T-bone spread: offensive package

Coach and Athletic Director, May-June, 1999 by Johnny Mallatt

A great little two-minute package that will create a lot of good mismatches

The need for a wide-open style of attack causes some coaches to go to the extreme, to build their entire offense around the concept.

I look upon such styles of offense as a phase of the game, not the whole offense. There is a time and place for this kind of offense, and one of those places is the wing-bone offense.

We can convert this simple play package into a wide-open two-minute or spread type of offense in just a matter of seconds. By moving the tailback to the backside end position and moving our X man to a wide flanker position, we get the strong-side trips as shown in the diagrams.

The reason it is so simple is because we don't have to make a lot of position or play changes. The T-bone spread plays are basically the same, with just the QB moving to a shotgun alignment in the backfield.

The QB-center exchange is the only major technical change that we must work on in order to perfect. This must be practiced on a daily basis in order for it to become second nature for the center and the QB.

The T-bone shotgun should be treated as another special team and practiced as such. In order for this phase of the wing-bone offense to work well, you must devote the time necessary to perfect it. We want all the offensive players to be on the same page, to feel at ease running it, just the way they do with the regular offensive package.

Some teams use the spread offense only in desperation. We believe it can be used at various times of the game as a normal offensive weapon. So in essence, it is not just a two-minute offense for us, but the regular offense in a different package.

We have packaged it in such a simplistic form, that the coaches and players believe in it and adapt to it well.

It is also a fun package to run, especially in the years you may have the good passer. The QB with average arm strength can still be effective if the patterns and depth of receivers are adjusted to fit the QB. If the QB has decent running ability, this can actually turn into a wide open offense with his running threat as an added dimension.

The base formation is always wing-over trips (shotgun). From this formation, we can throw the option pass, counter pass, and the Hail Mary patterns (spot & swing). We can then run the FB and QB counters and FB Dive from the shotgun alignment with a direct snap to the fullback or QB, giving us the old single wing look that causes problems for blitzing LBs and hard-charging defensive linemen. It will also slow the rush at the QB.

The wing bone two-minute offense is composed of four basic wing-bone plays, two passes, and two runs. The other two plays are the Hail Mary pass and the Hail Mary swing pass. These last two pass plays take a minimal amount of learning, and the players have a lot of fun running them in practice. When the situation arises they may help to win a game for the team.

These are not necessarily desperation plays. They are practiced and rehearsed with special techniques that are taught to the receivers.

Remember, we never practice anything in the wing-bone offense that we won't use in the game on a regular basis.

The T-Bone is like a special team, and in order for it to be successful you must practice it everyday. It affords us the luxury of having a wide-open, come-from-behind package, if and when we decide to use it. We rehearse it in the pre-game warm-up to make the players feel at ease with it.

The tailback in the T-bone shotgun can be replaced by another X who might be a better pass receiver. You needn't be afraid to use him in definite passing situations. Normally, a team will have a number of extra X's and Z-backs that can double as tailbacks in the T-bone spread offense. Note the patterns in the diagrams that give the receivers the routes they will need to get open against the various defensive alignments.

Johnny Mallatt, Coach, Baxter Springs (KS) Middle School