Tennessee Titans

Mariota shines in debut as scheme plays critical role

Published Sep. 16, 2015 7:37 a.m. ET

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By Brady Poppinga

Is Marcus Mariota a sure-fire, first-ballot hall-of-famer based off his Week 1 performance? No. Is he considered one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL based off that one game? No. Is there promise for this rookie who appears to have a lot of upside? Absolutely.

Overreacting to Mariota's performance is natural. But lest we forget, this basically is the same Tennessee Titan team that last year dominated Kansas City in Week 1 but didn’t post their second win until Week 6. So there is a lot of football remaining and a lot can still happen in the 2015 season. So let's pull back the reins on predicting Mariota’s future for now.

What’s encouraging – not only for Tennessee but for the NFL -- is how it appears Mariota will be used this season. Much of the credit goes to head coach Ken Whisenhunt, who also serves as the Titans’ play-caller / offensive mind. Whisenhunt used some of the same plays Mariota ran with success at Oregon and inserted them into his own scheme and philosophy.

*Here's how the play looked at Oregon. We'll discuss how the Titans incorporated it into their plan later in the piece.

That says a lot considering most NFL coaches usually make the player adjust to the scheme instead of adjusting the scheme to the player. That mentality comes from the idea that college schemes may not or do not translate well to the NFL. But as we're seeing with Chip Kelly in Philadelphia, and as we saw in 2012 with Robert Griffin III and Colin Kaepernick, if you draft a quarterback that excelled in running a spread/read option offense in college, then that offense can work in the NFL. And now that we’re seeing more read-option QBs entering the NFL, it’s imperative that the league begins to realize that college football is the future of NFL, not the other way around. Now that offenses are warming to more spread / read-option, defenses will have to look at the college game on how to defend it.

Take for example the Buccaneers’ defense that resulted in the Titans’ first touchdown. It takes advantage of the same concept we saw in the earlier Oregon clip -- a quick, single read on the MLB, and then a dump over his head when he bites. The quarterback doesn't even take a drop.

It was a perfect example of a poor scheme (Tampa 2) to defend read-option plays (see screen shot below). The two deep safeties create a dead space in the defense, and that places a great deal of stress on the linebacker (circled) that the quarterback is reading. If the LB steps up like he naturally should against a run fake, he loses. If that same LB plays the pass first, which is against most linebacking rules, then that creates huge running lanes.

Tampa 2 defense is particularly weak against teams that run read-option

This tells me that Tampa either didn’t anticipate the read-option (the Titans didn’t show much in the preseason) or the Bucs don’t know how to defend it. I would say most NFL teams don’t know how to defend it. The only way to learn how to defend it is to literally go back to school. NFL defensive minds need to sit down with college coaches who have a history of success against these offenses and learn what kind of defenses they use to slow them down.

So what are some good schemes for the play that resulted in Mariota's first TD pass?

This coverage, combining the concepts of Cover 4 & 0, has been adopted from the college game in taking on read option teams

Tampa is in a man-to-man defense that has every option covered (QB, dive and pitch). But, the pitch defender takes his eyes off of his responsibility and goes for the QB, leaving his guy free. The safety, who should either have the QB or pitch man, hesitates (see screenshot below). Tampa’s defenders were trying to play with their instincts on Sunday, which is typical of teams that aren't acclimated to playing against these schemes. In this instance, instincts mislead you.

Option responsibilities where the

Teams need to rep their defenses for such plays. We have no way of knowing how much read option the Bucs played in preparation for Mariota and the Titans, but Sunday's game showed future Titans opponents that being prepared and playing disciplined is much more important than being talented when facing schemes like this.

Presumably, when facing a quarterback who has a read-option background, you get his college film. Your scout team run a variety of those plays and work on how to defend them based off the rules of any scheme you're implementing. That way you give your guys a chance against a play that may be new to them. If not, you will still see defenses get out-schemed over and over again. Tampa may have some exposure, but as undisciplined as they seemed is a good lesson for future Titans opponents. It takes a strict, rules-based approach to beat these kinds of offensive plays. Any cracks in the dam and you've got a flood.

Although Mariota played very well in his first NFL start, his success was more of a function of out-scheming than outplaying. He'll have to adjust as defenses [presumably] adjust

The NFL is an ever-evolving game. Right now the movement is toward the college game. With more spread-style quarterbacks entering the league there will be more spread-style offenses implemented. Right now those spread offenses have the advantage. That means that defenses are going to have to catch up or they will continue to have issues. Just like offenses have looked to the college ranks to gain a scheme advantage over defenses, defenses will have to do the same to make up for lost ground.

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