“The Art of War” is all about surprise.
You want to surprise your enemy so that he does not expect you to do what you’re about to do. The same goes for football; the best way to beat an opponent is to make him guess what you’re going to do next — and guess incorrectly.
The Denver Broncos, however, have been tipping their hand when it comes to play-calling, according to ESPN’s James Koh.
Are the #Broncos tipping their playcalling with Royce Freeman? I would say absolutely. Just 27% of Freeman's runs have come with 3+ receivers on the field. Meanwhile teammate Phillip Lindsay runs the ball with 3+ WRs on 58% of his runs #NextGenStats
— James D Koh (@JamesDKoh) December 12, 2018
As Koh points out, when there are three receivers on the field, depending on the running back behind Case Keenum, the defense can guess what will happen next with a high rate of success.
Nearly three-quarters of the time, the Broncos will pass the ball with Freeman in the backfield and three receivers outside. But, much closer to half the time, Denver will run the ball if rookie sensation Phillip Lindsay is in the backfield with three wideouts deployed.
With Freeman and three wide receivers, it’s just too simple, too easy for any defense to read and then shut down.
Offensive coordinator Bill Musgrave’s play-calling has been suspect all season. Case Keenum excels in the play-action, and yet Musgrave hesitated to use it throughout most of the year, only recently calling a few more play-actions per game. Not only that, but Musgrave continues to hand the ball off to Lindsay too few times per game; he still hasn’t had 20 carries in a single contest.
Last week, the Browns saw that Musgrave was calling safe, short, outside passes and they stopped those with ease. In that game, Denver ran the ball a mere 20 times all game long, making it easy for Cleveland to guess what the home team was doing — and stifle the offensive attack.
The Broncos’ offense is one of the worst in the league, at No. 21 in points per game (21.8) and No. 26 in passing touchdowns (16).
And with every week that goes by, we see more and more why the offense is so terrible this year. Yes, the offensive line is a M*A*S*H* unit. Yes, further injuries to tight ends and wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders — as well as trading away Demaryius Thomas — has hurt production.
But at the end of the day, the offense’s lack of production is on Musgrave, who’s proven time and time again that he can’t mold his offense to his players (Keenum), that he doesn’t run the ball enough, and that his play-calling is far easy to guess.
So, while there’s a lot of blame to be placed on the shoulders of Vance Joseph, don’t forget about Musgrave and his offense because they deserve a share of the blame for the Broncos’ blunder-filled season, too.
