Yeah, both of Georgia’s trick play calls against Auburn flopped — one of them spectacularly — but you get the feeling from some of Smart’s comments that they still achieved something simply by running them.
During his run as Alabama defensive coordinator, Smart saw his share of trick plays, which he said “tend to stick in your memory.”
He rattled off several—all against Auburn, including one in 2010.
“You try to prevent them by staying home and being disciplined but they happen a lot,” he said. “We got hit on another one on a sprint-out, throw-back to (Philip) Lutzenkirchen that probably cost us the game the year they won the national title. So I remember a lot of trick plays.”
If they stuck in the back of his mind, perhaps his reasoning is that they’ll force opposing coaches into taking them into account in preparing for Georgia, too. Of course, running them successfully would probably help more with regards to that.
Get The Picture 
Until the 76 Cotton Bowl against Arkansas, Vince loved ’em.
Most famously: “Florida in a 4-3 . . . .” You fill in the rest.
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@Hogbody: Thanks for bringing that memory back plus my lost bet.
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“Trick” plays or “option” plays are tremendously important. They’re designed to give the offense a 1/2 to 1 step advantage over one or more defenders.
If you assume every team were to line up in the I with two tight ends and run off tackle every play, you can imagine how e defense would align and react on every single play.
Then consider the impact of a sweep or a bootleg out of that formation. The DE who for the last 30 plays has crashed to the inside is watching a back run past him to the outside.
It’s these plays that make defensive coaches teach players to stay home, which the defensive end is the prime example.
Offenses use the knowledge of staying at home or the hesitation involved to gain an advantage.
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thanks coach
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We’re gonna get ’em on the run and we’re gonna keep ’em on the run, see? And if that doesn’t work, we’re working on this new foward pass thing, see?
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In both our situations we had a “squeezed” field making their success much less likely. Then, add that you have a player(s) playing out of position (Godwin and don’t give me “he played QB in High School” and Eason) where points in both cases were critical. Thus you have a VERY foolish place to use those, whereas a naked bootleg(Not a trick play) with an RPO is much safer with often similar results while spreading the squeezed field. One of the plays did end in disaster and the other had a less than 50/50 chance of success. I love trick plays but in a low scoring game like this with that squeezed field, the calls in my opinion were atrocious. Using the logic that teams will see this on film as being a reason to use them in this situation and them be concerned is lunacy in my opinion.
I’m just thankful that our D is progressing and played their butt’s off along with Mahlzahn’s lunacy to begin the second half with 3 straight passes the last to our guy.
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It is not the actual trick plays that bother me, neither was a terrible call as trick plays go, but the underlying reason why we had to try them is a cause of real concern. We don’t really have anything that does seem to work. Given the inability of the offensive line to move anyone back, or even, stalemate someone, it has to be on Eason to complete those short, tight passes. Calling two plays like that in one game shows the depth of Chaney’s head below the waterline.
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Or maybe he’s just realistic to know that ‘same ol, same ol’ isn’t going to work given the state of our OL.
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This. Would rather a trick play than slamming into Adams two yards behind the LOS three times then punting.
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Guess I was looking for a few quick passes as we have done successfully in the past, slants to IMac, Nauta, Godwin, Chigbu, or hooks to any of our talented TEs. I certainly didn’t have those wasted between the tackles runs in mind….or fades, which I hate.
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I will be happy when we get back to talking about successful plays.
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Also what’s the ETA on those successful plays? 2018? ok thanks.
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Didn’t take you long to get back in the groove with the anti-Kirby snark. This win must of killed you.
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simply faking the reverse on the throw to Eason and Sony would have walked into the endzone.
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The master of trickery, Les Miles, probably wouldn’t call either of our lame attempts “trick plays”. He’d probably call them wasted plays, or something much less flattering.
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Always enjoyed watching Petersen at Boise and now at UW and trick plays. One could/can count on some each game. Would think a defense would have to be super disciplined playing one of his teams.
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