August 1, 2021 • 18 mins
A running back runs straight into the pile at the line of scrimmage. Why? And how does the relationship between offensive linemen and their running backs develop. Let long-time offensive line coach and current Bucs’ Assistant Head Coach Harold Goodwin take you through the most popular run schemes.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So you think you know football, Come find out straight
from the source in the Booth Review podcast, where we
take you inside the offices of the box assistant coaches
to talk some football fundamentals. Get your white boards ready,
here's Buccaneers staff writer Carmen Vitality. Welcome back into another episode.
(00:21):
I have assistant head coach and run game coordinator Harold
Goodwin with me today. I'm so excited to have him on.
Harold Goody, how are you. I'm good, I'm glad to
be here, glad to participate, and uh, I'm just happy
they will have a good conversation with you. Oh that's
so nice. Thank you so much. Um, you are goody
around the building. And in fact, it was really weird
(00:43):
for me to even call you Harold, because I don't
think anybody does. Does anybody call you that? Uh not
really not around here. Basically nobody calls me Harold anymore.
Probably just my mom. Well she named you that, so
I would, I would think, so she don't want to
use my government name, your government name. It's just good.
He just flows so nicely. Did that start in like
(01:03):
what peewee football actually started? At Michigan my freshman year,
I think Lloyd Carr started. He was a defense coordinat
and he just started calling me Goody and just stuck
ever since then. And my younger brother played at Michigan
as well, and they call him Goody. So when we
were together, somebody says Goody. We both look. Well, let's
go into your background a little bit before we start here, because, um,
(01:25):
you started playing football at the University of Michigan. You
were there during what period? And were there other people
there with you that might people might find interesting. Yeah,
there were a lot of good people there have there
from six that was a G nineties seven. So I've
been around Tom Brady or a new Tom Brady Vaccincy's
a freshman at Michigan. They're great players like Charles Woodson,
Nomani toom or just a bunch of pros that were
(01:47):
there back in that era. But uh, yeah, a lot
of good people, a lot of good players, a lot
of NFL greats were at Michigan at that time. All right, Well,
I don't want to get Michigan too much life. Um,
and from there you went on to just me a
brief synopsis of your stops up until the box. From there,
I was at j ninety seven won the national championship.
To year Charles won the Heisman Trophy and on from there,
(02:08):
I went to Eastern Michigan University UH for two years,
where I was One year I was a Titan coach,
next year I was the offensive line coach. And from
there I spent four years at Central Michigan, home of
the Antonio Brown. Obviously he wasn't there, but it was
a good journey. I was assistant head coach, offensive line coach,
so good time. And then from there I went from
to the University of Akron for literally about thirty days.
(02:31):
Uh we got let go as a staff at Central
Michigan and then Brian Kelly came in and let us
all go, who's now at Notre Dame. But I was
at Akron for thirty days working for J. D. Brookhart,
who was famous for coaching Larry Fitzgerald College. And uh,
thirty days, I was on a flight during recruiting. I
think I was flying into Detroit to do some recruiting.
(02:51):
Playing landed checked my cell phone. It was Lovey Smith.
So from there, that's my journey. How I got into
the NFL back in two thousand and four. I love
it gave me a call, brought me on an interview
and high I'm being and uh, I've been bouncing on
the league ever since. So Chicago, Pittsburgh, in Adnapolis, Arizona,
and now beautiful Tampa. Oh some love for Tampa Bay.
(03:13):
You know you're you know your listeners right now. It's
interesting because a lot of those stops included Bruce Arians Uh,
and you guys are very well This whole staff is
very well connected, which I found very interesting. But all
these little kind of you work with Lovey Smith. Levy
Smith is here in Tampa. There's just the coaching world
is just really really small. But I wanted to kind
of run through that very briefly because I just want
(03:34):
to understand the experience you have and the experience that
you're about to talk with us on. Because I want
to ask you being the run game coordinator now, uh,
some of the major run schemes, because I feel like
you hear so many different things on broadcast when you're
watching football on you know, and I think people hear power,
they hear gap schemes, they hear zone schemes. Who really
(03:58):
knows what that means? You might, you might not, But
I want you to take us through maybe the most
popular run schemes and maybe what we do here, well,
we do a little bit of everything here. We have
gaps games, gap scheames obviously when we have pullers plays
like power counter type schemes that we run from time
to time. Here. Also we have what we call zone
schemes where we're running inside outside zone which is probably
(04:20):
the favorite for like row or or Lenney where they
basically start up working somewhat sideways and then try to
get their shoulder squared up, cut the ball and uh,
you know, we have some tallest plays where we actually
tossed the ball and try to get the ball around
the corner. So quite got a quite a few things
we do. We love them all, but whatever's working that
week is what we go to. Okay, so it's kind
of a fluid thing. But I want to break down
(04:40):
kind of individually what that means when you tell me
a counter a gap zone. So when you're when you're
looking at a zone scheme, let's start there, uh, or
there's specific gaps that you want you're running back to shoot.
Is it inside, is it outside? Or is it based
on a certain player If you see this person crashed down.
How how do you determine how does the running back
(05:00):
determine where he goes? Well, each of what we do
in offensive line, we have gaps. So there's like the
two gap, four gaps, six gap, anything that's even. Uh,
we have even side, we have an odd side, but
obviously working inside out. Yet two you got four, you
got the six, and you get the eight hole. Depending
on what type of zone scheme we're using, that's way,
that's the way the running back starts to open the
shoulder or the direction he wants to go into from
(05:23):
an angle stand points, but a zone scheme is where
two offensive linement or offensive linement and tightening and working
for a down guy which is a defensive line to
a second level defending which is usually a linebacker or
a safety. And then when you talk gap, what's the
difference there gap? Generally, what we're trying to do was
take everything on the front side and be it to
say we have a right formation, the right guard at
the right tack when the tighten are most likely trying
(05:45):
to block down and some kind of structure or through
their gap, and we're pulling one or two guys from
the back side. Front side to replace them as they
blocked down. And then I think the big buzzword or
power schemes or power runs. Uh, what exactly is that
and how prevalent is it these days? Power schemes just
generally a gap schame. It just depends on if you're
wunning counter using the guards first. Uh, as far as
(06:08):
the kickout or the puller, and from one of the
gap scheme or a power scheme using the fullback or
horse is playing the F spots first and the guard second.
So we use a little both. What clarify the F
spot for me? The fullback full back? Yeah, general, we
don't use a true fullback. We use one of other
tight ends cam o J along with Gronkin. There's using
were a two tightenset. You're gonna say you will see that.
(06:29):
I feel like we've seen that quite a bit, even
at the goal line where you have Cambraid or someone
kind of offset in the backfield behind the line running
that kind of traditional fullback formation. Um, what are some
of the like? Are there different things you're looking to
accomplish with each one that you're running a lot of
times it's based off of what we feel like we
can have success with the be efficient in the run game,
(06:50):
get four yards of more or get a you know,
a third and one. We get that one yard and
it also ties in We try to tie it into
our passing game as far as plash, because Tom is
a big plash and proponent having it in all sense.
So if we can do the two together, it's going
to work out from a passing standpoint and a run standpoint.
We'd like to have that kind of stuff. Is there
one or the other that, for instance, with play action,
does one kind of sell itself a little bit or
(07:11):
lend itself more too, if you're also incorporating play action
in your offense. Okay, all right, And then I want
to know kind of especially because you have this offensive
line background. Um, I want to know kind of the
saying that just because I'm fit at all, because maybe
you've coached offensive line for the better part of a
couple of decades around by this point, so uh, calling
(07:35):
on your offensive line experience. I just think it's very
interesting when you talk about run schemes and stuff like that. Yeah,
the running back has these holes in front of him.
He can try and shoot them as much as he can.
He can see the field. Offensive lineman. When you're run blocking,
you have the guy behind you, you can't see what
he's about to do, you can't see where he's about
to go. Necessarily, what goes into being an offensive lineman
(07:57):
and run blocking just in general, because you're kind of
playing blind in a lot of ways. Yeah, that's true.
And they all have understanding what's the what's the back's
aiming point and what he's reading from, whether he's reading
a down down linement or a defensive linement too, or
is he reading a linebacker or a safe in the
run run progression? Uh, for the most part, all they're
worried about is, hey, I got this that guy and
(08:17):
what angles or what targets are we're using to get there?
What's our footwork? Uh? What do we need to do?
From a pad level standpoint? Is just something I could
be high because I'm trying to bluff a pass or
excuse me, bluffy Uh yeah, bluff a pass or doniti
came come hard off the ball and try to get
vertical movement on this guy. So there's a lot that
goes into it, but every plays a little bit different
from a technique standpoint, and uh, you know, as far
(08:39):
as the guys you're working to as well, talk to
a little bit more about that technique than what are
the major differences when you are blocking for a run
and how do you maybe not give that away because
obviously you don't want the defense to know necessarily what
you're about to do. Are there different tells that can
happen where a defense can key in on something and
be like, oh, yeah, they're gonna run, Oh no, they're
gonna pass. Well, one of the biggest things for like
(09:00):
a lot of defense element they tried to read the
stance of the offensive linemen. And that's one something we
try to eliminate as coaches. We try to talk to
these guys about, you know, making sure your stance is
the same. So sometimes, just occasionally we have guys to
give away, giveaway run or pass based when their stands
there in a three point stands their hands might be uh,
not all the way in the ground, then maybe on
the tips or their fingers. Just a little things like that.
(09:21):
But you know, the biggest thing is just come off
the ball no matter what, whether it's run or pass,
so they don't know, and make sure your stance is
always the same. We're talking with assistant head coach and
run game coordinator Harold Goodwin right now, Um, I want
a big purpose of this podcast is to just get
people a little bit more educated to know what they're
watching when they're watching these football podcast And I feel
(09:43):
like one of the things that people will yell at
their TVs about is you see you running back and
he runs right into the line of scrimmage, right into
the pile and doesn't really get a couple of yards.
What's happening there? Like why does that happen? And are
there benefits? Like what's going on? And is it as
simple as like, no, they just screwed up, Because I
feel like most people think they just screwed up, and
(10:04):
I know that that's not the case. That's not the
case most of the time. But you know, there are
times we do screw something up. But for the most part,
defense is a defense. Players have ag job too, and
sometimes they do their job very well. For the most part,
we try to make sure they don't. But when they
do their job and they force us to cram the ball,
that's what we teach the back, don't take a tackle
for loss, just cramming up in there and get what
you can get. But for the most part, we're trying
(10:25):
to displace those guys off the line of scrimmage and
at the minimum we want four yards and that's what
we're shooting for and every play. But at times they
do win. You know that the key is for us
to make sure we win more than they win each
and every snap. Well, in the running back in those
situations isn't just blindly going into the pile most of
the time either, they are actually trying to shoot a
certain gap because they know that they're supposed to have
blockers in a place that especially if they can clear
(10:46):
the line of scrimmage, that's going to create a hole
for them that will help them be beyond the defense.
Get beyond the defense very quickly. Good. I'm glad to
clear that up. Um, they can't wait to see you
run the ball. Yeah no, Well on at with our
offensive line, I might have a shot. They're really good.
So I can't give the big guys, the trench guys
(11:07):
enough love, whether that's the offensive of the defensive side
of the ball, but offensive lamen have a special place
in my heart, and especially the guys around here. Yeah
I know. Well, I'll stop now before I give them
all too big of a heads, but I wanted to
get your take on something, especially because of the fact
that now you have this assistant head coach title. You've
seen a lot of different systems. Where do you think
(11:29):
the league is going when it comes to the run game,
because obviously everyone talks about this being a passing league
and now I feel like we And in another episode,
we actually just talked to Larry Foot and he said
that he could even see it changing because defenses are
very much predicated on what offenses are doing. That's why
you're seeing more three four because they can account for
the speed of these offenses. Now, well, the teams that
(11:49):
are effectively running the ball, well, they're they're giving a
lot of defense. Is a lot of hard times because
a lot of these guys haven't even seen schemes like that.
So do you see an evolution happening where you're going
to see more like like look at San Francisco. You
look especially what the Ravens can do with Lamar Jackson.
Do you see more of that happening? Uh? Just gets
It depends on the coordinator or the head coaches philosophy.
(12:09):
But for the most part, I think most of the
NFL's offensive are traditional. Uh, you're getting your toil personnel
as far as having two tight ends or three wide receivers,
but as far as all that zone scheme stuff, unless
you got somebody special like lamar Uh, you're not gonna
see that a whole bunch. I'm myself as as a
traditional guy, but you know, just in general, I do
think the league though it's going to more of a
(12:30):
passing uh situation. But everything comes around, comes it goes around,
comes back around. So eventually we'll get back to the
run game full time. And then if you were to
start a team from scratch at this point, imagine, um,
what is how are you approaching your offense? What what
kind of if you can give me kind of percentages
(12:51):
or things that it focuses on our personnel that you
want to be sure to incorporate. What does that offense
look like for you? You know, not to be clich ish,
but like our offense. I like what we do and
it's what I've known for what fourteen out of my
seventeen years in the NFL, So it's hard to break
away from net. But I think you want to be somewhat.
I think if you look at our playoff run and
(13:12):
what we were from a run pass ratio, it was
pretty even and you saw the success we had, so
hopefully we can continue that. And that's what way I
want to be if I ever down the road become
a head coach or whatever, that's what I want to
see as well. I think even in the regular season
when the Bucks went over a hundred yards, they won
all but one game over a hundred yards on the ground,
and that one game was that Chicago, and that we
(13:32):
don't really need to revisit for a multitude of reasons
all across the board. Um, pretty much. But that is
neither here nor there, because you're sitting here a super
Bowl champion, UM, super Bowl fifty five champion, I should say,
because two times two times exactly two times super Bowl champion.
Although like I said, we had foot on the other
(13:53):
on and on another episode and he is three times.
So is there is there some sort of I don't know,
they're back and forth. Put the guys on staff that
have a couple of a couple more super Bowls or
as most you got one, that's all the counts. But
two is better than one, two years better than one. UM.
I love your group of guys, not only the running
backs but the offensive linemen. As we were talking about,
(14:14):
I also think that there's some of the most entertaining UM.
I need to know some stories about the rooms that
you're in and what you what you hear around this
building sometimes. Well, our room is quite diverse from a
political standpoint, life standpoints, so we have a lot of
great conversations. It's never a dry moment in that room.
And uh, at a certain point, I gotta, you know,
(14:36):
pull everybody back in because we start floating off into
outer space sometimes with some of the things we say
and some of the things we do in there. But
every room and this building, I think it's a good room.
We have a great chemistry on this team, great leadership,
So whatever happens inside the building, they get rid of
it and they go to work outside of the building
when we get in the grass. So as long as
we can keep that up, we'll be good again. You're
(14:56):
just you're pumping this team, this team a lot, but
we love here it because we all love UM the
guys that are around a lot. But I want to
talk also then about the personnel that you do have,
UM and maybe some of the like for instance, like
Tristan works coming in being so effective right away, Um,
(15:16):
what what contributed to that? Because in college, again you're
looking at your kind of seeing different schemes and you're
gonna see here, like, is there something that you know,
maybe he needed to work on, because that's just not
something that college you know, schemes call for. Or like
how was he in run blocking versus path blocking versus
all that kind of stuff. Yeah, Tristan was lucky because
Tristan went to Iowa. Kudos to the big team, a
(15:38):
school where they win pro style offense, pro style plays,
so a lot of the things that we do here
he was already doing back at Iowa, And the transition
for him was was easy from that standpoint, from a
mental standpoint, the physical part, he just had to get
used to the speed of the game. Obviously he played
against a lot of good players last year. He did
a hell of a job. And uh, you know, I
think the guy's a limit for this guy. He he's
(15:59):
gonna be a good one. But I think Iowa prepared
him well for the NFL. So kudos those coaches back
at Iowa. How does that compared to them someone like
Alex Kappa who has now you know, established himself as
a starter. He's one, he's tough as nailed guy, but
he came from a much smaller school that was used
to a very different competition. What does that jump like
for someone like him, then, well, that's huge just from
(16:21):
the speed of the game, the size of people he
goes against at his level. When he came out of college.
You know, he was dominating people at his college level.
But when you get here, you figure out guys a
little bit stronger, a little bit faster. So he's matured
over the last couple of years, getting bigger, strong than
himself and h you can see it started to play
out in each and every game he plays that he's
getting better and better. So he's another guy that as
long as we keep him healthy, he's gonna be a
(16:43):
very good player too. But there was a little bit
of transition for him, more sort of interesting just from
the uh, the physical standpoint, as far as having the
girth and the size that you need to just to
excel at this level. Well, an offensive line in general
is probably the position that most relies on consistent and
continuity because you get the same five guys and relatively
the same alignment. How do they though, build chemistry then
(17:05):
with their running backs to kind of put this whole
run game together. How does that happened? Do you learn
kind of tendencies of your running backs or do they
kind of learn where they can go with different I
don't know, like, how how does that? How does that
all work together? It's just for us, it's just simple,
you know, just repetition and uh you know, having your
walk through is doing it live in practice and just
watching film together. Running backs come in during the week
(17:27):
during a regular season and uh hear me talk and
uh hear the offensive linement talk as far as what
they're trying to do when get done from a blocking
schame standpoint. So we were able to mess it together
last year when need be, Hopefully we can do it
this year a whole lot more consistent than last year.
Well that's good to hear. Thank you so much for
taking the time to speak with us and and talk
through all this kind of stuff. So hopefully now when
(17:48):
you're watching the game and you here, you know you're
watching a running back run into the pile, you know
that there's a lot more that goes into it than
him just picking a random place and trying to fit
himself in Eric. Thank you so much for Harold Goodwin
for joining us today. I'm staff writer common by Sally.
I will talk to you next time. Good Books, m.
So you think you know football, Come find out straight
from the source in the Booth Review podcast, where we
take you inside the offices of the box assistant coaches
to talk some football fundamentals. Get your white boards ready,
here's Buccaneers staff writer Carmen Vitality. Welcome back into another episode.
(00:21):
I have assistant head coach and run game coordinator Harold
Goodwin with me today. I'm so excited to have him on.
Harold Goody, how are you. I'm good, I'm glad to
be here, glad to participate, and uh, I'm just happy
they will have a good conversation with you. Oh that's
so nice. Thank you so much. Um, you are goody
around the building. And in fact, it was really weird
(00:43):
for me to even call you Harold, because I don't
think anybody does. Does anybody call you that? Uh not
really not around here. Basically nobody calls me Harold anymore.
Probably just my mom. Well she named you that, so
I would, I would think, so she don't want to
use my government name, your government name. It's just good.
He just flows so nicely. Did that start in like
(01:03):
what peewee football actually started? At Michigan my freshman year,
I think Lloyd Carr started. He was a defense coordinat
and he just started calling me Goody and just stuck
ever since then. And my younger brother played at Michigan
as well, and they call him Goody. So when we
were together, somebody says Goody. We both look. Well, let's
go into your background a little bit before we start here, because, um,
(01:25):
you started playing football at the University of Michigan. You
were there during what period? And were there other people
there with you that might people might find interesting. Yeah,
there were a lot of good people there have there
from six that was a G nineties seven. So I've
been around Tom Brady or a new Tom Brady Vaccincy's
a freshman at Michigan. They're great players like Charles Woodson,
Nomani toom or just a bunch of pros that were
(01:47):
there back in that era. But uh, yeah, a lot
of good people, a lot of good players, a lot
of NFL greats were at Michigan at that time. All right, Well,
I don't want to get Michigan too much life. Um,
and from there you went on to just me a
brief synopsis of your stops up until the box. From there,
I was at j ninety seven won the national championship.
To year Charles won the Heisman Trophy and on from there,
(02:08):
I went to Eastern Michigan University UH for two years,
where I was One year I was a Titan coach,
next year I was the offensive line coach. And from
there I spent four years at Central Michigan, home of
the Antonio Brown. Obviously he wasn't there, but it was
a good journey. I was assistant head coach, offensive line coach,
so good time. And then from there I went from
to the University of Akron for literally about thirty days.
(02:31):
Uh we got let go as a staff at Central
Michigan and then Brian Kelly came in and let us
all go, who's now at Notre Dame. But I was
at Akron for thirty days working for J. D. Brookhart,
who was famous for coaching Larry Fitzgerald College. And uh,
thirty days, I was on a flight during recruiting. I
think I was flying into Detroit to do some recruiting.
(02:51):
Playing landed checked my cell phone. It was Lovey Smith.
So from there, that's my journey. How I got into
the NFL back in two thousand and four. I love
it gave me a call, brought me on an interview
and high I'm being and uh, I've been bouncing on
the league ever since. So Chicago, Pittsburgh, in Adnapolis, Arizona,
and now beautiful Tampa. Oh some love for Tampa Bay.
(03:13):
You know you're you know your listeners right now. It's
interesting because a lot of those stops included Bruce Arians Uh,
and you guys are very well This whole staff is
very well connected, which I found very interesting. But all
these little kind of you work with Lovey Smith. Levy
Smith is here in Tampa. There's just the coaching world
is just really really small. But I wanted to kind
of run through that very briefly because I just want
(03:34):
to understand the experience you have and the experience that
you're about to talk with us on. Because I want
to ask you being the run game coordinator now, uh,
some of the major run schemes, because I feel like
you hear so many different things on broadcast when you're
watching football on you know, and I think people hear power,
they hear gap schemes, they hear zone schemes. Who really
(03:58):
knows what that means? You might, you might not, But
I want you to take us through maybe the most
popular run schemes and maybe what we do here, well,
we do a little bit of everything here. We have
gaps games, gap scheames obviously when we have pullers plays
like power counter type schemes that we run from time
to time. Here. Also we have what we call zone
schemes where we're running inside outside zone which is probably
(04:20):
the favorite for like row or or Lenney where they
basically start up working somewhat sideways and then try to
get their shoulder squared up, cut the ball and uh,
you know, we have some tallest plays where we actually
tossed the ball and try to get the ball around
the corner. So quite got a quite a few things
we do. We love them all, but whatever's working that
week is what we go to. Okay, so it's kind
of a fluid thing. But I want to break down
(04:40):
kind of individually what that means when you tell me
a counter a gap zone. So when you're when you're
looking at a zone scheme, let's start there, uh, or
there's specific gaps that you want you're running back to shoot.
Is it inside, is it outside? Or is it based
on a certain player If you see this person crashed down.
How how do you determine how does the running back
(05:00):
determine where he goes? Well, each of what we do
in offensive line, we have gaps. So there's like the
two gap, four gaps, six gap, anything that's even. Uh,
we have even side, we have an odd side, but
obviously working inside out. Yet two you got four, you
got the six, and you get the eight hole. Depending
on what type of zone scheme we're using, that's way,
that's the way the running back starts to open the
shoulder or the direction he wants to go into from
(05:23):
an angle stand points, but a zone scheme is where
two offensive linement or offensive linement and tightening and working
for a down guy which is a defensive line to
a second level defending which is usually a linebacker or
a safety. And then when you talk gap, what's the
difference there gap? Generally, what we're trying to do was
take everything on the front side and be it to
say we have a right formation, the right guard at
the right tack when the tighten are most likely trying
(05:45):
to block down and some kind of structure or through
their gap, and we're pulling one or two guys from
the back side. Front side to replace them as they
blocked down. And then I think the big buzzword or
power schemes or power runs. Uh, what exactly is that
and how prevalent is it these days? Power schemes just
generally a gap schame. It just depends on if you're
wunning counter using the guards first. Uh, as far as
(06:08):
the kickout or the puller, and from one of the
gap scheme or a power scheme using the fullback or
horse is playing the F spots first and the guard second.
So we use a little both. What clarify the F
spot for me? The fullback full back? Yeah, general, we
don't use a true fullback. We use one of other
tight ends cam o J along with Gronkin. There's using
were a two tightenset. You're gonna say you will see that.
(06:29):
I feel like we've seen that quite a bit, even
at the goal line where you have Cambraid or someone
kind of offset in the backfield behind the line running
that kind of traditional fullback formation. Um, what are some
of the like? Are there different things you're looking to
accomplish with each one that you're running a lot of
times it's based off of what we feel like we
can have success with the be efficient in the run game,
(06:50):
get four yards of more or get a you know,
a third and one. We get that one yard and
it also ties in We try to tie it into
our passing game as far as plash, because Tom is
a big plash and proponent having it in all sense.
So if we can do the two together, it's going
to work out from a passing standpoint and a run standpoint.
We'd like to have that kind of stuff. Is there
one or the other that, for instance, with play action,
does one kind of sell itself a little bit or
(07:11):
lend itself more too, if you're also incorporating play action
in your offense. Okay, all right, And then I want
to know kind of especially because you have this offensive
line background. Um, I want to know kind of the
saying that just because I'm fit at all, because maybe
you've coached offensive line for the better part of a
couple of decades around by this point, so uh, calling
(07:35):
on your offensive line experience. I just think it's very
interesting when you talk about run schemes and stuff like that. Yeah,
the running back has these holes in front of him.
He can try and shoot them as much as he can.
He can see the field. Offensive lineman. When you're run blocking,
you have the guy behind you, you can't see what
he's about to do, you can't see where he's about
to go. Necessarily, what goes into being an offensive lineman
(07:57):
and run blocking just in general, because you're kind of
playing blind in a lot of ways. Yeah, that's true.
And they all have understanding what's the what's the back's
aiming point and what he's reading from, whether he's reading
a down down linement or a defensive linement too, or
is he reading a linebacker or a safe in the
run run progression? Uh, for the most part, all they're
worried about is, hey, I got this that guy and
(08:17):
what angles or what targets are we're using to get there?
What's our footwork? Uh? What do we need to do?
From a pad level standpoint? Is just something I could
be high because I'm trying to bluff a pass or
excuse me, bluffy Uh yeah, bluff a pass or doniti
came come hard off the ball and try to get
vertical movement on this guy. So there's a lot that
goes into it, but every plays a little bit different
from a technique standpoint, and uh, you know, as far
(08:39):
as the guys you're working to as well, talk to
a little bit more about that technique than what are
the major differences when you are blocking for a run
and how do you maybe not give that away because
obviously you don't want the defense to know necessarily what
you're about to do. Are there different tells that can
happen where a defense can key in on something and
be like, oh, yeah, they're gonna run, Oh no, they're
gonna pass. Well, one of the biggest things for like
(09:00):
a lot of defense element they tried to read the
stance of the offensive linemen. And that's one something we
try to eliminate as coaches. We try to talk to
these guys about, you know, making sure your stance is
the same. So sometimes, just occasionally we have guys to
give away, giveaway run or pass based when their stands
there in a three point stands their hands might be uh,
not all the way in the ground, then maybe on
the tips or their fingers. Just a little things like that.
(09:21):
But you know, the biggest thing is just come off
the ball no matter what, whether it's run or pass,
so they don't know, and make sure your stance is
always the same. We're talking with assistant head coach and
run game coordinator Harold Goodwin right now, Um, I want
a big purpose of this podcast is to just get
people a little bit more educated to know what they're
watching when they're watching these football podcast And I feel
(09:43):
like one of the things that people will yell at
their TVs about is you see you running back and
he runs right into the line of scrimmage, right into
the pile and doesn't really get a couple of yards.
What's happening there? Like why does that happen? And are
there benefits? Like what's going on? And is it as
simple as like, no, they just screwed up, Because I
feel like most people think they just screwed up, and
(10:04):
I know that that's not the case. That's not the
case most of the time. But you know, there are
times we do screw something up. But for the most part,
defense is a defense. Players have ag job too, and
sometimes they do their job very well. For the most part,
we try to make sure they don't. But when they
do their job and they force us to cram the ball,
that's what we teach the back, don't take a tackle
for loss, just cramming up in there and get what
you can get. But for the most part, we're trying
(10:25):
to displace those guys off the line of scrimmage and
at the minimum we want four yards and that's what
we're shooting for and every play. But at times they
do win. You know that the key is for us
to make sure we win more than they win each
and every snap. Well, in the running back in those
situations isn't just blindly going into the pile most of
the time either, they are actually trying to shoot a
certain gap because they know that they're supposed to have
blockers in a place that especially if they can clear
(10:46):
the line of scrimmage, that's going to create a hole
for them that will help them be beyond the defense.
Get beyond the defense very quickly. Good. I'm glad to
clear that up. Um, they can't wait to see you
run the ball. Yeah no, Well on at with our
offensive line, I might have a shot. They're really good.
So I can't give the big guys, the trench guys
(11:07):
enough love, whether that's the offensive of the defensive side
of the ball, but offensive lamen have a special place
in my heart, and especially the guys around here. Yeah
I know. Well, I'll stop now before I give them
all too big of a heads, but I wanted to
get your take on something, especially because of the fact
that now you have this assistant head coach title. You've
seen a lot of different systems. Where do you think
(11:29):
the league is going when it comes to the run game,
because obviously everyone talks about this being a passing league
and now I feel like we And in another episode,
we actually just talked to Larry Foot and he said
that he could even see it changing because defenses are
very much predicated on what offenses are doing. That's why
you're seeing more three four because they can account for
the speed of these offenses. Now, well, the teams that
(11:49):
are effectively running the ball, well, they're they're giving a
lot of defense. Is a lot of hard times because
a lot of these guys haven't even seen schemes like that.
So do you see an evolution happening where you're going
to see more like like look at San Francisco. You
look especially what the Ravens can do with Lamar Jackson.
Do you see more of that happening? Uh? Just gets
It depends on the coordinator or the head coaches philosophy.
(12:09):
But for the most part, I think most of the
NFL's offensive are traditional. Uh, you're getting your toil personnel
as far as having two tight ends or three wide receivers,
but as far as all that zone scheme stuff, unless
you got somebody special like lamar Uh, you're not gonna
see that a whole bunch. I'm myself as as a
traditional guy, but you know, just in general, I do
think the league though it's going to more of a
(12:30):
passing uh situation. But everything comes around, comes it goes around,
comes back around. So eventually we'll get back to the
run game full time. And then if you were to
start a team from scratch at this point, imagine, um,
what is how are you approaching your offense? What what
kind of if you can give me kind of percentages
(12:51):
or things that it focuses on our personnel that you
want to be sure to incorporate. What does that offense
look like for you? You know, not to be clich ish,
but like our offense. I like what we do and
it's what I've known for what fourteen out of my
seventeen years in the NFL, So it's hard to break
away from net. But I think you want to be somewhat.
I think if you look at our playoff run and
(13:12):
what we were from a run pass ratio, it was
pretty even and you saw the success we had, so
hopefully we can continue that. And that's what way I
want to be if I ever down the road become
a head coach or whatever, that's what I want to
see as well. I think even in the regular season
when the Bucks went over a hundred yards, they won
all but one game over a hundred yards on the ground,
and that one game was that Chicago, and that we
(13:32):
don't really need to revisit for a multitude of reasons
all across the board. Um, pretty much. But that is
neither here nor there, because you're sitting here a super
Bowl champion, UM, super Bowl fifty five champion, I should say,
because two times two times exactly two times super Bowl champion.
Although like I said, we had foot on the other
(13:53):
on and on another episode and he is three times.
So is there is there some sort of I don't know,
they're back and forth. Put the guys on staff that
have a couple of a couple more super Bowls or
as most you got one, that's all the counts. But
two is better than one, two years better than one. UM.
I love your group of guys, not only the running
backs but the offensive linemen. As we were talking about,
(14:14):
I also think that there's some of the most entertaining UM.
I need to know some stories about the rooms that
you're in and what you what you hear around this
building sometimes. Well, our room is quite diverse from a
political standpoint, life standpoints, so we have a lot of
great conversations. It's never a dry moment in that room.
And uh, at a certain point, I gotta, you know,
(14:36):
pull everybody back in because we start floating off into
outer space sometimes with some of the things we say
and some of the things we do in there. But
every room and this building, I think it's a good room.
We have a great chemistry on this team, great leadership,
So whatever happens inside the building, they get rid of
it and they go to work outside of the building
when we get in the grass. So as long as
we can keep that up, we'll be good again. You're
(14:56):
just you're pumping this team, this team a lot, but
we love here it because we all love UM the
guys that are around a lot. But I want to
talk also then about the personnel that you do have,
UM and maybe some of the like for instance, like
Tristan works coming in being so effective right away, Um,
(15:16):
what what contributed to that? Because in college, again you're
looking at your kind of seeing different schemes and you're
gonna see here, like, is there something that you know,
maybe he needed to work on, because that's just not
something that college you know, schemes call for. Or like
how was he in run blocking versus path blocking versus
all that kind of stuff. Yeah, Tristan was lucky because
Tristan went to Iowa. Kudos to the big team, a
(15:38):
school where they win pro style offense, pro style plays,
so a lot of the things that we do here
he was already doing back at Iowa, And the transition
for him was was easy from that standpoint, from a
mental standpoint, the physical part, he just had to get
used to the speed of the game. Obviously he played
against a lot of good players last year. He did
a hell of a job. And uh, you know, I
think the guy's a limit for this guy. He he's
(15:59):
gonna be a good one. But I think Iowa prepared
him well for the NFL. So kudos those coaches back
at Iowa. How does that compared to them someone like
Alex Kappa who has now you know, established himself as
a starter. He's one, he's tough as nailed guy, but
he came from a much smaller school that was used
to a very different competition. What does that jump like
for someone like him, then, well, that's huge just from
(16:21):
the speed of the game, the size of people he
goes against at his level. When he came out of college.
You know, he was dominating people at his college level.
But when you get here, you figure out guys a
little bit stronger, a little bit faster. So he's matured
over the last couple of years, getting bigger, strong than
himself and h you can see it started to play
out in each and every game he plays that he's
getting better and better. So he's another guy that as
long as we keep him healthy, he's gonna be a
(16:43):
very good player too. But there was a little bit
of transition for him, more sort of interesting just from
the uh, the physical standpoint, as far as having the
girth and the size that you need to just to
excel at this level. Well, an offensive line in general
is probably the position that most relies on consistent and
continuity because you get the same five guys and relatively
the same alignment. How do they though, build chemistry then
(17:05):
with their running backs to kind of put this whole
run game together. How does that happened? Do you learn
kind of tendencies of your running backs or do they
kind of learn where they can go with different I
don't know, like, how how does that? How does that
all work together? It's just for us, it's just simple,
you know, just repetition and uh you know, having your
walk through is doing it live in practice and just
watching film together. Running backs come in during the week
(17:27):
during a regular season and uh hear me talk and
uh hear the offensive linement talk as far as what
they're trying to do when get done from a blocking
schame standpoint. So we were able to mess it together
last year when need be, Hopefully we can do it
this year a whole lot more consistent than last year.
Well that's good to hear. Thank you so much for
taking the time to speak with us and and talk
through all this kind of stuff. So hopefully now when
(17:48):
you're watching the game and you here, you know you're
watching a running back run into the pile, you know
that there's a lot more that goes into it than
him just picking a random place and trying to fit
himself in Eric. Thank you so much for Harold Goodwin
for joining us today. I'm staff writer common by Sally.
I will talk to you next time. Good Books, m.
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