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The Zone Read

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DaiTheFlu's picture
September 19, 2015 at 8:32pm
29 Comments

At this point, it's clear that there are a few issues with this version of the Ohio State Buckeyes, whether it be the uneven QB play, rotating of QBs, offensive line play, penalties, play calling etc. I agree that all of these things are factors in our struggles the last couple games and will all need to be addressed for us to have any chance at repeating. One thing that's stood out to me, however, is the lack of the zone read in our offense, even to the point where Urban Meyer has stated that we're "no longer a zone read team".

Urban's offense has always been a power spread, certainly, but one other core tenet of the philosophy is the threat of the QB to run the ball. With that threat taken out of the arsenal, defenses are keying on Zeke's runs, limiting his explosive ability. They're also able to load the box and play one on one with most of our receivers, as we really don't have a true WR aside from Michael Thomas. Brax, Jalin, Curtis and so on are all electric play makers but aren't TRUE WRs. One way to punish teams by doing this is to run the QB. I don't think it's an accident that our most successful game offensively this season was the one in which our starting QB ran for 99 yards. I'd be shocked if the two QBS have COMBINED for that in the two games since.

Obviously returning to this style of play favors JT Barrett, which is fine by me. I was surprised he didn't start from day one, mostly because Urban has always talked about running the QB being an integral part of his offense because it gives the offense a mathematical advantage in the run game. I guess my question is: why has that element of the offense all but disappeared? More importantly, will we start to see it back in the rotation more? I strongly believe that it's critical to our offensive success in 2015 that we do. Thoughts?

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