Well rounded?

[Volizona]

Love the excitement CJH is bringing. No question we will put points on the board.

Several questions:

1. Do you think we will always run a fast paced offense/ 3 seconds per play regardless of the game situation or do you think we’ll be able to adapt and slow it down when it makes more sense to do so?

2. Will the defense be a secondary priority with the main purpose of just trying to slow the other team down enough for us to score more points or is it possible to actually have a dominating, shut down defense with a fast paced offense?

What say y’all?

 

[TitanicVolz]

I'm sure the coaches had a nice learning experience along with the players,now they have an idea of how teams will play them.They understand the flopping n the effects on the D playing an SEC schedule.Dont get it twisted Heupel prob had a hard on walking out to that Orange Assemble vs Ole Miss.Will find out real quick but I trust these guys just feels diff like from up high to down low everyone actually cares again about sports.Danny White is the real MVP

 

[DaddyChad]

Every position is a priority in recruiting, just to this point the offense is far more attractive to recruits on that side of the ball.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

I think if we're on offense, the goal is to go fast. All the time. Of course, that works best when we're getting first downs (or quick touchdowns). It only ever hurts if we're 3-and-out.

So the real goal is not to learn how to slow down sometimes, but to get efficient enough on offense to never need to.

The defense's role is to "break serve." Think tennis. Think how big an advantage it is when a tennis player is able to win a game while the other guy has serve. Instead of being 1-1 or 2-2 or 3-3, he's suddenly ahead 2-0 or 3-1 or 4-2. Huge surge toward a win.

That's what Heupel wants from our defense. To break serve a third of the time, get the ball back without the other team scoring.

Because the math goes like this: no matter how the coin flips work out, both teams are going to get more or less the same number of possessions. At most, one team will have one possession more than the other (if they possess the ball as both halves come to an end).

So if you have the ball 14 times and I have it 13 or 14 times, it all comes down to how reliably we scored TDs while we had the ball. If I'm able to score 80% of the time, and you can only score 65%, I'll beat you. Every time.

So...defense doesn't have to stop them from scoring every time, or even most of the time. They just have to break serve often enough to give our team the decided advantage. The offense will do the rest.

 

[BigOrangeTrain]

Love the excitement CJH is bringing. No question we will put points on the board.

Several questions:

1. Do you think we will always run a fast paced offense/ 3 seconds per play regardless of the game situation or do you think we’ll be able to adapt and slow it down when it makes more sense to do so?

2. Will the defense be a secondary priority with the main purpose of just trying to slow the other team down enough for us to score more points or is it possible to actually have a dominating, shut down defense with a fast paced offense?

What say y’all?

1. I don’t think we have seen the full scope of Heupels system yet. I do believe we will be able to slow the game down when needed when we get better OL play. But we will still run a very fast paced system for the majority of the time. That’s his system.

2. Secondary is important but a priority? No. The DL would be the main focus. If you can get pressure with your DL, then it makes the secondary’s job much easier. In the SEC, it’s always about the trenches.

 

[Vol8188]

I’d much rather be a team that does few things well, than a team that’s well rounded and does everything at an average level.

Play fast, score points.

 

[DaddyChad]

I’d much rather be a team that does few things well, than a team that’s well rounded and does everything at an average level.

Play fast, score points.

Pretty much will likely be our philosophy. I expect our defense to improve but will always be under pressure somewhat bc of the speed of the offense. The clock however will become an asset late in the game for us; teams will score but will they score fast enough to keep up?

 

[PlanetVolunteer]

1. I don’t think we have seen the full scope of Heupels system yet. I do believe we will be able to slow the game down when needed when we get better OL play. But we will still run a very fast paced system for the majority of the time. That’s his system.

2. Secondary is important but a priority? No. The DL would be the main focus. If you can get pressure with your DL, then it makes the secondary’s job much easier. In the SEC, it’s always about the trenches.

A pass rush solves over half of our DB's issues. Sure they were bad, but they will look a lot worse than they are in the SEC if every QB is standing around all day. Can't cover forever.

I'm not thaaaat worried about our DB's, sure they struggled. But we are at least bringing all of them back plus one or two transfers. Safe bet they get better on experience alone. They just need the D-line to be more disruptive and stop the damn qb run...

 

[1Big_Orange_Fan]

A pass rush solves over half of our DB's issues. Sure they were bad, but they will look a lot worse than they are in the SEC if every QB is standing around all day. Can't cover forever.

I'm not thaaaat worried about our DB's, sure they struggled. But we are at least bringing all of them back plus one or two transfers. Safe bet they get better on experience alone. They just need the D-line to be more disruptive and stop the damn qb run...

I'm pretty sure our best DB is about to be drafted in a couple of weeks after finishing up well at the combine...

 

[vegasvolfan]

Love the excitement CJH is bringing. No question we will put points on the board.

Several questions:

1. Do you think we will always run a fast paced offense/ 3 seconds per play regardless of the game situation or do you think we’ll be able to adapt and slow it down when it makes more sense to do so?

2. Will the defense be a secondary priority with the main purpose of just trying to slow the other team down enough for us to score more points or is it possible to actually have a dominating, shut down defense with a fast paced offense?

What say y’all?

I think our O will be our O. It is the way it is because that's how it is supposed to be, not because it is a stop gap. Same goes for D. We will continue to expect everything from our D even with our O. You don't hear Banks talking prevent and simple containment, etc. At least I have not. We just have to recruit more defensive players. I'm not sure why we aren't, but you would think that a fast scoring offense is an insurance plan for any defensive player that comes here, because our 1s, 2s and some 3s will see as much if not more PT at Tennessee than they would at schools that run more traditional offenses. Plus our staff is solid. I just don't get it

 

[EconVol92]

I think our O will be our O. If is the way it is because that's how it is supposed to be, not because it is a stop gap. Same goes for D. We will continue to expect everything from our D even with our O. You don't hear Banks talking prevent and simple containment, etc. At least I have not. We just have to recruit more defensive players. I'm not sure why we aren't, but you would think that a fast scoring offense is an insurance plan for any defensive player that comes here, because our 1s, 2s and some 3s will see as much if not more PT at Tennessee than they would at schools that run more traditional offenses. Plus our staff is solid. I just don't get it

I have been saying the exact same thing. There will be more than enough playing time to go 2 or maybe 3 deep on defense.

 

[Volizona]

I think our O will be our O. If is the way it is because that's how it is supposed to be, not because it is a stop gap. Same goes for D. We will continue to expect everything from our D even with our O. You don't hear Banks talking prevent and simple containment, etc. At least I have not. We just have to recruit more defensive players. I'm not sure why we aren't, but you would think that a fast scoring offense is an insurance plan for any defensive player that comes here, because our 1s, 2s and some 3s will see as much if not more PT at Tennessee than they would at schools that run more traditional offenses. Plus our staff is solid. I just don't get it

Very good point about the defensive players ensured of playing time. That could be a recruiting advantage.

 

[SaipanVol]

I think if we're on offense, the goal is to go fast. All the time. Of course, that works best when we're getting first downs (or quick touchdowns). It only ever hurts if we're 3-and-out.

So the real goal is not to learn how to slow down sometimes, but to get efficient enough on offense to never need to.

The defense's role is to "break serve." Think tennis. Think how big an advantage it is when a tennis player is able to win a game while the other guy has serve. Instead of being 1-1 or 2-2 or 3-3, he's suddenly ahead 2-0 or 3-1 or 4-2. Huge surge toward a win.

That's what Heupel wants from our defense. To break serve a third of the time, get the ball back without the other team scoring.

Because the math goes like this: no matter how the coin flips work out, both teams are going to get more or less the same number of possessions. At most, one team will have one possession more than the other (if they possess the ball as both halves come to an end).

So if you have the ball 14 times and I have it 13 or 14 times, it all comes down to how reliably we scored TDs while we had the ball. If I'm able to score 80% of the time, and you can only score 65%, I'll beat you. Every time.

So...defense doesn't have to stop them from scoring every time, or even most of the time. They just have to break serve often enough to give our team the decided advantage. The offense will do the rest.

If that is the math, then it is wrong. I checked one game and it was KY. they had the ball for 46.09 minutes and we had it for 13.52 minutes. They had 99 plays and we had 47 plays. The funny thing about that was we WON the game!

 

[VFL-82-JP]

If that is the math, then it is wrong. I checked one game and it was KY. they had the ball for 46.09 minutes and we had it for 13.52 minutes. They had 99 plays and we had 47 plays. The funny thing about that was we WON the game!

You're confusing different things.

Time of possession and # of plays are not the same thing as # of possessions. In CJH's scheme, only # of possessions matters. Those other two stats, they're not only meaningless, looking at them can be counter-intuitive (as you saw with us winning the KY game in spite of the Wildcats dominating the clock).

The offense goes fast to create opportunities. Their job is to score every single possession. The defense's job is to "break serve" at least a couple of times. If the offense keeps scoring (quickly) and the defense breaks serve at least a couple of times, we're guaranteed to win. Simple as that.

...

Here's a partial-game example to make the point:

We get the ball. One single play later, we score off a 75-yard strike. Time of possession 11 seconds.
KY gets the ball. Fourteen plays and 8:36 off the clock later, they score.
We get the ball. In three plays, we score. Time of possession, 0:26.
KY gets the ball. Eleven plays to get down the field, 5:58 expended.
...
at this point, the score is 14-7, Vols. Our defense has "broken serve" once by forcing KY to settle for a FG (which they missed).

Possessions were even, at 2 each. But add up those stats you mistakenly focused on: plays each team? 4 for us, 25 for KY. Time of possession? 0:37 for us, 14:34 for KY. Shockingly imbalanced...but also utterly meaningless to the score.

No, all that extra time and all those extra plays didn't give KY any extra chances to score more points than us. They still got 2 chances to score, and we got 2 chances to score.

Go back to that Kentucky game and count how many possessions each team got. I think you'll find it totalled 11 and 11.

In Heupel's scheme, time of possession and # of plays are unimportant stats. It's all about running quick to create opportunities, scoring quick, and the defense making breaks.

You might have noticed that all last season.

 

[SaipanVol]

You're confusing different things.

Time of possession and # of plays are not the same thing as # of possessions. In CJH's scheme, only # of possessions matters. Those other two stats, they're not only meaningless, looking at them can be counter-intuitive (as you saw with us winning the KY game in spite of the Wildcats dominating the clock).

The offense goes fast to create opportunities. Their job is to score every single possession. The defense's job is to "break serve" at least a couple of times. If the offense keeps scoring (quickly) and the defense breaks serve at least a couple of times, we're guaranteed to win. Simple as that.

...

Here's a partial-game example to make the point:

We get the ball. One single play later, we score off a 75-yard strike. Time of possession 11 seconds.
KY gets the ball. Fourteen plays and 8:36 off the clock later, they score.
We get the ball. In three plays, we score. Time of possession, 0:26.
KY gets the ball. Eleven plays to get down the field, 5:58 expended.
...
at this point, the score is 14-7, Vols. Our defense has "broken serve" once by forcing KY to settle for a FG (which they missed).

Possessions were even, at 2 each. But add up those stats you mistakenly focused on: plays each team? 4 for us, 25 for KY. Time of possession? 0:37 for us, 14:34 for KY. Shockingly imbalanced...but also utterly meaningless to the score.

No, all that extra time and all those extra plays didn't give KY any extra chances to score more points than us. They still got 2 chances to score, and we got 2 chances to score.

Go back to that Kentucky game and count how many possessions each team got. I think you'll find it totalled 11 and 11.

In Heupel's scheme, time of possession and # of plays are unimportant stats. It's all about running quick to create opportunities, scoring quick, and the defense making breaks.

You might have noticed that all last season.

I love CJH offence. I just stated in my reply to your quote that no matter what the possessions they were close to one another. Not in our offence scheme is it. The game stats they had 612 yds to our 461. If you read only the stats of the game you would assume KY won the game. I do not know how you came up the number that says we had 11 and KY had 11. I value your contribution to this board and you are a true VFL. I was reacting to a line in your quote that I thought was wrong and still do. CFB is changing and it feels good that TN is changing it!

 

[VFL-82-JP]

I love CJH offence. I just stated in my reply to your quote that no matter what the possessions they were close to one another. Not in our offence scheme is it. The game stats they had 612 yds to our 461. If you read only the stats of the game you would assume KY won the game. I do not know how you came up the number that says we had 11 and KY had 11. I value your contribution to this board and you are a true VFL. I was reacting to a line in your quote that I thought was wrong and still do. CFB is changing and it feels good that TN is changing it!

Thanks, brother. You're a true VFL, too. This is just a friendly conversation among fans.

Think through a football game, and you'll discover that # of possessions is an inflexible stat. That's why no one counts it; it almost never varies from 50:50. If it is a quick-moving game, maybe the two teams get the ball 17 times each. If it's a long, slow, grinder, maybe they each only get the ball 7 or 8 times. Or anything in between.

But the key point is, they're both going to get about the same number of chances to score. The same number of possessions.

That may not seem true at first. You may think there are possibilities in the structure of the game for one team to get the ball more often than the other team. There aren't. There simply aren't.** Go back to as many games as you want, throughout the history of the sport, and you'll find both teams got the ball the same number of times, within one. [as noted earlier, if one team holds the ball at the end of both halves, it will end up with one possession more than the other team]

CJH is playing off that fact concerning # of possessions. He simply wants to score every single time WE possess the ball, and get our defense to give us the opportunity to win by breaking serve at least once or twice each game when the OTHER team has it.

To score every single time we have it, he uses speed. Speed to uncover opportunities. If we go fast enough, the defense will make mistakes. They'll line up wrong, they'll miss a receiver, they'll be out of position, they won't have a play called...and when they make mistakes, we strike and score. So we're scoring on as close to 100% of OUR possessions as we can.

And our defense creates the opportunities for us to win by--every once in a while, doesn't have to be every time the other team gets the ball, just sometimes--by forcing a fumble, or an interception, or just causing their drive to stop short of the goal line. If they punt, that's breaking serve. If they settle for a field goal, that's breaking serve.

It's simple and elegant. It's exciting to watch, but not complicated. It is fast. Most certainly fast. But not confusing.

So forget time of possession or # of plays. Those are meaningless. Focus on which team is able to score a TD with each of their possessions. That's the key to winning.



** EDIT for correction: except for onside kicks, as @Vol in Buckeye Land astutely points out. That is the one way to "steal possessions." The only way.

 

[vegasvolfan]

Very good point about the defensive players ensured of playing time. That could be a recruiting advantage.

That's been my thought, but not sure how to get that info to them and not sure they want to hear a fan's input on how to recruit.

 

[fossilfiction]

No, it slows down when the game is about to wrap up. Other than that, it's always warp speed.
The defense needs to be good. I am sure that nobody on that t am says meh to being a good defense. Two or three more stops in a couple of games last year would have made the year pretty special compared to starting expectations. If the defense has a semi-regular pulse at the end of the season, Tennessee wins the bowl game.

 

[Vol865]

1. Yes. His system is based on a fast pace and spacing.

2. The more the offense scores quick, the more opportunities the Defense has to give up big plays. It's the nature of the beast. We need more talented depth to combat this. We will rely on turnovers to change the game.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

Absolutely.

And this is a funny thing: Josh Heupel's system may result in a roster that is tilted heavily toward the DEFFENSE.

Yes, the defense. Because they'll be spending a lot more time on the field, so it will be better to have more depth there.

To use a motor sports analogy, if your offense is a dragster, tuned for super high speed and quick dashes down the track, it will need to be incredibly well-tuned, but won't need a lot of spare parts in the pits. You come to the track and it either works, or it doesn't.

But if the offense is only going to be on the field 10-15 minutes each game, that means the defense is going to be out there a long time. A lot. Every game. And when you run a long, grinding race, like the 24 hours of Le Mans, you need tractor-trailer rigs full of parts. You need to be able to replace anything on that vehicle. And sometimes replace the same parts several times.

So it wouldn't surprise me if we see, over the next few years, the roster shift so that as much as two-thirds is defensive players. Just three or four QBs, only six or eight receivers, maybe three to five running backs and two or three tight ends, plus ten to twelve linemen ... total of 25-30 offensive players. But 50-60 defenders.

It could play out that way. Will be interesting to see whether it does.

 

[Vol in Buckeye Land]

Thanks, brother. You're a true VFL, too. This is just a friendly conversation among fans.

Think through a football game, and you'll discover that # of possessions is an inflexible stat. That's why no one counts it; it almost never varies from 50:50. If it is a quick-moving game, maybe the two teams get the ball 17 times each. If it's a long, slow, grinder, maybe they each only get the ball 7 or 8 times. Or anything in between.

But the key point is, they're both going to get about the same number of chances to score. The same number of possessions.

That may not seem true at first. You may think there are possibilities in the structure of the game for one team to get the ball more often than the other team. There aren't. There simply aren't. Go back to as many games as you want, throughout the history of the sport, and you'll find both teams got the ball the same number of times, within one. [as noted earlier, if one team holds the ball at the end of both halves, it will end up with one possession more than the other team]

CJH is playing off that fact concerning # of possessions. He simply wants to score every single time WE possess the ball, and get our defense to give us the opportunity to win by breaking serve at least once or twice each game when the OTHER team has it.

To score every single time we have it, he uses speed. Speed to uncover opportunities. If we go fast enough, the defense will make mistakes. They'll line up wrong, they'll miss a receiver, they'll be out of position, they won't have a play called...and when they make mistakes, we strike and score. So we're scoring on as close to 100% of OUR possessions as we can.

And our defense creates the opportunities for us to win by--every once in a while, doesn't have to be every time the other team gets the ball, just sometimes--by forcing a fumble, or an interception, or just causing their drive to stop short of the goal line. If they punt, that's breaking serve. If they settle for a field goal, that's breaking serve.

It's simple and elegant. It's exciting to watch, but not complicated. It is fast. Most certainly fast. But not confusing.

So forget time of possession or # of plays. Those are meaningless. Focus on which team is able to score a TD with each of their possessions. That's the key to winning.

Interesting points on number of possessions. It makes one wonder if some crazy analytics person will come along someday and say “we should try onside kicks every time we score.”

 

[beamerman]

You're confusing different things.

Time of possession and # of plays are not the same thing as # of possessions. In CJH's scheme, only # of possessions matters. Those other two stats, they're not only meaningless, looking at them can be counter-intuitive (as you saw with us winning the KY game in spite of the Wildcats dominating the clock).

The offense goes fast to create opportunities. Their job is to score every single possession. The defense's job is to "break serve" at least a couple of times. If the offense keeps scoring (quickly) and the defense breaks serve at least a couple of times, we're guaranteed to win. Simple as that.

...

Here's a partial-game example to make the point:

We get the ball. One single play later, we score off a 75-yard strike. Time of possession 11 seconds.
KY gets the ball. Fourteen plays and 8:36 off the clock later, they score.
We get the ball. In three plays, we score. Time of possession, 0:26.
KY gets the ball. Eleven plays to get down the field, 5:58 expended.
...
at this point, the score is 14-7, Vols. Our defense has "broken serve" once by forcing KY to settle for a FG (which they missed).

Possessions were even, at 2 each. But add up those stats you mistakenly focused on: plays each team? 4 for us, 25 for KY. Time of possession? 0:37 for us, 14:34 for KY. Shockingly imbalanced...but also utterly meaningless to the score.

No, all that extra time and all those extra plays didn't give KY any extra chances to score more points than us. They still got 2 chances to score, and we got 2 chances to score.

Go back to that Kentucky game and count how many possessions each team got. I think you'll find it totalled 11 and 11.

In Heupel's scheme, time of possession and # of plays are unimportant stats. It's all about running quick to create opportunities, scoring quick, and the defense making breaks.

You might have noticed that all last season.

Spot on. One thing about that game though was our defense was gassed because of time on the field, hence more people are needed on that side of the ball. Would have been nice to have some fresh kegs there at the end. Those guys held on by guts, they could not have had much left in the tank. For Tn we need to focus on number of possessions, not time of. Man, Tn football is certainly fun again and I was not sure if we could ever say that.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

Interesting points on number of possessions. It makes one wonder if some crazy analytics person will come along someday and say “we should try onside kicks every time we score.”

Absolutely. We should be doing that. Stealing possessions from them that way would be huge.

...

I just noticed another advantage of the go-fast offense. All other things being equal, it gives BOTH teams more possessions in a single game. And more possessions gives more opportunities for our defense to break serve.

Here's what I mean:

In a slow, grinding game, each team might get as few as 5 total possessions. In a fast, score-quick game, we could get as many as 20 each.*

That difference is huge, once you factor in the delta in scoring abilities of the two teams. Let's say Tennessee's offense is able to score a TD on 80% of our possessions. And our defense is able to keep the other team from scoring on more than 60% of their possessions.

(a) Slow game -- 5 possessions per team. Vols score in 80% of ours, so 4 out of 5 times. 28 points total. Opponents score on 60% of their drives, so 3 of the 5 possessions. They total 21 points. End result: close game, 28-21. Too close for comfort.

but...

(b) Fairly quick game -- say, 14 possessions per team. Vols score 80% of the time, so 11 touchdowns = 77 points (don't laugh, it could happen, heh). Opponent scores 60% of the time, so 8 TDs =56 points. We win by three scores, 77-56. Not even close.

Bottom line is, the faster we play on offense, the more possessions both teams get. And the more possessions we each get, the wider the gap will be between us at the end of the game, as long as we are better at finding the end zone.

So going fast not only creates tactical opportunities to score, it also sets us up strategically for a more favorable result.

...

Never noticed that before today, but it makes perfect sense. And is another reason Josh Heupel is a football genius.





* The math for that: 5 possessions per team = 10 total possessions in the game. 60 minutes / 10 possessions = 6 minute drives. That's both teams going slow enough that their average drive takes 6 minutes. Meanwhile, 20 possessions per team = 40 possessions total. 60 minutes / 40 possessions = 1.5 minutes per drive. We proved that kind of speed is possible in the KY game: 11 drives using up less than 14 minutes of clock. That's less than 1.3 minutes per drive. KY wasn't going fast, just the opposite. But if they had been, we might've seen 20 possessions per team in that match.

 

[OrangeBeachVol]

I think Hyp only used part of his offense last season as it was basically a teaching yr. I expect to see more of what some of you are saying on here this season as he can get do more with his O this coming season.

 

[VFL-82-JP]

Interesting points on number of possessions. It makes one wonder if some crazy analytics person will come along someday and say “we should try onside kicks every time we score.”

Oh, and one other thought concerning expanded use of onside kicks:

We shouldn't use them all the time. Too predictable and we'll rarely succeed.

We shouldn't use them in games where we have a comfortable advantage. You know, like Tennessee Tech, or Bowling Green, South Alabama, or Vandy.

And we shouldn't use them in games where we have very small chance of victory. As long as we're a 3-TD underdog to Bama, for example.

But the games we consider peer competition, like the Ole Miss and South Carolina and Florida games, we should use the onside kick early and often then.

Maybe 2 or 3 key games each year, target those for extensive "sabermetrics" special teams play.

It's an idea, anyway.

Go Vols!