The “Wildcat” Stunned the NFL in 2008… but What Happened After That?

[Music] the miami dolphins a team with a rich history from the undefeated 72 dolphins to hall of fame quarterback dan marino to ray finkel they have certainly left a mark on the history and popularity of pro football but after the days of their greatest signal caller they would slowly fall from consistent playoff contenders to one of the bottom dwellers just barely avoiding zero and with coach kamcam kamcam and his staff were shipped out after just one season and the finns were onto their fifth head coach in nine years tony sperano and during the 2008 season fresh off of going 1-15 experts looked at miami's roster and thought to themselves these guys are going to be lucky to not finish last maybe they would slightly improve and win five games or so but certainly they won't finish first because nobody does that in the afc east well things started off as expected they lost in week one to the jets then they got blown out 31 to 10 by the cardinals in week two entering week three the dolphins had lost 21 of their previous 22 games meanwhile their next opponent the mighty new england patriots were literally the opposite of them going into that game they had won 21 consecutive regular season games that was just three away from the most of all time even without tom brady that day they were still nearly two touchdown favorites over their divisional punching bag but not even the great bill belichick could have been prepared for what the dolphins brought to the table that day ricky williams is in he sets up as a slot receiver eighth play of the drive now williams will shift look at that roddy brown untouched for the touchdown chad pennington has completed 11th straight he's going to set up as a receiver again running up the middle touchdown ronnie brown taking the lane chad pennington is not under center again roddy brown looking to throw it brown touchdown anthony fasado and now miami sends pennington out to the perimeter again and it's ronnie brown and they continue to cash the patriots ronnie brown is gone [Music] 118 total yards four touchdowns and the complete dismantling of bill belichick's defense all resulted from six total plays six times the dolphins direct snapped it to running back ronnie brown which resulted in creating efficiency numbers somewhere in the stratosphere the dolphins had done the unthinkable by not just beating the patriots but blowing them out and in just one day they had stunned the entire nfl and everybody was talking about the wildcat to put it simply here's a regular shotgun formation on the left and the wildcat on the right really all the wildcat is doing formation-wise is putting the quarterback out at wide receiver and moving the running back directly behind center but here's why it was so effective normally on a run play the quarterback is handing the ball off and doesn't do anything after that rendering him useless it's essentially 10 on 11 at that point now with the wildcat you move the quarterback out to wide receiver which forces the defense to put a corner out on him evening up the numbers inside the tackle box this gives the advantage back to the offense then top it off with sending another running back in motion and boom you are now utilizing every player inside the box while also running in option play option plays had historically worked well at all levels except for the nfl this was due to the sheer speed and quickness of pro defenders but despite this the wildcat seemed to have cracked the code bill belichick that night in his post-game news conference commented saying quote they did everything a lot better than we did they outplayed us they out-coached us is there a better compliment that you could possibly receive in the nfl than this from bill belichick so where did the wildcat this seemingly revolutionary idea come from we will go over that along with what happened to the wildcat after this word from today's sponsor seeky is a company that i've been working with for a long time and they gather tickets from all across the web and put them into one area making buying simple they have everything from football baseball basketball concerts festivals or more and with so many amazing concerts and festivals happening right now you're not going to want to miss out i'm talking the weekend justin bieber tyler the creator john mayer bad bunny and so much more sigi rates every ticket from 0 to 10 to make sure that you're getting a good deal with green meaning good and red meaning bad and for first time buyers use code kto at checkout for 20 off your first purchase make sure to click the link in the description to download the app to be honest before that seemingly revolutionary game versus the patriots the wildcat wasn't all that unheard of the single wing formation was designed by pop warner yes that pop warner and it became extremely popular it involved a shift pre-snap where the quarterback would move out of the way and the center would direct snap it to the halfback it was meant to confuse defenses and overwhelm them with more personnel to one side but due to the rise of passing and smarter defensive coaching the single wings popularity would fade the game would see inklings of it in high school and college many decades later in the 1990s high school head coach hugh wyatt who coached the law center wildcats in washington state published an article about a formation that he had been running with two running backs out a shotgun that he called the wildcat in 1999 the villanova wildcats implemented a single wing-like formation that they also called the wildcat now the most famous example of this being used successfully at the college level was at arkansas in 2006 with darren mcfadden and felix jones but prior to 2008 it had almost never been seen in the nfl keyword almost before ronnie brown torched the patriots defense i could only find three examples of the wildcat even being used in the entire history of the nfl the first occasion was in 1998 when the minnesota vikings direct snapped it to wide receiver david palmer they only ran it a few times that year mostly for short gains the second occasion was that same year when the falcons went against the vikings and used their little play against them in the nfc championship the third and final occasion was in one throwaway game in 2006 where d'angelo williams received a direct snap seven times versus the falcons on one possession before 2008 that was it so anyways to get back to the dolphins when they were putting together their coaching staff in 2008 they brought in two critical hires the first one was qb coach david lee who had just previously been at arkansas where he had successfully run the wildcat and then they also hired offensive coordinator dan henning henning had taken a year off coaching but before that he was the offensive coordinator for the panthers in 2006 who like i said had run the wildcat that one time so in training camp coach lee and coach henning looked at their below average quarterback room and then they looked at their two talented running backs they had and thought hey why don't we try and put this formation in our offense the funny part about this was that the defense completely shut it down in practice in an espn article ronnie brown said quote when we put it in practice it didn't work it looked bad our defense was ragging us for the longest like y'all need to throw this out what is this after its woeful performance and practice the wildcat was most likely not going to see the light of day in an actual game but after the team started 0-2 and they were going to play the patriots in new england the dolphins thought to themselves oh what the hell let's just try it the very first time that they trotted out onto the field to run it this is what their linebacker channing crowder had to say quote as soon as they put it against the patriots the whole defense jumped up and walked to the sideline we knew how it looked against us and thought these mother effers about to embarrass themselves well to everyone's surprise it worked and it completely took the league by storm with a ton of momentum coming out of that win in foxborough the dolphins kept the wildcat train rolling [Music] ronnie takes the handoff goes right up the middle dances right now breaks farther [Applause] excuse me by ronnie brown [Applause] [Applause] and here's the reverse coming back the other way to patrick cobbs and he's got blockers in front 40 30 and he's got speed to the 10 and knocked out of bounds inside the five with saving the touchdown the dolphins had done the unthinkable that 10 game difference between 2007 and 2008 is still to this day tied for the greatest single season turnaround in nfl history in terms of regular season wins it wasn't all because of the wildcat but the formation sure played a major role after 2008 the wildcat exploded in popularity as many nfl teams began exploring their own versions of the formation in total teams used some variation of the wildcat 305 times in 2009 but sadly that's when it peaked it would drop off by over a hundred snaps in 2010 and now over a decade later we hardly ever see it so what happened to the wildcat the 2008 dolphins dominated with it and people thought it was going to be a revolutionary idea but at the same time we can look back at the 2008 dolphins and see its problems welcome back to miami everyone on an absolutely gorgeous day in south florida miami dolphins have won the toss they will defer which means the new england patriots will get their hands on the football first back in 2008 when they went up against the patriots for their second match-up bill belichick wasn't around with the surprise factor out the window his defense was fully prepared for the wildcat this time the dolphins were limited to just 27 yards using the wildcat and the patriots blew them out then the same kind of thing happened in the playoffs where the ravens completely shut it down the dolphins only managed to score 9 total points with an abysmal 2.47 yards per carry it was clear by the end of 2008 that teams were beginning to adjust to it after all the offensive play calling is pretty limited with a running back taking a snap since he doesn't have the true passing ability like a quarterback and it's not like defenses are holding their breath when unathletic quarterbacks line up at whiteout so after that season miami saw the writing on the wall and decided to try and improve upon the formation a wildcat 2.0 if you will this was their plan [Music] white starts up [Applause] you see that dude right there that was west virginia quarterback pat white out of all the quarterback prospects in the 2009 nfl draft he was by far the most athletic but due to only being around six speed even and 190 pounds pat white didn't project well as a true pocket passing quarterback in the nfl keep in mind this was when offenses weren't looking for quarterbacks who could run like they do today pat white would even go on to tell reporters at the combine that he was willing to play other positions in the league but the dolphins had other plans selecting pat white in the second round of the 2009 nfl draft it made complete sense with what they had done in 2008 so sports writers and fans alike felt that this was a match made in heaven but the experiment wouldn't go as expected it's not like pat white didn't complete a lot of passes in college but man does he just need to get the monkey off his back and complete one in this game he's on the move he's gonna run it [Music] pat white is hurt he hasn't moved since he took that hit that hit by ike taylor was literally the last play of pat white's career over the course of the 2009 season pat white had only accounted for 81 rushing yards and not a single completion that hit took place in the final regular season game and after that year the dolphins felt like the pat white experiment was a huge failure and they cut him before the 2010 season he would never play in another nfl game as for the dolphins they would finish the year 7 and 9 failing to reach the playoffs and to cap it off ronnie brown along with the two coaches that brought in the wildcat were out of miami after 2010 thus ending what was supposed to be a new revolutionary playstyle after just three total seasons so as of today the wildcat does show up from time to time we even saw it as the most iconic super bowl play in the last decade but it certainly doesn't hold a significant role in any nfl offense after all it was never even supposed to work quote they made chicken salad out of chicken crap said their linebacker shannon crowder now even though the wildcat had its rise and fall a much better form of it would eventually make its way into the nfl miami was on the right track with what they had done with pat white but it just didn't go well basically instead of having a running back take the snap and make a decision why don't you just take an athletic quarterback who can make the decision between handing it off running himself or and this was the revolutionary part throwing the ball this has widely become known as the rpo second down touchdown [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: KTO

Views: 1,162,152

Keywords: the wildcat, formation, stunned, the nfl, in 2008, but what happened, after that, 2008 wildcat, miami dolphins, ronnie brown, ricky williams, arkansas, darren mcfadden

Id: 8WIpm3lpiBo

Length: 16min 9sec (969 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 29 2022