TD's TDs: Kick Return Edition

My girlfriend and I watched the WSU game with the fledgling CAA-Long Beach chapter at Coach's in Seal Beach (there's another viewing party this Saturday, for those who aren't going up for the game).  She's kind of marginally interested in all the stuff I talk about on here, so while watching the replays of Davis' TD returns she says to me "I kind of believe you when you say that all the stuff going on on offense and defense isn't just chaos, but you'll never convince me that there's any plan behind THAT [i.e. kick returns and coverage]."  Challenge accepted.  I know next to nothing about special teams, but we'll probably never see back-to-back TD returns again, so I'd be remiss not to talk about them.  After a little research, this is what I've come up with.

Cal and WSU both lined up in the same (or nearly same) formations for both TD returns: 

Kick off returns use different formations and alignments, and you can watch for changes to them in the same way that you'd watch to see if our offense is in a trips or a 2x2 formation.  I haven't watched any of our other returns for comparison, but the following is a foundation from which we can watch for changes in future games.  The positions on a kickoff return team are a little different from the positions you'd see on offense or defense. For our particular formation, the line of blockers closest to the ball will be labeled just like the offensive line. You have two tackles lined up inside the numbers on each side of the field, two guards inside of the tackles, and a center in the middle of the field.   Those guys line up near the 50.   Behind them, near the middle of the field at the 35 yard line, is the “rover,” who is kind of the middle of the blocking scheme. Behind him we have a complex of three blockers with two “ends” inside the numbers on the 30 yard line, and one fullback at the 20 in the middle of the field. It looks like we have two returners back, each lined up around the 5(?) yard line near the hash marks. When the ball gets kicked to the corner on the left of the diagram, the returner who isn't going to get the ball (the returner on the right) becomes a second fullback.

Our personnel:

Tackles: Rockett (WR, 5'10” 180 lbs), McGovern (WR, 5'10” 195 lbs.)

Guards: Anderson (WR, 6'3” 215 lbs.), Wainwright (LB, 6'3” 220 lbs.)

Center: Worstell (WR/S, 6'2” 185 lbs.)

Rover: Austin (WR, 6'3” 210 lbs.)

Ends: Enwere (RB, 6'1” 225 lbs.), Hudson (WR, 6'3” 225 lbs.)

FB: Downs (LB, 6'3” 235 lbs.)

Returners: Davis (WR, 6'2” 180 lbs.), Watson (WR, 5'10” 190 lbs.)

So the guards, ends, FB, and rover are the big bodies on kick return, and they get bigger as you get closer to the returner.  This is because the front line players have to run farther down field to get to their blocks, while the blockers who start out farther back (the ends and the FB) are doing more straight-line, downhill blocking.  There are no true linemen on kickoff return, because as we'll see in a moment, they all have to run 20 yards down field once the ball is kicked, and they have to block the S/LB types who play on the coverage team.  The tackles and center are smaller guys with more speed.

In terms of WSU's formation, they are kicking the ball from the left (from our perspective) hash, and they have four players to the left and six to the right of the kicker.  From a scheme perspective, teams will switch that around, kicking from different hashes and the like.  Those variations are significant, and can tip you off as to what they're trying to do, so be on the lookout as you watch games from around the NCAA this Saturday, because you might pick up some interesting stuff. The return team will label the members of the kicking team with numbers, as I've done in the diagram above. The outside most players on each edge of the line are labeled #1, the next guys inside them are labeled #2, etc. On the two returns in question, these coverage players more or less stayed in their lanes, although because the kick is going to the corner in the diagram's left, they're going to try to form a sort of net, trying to fence the return man into that corner. This is something we'll take advantage of.

Each member of the return team is assigned a specific coverage man to block. For instance, you could tell your left tackle to block the #2 on his side. The goal of a kick return scheme is to leave the coverage men uncertain as to who is going to block them, and in so doing to open up a hole for the return man. Different kick returns will attack the coverage team in different ways, much like different run plays attack the defense with different blocking schemes.

With those preliminaries out of the way, we can see what specific return scheme we were using on Davis' first TD:

First, I should say something about reading this diagram. I initially drew in lines for the path of each player on the coverage team, but that picture was way too cluttered and impossible to read. What I've done instead is only drawn lines for the paths of the return team. At the point where they meet the guy they're supposed to be blocking, I've put the number of the coverage man. WSU was pretty much running straight down the field, so if you mentally draw a line connecting each coverage player's start and end point, you'll have a good idea of their movement on the play. So, on the left of the diagram #2 pretty much ran straight down the field outside the numbers until getting blocked out by the LT, and something similar goes for everyone else.

What does a blocking scheme look like on a kickoff return? Well, the first thing to note in the diagram is that on the left side we're trying to build a wall with the left tackle, rover, left end, center, right guard, and right tackle. The LT walls off #2, the Rover walls off the left-side #3, the LE walls off the left-side #4, the C walls off #6, and the RT walls off the right-side #3. In almost all of these cases, the player that each blocker is responsible for starts off lined up to his left, making it easy for the blocker to keep his man on his left shoulder, walling him off from the middle of the field. 

The #1 on each side of the diagram is a safety, or contain player, who absolutely can't let the return get outside of him (much like a contain player in a defensive scheme), so they're not going to rush to the middle of the field and we can leave them unblocked. Meanwhile we're trying to trap #5 with the LG. I think that ideally the LG would keep driving #5 to the right of the diagram, setting the right edge of the hole, but instead #5 jumps toward the sideline, effectively walling himself off from the play with all his other teammates that we've just talked about. The key thing to notice here is that WSU seems to have tremendously overpursued toward the returner, because we've been able to wall off every player from the left-side #1 to the right-side #3. WSU ends up with eight players to the left of the left hashmark. Since we're not blocking the #1 players, the right-side #2 is the sole remaining coverage man, and we're going to double team him with the right end and our deep fullback (originally the second return man, the guy that the ball isn't kicked to). This gets us a double team at the point of attack. Davis cuts into the lane between the wall on the left and the double team on the right, the up fullback (the one who starts out at the 20) leads through the hole to take out the kicker, and it's an easy return up the middle of the coverage. It's important to remember that these assignments are part of the scheme/play call, and aren't just random.  The return team has a specific way that they want to try and block each player on the coverage team, and that gives the return its shape.

You can also notice that the key blocks at the point of attack in that diagram are carried out by the guards, FB's, and right end.  Everyone else has a comparatively easy job of tracking their man and, from an inside position, continuing to direct him outside.

The second TD looked similar, but that's only because the path that Davis took was similar. The actual blocking scheme was pretty different:

On this return, instead of trying to trap #5 with the LG, we let him through to the 20 and block him with a double team by the up fullback and rover (who had quite different blocking assignments on the previous play). Now we're building the wall with the left tackle on #3, the left end on #2, the left guard on the left-side #4, the center on #6, and the right guard on the right-side #4. Notice that each of these blockers starts off to the right of the diagram from the guy he's supposed to block, again making it easy to keep his man on his left shoulder, forcing him to the left and making it easy to wall him off. On the right of the diagram #2 and #3 haven't overpursued nearly as much as they did on the previous return, allowing the right tackle and right end to kick them out to the diagram's right. Finally, the back fullback (originally the second potential returner) cuts upfield as a lead blocker and gets a good double team on #6.  Notice that the returner's lead blocker is also different in each of the two returns.  In the first return it's the up FB Downs, while on the second it's the other returner, Watson. Davis cuts to the right of the wall and the double team and to the left of the blocks of the RT and RE, giving him yet another big lane up the middle.

These different plays ultimately work because the players on the coverage team don't know exactly who's going to be blocking them. Take #5, for instance. On the first play, he's getting trapped from left to right by the left guard, and his blocker's meeting him at the 40 yard line. On the second return he's coming through clean until he runs smack into a two-man wedge made up of the rover and fullback at the 20 yard line. Much like different blocking schemes in the run game, good kick return schemes will keep the coverage team guessing, giving the return team an advantage in making its blocks and opening holes for the returner. The coverage team can counter by looping its players around behind each other in an effort to confuse the return team's blocking assignments and change the blocking angles, much like defensive line stunts can confuse an offensive line.  The cat-and-mouse game begins. WSU wasn't doing anything like this with its coverage team, though, making it relatively easy for us to block everyone we needed to block.

Now you know just about everything that I know about special teams.  Let's talk about that here: http://bearinsider.com/forums/showthread.php?87183-Touchdown-Trevor-Davis-The-Return-Edition&p=842378225#post842378225