The Ford effect: how Tre Ford’s presence at quarterback led to Javon Leake’s big day against Saskatchewan

By
Ben Grant
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Photo: Matt Smith/3DownNation. All rights reserved.

The Saskatchewan Roughriders have the best run defence in the CFL, yet Javon Leake had the game of his life on Saturday night with 12 carries for 169 yards and three touchdowns. That’s over 14 yards per carry, an absurd statistic more often seen in a video game than professional football.

The biggest factor in Leake’s rushing success on Saturday night was the presence of dual-threat passer Tre Ford at quarterback. It’s not my intention to take anything away from Leake in this article — he was fantastic — and I don’t want to discredit his offensive line either, as they blocked their tales off.

There are other factors, too, like the fact that one of Saskatchewan’s best run-stuffers, Anthony Lanier II, was out due to injury. Leake is also known around the league as more of an outside runner, so the Roughriders might not have been expecting the Elks to use him between the tackles. But when I watched the tape, what stood out the most was how Saskatchewan’s focus and positioning was impacted by Tre Ford being in the backfield.

In order to better understand how Ford contributed to Leake’s big day on the ground, we first need to take a look at why running plays don’t typically result in 50-yard touchdowns. This may sound silly but, on paper, they should.

I remember naively thinking I was some sort of genius when I started drawing up running plays a few decades ago in my first stint as an offensive coordinator. I was pulling linemen, creating advantages, and using the defence’s rules against them to account for every defender, but it turns out all offensive coordinators do this. On every play.

So how come most running plays gain only four to six yards? For one thing, the play’s success counts on every offensive player winning their block, and there are many highly-skilled players on the other side of the ball determined to make sure that doesn’t happen. There are also factors like blitzes and stunts that might not be identified in time, and sometimes defenders cheat a bit when it comes to their assignments and gap responsibility.

The term “gap” refers to the space between two offensive linemen. There’s a gap between the centre and guard, between the guard and tackle, and so on. On every play, there’s a defender responsible for every single gap, regardless of how many defenders actually end up rushing.

The players assigned responsibility for the gaps on the outside of the line have what’s known as “contain responsibility.” The contain men (generally defensive ends) are entrusted with making sure the ball-carrier never gets outside of them. They must funnel that player back inside at all cost.

Despite the importance of this assignment, defensive ends cheat at this responsibility all the time. Defensive ends aren’t normal human beings, they’re often the best athletes on the field and their combination of size and strength allows them to take liberties. They’ll sometimes line up with just a hint of an outside shade on the tackle in front of them, knowing they can still fulfill their contain responsibility while also being in position to assist with an inside run.

Defensive ends sometimes get the green light to attack an inside gap, either completely abandoning their contain responsibility, or in conjunction with a defensive tackle who twists or loops around the outside, assuming contain responsibility in the process. You can’t do any of these things against Tre Ford.

On the play below, TSN colour analyst Glen Suitor illustrated the consequences of Malik Carney cheating on his contain responsibility. He took too tight a line inside, and Ford easily escaped the pocket and ran for a first down.

On a sack by Adam Auclair later in the game, the blitz wasn’t picked up, which is what led to the sack, but you can see Carney on the outside taking his contain responsibility far more seriously.

So how did this lead to Leake having a huge rushing game? I’m getting there, stay with me.

Interestingly, it’s not Ford’s designed runs that really concern opposing defences. They’re more scared of the big play possibilities that arise when he escapes the pocket. When Ford gets outside, he puts defenders in conflict where they have to choose between coming up to tackle him or maintaining their coverage downfield.

At the professional level, running quarterbacks aren’t that hard to stop if you’re not afraid of their arm. Defences can load the box and force punt after punt. It’s why you don’t see teams, even in four-down professional leagues, running wishbone, power I, or flexbone triple-option-based offences. But though Ford is a dangerous runner, he’s also an accurate passer and an intelligent decision-maker.

Against Ford, Saskatchewan didn’t feel they could risk loading the box, and their ends had to take their contain responsibility seriously. Furthermore, there was a hesitancy to run exotic stunts on the line because the threat level of Ford breaking contain against a twisting defensive tackle was high, so the defensive linemen were always right where the offence expected them to be. All of this left Saskatchewan with a vulnerability against the inside run game.

Let’s take a look at Leake’s 51-yard touchdown run.

This play should have been blown up. Edmonton centre Mark Korte whiffed on his block attempt, which is almost always death on a middle run. But on first down near midfield, Saskatchewan wasn’t looking for a middle run from Leake, they were concerned with Edmonton’s dual-threat quarterback.

On the field side of their four-man line, defensive end Brian Cox Jr. was spread out extremely wide, eliminating himself entirely from the play out of respect for Ford. Boundary halfback Rolan Milligan Jr. blitzed from the outside, but because he had contain responsibility, he came in cautiously and was never a factor despite knocking slotback Kurleigh Gittens Jr. into the backfield.

With Milligan containing, Malik Carney had the freedom to really fire off the ball between the guard and tackle, but he instead came in upright so he could keep his eyes in the backfield and got washed away (and possibly held) by left tackle Martez Ivey.

The three linebackers, C.J. Reavis, C.J. Avery, and Adam Auclair, lined up five yards off the ball and barely took their read steps towards the line of scrimmage with their eyes instead on Ford. By the time they attempted to engage, offensive linemen had already climbed to them. Only defensive tackles Micah Johnson and Miles Brown seemed mentally focused on stopping the run on this play, but they were up against eight run blockers in the box.

It was more of the same on Leake’s 61-yard touchdown run later in the quarter.

Even when you’re run-blitzing, you can’t stop the run when your mind is on the quarterback.

Saskatchewan’s defensive line popped up out of their stance to see what was happening in the backfield and got out-leveraged at the point of attack and pushed off the line. Their contain men, Malik Carney and blitzing C.J. Reavis, performed their job admirably, but were never a factor in the play and were barely blocked at all. Safety Nelson Lokombo came downhill in support, but locked onto Ford as he carried out his play-fake to the wide side of the field. The result was that Leake was able to scamper for 61 yards up the middle of the field. No one even touched him.

Ford, Leake, and the entire Elks team played a great game on Saturday, and their coaching staff had a tremendous plan, but that doesn’t mean it will be easy to duplicate going forward. The Roughriders will learn some valuable lessons from this film, and unquestionably approach the Elks differently in Week 18 when these two teams meet again. In the meantime, you can bet Edmonton’s next few opponents will be sure they don’t repeat Saskatchewan’s mistakes, so the Elks offence will need to continue to develop if this much-needed win is to turn into a streak.

The Edmonton Elks (1-7) take on the B.C. Lions (5-3) on Sunday at 7:00 p.m. EDT, while the Saskatchewan Roughriders (5-3) travel to Ottawa to take on the Redblacks (5-2) on Thursday night at 7:30 p.m. EDT.

Ben Grant
Ben Grant is the radio colour analyst for the Toronto Argonauts. He has been coaching high school and semi-pro football for 20 years.
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