SEATTLE — First-year Broncos coach Gary Kubiak stands in the back of the end zone at team headquarters surveying his offense. The Broncos face a third-and-5 situation. Kubiak raises his voice.
“Hey, Peyton. Huddle up! Huddle up! Huddle up!”
The orders signal the Broncos are doing something radical for an NFL team that once turned the field into the autobahn: They are shifting into low gear.
In Peyton Manning’s first three seasons in Denver, the Broncos took the frenetic approach. When they scored an NFL-record 606 points in the 2013 regular season, they never had a drive last more than eight minutes. Same goes for last season. But neither season ended with a Super Bowl championship.
Kubiak has installed a hybrid offense, blending Manning’s most successful traits — audibles, pistol and shotgun formations — with the coach’s desire to establish a physical running game.
As such, the Broncos now huddle throughout the game, about 10 yards behind the line of scrimmage. Manning calls the play. This isn’t “Bull Durham,” with Kevin Costner’s character talking to Tim Robbins’ character about candlesticks as wedding gifts.
It’s serious.
“When Peyton is in there, he commands the ship. Everybody is quiet. Nobody says a word. They listen to the huddle call, and it’s time for business,” said tight end Virgil Green. “When Peyton gets into that huddle, if anybody is talking before he steps in there, as soon as he walks in there, silence.”
The huddle has a remarkable history. Most credit Paul Hubbard with its invention in 1892. Playing quarterback for Gallaudet — a university for the deaf and hard of hearing in Washington, D.C. — Hubbard circled players around him because he believed an opponent was stealing his hand signals. The huddle became more prevalent in college football in the 1920s at schools such as the University of Illinois, even as fans groused about it.
The huddle’s purpose has grown over the past century. The play call is only part of its function. It helps the offense burn time, allows players to focus and changes the pace.
“It’s like you’re a pitcher throwing an off-speed pitch, a fastball two-seam or a four-seam,” said Broncos offensive coordinator Rick Dennison. “Depending on what you want to do, a huddle can use up a lot of clock, which helps out quite a bit too.”
There remains order and etiquette in the huddle. In a sport in which no detail is too small, the huddle is diagrammed. Manning typically is on the side nearest the Broncos’ sideline. The tight end stands across from him near the tackles. Then the running backs and receivers fill in around. The play calls can be simple or verbose. Led by coach Andy Reid, the Kansas City Chiefs string together 16 words: “Shift to halfback twin right open, swap 72 all-go special halfback shallow cross wide open,” quarterback Alex Smith told The Kansas City Star as a hypothetical call.
Conversely, there was John Elway in the 1998 AFC championship game, telling Shannon Sharpe, after the huddle play call caused concern, “Go get open!”
“Every team does it differently. The center sets the huddle, but you have to know where to stand so you don’t have everyone leaning in and can’t hear. And you need good spacing,” Broncos tight end Owen Daniels said, smirking. “Even in the huddle, good spacing is important.”
Don’t laugh. Many Broncos lack experience at huddling up. Broncos rookie tight end Jeff Heuerman told the team after being drafted he had never huddled.
“So when looking at the differences (between the Ohio State and Broncos playbooks), I guess start there,” he said.
Kids today. Running back C.J. Anderson shook his head and smiled when told of Heuerman’s background.
“It shocks me a little bit, but that’s the way the game is now,” Anderson said.
The no-huddle began, by most accounts, during Sam Wyche’s lone season at Indiana University in 1983. He used it as a weapon to compensate for his team’s lack of talent and size when facing Big Ten behemoths. It prevented opponents from substituting smaller players in pass coverage on early downs. Wyche introduced the scheme to the Cincinnati Bengals in 1984. It increased scoring, drew the league’s ire — Wyche has said in multiple accounts that the NFL wanted it forbidden — and can be seen in a modified version across college football today.
No one used the no-huddle better than the Broncos in 2013. Kubiak promises to keep it in some form. But this season the Broncos also will downshift, slow the pace and, yes, gather around in a circle to call a play.
“For me, it’s a time to catch your breath a little bit and get ready. We can still change tempos with it,” Daniels said. “I am used to it. I love the huddle.”
