This is about the football - not soccer, but rather the American kind played by the Pittsburgh Steelers, New England Patriots, and Piedmont Highlanders.
OK, I lied. I'm really only talking about the Piedmont Highlanders, a high-school football team in California.
Two years ago two members of the Piedmont HS coaching staff, trying to find a way to win against a schedule of mostly larger schools, developed an entirely new form of offense around what many would term a "loophole" in the rules.
Normally, at least four offensive players are required to wear uniforms numbered 50 to 79, indicating that they are interior lineman not eligible to catch passes.
However, this rule is (or was) suspended in high school football on "scrimmage kick" formations. The rationale was that teams want faster players (interior lineman are stereotypically big and slow) for kick coverage, and high schools can't be expected to have a whole lineup of specialty players for specific situations.
So these coaches, Mike Bryan and Steve Humphries, devised something called the A-11 offense. A-11 mean all-eleven-players-eligible, at least when breaking huddle. Of course, five will be interior lineman on a particular play, but the defense doesn't know which five.
The idea is to have two players (double quarterbacks) lined up at least seven yards behind the line of scrimmage, making it a "scrimmage kick" formation, even though there's no intention of kicking. The other nine players line up on the line of scrimmage in "pods" of three players each, three in front of the quarterbacks (one of these will be the center), three wide to the right, and three wide to the left. Before the snap, two of these players (it might be any two, except the center) will drop off the line of scrimmage to become backs and this eligible pass receivers. If one or two of these were originally lined up as ends, this of course makes the next lineman into an end and eligible to receive a pass.
To put it mildly, conventional defenses are not prepared for this.
Piedmont has been using this as its primary offense for two years. The team has been winning more games, though it's hardly unbeatable: 8 wins 3 losses in its most recent season, including a first-round loss in the state playoffs.
But several state HS sports associations have banned the A-11, and last February, the national governing body for high school sports effectively outlawed the offense by limiting the relaxed numbering rules to fourth-down "scrimmage kick formation" plays only.
Mike Weinreb has written this article on the ESPN website which I agree with almost entirely: the arguments against the A-11 are reactionary and ill-founded.
I was hoping some local (central Pennsylvania) high school team might adopt this. Alas.
OK, I lied. I'm really only talking about the Piedmont Highlanders, a high-school football team in California.
Two years ago two members of the Piedmont HS coaching staff, trying to find a way to win against a schedule of mostly larger schools, developed an entirely new form of offense around what many would term a "loophole" in the rules.
Normally, at least four offensive players are required to wear uniforms numbered 50 to 79, indicating that they are interior lineman not eligible to catch passes.
However, this rule is (or was) suspended in high school football on "scrimmage kick" formations. The rationale was that teams want faster players (interior lineman are stereotypically big and slow) for kick coverage, and high schools can't be expected to have a whole lineup of specialty players for specific situations.
So these coaches, Mike Bryan and Steve Humphries, devised something called the A-11 offense. A-11 mean all-eleven-players-eligible, at least when breaking huddle. Of course, five will be interior lineman on a particular play, but the defense doesn't know which five.
The idea is to have two players (double quarterbacks) lined up at least seven yards behind the line of scrimmage, making it a "scrimmage kick" formation, even though there's no intention of kicking. The other nine players line up on the line of scrimmage in "pods" of three players each, three in front of the quarterbacks (one of these will be the center), three wide to the right, and three wide to the left. Before the snap, two of these players (it might be any two, except the center) will drop off the line of scrimmage to become backs and this eligible pass receivers. If one or two of these were originally lined up as ends, this of course makes the next lineman into an end and eligible to receive a pass.
To put it mildly, conventional defenses are not prepared for this.
Piedmont has been using this as its primary offense for two years. The team has been winning more games, though it's hardly unbeatable: 8 wins 3 losses in its most recent season, including a first-round loss in the state playoffs.
But several state HS sports associations have banned the A-11, and last February, the national governing body for high school sports effectively outlawed the offense by limiting the relaxed numbering rules to fourth-down "scrimmage kick formation" plays only.
Mike Weinreb has written this article on the ESPN website which I agree with almost entirely: the arguments against the A-11 are reactionary and ill-founded.
I was hoping some local (central Pennsylvania) high school team might adopt this. Alas.
