There are many things I don’t understand about what happened to Georgia’s offense last season, but the most puzzling thing to me was the seeming abandonment of what had been its bread and butter play for so many years, play action. You would think that an offensive scheme that emphasized the running game and had a talent in the backfield like Swift would be tailor made for PA, but, instead, Coley settled for a lot of zone read option stuff that grew increasingly ineffective as the season wore on.
Enter Todd Monken. Skip the Air Raid nonsense and ask instead if emphasizing 11 personnel groupings means Georgia’s offense will continue to ignore play action. I don’t know, but I will say there’s no reason you can’t run play action successfully out of 11 groups. For proof of that, you don’t have to look any further back than last season.
If you’ve got a good running back whom defenses perceive as a threat, you can sell play action. I’d like to think that’s something Monken already knows.
Get The Picture 
Abandoning play action last season was exactly the problem. If you look at the numbers (and I’m not right now, but I’m pulling this from memory), I seem to recall that we were on par with Rich Rod’s Ole Miss offense in terms of PA passing percentages. It was as if Coley decided to run that zone-read option offense but without having the threat — or even considering allowing the threat — of the QB run to keep the defense honest and to keep them from crashing the middle of the offensive line on the inside read hand off.
I’d love to see some of the guys out there who do film analysis see whether this statistical comparison holds true in terms of play calling.
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Very very very few PA calls.
Also, we are without any experience at TE. 11 P depends on a really quality TE play.
Having a TE that can put hand on the ground and also line up wide or in slot is what heavy doses of 11P work.
Darnell Washington could be better than Nauta, but that is probably asking more of Frosh TE than a QB on a new team.
Very interested what Monken does at TE.
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Other than this guy, you mean. 😉
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Well. Damn. My bad
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FWIW, I don’t think the issue is experience at TE. It’s commitment to using the position in the passing game.
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Of all the criticism of Coley, the use of TE in passing game was not one of them.
Wolf was the second most explosive target – but dropped 12% of balls and Woerner dropped 9% on 28 combined targets.
Wolf drop percentage was highest on team (with more than 5 targets)
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On those dropped balls, the scheme/design probably worked due to down and distance(?) which means a drive got extended (first down) or the catch got the special teams into a better field position…ya very seldom get a second chance at first impressions….
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That being said, McKitty had as many catches last season as Georgia’s three TEs, combined.
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49 receptions (in 2 seasons) will keep the first down markers moving……
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Wolf may have dropped some passes, but he caught the right one against Florida. I’ll always remember him for that play to seal the game.
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That is for sure. Probably Fromm’s best play of seasob
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Coley was a terrible OC and I remain convinced he was the main problem with our offense.
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I just hope that they remember that it is NOT illegal to throw a pass between the hash marks.
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You can’t play a player who constantly took himself out of the game. Enter Swift.
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The thing about last year’s offense is that it regularly set up PA and we still didn’t run it. That was such an easy offense to gameplan against.
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Hell, let’s try the old “I” formation!
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Just thinking about it makes me sick.
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