Falcons’ new rushing scheme built around versatility

FLOWERY BRANCH — Kevin Stefanski and Bill Callahan had never worked together, and because of the unprecedented nature of the 2020 off-season in light of COVID-19, they only had one month of practice to craft and mold the identity of the Cleveland Browns’ run game in 2020.

Stefanski, in his first year as an NFL head coach, and Callahan, a veteran offensive line coach, ultimately leaned on their bread-and-butter of a wide-zone system. It was generic, straightforward and a fair place to plant their roots.

But Callahan, a few games into the season, thought there was potential for more. He pitched Stefanski on the idea of running a gap scheme, on pulling guards and tapping into the movement skills of the Browns’ offensive linemen. There was no off-season film to support Callahan’s intuition, only four decades of coaching experience. Stefanski signed off.

“We had not repped it prior to that and he installed it,” Stefanski said during training camp. “We put it in, and it was excellent.”

Such is the depth of Callahan’s schematic intellect and the instincts to know when to pivot. He played quarterback in college, which former players and colleagues believe shaped his holistic understanding of offenses, and he’s been around more running backs and created more run schemes than most ever will.

In film sessions with the Falcons’ offense, Callahan has gone as far back as the early 2000s, when tape is grainy and some of his players weren’t even born. Star running back Bijan Robinson particularly enjoyed the early 2010s clips of DeMarco Murray with the Dallas Cowboys and the late-2010s, end-of-career brilliance from Adrian Peterson on the then-Washington Redskins.

Callahan directed run concepts for both players and both offenses. Robinson, still an enthusiastic 24-year-old who grew up watching the likes of Murray and Peterson, finds it fascinating.

“I think it’s cool to see how long he’s been coaching,” Robinson said, “but just all the backs that he’s coached and all the schemes he’s coached has been fun to watch.”

Robinson means all the schemes. There isn’t a run scheme out there, Stefanski said, that Callahan hasn’t experienced.

The Falcons have spent this offseason primarily working on wide-zone and gap scheme runs, and Robinson said the system is very similar to the one he played within at the University of Texas under coach Steve Sarkisian.

But the beauty of Callahan’s run game is there’s no cap on schematic opportunities. There may be calling cards and one collective identity, but there’s immense versatility, too.

“A lot of different ways to come at you. You really don’t know what we’re going to do. We have a lot of different variations,” Robinson said in camp. “We’ll throw one at you and then the next play or the next time we run the ball, it’ll be a completely different scheme. Creating that variety of plays has been fun, but there’s a lot to go into.”

Robinson added the Falcons have shown “a lot of different run schemes you probably haven’t seen here in a long time,” and they have a rushing concept to counteract every single look a defense may throw their way.

The Falcons have zone schemes, gap schemes, “G” schemes and toss schemes, Stefanski said. To run them all requires movement skills and proficiency in space from their offensive linemen. Training camp was as important for the Falcons to install concepts as it was to figure out what, specifically, their blockers do best.

They only showed some of their concepts in the preseason, but they emptied the proverbial clip in training camp.

And given what Stefanski knows about his staff, be it Callahan or offensive coordinator Tommy Rees, and his personnel, he feels the Falcons have plenty of flexibility.

“I think Coach (Callahan’s) depth of knowledge is so impressive and he can tap into that to lean into you-name-it type of run scheme,” Stefanski said. “He’s truly done it all. So, when we think about our scheme and what we want to be, obviously it’s what we feel like our players do best.

“And I do feel very confident with Coach Callahan, with Tommy, we have the ability to pivot into whatever other schemes we feel like fit our players best.”

That process won’t end when the regular season begins.

Stefanski said the nature of the NFL requires teams to pivot, and if a coaching staff is worth its salt as teachers, it can adapt on the fly. Breadth in a game plan — and in a team’s personnel — affords the ability to have an answer for new questions that evolve and appear each week.

The Falcons feel, with Callahan’s guidance, they’ll enter this season with a strong grasp on the capabilities and maximum capacity of their run game.

“The bottom line, where I give Coach Callahan a ton of credit, is understanding your players,” Stefanski said. “What do your players do best? What are the things they can do best? In this example, we’re talking about wide zone reach, force line reach, back side of blocks.

“Being able to cut or being able to down block, being able to pull, being able to pull to the same side of the run on a G scheme. Being able to pull on counter scheme.”

Another hidden value in the Falcons’ run game: all of the various schemes, blocking concepts and rushing plays are complementary

“It’s explosive,” running back Tyler Goodson said during training camp. “Everything plays off each other, and I’m excited to see how this thing goes.”

Robinson is the engine beneath the hood of the Falcons’ offense. He paced the NFL in yards from scrimmage last season and enters this year as the league’s second highest-paid running back.

The Falcons want to get Robinson to the second level as fast as possible. His main responsibility is creating space for himself, and when he gets to the second level, he becomes dangerous — it’s a matchup between one of the NFL’s most elusive ball carriers, running downhill with momentum at his back, and either a linebacker or defensive back separating him from an explosive run.

Those are the battles Robinson desires, and the battles he usually wins. The more the Falcons create those opportunities, the more big plays they can hit on the ground.