Snap to QB facing the backfield; Tech in 1928

1939hotmagic

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A comment to a football history blog post mentioned this, and I didn't believe it -- until I saw it courtesy of Youtube. Here it is, Tech's national title team defeating Notre Dame in 1928, and you can see several instances of the snap from center going to the QB -- as the QB is facing the offensive backfield. The QB and C are butt to butt during the exchange.



Also note that the QB sometime went in motion, and the C snapped the ball to a different back.

Not that the T formation, QB-under-center formation wasn't unknown back then, but this was an era during which the single-wing (in several variations) was the standard offense, QBs often were blocking backs seldom under center, and snaps from center typically were "shotgun-ish" to any of the half- or fullbacks.

Perhaps someone else can shed some light on this, but the "butt to butt"/QB-facing-the-backfield snap -- was that common among single-wing teams back in the day? I've clicked around, looked at a handful of 1920s games' clips, and didn't see that set at snap.
 
MikeJackets1967

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1939hotmagic said:
A comment to a football history blog post mentioned this, and I didn't believe it -- until I saw it courtesy of Youtube. Here it is, Tech's national title team defeating Notre Dame in 1928, and you can see several instances of the snap from center going to the QB -- as the QB is facing the offensive backfield. The QB and C are butt to butt during the exchange.



Also note that the QB sometime went in motion, and the C snapped the ball to a different back.

Not that the T formation, QB-under-center formation wasn't unknown back then, but this was an era during which the single-wing (in several variations) was the standard offense, QBs often were blocking backs seldom under center, and snaps from center typically were "shotgun-ish" to any of the half- or fullbacks.

Perhaps someone else can shed some light on this, but the "butt to butt"/QB-facing-the-backfield snap -- was that common among single-wing teams back in the day? I've clicked around, looked at a handful of 1920s games' clips, and didn't see that set at snap.
Click to expand...

The single wing was an interesting offense:cool: Tennessee ran that offense until 1963 and UCLA went to the 1962 Rose Bowl using that offense.
 

takethepoints

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When I was playing ball at my small college we ran a single wing. Nobody on the other side could figure out what we were doing most of the time. We sometimes had a hard time with that ourselves. But it did work.

Of course, having a 6'3" 220lb tailback who ran the 100 in 10.3 helped. Bill was bigger then most of the DLs we played against and was always the fastest man on the field. Problem = he had a heart murmur. It was real simple: if you could hear Bill's heart in the huddle, it was time for him to sit down a series. Needless to say, he'd have never seen the field today. College football has changed.
 
Supersizethatorder-mutt

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1939hotmagic said:
A comment to a football history blog post mentioned this, and I didn't believe it -- until I saw it courtesy of Youtube. Here it is, Tech's national title team defeating Notre Dame in 1928, and you can see several instances of the snap from center going to the QB -- as the QB is facing the offensive backfield. The QB and C are butt to butt during the exchange.



Also note that the QB sometime went in motion, and the C snapped the ball to a different back.

Not that the T formation, QB-under-center formation wasn't unknown back then, but this was an era during which the single-wing (in several variations) was the standard offense, QBs often were blocking backs seldom under center, and snaps from center typically were "shotgun-ish" to any of the half- or fullbacks.

Perhaps someone else can shed some light on this, but the "butt to butt"/QB-facing-the-backfield snap -- was that common among single-wing teams back in the day? I've clicked around, looked at a handful of 1920s games' clips, and didn't see that set at snap.
Click to expand...

That looks really weird, doesn't it?
 
GT_05

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1939hotmagic said:
A comment to a football history blog post mentioned this, and I didn't believe it -- until I saw it courtesy of Youtube. Here it is, Tech's national title team defeating Notre Dame in 1928, and you can see several instances of the snap from center going to the QB -- as the QB is facing the offensive backfield. The QB and C are butt to butt during the exchange.



Also note that the QB sometime went in motion, and the C snapped the ball to a different back.

Not that the T formation, QB-under-center formation wasn't unknown back then, but this was an era during which the single-wing (in several variations) was the standard offense, QBs often were blocking backs seldom under center, and snaps from center typically were "shotgun-ish" to any of the half- or fullbacks.

Perhaps someone else can shed some light on this, but the "butt to butt"/QB-facing-the-backfield snap -- was that common among single-wing teams back in the day? I've clicked around, looked at a handful of 1920s games' clips, and didn't see that set at snap.
Click to expand...


Interesting! Handoff up the middle looks super fast and maybe QB runs outside would’ve been a step faster since the QB didn’t have to pivot. Somebody call CPJ and let’s try this out. [emoji3]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

1939hotmagic

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It's interesting when one pulls on a "cyberstring" to see what's unearthed. And isn't.

Apparently coach Alexander, unlike many of his counterparts, never wrote a book about his coaching philosophy, preferred schemes, etc. A pity, because he had a reputation of being rather innovative, and his "inverted quarterback" measure was not common; indeed, leafing through the books of several popular and successful coaches of the 20s, 30s, and 40s, I haven't seen anyone mention or diagram a play with that approach. (If any of you hardcore Xs and Os guys do, please fire away.)

One interesting wrinkle: In the early 1940s, coach Tom Conley at John Carroll University stirred up a little media attention with his "Diamond T" formation using, yes, an inverted quarterback. A local newspaper's story about it was picked up by the Associated Press and the story popped up as filler in a few newspapers around the country. There was no mention of Tech and coach Alexander having used it. Here's the wrinkle: Tom Conley was a sophomore at Notre Dame in 1928, a reserve on the team when Tech defeated the Irish, when Tech used the reversed QB as you can see in the video in the original post. It's not much a mental leap to think that Conley was thinking of what Tech did in 1928, as he probably saw it happen in person.

It's really astounding that there's so little information about the inverted QB scheme. A little bit can be seen in old film clips, a a few newspaper stories, and -- in 1946 some grad student at Oregon State wrote a paper proposing use of the "Diamond T inverted quarterback offense" particularly at the high school level. He even included some suggested plays, and spent several pages on the center-QB snap.

OK, so much for distracting you from recruiting news with this antiquarian football arcana. You may resume your regularly scheduled anarchy. :)
 
MikeJackets1967

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GT_05 said:
Interesting! Handoff up the middle looks super fast and maybe QB runs outside would’ve been a step faster since the QB didn’t have to pivot. Somebody call CPJ and let’s try this out. [emoji3]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
I remember Bobby Dodd said in his book that he switched the GT offense from the single wing to the T formation in 1945. Frank Broyles was a damn good T formation quarterback.
 
buzzwilder

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That formation with all 4 backs in the backfield & the center snapping the ball directly to them is the old Notre Dame Box. I only know that because my HS ran it back in the 90's. Lots of options...power football, misdirection, etc I believe Carrollton ran it back in the day under Charlie Grisham.
 
MikeJackets1967

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buzzwilder said:
That formation with all 4 backs in the backfield & the center snapping the ball directly to them is the old Notre Dame Box. I only know that because my HS ran it back in the 90's. Lots of options...power football, misdirection, etc I believe Carrollton ran it back in the day under Charlie Grisham.
Click to expand...
Yeah Notre Dame ran it until Frank Leahy switched the team to the T formation in 1941.
 

1939hotmagic

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buzzwilder said:
That formation with all 4 backs in the backfield & the center snapping the ball directly to them is the old Notre Dame Box. I only know that because my HS ran it back in the 90's. Lots of options...power football, misdirection, etc I believe Carrollton ran it back in the day under Charlie Grisham.
Click to expand...

Yep, that was ND running Rockne's box single-wing. The Packers under coach Curly Lambeau also used a version of the box way back in the day:

http://www.packers.com/news-and-eve...e-scheme/7de53247-6024-4104-b572-82582d8a1660
 
Jerry the Jacket

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Man I love that old film. GT has one of the richest histories in all of college football. Just to think that these young (at the time) Yellow Jackets ran on the same small plot of grass and land that our teams continue to play on today. It just reminds you of all those that came before them and the tradition that has been built over so many years. When you see the white and gold take the field behind that ramblin wreck it continues the eternal memory of all those who built the legend of Georgia Tech football.

Go Jackets!
 
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