Northwestern is coming off of a 28-7 loss to Duke to fall to 1-1 on the season. Tensions are high in Wildcat land after a miserable offensive performance against the Blue Devils.
For Pat Fitzgerald, the longtime coach at Northwestern, the frustrations of last week and preparations for this weekend’s upcoming game against Akron have given him time to craft some serious takes about the state of football in 2018. Now, this isn’t a Larry Fedora-esque rant about the wussification of America, but more about how a particular offensive innovation is threatening the sanctity of the fine institution of football.
Yes, we’re talking about run-pass options, aka RPOs. You know them as the thing Cris Collinsworth mentions about a dozen times a game and that many announcers, like his partner Al Michaels, still haven’t figured out the difference between them and just a normal play-action pass. RPOs have absolutely changed the game of football, with offensive coaches loving them and defensive coaches despising them. Fitzgerald is a defensive guy and he’s got some real strong feelings about how RPOs are “the purest form of communism” and how they aren’t football plays.
"RPO is the purest form of communism."
You can't watch football without hearing "RPO" these days, and @coachfitz51 has some strong thoughts on the Run-Pass Option: pic.twitter.com/isVYvkPCvr
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) September 11, 2018
This is just a spectacular rant, one of the finest in recent memory. Part of the reason for that is there are legitimate gripes to be made about RPOs and the way they are refereed, with many refs not looking for the ineligible linemen downfield. Fitzgerald explains how it’s partially a rules issue, with the college game allowing linemen to drift three yards downfield before they’re ineligible, which gives ample time for an RPO to happen legally while also putting the defense at a total disadvantage. It’s also partially that referees don’t throw the flag enough when linemen do find themselves beyond that three yard buffer, which only exasperates the issues for the defense.
However, within that reasonable complaint — one that many others, including Nick Saban, have levied — Fitzgerald goes the extra mile to compare them to communism, which doesn’t particularly make any sense but I’m sure sounded really good to him. He also says that, so long as they’re going to allow it, it would be foolish of him to not have his team run RPOs because they are so successful.
