The One-Play Offense

Simplicity is a virtue in offensive football.  If the appearance of complexity can be maintained for the defense, a simple offense leaves more practice time to focus on core plays, fundamental skills, and other facets of the game.  Vince Lombardi often wrote about the value of a simple game plan, executed well.  Paul Johnson condenses his weekly list of available plays until it can be written on a Post-It note. Hal Mumme, when he metamorphosed the West Coast Offense into the Air Raid, so valued simplicity that he made his offense solely right-handed, shedding all strong-left formations like so much spent snakeskin.

An offense consisting of six plays, or even ten, would be extremely simple by modern standards, but the Holy Grail of offensive simplicity would be a system consisting of a single play.  When the aforementioned Mumme was coaching at Southeastern Louisiana University, I attended a clinic there where he mentioned just such an offense.  The (apocryphal?) story he told was of a High School coach in Kentucky (Mumme was previously head coach at the University of Kentucky) who had great talent on his team but no time to practice - all his best players prioritized their commitments to their school and club basketball teams, and played football when time allowed.  His response was a single-play offense, and the single play was the Air Raid "Mesh":

"Mesh" is a three step dropback pass play from the shotgun.  The flanker (Z) runs a 12-yard corner route, while the tight end (Y) runs a drag five yards deep over the center, setting the "mesh point" where he rubs shoulders with the split end (X) on an under route.  After the rub, Y and X will bend their routes diagonally upfield versus man coverage, but versus zone they will settle in the first open window between the linebackers (indicated by zigzags).  The fullback (F) checks for a blitz before releasing on a swing route, while the halfback (H) releases immediately on a shoot route. Image stolen from coach Bruce Eien's excellent site from the mid-2000's. 

Why Mesh

The structure of the Mesh play puts five basic passing concepts in play simultaneously: a triangle read to the frontside between Z, F, and X, so that one of the three will be open against virtually any zone coverage; packaged sides such that the route combinations on the frontside and backside of the play come open against different defenses, so the defense never happens into the perfect coverage; intersecting routes to "rub" off man defenders covering Y and X, and to a lesser extent H and X; drag routes to control blitzing; and a built-in "hot" route (H's shoot) in case of a blitz, so there is no need to adjust the play when the defense shows pressure.

Furthermore, the concepts fit together organically so the same decision process can be used versus any coverage - the passer makes a basic pre-snap read to get a hint of who might be expected to come open based on the secondary structure presented, then looks for his receivers in a predetermined order regardless of how the defense ultimately evolves.

Defensive coaches have a limitless capacity to invent coverage schemes, but for brevity I will dissect the play under the Run n' Shoot philosophy that all coverages are variations on four basic frameworks: 2 deep zone, 3 deep zone, man with one or more safeties, and blitz (man coverage without a safety).

2 Deep Zone. With two safeties on the hashmarks, the passer focuses on the frontside triangle read, in particular the flanker's (Z) corner route and the fullback's (F) swing route applying a high-low stretch on the cornerback in the flat.  The QB throws the corner route in rhythm off the third step unless the cornerback sinks backward to take it away.  In that case he briefly looks next to the split end (X), who will usually be covered by the outside linebacker in Cover 2.  F's blitz pickup responsibilities are relatively less likely to be needed against a 2 safety look, so if the corner takes the Z and an outside linebacker takes X, F should be alone on the swing route for a dropoff with space to run (and a lead blocker in Z).

The Cover 2 cornerback is put in a bind by the vertical stretch applied by Z and F.

3 Deep Zone.  Against a single-safety high look, the passer shifts his thinking to the horizontal stretch on the outside linebacker.  The pre-snap read tells him the cornerback is now likely to backpedal and take away the corner route.  Fortunately, this puts the outside linebacker in a bind: cover the back in the flat or the X on the drag route?  Based on leverage or matchup, the passer can also work the horizontal stretch on the backside between H and Y, particularly if it looks like F will be needed in blitz pickup.

The weakness of Cover 3 is its soft undercoverage. Mesh exploits it with horizontal stretches on the outside linebackers.

Man Free or Man Under.  Whether the defense presents one or two safeties, the passer's focus versus man defense becomes the rubs caused by the intersecting routes of Y and X, and to a lesser extent between H and X.  Setting a basketball-style pick is illegal, of course, but these are simply routes that cross, and there's nothing wrong with that as long as receivers keep moving and don't target a particular defender.  Even if the passer doesn't deduce man coverage pre-snap from the pass defenders' alignment, he can progress through his receivers in the same order as he would for zone defense.

Having so many crossing routes creates a jumble of bodies for man defense.  Defenders in man coverage have to avoid not only the crossing receivers but also their own teammates.

Blitz.  When the defense presents no safety at all, it can always bring one more rusher than the offense can block.  In this situation cornerbacks will typically play with inside leverage to defend against a quick slant, so the corner route can be thrown in rhythm and with leverage.  H's shoot route also provides a built in hot throw with a rub from X's under route.

Z's corner route has leverage and H's shoot gives a built-in hot throw versus a blitz.

Unsound Defenses.  Versus defenses that do not sufficiently cover the offensive gaps, like a 3 Deep Man Under, or fronts that vastly outnumber the offense to one side, the QB runs the ball himself, similar to a QB draw.  The passer will also scramble whenever he can't pass to one of his first three receivers, with the route structure providing several solid option for throws on the run.

Predictably Successful

How does an offense with only one play prevent the defense from "playing the play" and using recognition of a predictable play to defeat it?  The Air Raid has several ingenious methods of maintaining the appearance of complexity for the defense.

Formation and Motion.  In the Air Raid system, a receiver runs the same route regardless of where he lines up.  There are a few simple adjustments to keep in mind (e.g. swing and shoot routes turn into hitches if the receiver is near the sideline, the swing is always run to the opposite side of the shoot), but in general if a receiver runs a corner route, he always runs a corner route no matter where he aligns.  The onus is on the coach to call combinations of formations and plays that make sense.  Simply moving the receivers around with a handful of formations and motions adds significant complexity, without changing the play (click to enlarge):

Pass Protection.  Depending on where the defense is applying pressure, the pass protection can be tweaked by having H and/or Y stay in to protect instead of or in addition to F.  This adds complexity for defenses that blitz to prevent certain receivers from getting out into the route.  With all three staying in to block, a max protection pass with a corner route and drag provides a good answer to a Cover 0 blitz.  The play can also be made into a sprint-out pass by having F help seal the edge rather than running the check-swing.

Tags. Receivers can be tagged with route adjustments to take advantage of defenders who over-anticipate a particular route.  A safety expecting to jump Z's corner route can be burned by tagging Z with a post or a PCP (post-corner-post) instead.  F can be tagged with a wheel route, H can turn his shoot into an out-and-up, Y and X can stop and double back before they mesh, turning their drags into returns.  Changing the corner to a curl, the swing to a wheel, and Y's drag to a return yields a stem/chair combo route ready-made to defeat a 2 Deep shell rotating to Cover 3 Cloud.

All of which begs the question of when a single play is no longer a single play, and of what a football play even is, anyway.  If the basic "Mesh" scheme can be turned into dozens of different looks with subtle changes in motion, formation, protection, and route tag, then maybe it isn't so much a single play as a method of teaching: a way of sequentially presenting information to players so that what is actually complex appears to fit simply into a consistent framework.  After all, Air Raid teams are as famous for their innovative teaching and practice techniques as they are for offensive prowess.  Whether or not Hal Mumme's story of the poor Kentucky coach with no practice time is true, the point is still a good one.  A simple scheme, executed well, is always best.  But a complicated scheme, taught well, can be simple too.