One of those TIFWIW stories…..but had a chance to talk with a former Georgia FB who played under Mark Richt and then Kirby Smart.
He was careful to say he didn’t know exact rule at time, but that when Kirby Smart came into UGA, he specifically talked about WR crack-back blocks being really dangerous plays bc of high likelihood of targeting.
I don’t know exact year they banned the type of block Evan Spencer laid out on Alabama, but that block is illegal now.
My “friend” was saying Georgia took out all schemes where a WR would “crash down” on a LB, whereas it was pretty typical under Richt.
He said it was basically an adjustment due to new rules and harsher penalties for those types of blocks. The coaching staff emphasized how you could not blow up a defenseless defender, so they basically removed schemes where it’d put their offensive players in a position to get ejected.
I say all of this because….
Once he watched the OSU/Oregon game….he texted me he didn’t think OSU had any experience with WR’s crashing down as a blocker. He said Oregon did excellent job of treating the block as more of a “basketball pick” than a block. He said they used a very common concept from 10 years ago that has largely been lost bc teams have taken that concept out. But Oregon really executed well where they didn’t commit penalties but executed the play without having to lay wood. Just getting the bodies in the wash made it effective.
No excuse for our defense….but I do wonder how unprepared they were for a play that has basically been dead for multiple years. I think we got caught with our pants down….it was a play our guys have never seen bc it was basically legislated out. But Oregon found a way to execute it without committing penalties. And good on them for figuring it out…..
