’ll see how the gameplan looks against a much better opponent next week.

On the defensive side of the ball, the Tigers’ secondary held up better than expected, although UMass doesn’t have a ton of weapons at WR and Taisun Phommachanh, not known for his arm in the first place, was further limited by injury. Auburn’s front seven, particularly the LB corps, was as much of a work in progress as it was portrayed to be during the offseason. Lots of missed assignments and poor run fits allowed UMass to chew up yards on the ground early in the game, and they may well have continued to do so had Phommachanh been fully healthy. The defensive line struggle to consistently get pressure with four rushers and most of Auburn’s QB pressures and tackles for loss came from plays where Auburn brought five or more rushers, most often from the nickel/”star” position. This worked fine against a QB and receiving corps that couldn’t punish the Tigers’ blitz-happy approach, but that won’t be the case later in the season, and if Auburn doesn’t find a way to pressure the QB and create negative plays with four rushers, it could be a long season for the Tigers’ defense and we could be in for a lot of shootouts.

I’ll have another post up later this week with a preview of Auburn’s next opponent, those noted Atlantic Coast denizens, the Cal Bears.

September 4, 2023

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aubiefifty · October 24, 2023

What will Auburn’s offense look like in 2023?

Well, it’s a New Era™ on the Plains…again.

Auburn will start the 2023 season with its third head coach in four years and its sixth new offensive coordinator (excluding interims) in the past six years. It should come as no surprise that Auburn’s offense has spent most of that six-year span underperforming, lacking a clear identity and undermanned, particularly in the trenches. There seems to be more optimism among Auburn fans than the last few rounds of coaching turnover have produced, but with so many new faces on both the coaching staff and the roster, there’s a lot of uncertainty for Auburn on the offensive side of the ball going into 2023.

So what will Auburn’s new offense look like? That’s what we’re going to try to figure out today.

HUGH FREEZE AND THE RPO

When asked about the identity of his offense, Hugh Freeze has described his system as an up-tempo, 11 personnel, RPO offense. In other words, a hurry-up, no huddle offense that’s going to have three receivers, a tight end or H-back, and a running back on the field most of the time, and will feature a lot of runs with screens and quick passes attached, along with some deep play-action to keep the defense honest.

Sound familiar? It should! As you may or may not have heard about 500 times by now, Hugh Freeze and Gus Malzahn are friends, and Freeze has acknowledged Malzahn’s influence on his offensive thinking. However, even though their offenses are similar on the surface, they don’t really come from the same place. Freeze’s and Malzahn’s offenses are a case of what biologists would call convergent evolution, where two species that aren’t closely related become similar to one another because they face similar evolutionary pressures. While Gus Malzahn’s offensive roots went back to his time coaching the Delaware Wing-T system as a high school coach in Arkansas, Freeze, from what I can tell, has been a spread guy since the beginning. We’ll get into some of the implications of that difference later on, but I thought it was important to point out because of the parallels between the two.

When these two first entered the SEC (Malzahn in 2006 and Freeze in 2011), their brand of spread, up-tempo football was a novelty in a conference that had been dominated for decades by traditional three-yards-and-a-cloud of dust football (with a few notable exceptions, like Steve Spurrier’s Fun-and-Gun at Florida and Hal Mumme’s Air Raid at Kentucky). Now, as Freeze makes his return to the SEC 12 years later, that’s not the case. That’s not to say Freeze’s offense is outdated, it’s not, it’s just that the offensive meta in college football has converged toward what he and Gus have been doing for a couple of decades.

So what distinguishes Freeze’s offense from your run of the mill college spread offense? Honestly…not that much. You’ll see the standard three- and four-wide receiver shotgun and pistol sets, along with an occasional empty or heavy set. The run game is mainly built around inside zone, with some outside zone and gap schemes like power and counter mixed in. Unlike Gus, whose Wing-T background inculcated him with a love of gap schemes (power, counter, trap, and buck sweep) before working with RichRod protégé Herb Hand at Tulsa introduced him to the zone read, Freeze’s spread background is more zone oriented, with the gap schemes as a secondary part of the offense.

The passing game, although a bit more expansive than Gus Malzahn’s, is fairly standard for the college level as well: quick game concepts like stick, snag, and fade-out, dropback concepts like shallow, smash, and four verticals, and deep shots and bootlegs off play-action. This isn’t a criticism, by the way. These standard concepts are standard concepts because they work. (If you don’t know what these terms mean, I intend to create a “football glossary” post at some point that includes clips of different concepts so that I have something to refer back to when I mention them instead of having to explain them over and over again).

The thing that distinguishes Freeze’s offense from other spread systems is how it’s packaged. The key to this is the run-pass option (RPO). The term is ubiquitous in college football these days (although it’s often misapplied), but what does it mean in practice? Really, it comes down to one basic concept: putting a defender in conflict. This works by identifying defenders who have a dual responsibility, i.e. covering a gap in the run game and a zone in pass coverage, and forcing them to choose between the two by threatening to run the ball or throw it to a receiver in their zone. The defender can’t cover both the run gap and the pass zone (Brent Dearmon, a Gus disciple, makes the apt analogy of “trying to serve God and Mammon”), so he’s got to choose, and whatever he chooses, the offense is going to make him wrong.

So how do you identify the conflict player? The conflict player will vary from game to game based on the opponent’s defense, so part of it is just gameplanning, but as a general rule, it’s usually going to be an outside linebacker, nickelback, or inverted safety, who will often line up over the slot receiver in a three-receiver set (sometimes referred to as the “apex” player).

Perhaps the simplest way to think about it is as a numbers game: the offense is reading the guy who would cause them to be outnumbered in the box. if you have six blockers and six defenders in the box, you have the numbers to run the ball, but you need to keep the defense from getting a seventh guy into the box, so you tag a quick pass that attacks his zone to give him a dual responsibility. The QB will put this guy under pressure by meshing with the RB, giving the appearance of a run play, and either handing it off if he drops into coverage or ripping it out and throwing it if he comes down to fill his gap.

Often, this post-snap read is combined with a pre-snap read on the backside of the play. In a three-receiver set, the defense will often leave the defender over the single receiver on the backside in one-on-one coverage, and the QB is sometimes told that if he likes what he sees there, he can throw it out there; for example, if that corner is playing soft coverage, he can throw a quick hitch to the single receiver.

Here’s a clip of the man himself explaining it in an interview with Trevor Matich back in his Ole Miss days:

In terms of the actual concepts employed, there are almost infinite permutations of the RPO. The most common form of RPO a base run play like zone or power paired with a quick screen or some type of quick-hitting route like a stick or slant. Again, this can come down to gameplanning, and offensive coaches will often mix-and-match the run and pass components of their RPO game based on what type of defense their opponent is using and which defenders they want to attack.

Okay, enough wall of text, let’s get to some film and see how this works in practice. These clips are from Liberty’s 41-13 home win over Middle Tennessee State in 2021 and Liberty’s 36-34 home win over Florida International in 2020.

First, we’ll look at the simplest phase of the RPO, where the QB simply hands the ball off. This is a basic inside zone play with a bubble screen tagged to the backside. The pre-snap read (the single receiver running the fade) is dead because the corner is playing press, so the QB (former Auburn QB Malik Willis) goes directly to his post-snap read, the nickelback lined up over the slot receiver. He takes away the bubble screen so Willis hands the ball off and it’s a successful run on first down to set up a second and short.

This next clip is another example of using the threat of a quick pass to open up the run, but in this case it’s tagged to the backside of a read option play rather than a simple give-or-throw read. Here Liberty is running some type of pin-and-pull or bucksweep scheme (it’s hard to tell the two apart sometimes) with Willis reading the backside defensive end for give or keep, with the option to throw a bubble screen to the slot receiver should the slot defender crash down on Willis if he keeps. That doesn’t happen here and he’s able to pull the ball and get a decent gain.

An interesting note is the playside tackle pass-setting rather than run blocking the DE to draw him upfield and open up the lane for the RB to bounce the ball into the B gap. It’s an interesting way to run the ball against a bear front, which would usually preclude running inside zone (a problem that Gus never solved in his time at Auburn).

Second, we’ll look at a few examples of the second phase of the RPO, where the QB pulls it and throws the quick pass.

In this first example, Liberty lines up with three receivers bunched to the sideline, and they’ve paired their base inside zone run with a quick screen to the Z receiver. I’m honestly not sure how much of this was a post-snap read and how much of it was just Willis realizing he had 3 on 2 out there and throwing it (you can see the MTSU DB realizing he’s out of position and scrambling to get where he’s supposed to be), but it’s an incredibly “cheap” way for the offense to pick up yards, since they only had to block one defender. Football doesn’t have to be complicated: get there firstest with the mostest.

(I won’t post the clip but it’s worth noting that on the very next play, Liberty ran a pop pass off of this action, pump-faking the quick screen and looking to throw a wheel route to the #2 receiver which Willis badly underthrew right into the hands of a defender.)

In this example from the FIU game, Liberty incorporates motion into their RPO game, running a common RPO concept, pairing an inside zone run with an arrow route to the slot receiver motioning into the backfield (something Auburn frequently ran with the trio of Kerryon Johnson, Jarrett Stidham, and Ryan Davis in 2017). Motion pairs great with RPOs because motion puts additional pressure on the defense, forcing the conflict defender to commit more quickly or risk being outleveraged. In this case, the defensive end crashes down on the run, leaving the arrow open, and thanks to some good downfield blocking, they’re able to get a nice gain out of it.

I’ll also include the end zone angle here so that you can really see the read on the conflict defender in action.

Finally, here’s a case of the QB throwing his pre-snap read. There weren’t many of these in the MTSU game because MTSU played a lot of press coverage, and generally pre-snap reads are going to take advantage of soft coverage with a route like a quick hitch.

This is an unbalanced set with both receivers on the left on the line of scrimmage. The Z receiver comes in motion across the formation pre-snap, probably to get the defense to show what coverage they’re in. The run call is CY counter, a variation on the standard GY counter concept with the center pulling and trapping the defensive end (instead of the guard) and the TE wrapping to the playside LB. The backside receivers run a quick screen, which is presumably the post-snap read. The motion man runs a speed out, taking advantage of the soft corner.

So what does the defense do to stop the RPO? There are two basic options: stay in zone coverage and use another defender to fill the conflict player’s zone, allowing him to play run full time, or just play man coverage so that the receivers are always accounted for. Any team that’s going to make the RPO a mainstay of its offense has to have answers for these two defensive tactics.

The simplest way to address the defense rotating its zone defenders is to run play-action and throw the ball wherever the support player came from. The defense is robbing Peter to pay Paul, so you’re going to go hit Peter up for money. For example, if the defense is going to keep the outside linebacker in the box and rotate the safety down, a deep vertical route that attacks that safety’s deep zone should be open.

Man coverage can also be attacked through play-action, but there are other options. For example, you can use man-beating pass concepts like the late Dread Pirate’s beloved mesh, or run a read option play like zone read or power read, which generally work well against man coverage. Man is a much tougher problem for RPO teams, especially if the other team has better Jimmies than you have Joes and can handle your top receivers one-on-one. This requires the offense to get creative to find solutions to these problems (finding what Brent Dearmon calls “manswers” in the video linked above).

BEGGARS CAN’T BE (DEEP) CHOOSERS?

Of course, Hugh Freeze isn’t the only new face on the offensive side of the ball for Auburn this year. The Tigers also have a new offensive coordinator, Philip Montgomery, who was fired after eight years at the helm of the Tulsa Golden Hurricane. Wait, Auburn hiring an OC from Tulsa? Why does that sound familiar?

Oh, right.

Before his time at Tulsa, Montgomery was the offensive coordinator at Baylor under Art Briles for four years, where he coached a guy you may have heard of named Robert Griffin III. From 2011 to 2014, Briles and Montgomery helmed an offense that put up video game numbers at a school that had been the doormat of the Big XII for two decades. So how did they turn a program that was an afterthought into one of the country’s most feared offenses, and how much of that might Montgomery be bringing to Auburn?

Briles’ offense (sometimes known as the veer and shoot, even though it has nothing to do with the split-back veer or the run and shoot) has a few unique characteristics that set it apart from its contemporaries. The first was its tempo, which was among the fastest in the country, giving Chip Kelly’s Oregon and Gus’ Auburn offenses a run for their money in that respect. However, the real secret sauce is in the receiver splits. Unlike a standard offense where the slot receivers are aligned near the hashes and the outside receivers are aligned near the numbers, the receivers in the veer and shoot take the widest splits possible, with the slot receivers on the numbers and the outside receivers almost touching the sideline. The reason for this is actually quite simple: stretch the defense as wide as possible and isolate defenders, turning zone into man.

This horizontal stretch of the defense was often used to run the ball, since it makes it nearly impossible to get players from outside the box into the box to support the run defense. Baylor’s run game was really simple, consisting almost entirely of inside zone and power, but the wide splits ensured they had equal numbers in the box to run against. However, the real reason for the wide splits was to get their track star receivers one on one with defenders so that Baylor could run their deep choice concepts.

The basic premise of the deep choice is that the offense will tag a single receiver to run a deep route, giving him the option to adjust that route based on what the defense is doing. If the defender is trying to play press and get in his face, he’ll run a go route to get behind him; if the defender is backing off and playing soft, he’ll run a stop route; if the defender is outside of him (or if the safety vacates the middle of the field), he’ll run a post. The basic idea, as Briles summarized it, was “find grass and run fast”.

As for the rest of the play, the offensive line and backs were in max protection with seven pass blockers to allow the deep choice receiver time to get open. The QB will give a play-action fake and then he’s locked on that deep choice guy, looking to throw him open. The QB and receiver have to be on the same page and make the same read of the defense, otherwise the throw won’t go to the right place. Perhaps the most radical part of the play is the other receivers. Their responsibilities differ based on their location: if they’re inside the deep choice runner, they run a post to pull the safety away; if they’re outside the deep choice runner, they’ll run a curl to hold the corner on the outside; and if they’re on the opposite side of the field, they do nothing to conserve their legs. Because the other receivers aren’t doing anything, the deep choice is very much bang-or-bust. Either the deep choice runner gets open and it’s a big play or he doesn’t and the offense has nothing, which a lot of offensive coaches aren’t comfortable with.

Let’s take a look at each component of the deep choice series individually. These clips are from Baylor’s 60-14 home win over Kansas in 2014, Montgomery’s last season as the Bears’ OC. Obviously I would have preferred to use film from his more recent offenses at Tulsa but all 22 film of Tulsa’s offense is much harder to come by. On an unrelated note, I realized that this film was actually posted by one of Kansas’ DBs in this game, which is like willfully uploading a video of your high school bully stuffing you into a locker.

First, the single choice, where the single receiver runs the choice. This is the ideal situation for single choice, because the corner is in press coverage and the safety isn’t really in position to help. The X receiver gets over the top of the corner, and then it’s just “find grass, run fast”:

Second, the slot choice, where the inside receiver on the two-receiver side runs the choice. The outside receiver’s stop route holds the corner, leaving the slot receiver plenty of room to the outside that he can use to get separation from the safety. Even with some shenanigans by the safety, he’s able to bring the pass down and score. The only thing more embarrassing than committing DPI is committing DPI and still getting scored on.

I should point out that unlike single choice and outside choice, the QB actually does have a progression to read on slot choice. If the corner bails hard and drifts into the deep space the slot is trying to attack, he can throw the stop route to the outside receiver. That’s what happens here, and it’s open even though the throw is behind him and it’s incomplete. Note that the safety manages to stay over the top of the choice runner here, so he also runs a stop route. Baylor would often use these stop routes to set up double-moves, pump faking the stop and then throwing the go route, one of their most reliable sources of big plays.

Finally, the outside choice, where the outside receiver on the two-receiver side runs the choice. In this case, Baylor used one of their favorite tactics when running outside choice, combining their extremely wide splits with a stacked formation to further confuse the defenders about their responsibilities. The WR beats the corner deep, but even though the throw is behind him, he succeeds in drawing a pass interference penalty. Monty was a trailblazer in the #AllPIOffense too, I guess.

I’m realizing now that all of these clips (aside from the one where the QB didn’t throw the choice) ended with the choice receiver running a go route rather than a stop/post/bend, but I think these clips capture the nuts and bolts of the play well enough. Hopefully Auburn’s offense will give us a look at the diverse potential of these concepts this season.

PUTTING THE PIECES TOGETHER

So now that we’ve taken a look at what Freeze and Montgomery have done on their own, we come to the big question: how will these two offenses fit together? Discord between offensive coordinators and offensive-minded head coaches has been a frequent issue for Auburn in its tumultuous recent years, and some Auburn fans are surely gun-shy about another unhappy marriage. However, I think there’s some reason to believe this will be different, mainly because of why Freeze hired Montgomery in the first place.

So why did Freeze turn to Philip Montgomery, a guy he’s never worked with who’s never coached in the SEC? I think that this video clip offers some good insight, as Freeze speaks highly of another team that’s applied the veer and shoot principles to spark an offensive turnaround.

It makes sense that he’d go get a guy who has experience running that offense, given his obvious admiration for the schematics of what Josh Heupel and Hendon Hooker (now, now) have done in Knoxville.

I think the Tennessee analogy is apt, since that offense is exactly what you’d expect from the Freeze/Montgomery pairing: a system that combines a bread-and-butter 11 personnel RPO game with the wide splits, breakneck tempo, and deep choice routes of the veer and shoot. It’s a sensible combination, given that the veer and shoot always incorporated the tempo, personnel, and schemes that Freeze made his mainstay, with the addition of the explosive deep choice game. Unfortunately, Auburn’s spring game was played in some truly atrocious weather, which limited the offense to a lot of running and only one deep choice play that I noticed in the abbreviated scrimmage.

In terms of personnel, obviously the Auburn roster has been in a lot of flux this offseason and it’s hard to predict what the first 11 guys on the field are gonna look like in week 1. Freeze and new offensive line coach Jake Thornton gave the trenches a much-needed renovation in the portal, while the receiving corps has also seen a lot of movement in and out. The RB room should be solid as usual, but that’s the least of Auburn’s concerns.

The biggest question mark, of course, is in the QB room. I would be shocked if Michigan State transfer Payton Thorne isn’t the week 1 starter. Robby Ashford did his best to salvage a lost season last year, and his dynamic running ability is obviously a weapon, but he’s too limited as a passer to fill the role Auburn would need him to in the new-look offense, where the QB run game will have a role, but probably won’t be a primary focus. Thorne has the best tools in terms of arm strength and accuracy and I don’t think the QB competition will be all that close. I must note with some chagrin that a perfect QB for this system would’ve been Bo Nix, and I invite all of you to join me in directing the expletives of your choice at Bryan Harsin. His incompetence in both recruiting and interpersonal relationships hamstrung this program and has made an already difficult rebuild that much worse for the new staff.

Which brings us to the final question: will this new arrangement actually work? Unfortunately, I have no idea, and unless someone has access to a crystal ball or time machine, it’s going to be hard to predict. Auburn football is a random number generator under the best of circumstances, and massive coaching and player turnover hardly constitute the best of circumstances. I certainly wouldn’t expect a Tennessee-style renaissance, or at least not overnight; of course, we don’t even know if Tennessee will be able to sustain what they’re doing over the long term, since they’re not gonna pull a Hendon Hooker out of the portal every year.

Realistically, I think it’s going to be less about Xs and Os and more about how quickly the offensive staff can get everyone on the same page, since they’re basically MacGuyvering an offensive roster at this point. I think Auburn will take a significant step forward over the last few years and be a lot more fun to watch (a low bar to clear), but it’s going to take a couple of recruiting classes and a couple of seasons of cooperation among the new offensive brain trust before we see the potential of this offensive scheme.

(For anyone who’s wondering, I don’t really intend on writing an equivalent article about Ron Roberts’ defense. My knowledge of defense is much weaker than my knowledge of offense, and I don’t think I have much value to add. If you’re interested in learning more about the new Auburn defensive scheme, I recommend this breakdown of Roberts’ defense at Baylor, where he was the DC for his protégé, Dave Aranda.)

August 9, 2023

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