The traditional running game strategy was long overdue for correction. Handing the ball off to a smallish player five yards behind the line of scrimmage in full view of the defense with no deception, where the point of attack is moving toward the defense which is crashing six or seven defenders into the line against five OLs is a lot of things...but smart isn't one of them.
The numbers couldn't have been clearer. The average run in the NFL for decades was around a poor 3.5 yards per play utilized, while each pass on average was more than twice that. How the running attack dominated NFL thinking as long as it did with those awful numbers is a documentary in waiting. As is the mystery of why teams continue to falsely believe today that bubble screens behind the line of scrimmage like extended handoffs - are somehow magically converted into vertical passes. They rarely gain positive yardage. Again, just like with the traditional running attack, there is zero deception in front of the defense and too much traffic to gain significant yardage.
It's easy to analogize the NFL's avoiding the forward pass to the NBA struggling to figure out that shooting 35% on 3s yields more points than 50% on 2s. Arithmetic still works everywhere but in sports front offices it seems. It's an excruciatingly slow roll to the equals sign.
The running game over the past 15 years has cratered further, and for good reason. When you use your QB to run the ball from the gun, you go from zero deception to massive deception that changes the numbers on defense in favor of the offense. Not only does your rushing YPA increase significantly, but the defense must respect the risk of a designed QB run, resulting in less blitzing and fewer defenders in pass coverage resulting in wider passing windows. It's why "run first" dual threat QBs with poorer pocket passing skills have a short lifespan in the League (Cam Newton, Russell Wilson etc.). Like the old TV show the Fugitive, the day their running stops, the show is over.
The other problem with the traditional RB is that they are typically very poor at the two competencies modern passing offenses desperately need - pass catching and blocking. Most RBs are drafted for their running ability, and a 200-pound RB is little match when blocking a 250-pound LB or end is collapsing the pocket. At some point, a team will figure out that moving an additional TE into the backfield will create better blocking (both passing and leading designed runs) as well as pass receiving from the position.
As the NFL has moved to aggressively copy college Air Raid style offenses, the college supply chain has become devoid of talented traditional RBs, and high school coaches are reticent to put their best athletes at the position - opting instead for them to be quarterbacks, wide receivers or defensive backs. The market has responded to the increasing lack of demand for the position which has further accelerated change.
The RBs that do come into the League with hype (e.g. Bijan Robinson) tend to disappoint, and virtually all running backs fall off precipitously after 1,500 touches. Joe Schoen on Hard Knocks was wrong - age isn't relevant to the aging curve, but touches are - 1,500 is the wall. Joe could still be right, however, for the wrong reason as Saquon Barkley is sitting right at 1,500 touches. A falloff would not be a surprise.
In any event, with 1,500 touches hanging over them like the Sword of Damocles, few RBs are effective for even 5 years. Like horse drawn carriages, the world has evolved and innovated traditional RBs to a much reduced role. The game for fans is better as a result.
Thanks for this note, Grant -- and I don't really disagree with anything here. But I also don't want a version of football in which there is NO room for a traditional RB. That position (along with the O- and D-lines) is connected with the original physical spirit of the game itself, with its origin in rugby. We lose something as we move further away from those roots, even if passing is more efficient than running -- and mostly more exciting, too.
Neil, thanks very much for your thought-provoking follow-up here. Two points of clarification that understandably might have been lost in my points, and a brief discussion of your valuable perspective here.
First, I believe that running the football is essential to offensive strategy and production. The narrower your strategy is, the easier it is to defend (see 1980s pass heavy Run and Shoot offenses). I simply want that running component to be maximized in efficiency and not done is a non-deceptive and lumbering manner as has historically been the case with traditional running backs. "Three yards and a cloud of dust" is not a strategy I find compelling intellectually or as a fan. For me, using the QB is the more effective and exciting way to utilize the run.
Also, I don't want the position to necessarily be eliminated - just evolved. However, I do want players with skill sets that are more effective in supporting the superior passing game. Again, I think adding a TE to the backfield and calling that position something else (e.g. "flexback") where blocking, pass catching acumen and yards after catch are emphasized through physical attributes and skill is the better path forward than via undersized RBs who don't block well and often don't catch passes particularly well either.
I do recall a consistency in your remarks around what I would term the importance of aesthetics in sports. You raised this I think regarding the baseball shift and various conference realignments and the elimination of the PAC 10/12. I too value these elements in sports whether you bucket them under aesthetics, nostalgia, or historical/cultural significance. So, I do not dismiss your perspective at all, and in fact think that we would likely align on the vast majority.
Where I think we might diverge and would respectfully have to disagree, is when aesthetics bleeds into sports strategy. If you are engaged in an athletic endeavor where you seriously contemplate or analyze that endeavor to the point that you develop a strategy to achieve certain outcomes, then - for me - aesthetics should play no part in that work.
Strategy for me is an intellectual red line. The entire focus should be on achieving the outcomes you seek through your strategy and not muddied by other considerations. If it is worth thinking about or doing, then do it in the most efficient manner and get there first.
As an example, I'm not a fan of the current "three true outcomes" aesthetic in baseball. However, I both understand it and respect it as a strategic outcome. The reality is that competition will eventually lead us to smarter outcomes eventually even where those are not ones I favor as a fan.
Thanks so much again for taking the time to generously offer your thoughts here and encourage dialog on these issues.
I think the place where our perspectives come together is in the fact that it is on the *league* to prioritize aesthetics/cultural considerations/etc. As Ethan Strauss has often said, the game IS the rules. You get the style of play that the rules (and other aspects of the dominant meta) reward. So it's definitely not incumbent upon any particular team/coach/etc. to re-prioritize the RB in football, or to bring back balls in play in baseball. It's on the league/governing body to tweak the rules and make those things more strategically effective (if indeed those things are what fans want or are important to the fabric of the game in some way).
The traditional running game strategy was long overdue for correction. Handing the ball off to a smallish player five yards behind the line of scrimmage in full view of the defense with no deception, where the point of attack is moving toward the defense which is crashing six or seven defenders into the line against five OLs is a lot of things...but smart isn't one of them.
The numbers couldn't have been clearer. The average run in the NFL for decades was around a poor 3.5 yards per play utilized, while each pass on average was more than twice that. How the running attack dominated NFL thinking as long as it did with those awful numbers is a documentary in waiting. As is the mystery of why teams continue to falsely believe today that bubble screens behind the line of scrimmage like extended handoffs - are somehow magically converted into vertical passes. They rarely gain positive yardage. Again, just like with the traditional running attack, there is zero deception in front of the defense and too much traffic to gain significant yardage.
It's easy to analogize the NFL's avoiding the forward pass to the NBA struggling to figure out that shooting 35% on 3s yields more points than 50% on 2s. Arithmetic still works everywhere but in sports front offices it seems. It's an excruciatingly slow roll to the equals sign.
The running game over the past 15 years has cratered further, and for good reason. When you use your QB to run the ball from the gun, you go from zero deception to massive deception that changes the numbers on defense in favor of the offense. Not only does your rushing YPA increase significantly, but the defense must respect the risk of a designed QB run, resulting in less blitzing and fewer defenders in pass coverage resulting in wider passing windows. It's why "run first" dual threat QBs with poorer pocket passing skills have a short lifespan in the League (Cam Newton, Russell Wilson etc.). Like the old TV show the Fugitive, the day their running stops, the show is over.
The other problem with the traditional RB is that they are typically very poor at the two competencies modern passing offenses desperately need - pass catching and blocking. Most RBs are drafted for their running ability, and a 200-pound RB is little match when blocking a 250-pound LB or end is collapsing the pocket. At some point, a team will figure out that moving an additional TE into the backfield will create better blocking (both passing and leading designed runs) as well as pass receiving from the position.
As the NFL has moved to aggressively copy college Air Raid style offenses, the college supply chain has become devoid of talented traditional RBs, and high school coaches are reticent to put their best athletes at the position - opting instead for them to be quarterbacks, wide receivers or defensive backs. The market has responded to the increasing lack of demand for the position which has further accelerated change.
The RBs that do come into the League with hype (e.g. Bijan Robinson) tend to disappoint, and virtually all running backs fall off precipitously after 1,500 touches. Joe Schoen on Hard Knocks was wrong - age isn't relevant to the aging curve, but touches are - 1,500 is the wall. Joe could still be right, however, for the wrong reason as Saquon Barkley is sitting right at 1,500 touches. A falloff would not be a surprise.
In any event, with 1,500 touches hanging over them like the Sword of Damocles, few RBs are effective for even 5 years. Like horse drawn carriages, the world has evolved and innovated traditional RBs to a much reduced role. The game for fans is better as a result.
Thanks for this note, Grant -- and I don't really disagree with anything here. But I also don't want a version of football in which there is NO room for a traditional RB. That position (along with the O- and D-lines) is connected with the original physical spirit of the game itself, with its origin in rugby. We lose something as we move further away from those roots, even if passing is more efficient than running -- and mostly more exciting, too.
Neil, thanks very much for your thought-provoking follow-up here. Two points of clarification that understandably might have been lost in my points, and a brief discussion of your valuable perspective here.
First, I believe that running the football is essential to offensive strategy and production. The narrower your strategy is, the easier it is to defend (see 1980s pass heavy Run and Shoot offenses). I simply want that running component to be maximized in efficiency and not done is a non-deceptive and lumbering manner as has historically been the case with traditional running backs. "Three yards and a cloud of dust" is not a strategy I find compelling intellectually or as a fan. For me, using the QB is the more effective and exciting way to utilize the run.
Also, I don't want the position to necessarily be eliminated - just evolved. However, I do want players with skill sets that are more effective in supporting the superior passing game. Again, I think adding a TE to the backfield and calling that position something else (e.g. "flexback") where blocking, pass catching acumen and yards after catch are emphasized through physical attributes and skill is the better path forward than via undersized RBs who don't block well and often don't catch passes particularly well either.
I do recall a consistency in your remarks around what I would term the importance of aesthetics in sports. You raised this I think regarding the baseball shift and various conference realignments and the elimination of the PAC 10/12. I too value these elements in sports whether you bucket them under aesthetics, nostalgia, or historical/cultural significance. So, I do not dismiss your perspective at all, and in fact think that we would likely align on the vast majority.
Where I think we might diverge and would respectfully have to disagree, is when aesthetics bleeds into sports strategy. If you are engaged in an athletic endeavor where you seriously contemplate or analyze that endeavor to the point that you develop a strategy to achieve certain outcomes, then - for me - aesthetics should play no part in that work.
Strategy for me is an intellectual red line. The entire focus should be on achieving the outcomes you seek through your strategy and not muddied by other considerations. If it is worth thinking about or doing, then do it in the most efficient manner and get there first.
As an example, I'm not a fan of the current "three true outcomes" aesthetic in baseball. However, I both understand it and respect it as a strategic outcome. The reality is that competition will eventually lead us to smarter outcomes eventually even where those are not ones I favor as a fan.
Thanks so much again for taking the time to generously offer your thoughts here and encourage dialog on these issues.
I really appreciate the back and forth!
I think the place where our perspectives come together is in the fact that it is on the *league* to prioritize aesthetics/cultural considerations/etc. As Ethan Strauss has often said, the game IS the rules. You get the style of play that the rules (and other aspects of the dominant meta) reward. So it's definitely not incumbent upon any particular team/coach/etc. to re-prioritize the RB in football, or to bring back balls in play in baseball. It's on the league/governing body to tweak the rules and make those things more strategically effective (if indeed those things are what fans want or are important to the fabric of the game in some way).