Offensive Run Plays on Various Downs

[Tim-Colts]

Here's another one for Rich's bingo card. I find this league more restrictive than a pair of underwear that are 2 sizes too small.

Oh look in the logs, my opponent this week has a problem stopping this PML play for the past 3 weeks. Add that to my game plan. Hey, I feel like a 543 1st and 10 instead of a 672 of last week. Now submit my PPP for approval, done!

Last night we saw at least a dozen times a player busted out and was open by 5+ yards get tackled before the goal line (might have only been 10 times, but it happened a lot). So there seems to be little threat of getting a play to score long touchdowns at will. I understand having restrictions on play calling for the BOMB plays, that makes sense. For 1st and 10, like Dean mentioned why are there 3 categories only and they are absolutely required. We have that on most downs with the exception of some "choices" on some of the downs.

My gut feel is it won't change much any way whether we add more options for running on 1st and 10. The cookie cutter complete restriction on categories for down/distance/time etc. won't allow for it.

[Donovon-Steelers]

Maybe I'm missing something bcz I didn't read everything on here but from a cursory glance, I don't understand the purpose of this. The most popular formations in RL already exist in RM plays. The most popular formations in RR already exist in RM plays. And any that don't exist can easily be re-created as a RM play. The only difference is the QB sneak play %, which everyone seems to agrees on NOT increasing. So then what's the point of this proposal? Have to agree with some others that this seems like a solution looking for a problem that doesn't exist.

[Tim-Colts]

Maybe I'm missing something bcz I didn't read everything on here but from a cursory glance, I don't understand the purpose of this. The most popular formations in RL already exist in RM plays. The most popular formations in RR already exist in RM plays. And any that don't exist can easily be re-created as a RM play. The only difference is the QB sneak play %, which everyone seems to agrees on NOT increasing. So then what's the point of this proposal? Have to agree with some others that this seems like a solution looking for a problem that doesn't exist.

So the idea was to be able to setup your profile with a category that is true run middle, sweeps and off tackle in different categories. Then you can decide throughout the game when to potentially deploy each type of run. Now you get a pool of 10 plays, its the only category and you get zero predetermination on when each play type is used.

Maybe 1st half you want to pound the middle and 2nd half run sweeps, you can more easily control that without needing to prepare 2 different plans. Also I think this would make it easier week over week to change your plan of attack that does not require you to sift through 200 plays to pick out what you want. My thinking also might mean I'm picking in the top 5 every season too, so what do I know.

[Jerry-Redskins]

Just for the last couple of comments, My first and second half plans are different each week. One of the things I tweak depending on the opponent is the number of sweeps in the plan by half. Of course my OC can have a mind of his own at times. Nature of the weights and commish sim is that yeah the calls I wish occurred do not some games. Works out over a season average, but not in an individual game or series. I think the new emphasis of everyone watching game broadcast, you are thinking ahead on what the next call should be and it does not occur and it can be frustrating. I know, I sit here and go run at them again and bam a PM is called by my OC.

This means how far to go to help give more specific play calling capability. This gets into what Justin was laying out better than I did. You can't do actual discrete categories as then you limit yourself more with only three calls per situation and the situation as Justin mentions; are you down 8 or 30 points? Are you at the opponents 6 or the 36 yard line? We can never get specific enough with commish sim in our software and create a balance to have teams call a realistic number of plays. It is the ultimate limitation.

In my opinion, the question from this perspective becomes do we make all run play categories the same number minimum to allow teams to use them to be more specific if they want to in order to try to control the play calling more. I would still not be for it as it would still allow a team to need less run plays in a plan as well for a major category. The side effect would mean I could go 6 RM and not put RR in my plan/profile at all and only need to find 6 successful plays versus 10 if the minimum was to become 6. Part of the PNFL has also been situational play calling ability and the balance around making sure teams call a realistic number of plays in a game. This is what I allude to in that all other leagues I played in before the PNFL would let me basically call one play the entire time in commish sim. It is easier to have to only use a handful of plays and have an opponent guess wrong in a given week and can't react in a commish sim. The balance to force a well rounded game plan versus a limited one has been the greatness of the PNFL.

Personally I believe this is one of the big driving forces in the PNFL's longevity. The principle everyone has to design a full balanced profile and plan with some situational abilities and not the gimmicks of all my prior leagues is so important in my opinion. It is absolutely way harder to learn this style and be consistently successful, but I truly believe all other FBPRO leagues that existed were not football. I get more specificity is wanted, but where is the line in allowing others to do less whose sole purpose is to win at all cost, which lets face we all slowly gravitate to over time. We would all in up doing the same to get wins. I think keeping the RM segregated an at 10 with other plays more restricted as to when they can be called is more important to the overall concepts and play style of the league.

[Barney - Vikings]

As someone who likes the idea, the concept is to bring more play calling flexibility. Right now we are locked into a very specific scenario on first down. Our only run option is RM. RM is really Run Random. Most if not all coaches will have some inside runs,some off tackle and some sweeps. The mix might change every week but it would be nice to have more control over the types of runs as the game is already super random as it is.

It would be nice to be able to focus on one type of Run on first down if it made sense, so I might divide my running plays with my RM‘s being inside runs, my RL‘s being off tackle runs and my RR’s being sweeps. So then if I’m interested in only running off tackle on first and 10, because I don’t want to risk a loss on a sweep I could just call RL. As it is unless I have no sweeps in RM I can’t do that.

I would allow us choose 2 run categories and 1 pass on 1st and 2nd down. A 6-6-6 split for runs has the same number of plays as our current 10-4-4 still 18 runs. And if you choose two running categories, you would have to have 12 plays that work as opposed to 10.

To address a couple of the objections:

1. All change has potential unintended consequences. That doesn’t mean it isn’t a good idea or shouldn’t be tried. We can always change back if it is a bad idea like we did with the Salary Cap.

2. There is no reason to have multiple PM categories on first down. We already have enough flexibility with two passing categories with at least 10 plays required. I’d just like to see that kind of flexibility in the running game.

[Justin-Chicago]

I might divide my running plays with my RM‘s being inside runs, my RL‘s being off tackle runs and my RR’s being sweeps. So then if I’m interested in only running off tackle on first and 10, because I don’t want to risk a loss on a sweep I could just call RL.

In the above scenario, why not just make your RMs off tackle?

[Barney - Vikings]

I might divide my running plays with my RM‘s being inside runs, my RL‘s being off tackle runs and my RR’s being sweeps. So then if I’m interested in only running off tackle on first and 10, because I don’t want to risk a loss on a sweep I could just call RL.

In the above scenario, why not just make your RMs off tackle?

Well, I could use 10 off-tackle RM’s of course. But if I want to run inside on second and 10 and sweep on third and 10 or some combination of those it wouldn’t be available.Not saying I would do that but I’d like the flexibility to do that if it made sense.

[Justin-Chicago]

If running the ball on 1st and 10 and 2nd and 10 only got you to 3rd and 10, another run would not be the smartest playcall, unless called for clock management.

However, if the run game keeps the down and distance "on schedule" by gaining 1-5 yards, you already have the flexibility to do what I believe you are looking to do:

RM on 1st and 10
RR on 2nd and 10
RL on 3rd and 5
or
RM on 1st and 10
RL on 2nd and 5
RR on 3rd and 5

[Barney - Vikings]

If running the ball on 1st and 10 and 2nd and 10 only got you to 3rd and 10, another run would not be the smartest playcall, unless called for clock management.

However, if the run game keeps the down and distance "on schedule" by gaining 1-5 yards, you already have the flexibility to do what I believe you are looking to do:

RM on 1st and 10
RR on 2nd and 10
RL on 3rd and 5
or
RM on 1st and 10
RL on 2nd and 5
RR on 3rd and 5

Well, I appreciate your problem-solving ability but a more typical example might be run off-tackle for 6 yards on first down, now I want to run a sweep on second.
I don’t want to go back and forth on scenarios. Maybe having the possibility of 2 run categories on a down would add to the flexibility but then you would have to have a 6-6-6 distribution to avoid abuse.

[Justin-Chicago]

I won’t go back and forth on scenarios. I understand what you’re saying, but RR has always been defined as a passing down run, right?
Personally I’d rather see RR allowed on 2nd and 2-5, and/or RL on 3rd and 6-10, than mess with RM exclusivity on 1st down.