Monday: 4 Days to go!

The Big Boys 

Phillip (right) and Marcus Norman.  6'4"  Brothers  

Here is a photograph of our offensive line....or most of them.  Even though I coach the QB's and RB's, I have a real soft spot for these big boys.  This is where the real work gets done.  Being an offensive lineman is a thankless job.  You never read headlines which say: "Finnegan Blocks Well in Sebastian's Victory"  or you will never read: " DeMarco CRUSHES the Defensive Linemen"   Yet, without the big boys, the offense goes nowhere.  I certainly appreciate them. 

Well, this is game week, and things are gearing up at practice.  Luckily, the weather cooperated today, so we got in a full practice.   For the most part, we have our game plans together, and now we are in a rehearsal mode.  We will touch on every aspect of the game between today and Wednesday.  Thursday will be a walk-thru day, and we play on Friday night at 7PM....in Melbourne.  I am starting to get a little edgy right now, and this makes practice drag a little for me.  There is so much I think we (the QB's) need to touch on, but I am running out of time to do it...and it pisses me off. 

I got home tonight and started breaking down a game video for a future game.  The first of dozens I will do this season.  This is tedious work and very time consuming. Watching video on a computer has changed the game.  I can stop and start the video as much as I want, I cam ZOOM in on a particular position, I can watch it in slow motion, or I can fast-forward the video past the stuff I do not want to look at.  Basically, I am diagramming the opponents defense to how we EXPECT them to line up against our offense.  It really is a guessing game, but all coaches tend to be pretty consistent in what they do with minor tweaks here and there. So, all we can do is give it our best guess.  Back in the old days, we did not have any type of video available.  Then, reel to reel tape became available at times, but not every school had the ability to copy or exchange the film.  With the invention of the VCR, it changed the way we view our opponents.  For the first time, we had the ability to exchange game video with our opponents.  (For those of you who don't know, most high schools will exchange their own video with their opponents.  For instance, we will exchange 2 videos with say.....Melbourne.  If we give them two game videos, then they will give us two game videos.)  VCR tapes were pretty expensive, and it took forever to copy a tape.  However, it sure beat not having video at all!  Now days, with the invention of the DVD player, DVR,  and Computer, exchanging video is super easy and cheap.  It also means a lot more work for all of us.  

That's it for tonight.  

GZ