I think the way to put it is that as you go higher in levels, the gap between the best athletes on the field and the worst narrows, as well as the gap between the best and worst teams at any given level.
Historically, most major innovation in football has been driven by HS or small-college teams that were massively outclassed athletically, from Pop Warner emphasizing speed and deception with the small-college Carlisle Indians, to most all of people that developed the passing game, to the guys behind the spread revolution of the last 15-20 years. These were coaches that knew their only chance to win was to be innovative. When your athletes are very nearly as good as the other guy’s athletes, you don’t have as much incentive to try unusual things.
But like anything else, there are lots of reasons and they all factor in. The article I linked discusses some.
Not sure that’s the case. Alabama has seven position coaches in addition to Nick Saban and his offensive, defensive and special teams coordinators. Plus god knows how many graduate assistants. Lest you think that’s not representative, AAC East Carolina has… well, this many coaches.
The Buccaneers have 24 coaches including Lovie Smith and coordinators. Yeah, that’s a lot more, but major college teams certainly have enough staff to scout every opponent’s last 8 or 16 or 56 games.
Paul Johnson’s been running the same offense since the 1990s. Navy runs the same offense, and is ranked #19 this year with their usual bunch of two-star recruits.
Which seems more likely:
After 20 years, opposing coaches finally figured out the flexbone once and for all … but only the ones who play Tech, not the ones who play Navy.
Tech is just having a down year, scoring only 32 points per game.
I don’t think many people took navy or GSU seriously since neither are P5 teams. When a P5 team took that scheme to the Orange Bowl and won, people started paying attention to the scheme.
Doesn’t mean Tech isn’t ALSO having a down year (we’re going to snap our bowl streak cries), but I think the reason the offense is down is because teams that care have figured out how to defend the option.
Who exactly are the “people” that didn’t take him seriously? I’m pretty sure the coaches he played against at those schools all those years took him seriously, and it’s not like they’re all dumber than the ACC coaches.
Moreover, I guarantee you that the day Johnson was hired at Tech, every D coordinator in the ACC ordered up crates of Navy/GSU film. For that matter, they probably ordered up film from Fisher DeBerry in the 1980s, when he created the formation, and for good measure, they brushed up on the wishbone from the 60s and 70s, since the flexbone is just a variant of that. Seems odd that it would flummox all of them for six years, and then they’d suddenly all figure it out at once.
It’s a fundamentally sound offense. It has limitations and weaknesses, but every system does. I suspect the biggest problem it presents is in recruiting: it’s so far from what the NFL does that I have to think it hurts GT with kids who see themselves as NFL-bound (which is pretty much all of them). Scheme is only going to go so far in overcoming talent gaps.