On Christmas Eve, Mike Shanahan presented a play he especially wanted to give the Oakland Raiders.
Actually, it was a hand-me-down play disguised in unusual formations and shifts. As the Broncos got set at the line, running back Tatum Bell sprinted out to the left end.
Hey, hey, said the Raiders, watch that guy over there.
The Broncos’ backfield, however, remained occupied. Lined up behind Plummer was Charlie Adams, the Broncos’ No. 3 receiver.
What’s he doing back there? Plummer barked a signal and Adams went in motion to the left, headed toward Bell.
Raiders eyes and minds couldn’t help but focus on the Broncos’ left, where Bell and Adams had just strayed. Plummer then dropped back and watched tight end Jeb Putzier break wide open on a simple up-and-cut pattern to the right.
Jake and Jeb connected for a 17-yard gain to the Raiders’ 25-yard line. A few plays later, the Broncos had a 10-0 lead, on their way to clinching the AFC’s No. 2 seed.
The route Putzier ran was not unlike those drawn on high school chalkboards across the country. But it was the deceptive alignment and motions going one way that had the Raiders dumbfounded as the play went the other way.
Such is the brilliantly simple nature of the Broncos’ offense devised by coach Mike Shanahan and offensive coordinator Gary Kubiak.
“My first time with the game plan I was like, ‘Holy moly, this is wild,”‘ said Plummer, who spent his first five seasons with the Arizona Cardinals before joining the Broncos three years ago. “Then you learn how to prepare. You know Tuesday night when the fax comes in that your head’s going to be spinning Wednesday morning, but then it’s going to slow down by the time the week comes to an end, and by Sunday you’ll know what to do.
“It looks like it’s pretty crazy. It is pretty crazy. But we’ve learned how to prepare for it.”
Come Saturday night at Invesco Field at Mile High, it won’t be so easy for Shanahan to fool coach Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots during their AFC second-round playoff game.
In his defense
If Shanahan is a “mastermind” on offense, Belichick is considered a genius on defense. Against the seemingly unstoppable heavily favored St. Louis Rams in the Super Bowl four years ago, Belichick devised a defense that concentrated solely on stopping quarterback Kurt Warner’s passing game. The Rams could have run all day had they wanted, but coach Mike Martz stubbornly refused and the Patriots had their first of three Super Bowl trophies in a four-year span.
Last year in an AFC divisional playoff against the similarly high-powered Indianapolis Colts, Belichick put seven defenders near the line of scrimmage, ordered his two cornerbacks to jam and physically attack the receivers on the flanks, and had his two safeties play a double center field. Colts quarterback Peyton Manning never did call the right audible in a 20-3 defeat.
Former Patriots linebacker Ted Johnson, who retired before this season after a series of concussions and is now a media analyst, said Belichick is a master of stripping away the numerous formations and motions and zeroing in on the play’s root.
All teams have tendencies when the game is tight, the pressure is on, the play is huge. The problem Belichick admittedly has when he faces the Broncos is Shanahan may be unparalleled in avoiding tendencies. And if Shanahan does fall into patterns, he goes to great lengths to disguise them.
Let the chess game begin.
“I faced the Broncos a lot, and to me what they do is quite simple,” Johnson said. “They run the ball either right or left. They don’t run traps, they don’t run counters. Cut through everything else they do and it’s the same exact run.
“Now the thing about it is how Coach Shanahan changes his personnel from game to game. He will play two tight ends one game and feature that. The next week he will feature three wide receivers. So as a defensive coordinator you’re like, shoot, do I play nickel? Or do I play my regular? And once they get that run going, the safeties are biting and forget it. You’re done.”
Shanahan said it’s all about finding mismatches, creating strengths against weaknesses. Putting in a fast guy against a tough guy, if the situation calls for it. Other times a bruising runner can knock down speed on a passing down.
If an element of confusion can be added, so much the better. Before the Plummer-Putzier completion against the Raiders, Shanahan called a simple run up the middle. Bell got 4 yards on that play, then sprinted out to left end on the next.
“I’ve been doing that since I’ve been coaching,” Shanahan said. “Sometimes it’s personnel groupings, sometimes it’s formations. Sometimes it’s what we see on defense, too. Different type of blitzes, different alignments, different coverages. It’s like a chess game.”
Just playing games
Playing chess really is like calling plays. In chess, there are only so many moves on a board. Brilliance comes in the setup. On the football field Christmas Eve, Putzier made a catch off a route that has been drawn up in the dirt since boys discovered sandlots.
It wasn’t the play, but the illusion that gained 17 yards.
“That’s the thing about our offense. I think it’s a lot harder to devise it and scheme it than it is for us to execute it,” Broncos receiver Ashley Lelie said. “It’s harder on the coaches’ end, but on our end, they kind of simplify it for us. That’s when good coaching comes in. For everybody else looking in, it looks pretty darn complicated. But for us, it’s not.”
Staff writer Mike Klis can be reached at 303-820-5440 or mklis@denverpost.com.
