Standard Offenses Might Go Way of the Single-Wing Formation

Only three NFL teams are playing high-tech football this year--the Buffalo Bills in the no-huddle offense and the Houston Oilers and the Detroit Lions in the run-and-shoot offense--and all lead their divisions.

Will any of the 25 other teams follow suit next year and open up?

“I doubt it,” Houston Coach Jack Pardee said. “I doubt if there’s much more run-and-shoot in the immediate future.

“It’s too big a risk for (most coaches). They finally land a coaching job somewhere, they’re going to do what they know --not something new that somebody else is doing, even if it’s a winner.”

Others are not so sure. Run-and-shoot creator Mouse Davis, who taught the fast-striking offense to Pardee and Detroit Coach Wayne Fontes, won’t be surprised if it takes over someday.

“It might be like the T-formation takeover in the 1940s,” Davis said, noting that the established coaches of that era--Bernie Bierman, Red Sanders and others--fought the T for years from their single-wing strongholds.

Then Frank Leahy of Notre Dame, the greatest coach of his time, invested all six months of his off-season in a personal T-formation learning project. And shortly, Leahy had so many followers that within a year or two, they killed off the single-wing establishment. It could happen again.