I think we have already began to see poor efforts at wildcat installation at the high school and college level. Too many people think that it is simply putting an athletic QB into play. I know I have seen it time and time again as a high school coach. Elements are always left out. Either there is no motion or action off the jet/fly sweep or a lack of an unbalanced line. Too many teams are just trying to run QB lead, power, and counter and are either getting stuffed or getting lucky because they simply out athlete the competition.

The salary and 53 man roster limits make it possible to essentially put an offense on the field that’s too expensive to defend. Remember that the highest paid defensive players in the league are DL and CBs, while on offense it’s QBs, with only a handful of elite RBs and WRs getting the truly big salaries. Get a QB (or two), pay for a couple of big time WRs, and then fill out your offensive roster with servicable journeymen. This approach worked for the Cardinals last year.

There might be some issues running a spread option offense on a pro field against pro athletes, bu, something like an Air Raid looks to have potential at the pro level in terms of both marketability and on field success simply because no team would have the nickle and dime backs to match up with it across the board. Nickle backs get more attention now, but dime backs are still usually guys who barely make the team and are frequently there for special teams duties more than defensive prowess.

Now, if a team did start running a spread passing attack with some “college” stuff like Jet or Rocket sweeps and counters mixed in, and they had the playmakers at WR and QB, it would be extremely hard for an NFL defense to match up. If they want to load up on DBs for that week, they have to release other players and risk losing depth elsewhere at key positions. With the NFL schemes being so complex that it takes weeks for professional players just to learn the playbooks and verbiage, this is a real bind you’re putting the front office and coaching staff in when they have to defend, say, the punishing running game of the Giants or Panthers the next week.

Of course, some aspects of the spread WILL be negated, at least somewhat. The formations, for example, won’t simplify the reads for the QB nearly as much in the NFL as they do in HS or even college. But someday some coach somewhere is going to take someone like Tim Tebow and keep him on the field for most of his team’s snaps instead of trying to make him into a pocket passer, position switcher, or situational player. It only makes sense.

Chris, yea that Jets game really was a playoff game. I am a Dolphins fans and it was pure bliss .

I love the wildcat play where they snapped to Ronnie Brown, and Ronnie gets low to look like he is running and then he pops up and makes a horrible pass to a wide open TE. A decent throw would have been a touchdown. Oh well .

I would add misdirection to your list of things that the wildcat adds that is tough to deal with. You don’t see too much true misdirection in the pros.

And motioning the sweeper seems to be an obvious andvantage that the offense has over the defense. If the rules let one of your guys get a running start why not exploit that. If you don’t you seem to be choosing to play without exploiting all your advantages.

By the way, an interesting future arcticle might be on the less heralded series run by Paul Johnson the “rocket sweep”. That allows the wings to get a full speed running start on an outside pitch play and really sets up counters and bootlegs.