Season one is behind us and a new dawn has arrived. I want to start by thanking those of you who have been here since Day 1 and saw us go through some very tough growing pains. But we have persevered and are better because of it. To the new guys, welcome. Glad to have you here and look forward to competing with you.
As we head into Season Two, I want to go over several things that came up during Season One and ensure we do not encounter the same issues again this season. Please take the time to read this post thoroughly. After this, there are no excuses for doing any of these things. We are all here to play smart, realistic and strategic simulation football. We are here to provide as even and balanced of a playing field as possible. All of our rules and the principles listed in this post help to accomplish that.
pack1797, Ol'ColdToes, 5StarTA, Rabbitsheriff, mycaddy, moniqx4, Falconsroach7, bpslm, TylerDale90, Lyric4christ, Walrussmuglr, kha0tikdreamz, Milhouse, Luis3250, RedSkinzHog, SnapDan, Cnote, LethalNtention, Gubber227, Philipfly, Ron_Codpiece, ntd929
As we head into Season Two, I want to go over several things that came up during Season One and ensure we do not encounter the same issues again this season. Please take the time to read this post thoroughly. After this, there are no excuses for doing any of these things. We are all here to play smart, realistic and strategic simulation football. We are here to provide as even and balanced of a playing field as possible. All of our rules and the principles listed in this post help to accomplish that.
- Your playbook dictates your formations - If you have only one 3 TE set in your offensive playbook and you have 30 formations, you should only run a 3 TE set about 3% of the time (Once every 30 plays). It does not have to be exact, but it should be pretty close game in and game out. Likewise, if your playbook only has 40% shotgun sets, you should only be in shotgun about 40% of the time.
- Mix up your formations - Ideally you should be in a different formation every play. That's what real life teams do. Occasionally you might come out in an I-Formation or 2 TE set on consecutive plays. That happens in real life. But you should not be coming on in the same shotgun formation two, three, four plays in a row. You should not be running the same I-Form or 2 TE repeatedly, even on 3rd and long. Again, if you do not see it on Sunday, we probably shouldn't see it in here.
- Diversify your play calls - In a perfect world, you would not call the same play from the same formation more than once. Sometimes you may run the same dive play from the same I-Form or other running formation or something like that. However, for the most part, you should not be running the same play multiple times. Each playbook has over 200 plays and we only run about 50-55 per game. There is really no reason to be running the same plays repeatedly.
- Do not use the same concepts over and over - There are a few passing concepts that you may use 2-3 times in a game like mesh, curl flats, drive or even levels. However, those should typically come from different formations and not always be on the same down every time (using the same play, in the same situation over and over = money play). Plays like 4 verts, and PA shot and anything else that looks like 4 verts, especially from trips, should be used, at most, once per game.
- Don't abuse money plays - The typical money concepts this year are 4 verts from trips, streaks to very fast WRs, HB screens, corner routes and HB tosses. 4 verts should not be used more than once in a game in almost any scenario. Its just straight cheddar and we should all be better than that. We should also limit plays like HB screens and tosses and corner routes to 2-3 per game, at most. Again, challenge yourself to be better than having to rely on concepts the AI doesn't handle well. You can mix them in, but don't wait until your final drive or two when losing and then all of the sudden pull out your block of cheddar because you don't want to lose. If you weren't good enough to beat your opponent playing sim football for 3.5 quarters, you don't deserve to beat them on money plays at the end.
- Run the play where it was designed to go - Running backs in real life do not take the hand off and then run parallel to the line of scrimmage toward the sideline. That is a common Madden glitch play to try and out run the defense. If you call a dive, run it between the C and G. If you call an inside zone, run it between the G and T. Occasionally, maybe 1-2 times a game, you may break a run outside of the intended hole because it was clogged up. However, that usually just consists of moving one gap over. It almost never happens in real life where a HB is running a dive and turns and runs straight toward the sideline. Don't do that in here.
- Use play-action realistically - Read the rules on this too. Play-action on 1st or 2nd down and 10 or less to go is realistic. Play-action on 3rd and 5 or less "can" be realistic. Play-action on 3rd and long is not realistic. No real life defense is going to bite on a play-action on 3rd and 15. The absolute only reason to run that there in Madden is to try and glitch the AI into biting on it. Its completely unrealistic. Also, the majority of your passes should not be play-action. A "high" percentage of your passes being PA would be about 33%. The vast majority of us should be below that for the vast majority of our games.
- Run commit is not a base defense - NFL teams only "run commit" in 1 yard or less to go situations on the goal line or, maybe, when losing late on a 3rd or 4th down that they need to get a stop to get the ball back. Also, run commit is exactly what it says. You are "committing" to stopping the run. That doesn't mean call a base zone defense, get your defenders to all attack if its a handoff and then drop back into coverage if they happen to fool you and are passing. That is completely unrealistic and just playing Madden. If you are run committing, it should be an all out blitz and you should be perfectly aware that if your opponent expects it and fools you, you just gave up a TD. That's how it work in real life and that's how it should work in here.
- Quarters and dime are not base defenses - Quarters is designed for 5 WR sets, very long 3rd down situations and late game Hail Mary scenarios. You should not come out in quarters vs an I-Form or 2 TE set (or even a 3 WR set the vast majority of the time). Likewise, dime is not a base defense. You should not be running dime vs 2 TE sets or even 3 WR sets very often. If your opponent has two good tight ends and you are worried about them throwing to them, play zone and spotlight one of them and user cover the other. Or get better safeties and linebackers. Corners very rarely cover tight ends in real life because of the huge size disadvantage. That should not happen in here any more frequently.
- Personnel match your opponent - If your opponent comes out in 2 TE or 2 RBs, come out in a base 4-3 or 3-4 defense. If they have 3 WR, come out in nickel. If they have 4 WRs, come out in dime. There are exceptions like 3rd and long when your opponent may have 3 WR and you may want to play dime. But for the vast majority of plays you should personnel match. On the flip side, there is nothing wrong with playing a base 3-4 or 4-3 vs a 3 WR set, especially on early downs. If a team likes out come out in 3 WR on 1st and 10, run a base D and get that extra guy in the box to help shut down the run.
pack1797, Ol'ColdToes, 5StarTA, Rabbitsheriff, mycaddy, moniqx4, Falconsroach7, bpslm, TylerDale90, Lyric4christ, Walrussmuglr, kha0tikdreamz, Milhouse, Luis3250, RedSkinzHog, SnapDan, Cnote, LethalNtention, Gubber227, Philipfly, Ron_Codpiece, ntd929
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