The Eagle Offense For NFL Football by Zennie Abraham

Eagle Offense by Zennie Abraham - 510-517-7565 Zennie@zennie62.
com
The Eagle Offense

(Updated August 2,
2021)
By Zennie Abraham
CEO,
Zennie62Media, Inc.
“The attention to detail and the time you’ve spent on your playbook
ideas is a dedication unseen by most. Your love for the game is
obvious and makes u much more committed than any reporter or
fan. Good job!!!” - Coach Tony Franklin, famed former Cal Offensive
Coordinator, Middle Tennessee State Offensive Coordinator, Airraid
Offense Developer, creator of the The Tony Franklin System.
Eagle Offense by Zennie Abraham - 510-517-7565 Zennie@zennie62.com
Why The Eagle Offense Exists
Before we discuss where players line up, it’s important to understand why we’re doing
this thing we call The Eagle Offense.
The Eagle Offense is an expression of my interest in why the 2007 New England
Patriots Offense (the one that went undefeated during that NFL Regular Season only to
be stopped by the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLII) worked so well. In it,
Quarterback Tom Brady threw for 4,751 yards, and 50 touchdowns. And the only
reason the Patriots lost Super Bowl XLII was because they went away from its basic
approach: spread formations and short passing. Then, as fast as that approach hit the
NFL, it was done. New England never went back to it. I never forgot it.
Then consider the success of The Golden State Warriors under Head Coach Steve Kerr.
That offense features plays with two of five players stationed at either corner of the
half-court. Their positioning spreads the defense, and often either player was left wide
open to take a three-point shot.
Then consider the use of football offenses where there were four wide-receivers to one
side of the formation. Two of my favorite football coaches, Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly,
and Cal’s former Offensive Coordinator Tony Franklin, were practitioners of that
formation approach. That type of set forces the defense to make unusual coverage
choices. But, to my mind, I’ve never seen one offensive attack based on that formation
approach.
And then consider the popularity of the no-huddle-offense and the Airraid attack over
the last 10 years. While I am a giant fan of pre-shifting, I do agree with many who argue
that the no-huddle can force the defense to make coverage mistakes, too.
Add all of that with my love of the Bill Walsh Precision Passing Approach, with its
emphasis on timing and ball placement, and his calls for variation in his passing attack,
and his love for mobile quarterbacks, and you get The Eagle Offense.
I am giving this playbook to Las Vegas Raiders Head Coach Jon Gruden before anyone
else. The reason is simple: he always paid attention to, and asked for, my play ideas and
concepts. The last time was at the 2018 NFL Owners Meeting in Orlando, when coach
Gruden had Raiders Public Relations Executive Will Kiss wait for me in the hotel lobby
to receive my play drawings. Gruden later used the approach that season.
The Base Formation:

The “Bread and Butter Play” of The Eagle Offense: Eagle Right (Left) H Fly Motion Belly, 1
Cross Fly Pass
The idea of The Eagle Offense is simple: to stretch The Defense from sideline to sideline, and force it
to focus its coverage toward what I call the “Strongside” or the “Wingside”, where our four receivers
are placed, or over-emphasize the “Weakside” or “Singleside” where our lone weakside receiver is
placed.
The result is to leave the seams and weakside flat open for attack via the quick pass, and to make short,
quick passes more effective. While this is not the only formation any offense should run, there are
enough plays for a high school or college team to form a dangerous and effective, and yet easy to
understand approach.
Base Formation: The Eagle
The Eagle Formation looks like this from left to right:
1. The Tight End split out just one-third beyond the numbers and to the sideline, in other words,
closer to the numbers than the sideline, but not midway between the numbers and the sideline.
The reason for this is we want to be able to run a fly pattern and “bend” that route slightly to the
sidelines, thus getting outside position. On the other hand, we want to keep the defender honest
with an occasional slant or inside pattern of some design, depending on the play. The Eagle
Offense is “play specific” - in other words, it does not have route rules that come with the
base-formation; only alignment rules.
2. The Offensive Line Splits are generally 3/4th of a yard between line players. The idea here is to
spread out the defensive line make stunts harder to execute, and form larger natural holes. But
note that the Offensive Line Splits are not the traditional one-yard that we see in the Airraid
Offense. That's too much of a split and creates a disadvantage for us. The reason is we don't
want to put our people on too much of an island so we can't double-team block, where called
for. We also ask our line player to cheat toward a defender, where necessary. Overall, the
quarterback is not going to hold on to the ball for even a short time; we're forming an advantage
that, over the course of the game, will wear-down the defense. As for blocking style, we will
ask our line blockers to meet the defender and block in their chest in an effort to blunt their rush
immediately by pushing them back. This is not the standard Airraid Offense Style of Vertical
Set – we're taking the physical battle to the defender, as if we're run blocking on each snap,
even when we're passing.
3. The Quarterback is four yards (not five yards) behind the center in a shotgun setup. That's
standard for our approach. The Quarterback is just close enough to be able to run more
effectively, and yet back far enough to have a natural space between passer and defensive line
that we use to have natural time to throw: generally about 1.5-2 seconds. (We ask our QB and
players to pre-snap read to determine where the ball will be thrown, and the kind of blocks to
use, depending on the play called.)
4. Now, we get to the “Wingside”, with:

1. The Halfback one-yard off the line of scrimmage and 3/4ths yard from the “Wingside” or
“Strongside” Offensive Tackle.
2. The Fullback and Flanker, with the Fullback between the Flanker and Halfback, but next to
and one-step behind the Flanker such that they appears to be in- tandem and at a mid-point
between the “Wingside” or “Strongside” Offensive Tackle and the numbers.
3. The Split End lined up split out just one-third beyond the numbers and to the sideline, in
other words, closer to the numbers than the sideline, but not midway between the numbers
and the sideline. The reason for this is we want to be able to run a fly pattern and “bend”
that route slightly to the sidelines, thus getting outside position. In other words, just like the
Tight End on the Weakside of the formation.
Play Design Rules From The Eagle Offense Formation
There are a set of simple play design rules we follow from this formation. They may seem restrictive,
but once understood, they can cause a large number of plays to be formed, and interesting and creative
approaches.
1. Plays are designed where, when the quarterback is called to pass, the drop back is at most
two-steps. So, we have variations of zero, one-step, and two-step passes.
2. Pass patterns drawn on the “Wingside” or “Strongside” are in combination with each other. The
reason is simple: you want to make sure a throw to one receiver is done in such a way that the
other receivers don't get in the way of it. In other words, if we had individual sight adjustment
rules for each receiver on that side, you might have the Flanker and Split End both turning to
the Quarterback just because both defenders were more than 10-yards back, and yet have the
Fullback running a swing pattern, thus setting up a problem where the Fullback might run into
the Flanker. Not a good situation. So, we leave sight adjustments for the Tight End (or
whomever you ask to play the Weakside Receiver Position) to be done only if there's no other
receiver to be there due to a motion call. Note that the Halfback is sent in motion in our base
play from “Wingside” or “Strongside” to “ Weakside” - we need for the Tight End to clear out
from that area by running a fly pattern. We have the Tight End as “1” because we're always
looking to attack deep, first, and a pre-snap read will show if that's possible, otherwise we let
the Tight End run off and take the cornerback / safety along, and immediately throw to the
Halfback (where the QB only needs a zero-step / hitch step throw).
3. We think of the QB as a potential runner, and have a Weakside Sweep Play and a run / pass
option play. We use motion to set up the Halfback, Fullback, or Flanker as ball-carriers,
depending on play design.
4. Our names for “Man-in-Motion” are lifted from the Paul Brown – Tom Landry – Bill Walsh
nomenclature, where motion to the strongside from the weakside is called “Go”, whereas
motion to the weakside from the strongside is called “Fly”
Basic Practice Rules For The Eagle Offense
The practice rules I recommend are to work from the plays. Run each play and have the players work
on their particular position assignments from the formation and the plays. You can break out parts of a
play, say the weakside passing in the base play, and use those as practice material. The idea is to have
the players form a “muscle-memory” for the offense, as well as be better able to adjust to changes in
opponents defensive attacks, by knowing what play is best to use, or how to adjust a play. The main
objective should be precision passing – being able to complete a pass, even with close coverage.
Plays Of The Eagle

Offense
Eagle Offense Play

Set One:
Eagle Right / Left H

Fly Motion Belly,
Cross Fly Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Two:

Fly Motion Up,
Cross Fly Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Three:

Fly Motion Flat,
Cross Fly Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Four:

Fly Motion Angle,
Cross Fly Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Five:

Fly Motion B 1 FB
Angle Seam, Cross
Fly Pass Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Six:

Fly Motion Short
Out Swing Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Seven:
Eagle Right / Left

QB Sweep Pass
Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Eight:
Eagle Right / Left

H QB Motion Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Nine:
Eagle Right / Left

Sprint Pass Series
Eagle Offense Play

Set Ten:
Eagle Right / Left

Mini Pass Series
Eagle Right / Left

Shovel Pass Series
Eagle Right / Left

FB Flat Series
THE END
FOR NOW!!

The Eagle Offense For NFL Football by Zennie Abraham

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Eagle Offense by Zennie Abraham - 510-517-7565 Zennie@zennie62.

The Eagle Offense

Why The Eagle Offense Exists

The Base Formation:

Base Formation: The Eagle

The Eagle Formation looks like this from left to right:

use, depending on the play called.)

4. Now, we get to the “Wingside”, with:

Play Design Rules From The Eagle Offense Formation

Basic Practice Rules For The Eagle Offense

Plays Of The Eagle

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left H

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left

Eagle Offense Play

Eagle Right / Left

Eagle Right / Left

Eagle Right / Left

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