Football Study Hall: Nebraska and the Frost option

[Enhance]

Stupid writer. The defensive rankings of teams running the triple options has zero correlation to the defensive rankings if Nebraska adopted that offense.

It's a spotty correlation because the data set is so minimal. I'm aware of only one P5 program in recent history to run the triple option/flex bone. I feel pretty confident saying tOSU or Alabama could flip to the flex bone and produce great defense.

I do agree with the writer's overall point, though - a move to that offense would've been a very poor idea.

 

[Crazyhole]

I hate it when people try to compare what Nebraska would be running the option to what Navy has.   Navy is never going to have an elite defense because if the restrictions that come with being a service academy.   Running an option offense has nothing to do with their failings on defense.   

If Miami decided to run an option offense would people automatically assume their defense would all of a sudden become slow and porous?   What about Ohio State?   Was Nebraska's defense not lightning fast in the mid 90s?   Did we not consistently have one of the top passing efficiency defenses in the country?    

The whole discussion is stupid and short sighted.   

 

[Hilltop]

Writers get hard up at the start of any team's off season.  Can't blame them- recruiting stories get old and we won't have any more, non-recruiting, real news until spring.  

 

[brophog]

It's a spotty correlation because the data set is so minimal.

Here's where the real hole in the data is in any of these offense affects the defense arguments:

What we really want to know is not how a defense did in a whole game, which things like scoring defense or total defense measure, nor what a team did on a single play, which is what yards per play measure......no, what we really need to know is drive efficiency. Drives are, after all, what a possession constitutes in football. The problem is that drive data is not easily reproduced from the box score. 

Football Outsiders does some of this, as do some other sites that propagate their own data. FO has a stat it calls DFEI which filters out late half clock killing drives and late game garbage drives and then filters this drive efficiency by opponent offense SOS. Some interesting things emerge. Wisconsin is #1, which isn't terribly surprising given their high defensive ranking by other means. Nebraska is #109, also expected. Central Florida is #20. Central Florida was #10 a year ago (Nebraska 66).

 

[Mavric]

I hate it when people try to compare what Nebraska would be running the option to what Navy has.   Navy is never going to have an elite defense because if the restrictions that come with being a service academy.   Running an option offense has nothing to do with their failings on defense.   

If Miami decided to run an option offense would people automatically assume their defense would all of a sudden become slow and porous?   What about Ohio State?   Was Nebraska's defense not lightning fast in the mid 90s?   Did we not consistently have one of the top passing efficiency defenses in the country?    

The whole discussion is stupid and short sighted.   

Yes and no.  There is definitely a component of the service academies having less to work with - that’s pretty much why they run that offense to begin with.

But there is also a component of them not be able to fully prepare for the other offenses they see because the are so decidedly one-dimensional that they would struggle to give their defense a good look in practice.  

Just like it’s tough for other teams to prepare for their offense on a one-week prep, it’s tough for their defense to prepare for other offenses that they never see.

 

[JKinney]

Yes and no.  There is definitely a component of the service academies having less to work with - that’s pretty much why they run that offense to begin with.

But there is also a component of them not be able to fully prepare for the other offenses they see because the are so decidedly one-dimensional that they would struggle to give their defense a good look in practice.  

Just like it’s tough for other teams to prepare for their offense on a one-week prep, it’s tough for their defense to prepare for other offenses that they never see.

I think you bring up some good points, but overall I disagree with your above statement.  In the History of Nebraska Offenses thread, I provided data showing the total defense ranking for Nebraska from 1989 to 1997.  You will find that from 1994 through 1997 Nebraska had a top ten offense and top ten defense every year (provided some assumptions about 1995).  Although Tom Osborne was not running Navy's current offense exactly, I think it would be fair to say that the Husker defense practiced against an offense that was also decidedly one-dimensional, and they did well by my standard.

I would also point to the head to head matchup between UCF and Navy, I realize the sample size is just one game, but the score was 31-21 UCF.  While Memphis (which runs a similar offense to UCF, so according to your argument the defense should be better prepared) lost 40-13, and 62-55, and in 2016 won 73-56.  This seems to point to the fact that the type of offense you run, doesn't necessarily dictate what your defense will be better prepared for.

 

[Mavric]

I think you bring up some good points, but overall I disagree with your above statement.  In the History of Nebraska Offenses thread, I provided data showing the total defense ranking for Nebraska from 1989 to 1997.  You will find that from 1994 through 1997 Nebraska had a top ten offense and top ten defense every year (provided some assumptions about 1995).  Although Tom Osborne was not running Navy's current offense exactly, I think it would be fair to say that the Husker defense practiced against an offense that was also decidedly one-dimensional, and they did well by my standard.

I would also point to the head to head matchup between UCF and Navy, I realize the sample size is just one game, but the score was 31-21 UCF.  While Memphis (which runs a similar offense to UCF, so according to your argument the defense should be better prepared) lost 40-13, and 62-55, and in 2016 won 73-56.  This seems to point to the fact that the type of offense you run, doesn't necessarily dictate what your defense will be better prepared for.

Comparing the Nebraska teams on that era with the current service academies is apples and oranges.  Those Nebraska teams had some of the best athletes in the country.  The current service academies have nothing close to that.  As I noted, those Huskers played a lot of teams that we simply dominated physically.  The service academies are usually on the other end of that battle.  Not really comparable.

I don't think just making a blanket "look at the score of those three games" tells you much.  There are way too many variables for three games to give you any sort of trend.  In the Navy game, UCF turned it over on downs at the Navy 3, had a botched snap that killed a drive, missed a FG on first down as the half expired, and threw an INT in Navy territory.  Credit Navy for making some plays but UCF could have easily scored 10 more points - and possibly more - with just a couple things going differently that had nothing to do with how well Navy was playing defense.  To say nothing of whether the defenses were playing more aggressive for Memphis vs.  playing more to prevent the big play for Navy or anything like that.  Need a much bigger sample size than that to draw any conclusions.  Considering Navy has more often been in the 70s in the country in total defense than they've been in the Top 50 recently, the aren't exactly setting the world on fire.

 

[beorach]

I'm really confused about this whole S+P' stat.  The guy writes that it's a defensive one but then ties it to an offensive scheme?  Can anyone explain, please?

 

[JKinney]

Comparing the Nebraska teams on that era with the current service academies is apples and oranges.  Those Nebraska teams had some of the best athletes in the country.  The current service academies have nothing close to that.  As I noted, those Huskers played a lot of teams that we simply dominated physically.  The service academies are usually on the other end of that battle.  Not really comparable.

I don't think just making a blanket "look at the score of those three games" tells you much.  There are way too many variables for three games to give you any sort of trend.  In the Navy game, UCF turned it over on downs at the Navy 3, had a botched snap that killed a drive, missed a FG on first down as the half expired, and threw an INT in Navy territory.  Credit Navy for making some plays but UCF could have easily scored 10 more points - and possibly more - with just a couple things going differently that had nothing to do with how well Navy was playing defense.  To say nothing of whether the defenses were playing more aggressive for Memphis vs.  playing more to prevent the big play for Navy or anything like that.  Need a much bigger sample size than that to draw any conclusions.  Considering Navy has more often been in the 70s in the country in total defense than they've been in the Top 50 recently, the aren't exactly setting the world on fire.

Just to clarify, I am not comparing the 94' - 97' Huskers to the current Navy Midshipmen, what I am doing is saying that they ran a similar specialized offense.  In 94' - 97' not a lot of teams were running the offense that the Cornhuskers were.  You had stated in a previous post: "there is also a component of them not be able to fully prepare for the other offenses they see because the are so decidedly one-dimensional that they would struggle to give their defense a good look in practice."  The fact that Nebraska was able to run a similar specialized offense, and still have a top ten defense for multiple years is evidence for (but obviously does not prove) that having a specialized offense does not hurt your defensive preparation.

I absolutely don't think you should  "look at the score of those three games", like I said in my post, the sample size is incredibly small to make any such comparison.  What I am trying to do is separate two variables:  The Navy Midshipmen's recruiting restrictions & player weight limits, from the type of specialized offense they run.  Until the sample size is increased, I will agree to disagree.

BTW, Mike Leach at Texas Tech ran a very specialized offense, I will take a look into his defensive statistics and see how they looked on average.

 

[Mavric]

Just to clarify, I am not comparing the 94' - 97' Huskers to the current Navy Midshipmen, what I am doing is saying that they ran a similar specialized offense.  In 94' - 97' not a lot of teams were running the offense that the Cornhuskers were.  You had stated in a previous post: "there is also a component of them not be able to fully prepare for the other offenses they see because the are so decidedly one-dimensional that they would struggle to give their defense a good look in practice."  The fact that Nebraska was able to run a similar specialized offense, and still have a top ten defense for multiple years is evidence for (but obviously does not prove) that having a specialized offense does not hurt your defensive preparation.

I absolutely don't think you should  "look at the score of those three games", like I said in my post, the sample size is incredibly small to make any such comparison.  What I am trying to do is separate two variables:  The Navy Midshipmen's recruiting restrictions & player weight limits, from the type of specialized offense they run.  Until the sample size is increased, I will agree to disagree.

BTW, Mike Leach at Texas Tech ran a very specialized offense, I will take a look into his defensive statistics and see how they looked on average.

And I am saying I don't care if the Huskers would have run fullback dive on 100% of their plays during that time period.  They had good enough athletes on defense to dominate most opponents.  So I don't think - in that case - the "specialized" offense was nearly as much of a hindrance as it is now.  And the Huskers offense of those days wasn't as specialized as the service academies are now, but that's kind of splitting hairs.

I provided information on a larger sample size - how Navy has done in total defense over the last several years.  There are a lot of factors to it but they have been average at best.

 

[JKinney]

And I am saying I don't care if the Huskers would have run fullback dive on 100% of their plays during that time period.  They had good enough athletes on defense to dominate most opponents.  So I don't think - in that case - the "specialized" offense was nearly as much of a hindrance as it is now.  And the Huskers offense of those days wasn't as specialized as the service academies are now, but that's kind of splitting hairs.

I provided information on a larger sample size - how Navy has done in total defense over the last several years.  There are a lot of factors to it but they have been average at best.

Obviously I'm not making myself clear, I apologize.  I will try one more time to explain my perspective.  If I'm still sounding/am crazy then no hard feelings.

You state above that the reason the Husker defense was good during that time period is because we had enough athletes on defense to dominate most opponents.  I would say almost the exact same thing, except I also think they were coached superbly (which I think you would also agree with?).  I think what makes a good defense has almost nothing to do with what offense they practice against, but rather the quality of their athletes and how well they've been coached. 

So what makes Nebraska different than Navy?

1.  The fact that Navy can't recruit nearly as well as other schools (which means they don't get 'good enough athletes to dominate most opponents'.)

2.  Navy's players must stay under a weight limit, in some/all cases (they don't have big enough defensive and offensive lineman to fit their needs, among other problems). 

So Navy's defensive rankings aren't particularly useful to me, because all things being equal, I believe their athletes are far inferior to other D1 FBS schools, because of the fact they are a service academy.  When you say, "See these rankings show Navy's defense isn't well prepped because all they face is an option attack."  I will say, "The reason Navy's defense is mediocre, is because they don't have very good athletes."  What IS important to me, is whether the fact that your team has a specialized offense can substantially hurt your team's defense, which would be an argument against modern teams running the option offense.  I do not believe this to be the case.