Joe Flacco's adeptness in Kevin Stefanski's play-action passing game gives him a big edge over the other three QBs in the Browns' Quarterback Derby. (Cleveland Browns)
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Editor's note: Tony Grossi is a Cleveland Browns analyst for TheLandOnDemand.com and 850 ESPN Cleveland. He has covered the Browns since 1984.
What do Brett Favre, Vinny Testaverde, Steve DeBerg, Peyton Manning, and Jared Goff have in common?
The quarterbacks were some of the best play-fakers of their day.
They could take the snap from center, turn their back to the defense, stuff an empty hand into the gut of their running back, stymie defensive linemen and linebackers and safeties into thinking run, and then pivot, reset their throwing stance, and find the inevitable open target downfield as a result of the most deceptive and effective pass play in football.
To operate the Kevin Stefanski offense at peak efficiency, the quarterback must be able to execute and sell the play-fake.
“I think it's big,” said Brad Childress, the former Vikings head coach who gave Stefanski his first job in the NFL in 2006 as his personal assistant. “Particularly with the version that he's employing, you know, kind of the Gary Kubiak version of that. And it's really most effective from underneath the center.”
Joe Flacco could be included in that opening list of quarterbacks exceptionally adept at the play-action passing game.
Flacco had one of his finest seasons with Baltimore in 2016 with Kubiak as Ravens offensive coordinator deploying the same offensive scheme he later taught Stefanski in Minnesota in 2019.
It helps to explain why Flacco was an instant hit when he came off his couch in 2023 and effortlessly tossed four consecutive 300-yard passing games. The Browns averaged 31 points in a 4-0 march to the AFC playoffs.
“I think with the type of zone run game that we do in this offense and how that’s paired with the passing, you know, with our play-action game, I do think it’s just good stuff,” Flacco said at last week’s Browns minicamp. “And when you get into a rhythm and you can kind of learn how to tempo your drop and get your eyes in the right spots, then yes, I obviously enjoy doing that.”
Flacco’s big edge
The question to be answered when the Browns reconvene for training camp in late July is how long it will take Kenny Pickett, Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders to master the most fundamental play in Stefanski’s pass offense.
Each of the quarterback competitors has little experience doing what now comes naturally to Flacco.
Ball-handling is one aspect of the execution of the play. Childress said Favre had the biggest hands he’d ever seen for a quarterback. Pickett’s famously-small hands – they measured 8.5 inches at the 2022 NFL Combine, smaller than any quarterback in the league at the time, and since – pose a unique challenge to him. Pickett did hardly any play-action in two seasons with the Steelers and was primarily a shotgun quarterback at the University of Pittsburgh.
“I think it’s just something that [when] you rep it, you get a lot better at it,” Pickett said. “I feel like it’s come pretty easily so far in this camp and minicamp and OTAs. I feel really comfortable going through the play-action footwork and the fakes and getting to where I need to be on time.”
Gabriel said, “You know, I think at one point I was the play-action king, I guess. We did a lot of play-action [his first three college seasons at Central Florida], but … ‘’ that tailed off considerably his last two seasons at Oklahoma and Oregon.
Sanders said he was exclusively under center in his early beginnings as a quarterback in little league football. That was not the case at Jackson State and Colorado, however.
“I got a good foundation, and now I definitely am going to improve on that,” Sanders said. “But [my] prep for pro day and all that different type of stuff really made me more comfortable with everything.
“Everything in life in any aspect is going to be a challenge. So it’s just, are you going to be the one to overcome the challenge or are you going to let that challenge get you? So that’s how I attack it, and I just want to always look most professional as possible.”
Why it works
The quarterback may be the key, but an effective play-action passing game is also dependent on the offensive line and running attack.
“It has to be worked on,” Childress said. “We used to say it has to look like, feel like, smell like run to those guys up in the front, the linebackers, and things that you're trying to influence. That's the hardest thing with play-faking and play-action is getting the linemen’s pads not to be high. It has to look like a run.
“So, I mean, it's a buy-in from your linemen as well. You know, you're telling me to fire out, but it's hard to fire out and still pass protect. It has to really be hand in glove. And then you've got to trust the fact that the quarterback's not going to get caught with the ball in his hand either against the bastard look, you know, or something that changed when you turn your back on the defense.
“You definitely have a better play-action [game] when you have Nick Chubb in there. I know Nick's not there anymore, but, you know, it can't be just tongue-in-cheek. You can't just play pass, running the ball six times a game, eight times a game. There has to be a commitment to the run in addition to it.”
But the quarterback makes it all work.
Childress said Manning used to study video of himself running play-action off stretch-run plays to perfect the deception of making a pass play look like a run play.
Most quarterbacks coming out of college nowadays do more RPO (run-pass option) play-faking than play-action passing. Quarterbacks don’t turn their back to the defense running RPO’s.
“It's uncomfortable to take your eyes off the defense,” Childress said. “But it can be learned.”
Yes, at the University of Delaware in the 2007 and 2008 seasons, Flacco played quarterback exclusively out of the shotgun and never was under center.
“So you can teach an old dog new tricks,” Childress said.
“I think everybody likes being in shotgun, but I love being able to go under center in this league because you cannot live in the dropback world,” Flacco said. “I don’t care who you are. Because even the guys that are in shotgun all the time, they’re doing RPOs and they’re doing other things to kind of mix and match and get easy completions and things like that.
“If you’re just living in three-step and five-step drops and you’re letting the defensive line pin their ears back and come after you, you’re going to have a tough time. So I love the fact that we can go under center and kind of marry the run and the pass. I think that’s just huge. I think teams do it in different ways and for us it’s getting under center a little bit, and I love it.”
And that will be the challenge for Pickett, Gabriel and Sanders in training camp. To claim the starting job over Flacco, they’re going to have to learn how to run the play-action passing game.