On the following pages are some charts and data points that I collected during the season. It starts by breaking down the run and pass plays by total. Then the run plays are broken down by formation. The following pages then zero in on the effectiveness for runs out of the I formation by direction. It shows some clear need for improvement. The data should be fairy accurate however the actual details are more complicated since each grouping has many sub-groupings depending upon TE alignment, WR positioning, motion, and other factors. The USC staff will of course collect data at a more detailed level than I have but this is probably good enough for fan discussion purposes. On the following pages I will put up some charts that outline several points related to the I Formation.

• Run breakdown by formation
• Average run yards gained by formation
• Yards gained by I Formation by game (total and rush yards)
• Yards per carry for first three games versus remainder of season
• Yards gained running left, versus right, versus middle

For starters here is a breakdown of the USC rushing attack by offensive formation.

As you can see USC had 863 offensive plays this season with 416 of them being rush attempts. Of those rush attempts 149 were from the I Formation making it the leader in terms of frequency of use. The I Formation was not the leader however in either rush yards gained or yards per carry. More yards were gained by the 3 WR run sets and more yards per carry in almost every other formation was gained. This is quite a drop off from the past couple of years as easily over 1,000 rush yards were gained out of this formation alone. Yards per carry out of the I Formation were closer to 5.0 in previous years.

Next here is total I Formation total yardage (pass and run) by game. The formation got off to a great start against Arkansas but then dipped the rest of the season.

Please note that this chart only shows total run yards per game and not the average per carry which was fairly dismal as well. To get a sense of the average run yards per carry out of the I Formation I broke it down by parts of the season. I also wanted to see how much the loss off the fullback affected the running game on a run yards per play basis. Here is a sense of how much the loss of the fullback actually hurt the USC attack in 2006. This chart breaks down the average yards per run for the first three games and compares it to games 4 though 13. The difference was nearly 2 yards per carry by my estimation.

Clearly as you can see there was a big loss in terms of yardage effectiveness out of the I Formation after the injuries that sidelined Brandon Hancock, Ryan Powdrell, and Stanley Havili. In particular the I Formation has been a chief run play formation on third and short during the Pete Carroll era. The inability to rely upon this play package on third and short calls forced more usage of other formations and plays as a result. In hindsight it is actually quite remarkable that the 2006 USC offense managed to convert on 46% of the 3^rd down and 71% of 4^th down plays without an effective I Formation. In 2003 the offense for comparison only managed a 39% conversion rates on third down and 45% on fourth down. The figures for 2004 were 43% and 52% respectively. That stat alone is pretty ironic when you consider all the complaints about play calling this past season.

I charted the I Formation runs in terms of direction at a high level. Ideally something like this should be looked at by running back and by run gap (e.g. Strong side A, B, C, D, versus Weak side A, B, C, etc.). That is not possible however unless you either know the play call or have an end zone view of the play. TV does not often provide that angle so the best I can do is to break it down by right, middle, and left. I did not break it down by running back yet either.

Here is the first chart for the entire body of runs to the middle of the offensive line.

As you can see in general the I Formation averaged only 2.95 yards when run up the middle off of either the center or the two guards in the USC offense. Often it was alarmingly stuffed for less than a two yard gain. There were only a few plays of over 10 yards gained up the middle this year in start contrast to previous years.

The next chart looks at I Formation runs to the left side of the formation.

This is mainly plays run off of either Sam Baker, or Fred Davis when he was lined up on this side of the play formation. As you can see the average here is markedly higher at 7.3 yards per carry. Part of this spike in the data is due to the noted ability of All American left tackle Sam Baker. However the data is also skewed by the presence of a few plays. Emmanuel Moody had a couple of big runs out of the I Formation to the left on toss plays where he was able to turn the corner. Excluding these couple of plays USC would have averaged only about 2.9 yards per carry to the left side of the formation.

The chart below show that runs to the right side were slightly worse out of the I Formation averaging only 2.5 yards per carry.

This encompasses plays mainly run off of Kyle Williams and Fred Davis when he was lined up to the right side of the formation. Of more concern no big runs to the right over 10 yards were recorded out of this formation to the right side. This is something that I’m sure will be focused on for improvement in 2007.

That is as far as I have broken down the data so far. My guess the coaching staff will make improving the I Formation a large priority in the spring and summer practice sessions. Fixing this formation will not only enable better short yardage conversion it will also keep defenders from cheating back and ignoring the run component on play action passes. The return of a healthy fullback such as Stanley Havili will also add a further threat out of the backfield. I suspect the net effect of all these items will be large when I check the offensive totals for 2007 during the season.