

"It was minus-35 wind chill, and there was no way I could look at a game plan or pull something out of my head. To me, it was just sort of a safety net because there's so much emotion to start the game, you want to think clearly, and this, in a sense, forces you to stay with a regimen that you clinically planned prior to the game." " The scripting saved us because I couldn't think," he said. If something really worked or you saw something in the defense, you'd go back to (a play).


"Let's say, of the 25, you'd run 18 or 19 sort of in order. "Would you run 25 in order? No," Walsh said. While there might be a long script of plays, they are not called blindly in order. There are, of course, some misconceptions about scripting. Walsh used to do 25 plays, but most teams now script about 15 plays. Just about every team in the NFL now uses some form of scripting. "You already know if (the defense does) this, who we're going to. You can sleep easier, you have more confidence going into the game, and you're more at ease.įor the coaches, you can feel comfortable that the game is almost on automatic pilot when it starts." "You know what's going to be called and there's no reason to make a mistake," veteran tight end Shannon Sharpe said of the system in Denver, where coach Mike Shanahan scripts the first 15 offensive plays every week. "The players really appreciate the idea that you're giving them a (head) start on the game. "It got to the point where our offensive team really wanted to know those plays," Walsh recalled. With a script, the offensive players could devote more study time to plays that definitely would be used in the game, as opposed to studying an entire game plan that invariably included a bunch of plays that would not be called. All the planning could be done in the office during the week instead of on the sidelines during the frenzy of a game. Walsh still remembers the criticism and skepticism from the NFL coaching establishment that greeted him in the 1970s when, as an offensive assistant with the Cincinnati Bengals, he started scripting plays. The Master of the Game Plan Preparation and Execution Perfectedīill Walsh, ever the innovator, conceived a plan, now routine in the NFL, to "script" in advance the offensive plays he would call early in a game. Overall, it requires a great deal of experience, discipline and emotional intelligence to run "The Script" tool. the offense coordinator discovers whether the players are able to master those plays and decides whether to adjust the technicalities of the play. On the last practice, the team rehearses "The Script." Beside eliminating anxiety (rather than create anxiety) among the players. Idealistically,the offensive coordinator informs the players "The Script" one or two practices before game day. Regardless of the game situation, the disciples of the West Coast Offense are trained to stick to The Script regardless of the down, the distance and the defensive alignment, except for the fourth down. The strategist would use this information to plan the offensive strategy for the remainder of the game. The purpose of The Script is to see exactly how the other team reacts to each offensive play at the opening stage of the game. He was named the NFL's Coach of the Year in 19. Walsh went 102–63–1 with the 49ers, winning ten of his fourteen postseason games along with six division titles, three NFC Championship titles, and three Super Bowls. "The Script" is a game preparation and implementation tool that was invented by Bill Walsh, an American head football coach of the San Francisco 49ers and Stanford University, during which time he popularized the West Coast offense. Beside the utilization of Chinese strategy principles as a process, one of our favorite tools is "The Script."
#Squidoo script update#
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