As a graduate, I'm legally obligated to remind you to not forget Purdue Neil! The Cradle of Quarterbacks deserves some statistical love too.
Still to not miss the forest for the tree, I do appreciate and admire the far too often forgotten story of LaVell Edwards and how he evolved his offensive strategy to leverage his physically smaller but faster players at BYU by adopting the forward pass while everyone else was trying to run between the tackles. In the 70s everyone parroted back the narrative of the time - BYU was a gimmick offense that wouldn't survive or succeed, nor would its QBs be able to handle the "more complex" NFL offenses.
Air Raid? Rinse and repeat the same failed arguments. It's a great lesson in disruption and hubris, and one that I recently mentioned on another Substack as a counter example to the lack of innovation within the Nebraska program post-Osborne.
Another more subtle lesson, is how much misinformation there is in what should be straightforward history. Did LaVell learn from Bill Walsh as the narrative says today, or did Bill Walsh - and later Mike Holmgren - learn from LaVell Edwards? The body of evidence points to the latter, including Walsh purportedly receiving copies of BYU game films to incorporate into game plans.
Sure, success always has many fathers, but the history of the modern forward pass offense and who we ascribe as the innovator are strangely shrouded in fog and agendas. That history in my view begins with Sid Gillman - a true genius and innovator that at most these days resides in an obligatory footnote as authors pursue more popular and recent head coaches as the supposed creators.
I always admired Al Davis and Don Coryell who would tirelessly remind people that the modern passing game began with Gillman - full stop. Unfortunately, those voices of truth are gone or small and fading these days as the forward pass Big Bang moment in our revisionist history now somehow starts with Walsh.
As a kid in Ohio, I loved Walsh as the cantankerous and quirky AHC for the Bengals who made Ken Anderson one of the great underrated players in football as well as the tragic story of his fractured relationship with Paul Brown. I also respect how he played a part in Virgil Carter (also from BYU...another LaVell Edwards connection to Walsh) developing the now familiar "Expected Points" metric...but regarding modern theories of downfield passing, Gilman preceded Walsh and others by a good measure.
I come not to criticize any of these people. They each in their own and important way played key roles in moving the game forward to where it is today. However, remembering who was the actual originator of these concepts is important work that is crucial to understanding history and how we got here.
To that end, I would encourage everyone to learn more about Sid Gillman - an original and true innovator. Thanks so much again for an inspiring read.
Shoutout to Joe Tiller! Yes, that's a great note -- it's sometimes difficult to triangulate where to place the single-back spread guys like Tiller and Dennis Erickson in the broader narrative of offensive development: The BYU offense combining with Tiger Ellison's Run-and-Shoot to beget the Air Raid; the rise of the Gillman/Air Coryell offense; Chip Kelly/Rich Rodriguez with the spread option; Steve Spurrier's Fun-n-Gun; Chris Ault and the Pistol; etc. But it was wildly effective, not just with Drew Brees but a bunch of other QBs.
As a graduate, I'm legally obligated to remind you to not forget Purdue Neil! The Cradle of Quarterbacks deserves some statistical love too.
Still to not miss the forest for the tree, I do appreciate and admire the far too often forgotten story of LaVell Edwards and how he evolved his offensive strategy to leverage his physically smaller but faster players at BYU by adopting the forward pass while everyone else was trying to run between the tackles. In the 70s everyone parroted back the narrative of the time - BYU was a gimmick offense that wouldn't survive or succeed, nor would its QBs be able to handle the "more complex" NFL offenses.
Air Raid? Rinse and repeat the same failed arguments. It's a great lesson in disruption and hubris, and one that I recently mentioned on another Substack as a counter example to the lack of innovation within the Nebraska program post-Osborne.
Another more subtle lesson, is how much misinformation there is in what should be straightforward history. Did LaVell learn from Bill Walsh as the narrative says today, or did Bill Walsh - and later Mike Holmgren - learn from LaVell Edwards? The body of evidence points to the latter, including Walsh purportedly receiving copies of BYU game films to incorporate into game plans.
Sure, success always has many fathers, but the history of the modern forward pass offense and who we ascribe as the innovator are strangely shrouded in fog and agendas. That history in my view begins with Sid Gillman - a true genius and innovator that at most these days resides in an obligatory footnote as authors pursue more popular and recent head coaches as the supposed creators.
I always admired Al Davis and Don Coryell who would tirelessly remind people that the modern passing game began with Gillman - full stop. Unfortunately, those voices of truth are gone or small and fading these days as the forward pass Big Bang moment in our revisionist history now somehow starts with Walsh.
As a kid in Ohio, I loved Walsh as the cantankerous and quirky AHC for the Bengals who made Ken Anderson one of the great underrated players in football as well as the tragic story of his fractured relationship with Paul Brown. I also respect how he played a part in Virgil Carter (also from BYU...another LaVell Edwards connection to Walsh) developing the now familiar "Expected Points" metric...but regarding modern theories of downfield passing, Gilman preceded Walsh and others by a good measure.
I come not to criticize any of these people. They each in their own and important way played key roles in moving the game forward to where it is today. However, remembering who was the actual originator of these concepts is important work that is crucial to understanding history and how we got here.
To that end, I would encourage everyone to learn more about Sid Gillman - an original and true innovator. Thanks so much again for an inspiring read.
Shoutout to Joe Tiller! Yes, that's a great note -- it's sometimes difficult to triangulate where to place the single-back spread guys like Tiller and Dennis Erickson in the broader narrative of offensive development: The BYU offense combining with Tiger Ellison's Run-and-Shoot to beget the Air Raid; the rise of the Gillman/Air Coryell offense; Chip Kelly/Rich Rodriguez with the spread option; Steve Spurrier's Fun-n-Gun; Chris Ault and the Pistol; etc. But it was wildly effective, not just with Drew Brees but a bunch of other QBs.
On behalf of Boilermakers and their fans everywhere...thank you!