Red Right 88

Hold on, I’m Adjusting

What do NFL teams do in the locker room at halftime?

In his new book, Take Your Eye off the Ball: How to Watch Football by Knowing Where to Look, Pat Kirwan, a senior analyst on NFL.com and former coach and front office member, offers a glimpse into what goes on while we’re grabbing a beer and restocking the chip bowl:

“… the booth coach typically gets down to the locker room ahead of everyone else. He sets up a quick statistical breakdown on the white board of everything that’s gone on so far.

“The goal is to give coaches enough material to use both in determining what adjustments are necessary and lecturing the players about what’s working and what isn’t. Some coordinators keep it simple – for example, they’ll decide that every play that gained 4 yards in the first half will be run again in the second half.

“Of course, most coaches aren’t going to have emptied the bucket in the first half. There should always be a few plays at various down and distances that a team didn’t show. Those will get unveiled in the second half.

“Then the coordinators write up new play-call sheets, filling new plays into each box. The key is to not rewrite the entire game plan. A coaching staff may be able to identify three new things to roll out; any more than that and they run the risk of confusing too many players.

“The team that had the best game plan going into the game – and the team that makes the best adjustments in the locker room – is usually the one that comes out on top.”

So now that we know what teams are supposed to do, the question becomes: just what are the Browns doing at halftime? Time and again, the Browns struggle in the second half; what worked in the first half rarely seems to work in the second, and the team, especially on offense, more often than not loses its way.

Last season, the Browns were outscored in the second half in nine of their 11 losses – the only exception being the two games against the Bengals. That’s probably not uncommon for a game where you lose, but consider that in their five wins, the Browns only outscored the opposition twice (KC and Oakland).

It happened again Sunday against Tampa – after a strong (for them) first half, the Browns wilted in the second. The question is why?

Maybe this is just another indicator of a team that isn’t very good. Maybe it’s an indictment of coordinators Brian Daboll and Rob Ryan. If the team plays well in the first half that would indicate the scouts did a good job creating a report on the opposition and the coaches prepared the team well during the week.

But it’s up to the coaches to adjust and put the team in a position to win in the second half of the game. And something is clearly wrong, especially on offense where it seems like Daboll is turning into Maurice Carthon. It could be that in all the talk last year about how coach Eric Mangini must go, we’ve missed the real culprit in all of this.

We know what we’ll be doing Sunday during halftime; the question is: what will the Browns be doing?

***

C’mon, Tony, didn’t we just cover this?

If Jake Delhomme is hurt it’s OK for Seneca Wallace to play on Sunday. That’s why you carry more than one quarterback on the team. This isn’t Derek Anderson vs. Brady Quinn all over. This is just the way an NFL team operates.

I wouldn’t expect the hoople heads to be able to tell the difference, but the main beat writer for the city’s biggest paper covering the most over-analyzed team in town should be able to see the difference.

Tell me how having Wallace under center will change the game plan; how will the Chiefs have to adjust; what kind of shenanigans can the Browns throw at Romeo Crennel with Wallace playing instead of Delhomme?

Just don’t give me more of the same.