Teams Should Be More Unconventional: Vick, The Wildcat, and David and Goliath

The most interesting thing about the Wildcat offense was not that it broke with conventional football wisdom, but that teams don't break conventional wisdom that often.

Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink and Outliers, points out in his latest article that when less-talented teams beat favorites (i.e., when David beats Goliath), they usually do so by adopting unconventional methods.

Gladwell uses the full-court press in basketball as an example, as it throws off the timing and rhythm of talented offensive teams. However, the same principles apply to football as well.

It's telling to note when the Dolphins first broke out their new—or "so-old-it's-new"—offense against the Patriots. This was a matchup in which there was a considerable gulf in talent. True, Tom Brady was hurt. But the Pats were a year removed from a perfect regular season while the Dolphins nearly went 0-16 the year before.

The new offense, though, caught the Patriots defense completely off guard, resulting in a 38-13 shellacking. The game ended up being tremendously important, as the Dolphins won the AFC East while the Pats stayed home despite an 11-5 record.

This begs the question: Why do less-talented teams seem perfectly happy losing conventionally as opposed to trying new approaches?

The question is by no means new.

ESPN.com's Gregg Easterbrook criticizes coaches constantly in his "Tuesday Morning Quarterback" column for punting when their team is behind by a large margin. Such a move, he argues, does not increase the chances of winning, but keeps the score down—preventing the coach from looking bad.

However, the problem goes beyond that. NFL teams seem incredibly resistant to running any scheme that differs from the "business-as-usual" game plans, even when the talent is available to do so.

Take Michael Vick's career so far as an example (and let's ignore his moral lapses for the time being). Vick is a talented athlete, as we all know. Still, he has limitations. He's fast and has a strong arm, but he's not especially accurate (his highest completion percentage in the league has been 56 percent).

What did Atlanta Falcons head coach Jim Mora, Jr. do with Vick? Mora had Vick run the West Coast offense, an offense predicated on timing, quick decisions and accuracy.

Why did Mora do this? It's because Mora was an assistant under Steve Marriucci, who is another West Coast devotee. Mora did this because that's what he was taught and what many teams in the league had been doing.

Mora, in short, ignored the talent available to him to implement the "tried and true" method.

The irony of this is that the West Coast offense was originally an innovative scheme designed to exploit the talents of players ignored by the NFL. Bill Walsh designed his scheme while he was with the Bengals to accommodate a weak-armed but accurate quarterback and receivers who weren't going to blow by anyone.

Vick is now a free agent, and presumably has a better chance of signing with a team that will use his talents more effectively (assuming, of course, the team is willing to take on the bad publicity).

I'm not singling out specific teams here—the league seems full of this kind of mentality. Look at the Detroit Lions last year. What could they have lost by trying unconventional game plans? They couldn't have gone 0-17.

The Lions, though, continued to play conventionally and lost regularly to teams with more talent.

The Bengals and Bills leveraged their "no-huddle" offenses into Super Bowl appearances. Both teams now run very conventional offenses, and both have been lousy for the past decade.

So, it becomes somewhat frustrating that so many teams are looking to adopt the Wildcat, but are ignoring the thinking behind it. The Wildcat is not, in itself, a superior scheme. It can be, and has been, defended well.

The true lesson of the Wildcat is that less-talented teams should consider success through unconventional means.