I agree to an extent that option football uses trickery and deception but it is more based on attacking the heart of the defense and then moving outside when the defense overplays the middle. To have a successful option play, the fake to the fullback must be respected by the defense. Typically that means the defense must defend the fullback first. Osborne and Company often said the same about stopping the Sooner wishbone. If you didn't overplay the fullback, he would gut the defense. So often Nebraska fans would dread seeing that Lott or Holliway or Watts or your favorite QB make that last second pitch to the tailback coming around the corner just a breath away from the defense making the critical tackle only to see wide open green down the sidelines as the big play goes just when we thought we had them stopped. But it was only because we had to devote so much to stopping the runs inside the tackels first. Those OU tailbacks could flat out fly and their fullbacks were strong and tough and played like Jano.
Yes, there is trickery and deception (they called the QBs 'wishbone magicians' because of Sooner Magic and they carried out fakes and it was hard to keep an eye on the ball. You just had to tackle all four ball carriers every play essentially. Not easy with big strong powerful and well conditioned O lines.
But, in Riley's case, he likes to run the 'fly sweep' (essentially the old fashioned reverse or end around in my view - a clear 'trick play' useful perhaps once a game maybe but no bread and butter running game maker). Screens are essentially trick plays that rely on the offensive line being able to sell the defensive line on the notion that they just missed their pass blocks and the D linemen have a chance to get to the QB. Of course, the idea is to get the D line to overrun and attack and take themselves out of the play and free up O linemen to take on LBs and safeties and create blocking mismatches. Again, this is a play which really requires the offensive line to be 'normally' good in pass blocking and then have a lapse now and then. We have had so much trouble pass protecting that Tommy A had to constantly dance and scramble and run for his life. This fall our QBs will not likely have that extra ability. The line will HAVE to block much better. The QB has only the option to throw the ball quick (dink and dunk, screens, slants, sideline outs, and other short pass routes, or throw the ball away to avoid sacks). Again this allows the defense to defend mostly near the line of scrimmage.
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If you are going to pull the defense off the line of scrimmage, you have to make them defend more area - stay back to avoid the 15 or 20 yard completions that get Riley's 'big chunk' yardage. Or atleast they must fear that. With Tommy, he was not accurate or consistant enough in the short throws (timing, throwing fast balls instead of 'touch' passes and not leading the receiver to open areas and allowing them to run after the catch. Short passes are good for short yards UNLESS your receiver catches the ball in stride and with a chance to make YAC. Hopefully our QBs can throw these routes at a 70% or better rate. We should have receivers that can make people miss and have good hands. We may lack big strong WRs who are hard to arm tackle but we have some that can make good tacklers miss. Our TEs should be good for three or four good catches PER game for 60 yards and a couple TDs.
But we still need to get 3 TDs a game and 275 yards a game at 5.5 yards per carry out of our RBs. If not, we will struggle to move the ball. Once again, our punter will be out there FAR too often. If we punt more than 3 times a game, it will be a long challenging 'nail biting' season.
In the end, we need to be able feel confident we can run the ball on third and three and get the first down. We also need to feel confident we can run the ball three straight plays and get the first down from anywhere on the field. Get a defense to play us honest because we are capable of successfully throwing anywhere on the field with reasonable success (screens, slants, outs, posts, fades, curls, etc) and of course pop a couple delay draws, middle screens, etc.). keep the defense playing us straight up and our chances are much better against about 10 opponents. The top teams will play us honest and beat us with superior skills, strength and speed and depth. We won't wear Ohio State down.
The fake to the fullback and the give to the fullback both have one thing in common (the fullback is ON the field). Riley has not played the fullback much and with only one or two backs, there is almost NO deception and no power blocking involved in the run game. Riley instead relies on the extra WRs running all over to somehow decoy and occupy without much blocking a number of defenders. Theory is that the CBs and safeties and even a LB won't be able to stop the run if they must cover a receiver. But only works IF your QB can actually make the throws and the O line can actually keep the QB on his feet long enough to do so. We haven't had that for so many years it's hard to remember a Nebraska team with an excellent passer. Gonna be interesting to watch this fall.
