This isn't to say you don't run at all. If you can get first downs running the ball and work your way down and score, that is great. You have success and establish a lead and control the game because your defense is getting stops.
But what really puzzles me is typically it makes sense to abandon the run because that is the reason you fall behind. The other team scores and you don't because you are so entrenched in trying to establish the run. Yet, fans act like it isn't the best play to win the game. For example,
I rarely see this:
Team A - wants to establish the run but fail and have to punt the first few possessions.
Team B - scores a couple of touchdowns and take a 14-0 lead.
Team A stays with the run and continues to punt
Team B - Widens the lead and take a 24-0 halftime lead
Team A stays with the run and finally breaks through and scores a field goal 24-3.
Team B - scores again 31-3.
Team A stays with the run and scores the rest of the game with a large quantity of runs and comes back to win while Team B stops scoring.
I just don't get it. This idea that abandoning the run and letting the opponent pull away and hide with a big lead is the way to go. Maybe, if you have the Rams defense from last year and can keep the game close as the opponents don't pull away as you continue to grind and pound hoping to break through, you can do this, but in decades of watching the NFL, I don't know if I have seen a team stick with the run when the opponents are scoring and a team gets down early because they are so focused on running, find a way to catch up. I don't even know if I have ever seen it.
Yet, we have the majority of fans calling for something that rarely happens with a probability lower than hitting on a Royal Flush in Poker.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/09/2021 10:46AM by Rams_81.
