From T formation to spread, NFL now pass happy
Most NFL fans today know football as a highpaced sport dominated by quarterbacks like Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers passing their teams toward the scoreboard. But it hasn’t always been like this.
Before the 1970s, passing was seen as a high-risk, high-reward maneuver, and having a good running back often was as important as a good quarterback.
In the era before the 1970 NFLAFL merger, quarterbacks completed just 49.1 percent of their passes and threw interceptions on more than 6 percent of their attempts. Today that’s well below par if you consider Brady’s career completion percentage is 63.8 and interception rate is 1.8.
The success of the Brady-era Patriots and today’s high-flying offenses might make it hard to recall how the ground-and-pound running games used to be prevalent in the NFL.
They are not prevalant anymore.
Since 1991, there have only been two seasons (1997, 2005) in which teams with more rushing than passing yards achieved higher point totals than teams with more passing yards. Before 1991, the path to points split fairly evenly between passing yards and rushing yards.
In the 1970s, two innovations changed the game.
First, coaches Don Coryell of the Chargers and Bill Walsh of the 49ers created new passing systems that led to a lot of points. Coryell turned Dan Fouts and Kellen Winslow into stars in his wide-open offense. Walsh authored the West Coast offense, perfected in San Francisco where a young Brady watched Joe Montana and Jerry Rice thrive in a system built on quick, short passes. It allowed the league’s best athletes to make plays in the open field.
Second, and maybe most important, was the 1979 rule change that prevented defenders from contacting receivers beyond 5 yards downfield until they touched the football. The rule came in the wake of Raiders safety Jack Tatum, known like many players then for vicious hits in the secondary, paralyzing Patriots receiver Darryl Stingley on a brutal hit during a preseason game.
That shepherded in modern pass interference rules, and the trend toward passheavy offenses was born.
For the first time in 1982, offenses passed for more yards than they rushed. Even since, the gap between pass attempts and rush attempts has continued to increase.
A look back at how NFL offensive systems have evolved through time:
Pre-1960
This was the era of the T formation, in which three running backs would line up horizontally behind the quarterback. The league was dominated offensively by the Chicago Bears, led by quarterback Sid Luckman, who mastered the T formation and turned it into a relatively explosive offense. It presented an op-
tion for Luckman to either handoff, pitch, or throw the football, and overwhelmed defenses with its all-out blocking schemes.
Notably, Packers receiver Don Hutson was a star well ahead of his time, leading the league in receiving yards seven times. His 1942 campaign with 74 catches for 1,211 yards and 17 touchdowns probably would earn a Pro Bowl nod even now.
1960s
The game was attempting to come out of its slow-paced shell. In San Francisco, head coach Red Hickey introduced the shotgun formation, while the play-action pass also began to rise. In the 1940s and 1950s, the league averaged 136.3 passing yards per game, and that number jumped to 180.7 in the 1960s. The league’s best player, however, was Cleveland Browns running back Jim Brown, who had nearly 1,000 more rushing yards than any other player in the decade despite retiring in 1965.
1970s
This decade ushered in the modern era of offense. The Air Coryell and West Coast systems made passing the football a safer, albeit still somewhat risky, endeavour. Completion percentages rose above 50 percent on average for the first time, while the interception rate dropped to its lowest point at 5.3.
1980s
NFL offenses became more or less what we see today. The college ranks were beginning to produce more and more potent passers too. The 1983 quarterback class, for example, which included John Elway, Dan Marino, and Jim Kelly, foreshadowed where the game was headed. Teams began to pass more than run, and the short passing game took shape.
1990s
The impact of that ’83 draft class was long, as it continued to lead the league through the next decade. Elway closed his career with two Super Bowl wins and ranked, at the time, second all-time with 51,475 passing yards. Marino became the first ever to reach 60,000 yards and was a forerunner of the type of offense Brady runs today. Kelly reached four straight Super Bowls. They gave way to the next batch of elite passers like Brett Favre, who emerged in the ’90s, won a Super Bowl, and mounted an assault on virtually every passing record, some of which he still holds.
2000s
Offenses continued to get more complex, and quarterbacks took on more responsibility. The spread offense, now used in every level of football, found its way to the NFL. Brady and Peyton Manning will forever be linked for their domination of this era and their expertise running sophisticated offenses. Along with the quarterbacks, terrific athletes such as Randy Moss and Terrell Owens added a next-level explosion to the game, while running backs like Marshall Faulk and LaDainian Tomlinson added pass-catching abilities to their arsenals. Those two perfected the dual-style backfield threat so much it landed them in the Hall of Fame.
2010s
In recent years, NFL passing games have become even more dynamic. It is now a matchup-based league, as teams try to find favorable situations for all types of receivers in the era of ultra-efficient passing offenses.
Three of this decade’s Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks are at the top of the leaderboard in career passer rating — Aaron Rodgers (104.1), Russell Wilson (99.6) and Tom Brady (97.2).
Teams ran the ball just 26.8 times per game during the past seven seasons, which is the lowest of any decade in NFL history.