How unique is Florida’s three-quarterback offense?
Five men with a combined 151 years of coaching at the college level or higher could only provide one example of ever seeing it before.
“I think Red Hickey and the San Francisco 49ers did that back in the early ’60s,” South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier said. “Other than that, I’ve not seen three of them go at it.”
For Vanderbilt coach Robbie Caldwell, ESPN analyst and former coach Lou Holtz, and UF coach Urban Meyer and offensive coordinator Steve Addazio, last weekend was the first time they’d seen a three-quarterback rotation.
The Gators used John Brantley, Trey Burton and Jordan Reed in a 55-14 win against Vanderbilt, a move that morphed an often dull and predictable scheme into a highly unusual — and unproven — attack.
“I’m an old man, and I’ve never heard of anybody playing three quarterbacks in a game as part of their system,” said Holtz, 73, who coached for 43 years before retiring.
Florida figures to do the same against the Gamecocks on Saturday, and the new game plan means as much work for UF as it does confusion for opponents.
The Quarterback Shuffle
It’s easy to affix labels to the trio: the runner, the thrower and the dual threat.
Burton is the team’s second-leading rusher but has attempted just four passes, and two of those came on a shovel pass and a jump pass.
Brantley has thrown for 1,616 yards but has negative-91 rushing thanks to sacks.
And Reed — hampered by injury early in the year — burst onto the scene against the Commodores with 120 yards passing and 84 on the ground.
Those tendencies make it easy to predict what kind of play is coming based on who takes the snap.
“Certainly, we’ll understand when the two runners are on the field, and when Johnny Brantley is on the field, he’s not as apt to run as the other guys,” Spurrier said.
But it’s not that simple. The trait that really makes Florida’s system special is that all three quarterbacks can stay on the field for every play.
Brantley has frequently been used as a decoy at receiver, Burton has played at every position other than offensive line, and Reed can line up at tight end or receiver.
And to enhance the confusion, Meyer and Addazio installed a pre-snap rotation where Brantley, Burton and Reed can move from fullback or tight end to quarterback as an audible.
That’s done to try and catch a defense off guard. If opponents line up in man-to-man to stop a running quarterback, Brantley slides behind center and takes the snap in hopes of facing one-on-one coverage against his receivers.
If a defense comes out ready to stop the pass, Burton or Reed can come in and try to break a big play running the option.
The Gators debuted that tactic against Georgia on Oct. 30 and kept it against Vandy, where it was a headache for Caldwell.
“They step up to the line and Brantley’s back there, and all of a sudden they check and move around, and now you have to check your defense and it becomes a cat-and-mouse game,” Caldwell said. “It puts the defense behind the 8-Ball, so to speak.”
But with two games’ worth of film available for studying, it’s likely the Gamecocks will come to Gainesville prepared for the follow-the-quarterback routine.
That leaves Meyer’s top objective as finding other tricks to keep the defense off balance.
“It’s hard. That’s something we spend a lot of time on,” Meyer said. “We’re not coming up with new plays. We’re just coming up with ways to (confuse opponents). I think our tempo is one way, but that question is what we’re spending an inordinate amount of hours working on.”
By tempo, Meyer means Florida’s no-huddle offense, which allows quarterbacks to switch in and out without substitutions coming from the sideline since all three are often on the field together.
But if defending all that sounds confusing, just imagine the task of organizing a practice.
Three’s a Crowd
Meyer has long said he won’t let a player perform a task in a game until he’s done it a few hundred times in practice, so what to do with these three quarterbacks?
“You want to maximize every second,” Addazio said. “They’re precious, because there are only so many reps in the course of a practice, and the organization of that is something we’ve really had to make sure we have tight.
“There’s no space that’s unused. You need every second of it, for sure.”
Turns out, practice reps are the reason the three-man weave wasn’t unveiled sooner.
Addazio said playing all three was the plan in the preseason, but Reed missed 24 of 26 fall practices and the season opener due to a hamstring injury, derailing the process.
Once he got healthy, there was still a long way to go before the scheme was game-ready.
Brantley, Burton and Reed were all high-school quarterbacks, but Burton and Reed were moved to other positions upon their arrival at UF.
On top of learning new roles like route-running and blocking, they had to manage the offense while also improving their throwing skills.
That leaves a lot of room for variation and mistakes.
“There’s a lot of minor things you don’t think about,” Holtz said. “The starting count — everyone has a different rhythm, so you could start jumping offside. Then there’s the chemistry and guys throwing the ball differently as far as spiral or speed. There are a lot of subtle differences.”
The Three Musketeers
For all their differences, the trio is on the same page when it comes to sharing the spotlight.
And that’s perhaps the most impressive part. Three players who came to Gainesville hoping to be the next great Florida quarterback have shelved their desires to be “The Man” and adopted an all-for-one, one-for-all mentality.
“It’s working because we have some really unselfish guys who are really just all for the team and for winning,” Addazio said. “That’s very evident. It’s created a level of excitement and energy, and it’s been a real positive thing for us.”
Brantley, already dealing with the pressures of being Tim Tebow’s successor and the talk of UF transfer Cam Newton’s success at Auburn, hasn’t uttered a word of complaint.
Instead, he’s been complimentary of his fellow quarterbacks.
When Burton burst onto the scene with six touchdowns against Kentucky, Brantley congratulated him and said his offense needed someone like Burton to run the option.
Then, when Reed threw a touchdown on his first-career pass against Vandy — a Tebow-esque rocker-step strike to Deonte Thompson — Brantley pointed out to reporters that Reed made the play without a single warm-up throw before the game.
“You can expect that out of John,” Meyer said. “It would be different if we had that 240-pound tailback that was a Heisman candidate. That doesn’t exist here right now. It would be different if some other things were going on that we could be more manageable for what he is perfect at doing.
“His objective is to help Florida win. … That tells you the character of him and his family because I am sure he is just taking shots across the bow.”
If Brantley is bothered by the situation, he doesn’t show it publicly. He praises the new offense for reversing the team’s struggles, maintaining a steady hand as the team’s leader.
“I still need to lead this team, even though I’m not taking all the snaps, and that’s fine with me,” he said.
Now comes the matchup that will put the system — and maybe Brantley’s mindset — to test.
It’s one thing for the three quarterbacks to light up Vanderbilt but quite another to succeed against South Carolina with a berth in the Southeastern Conference Championship on the line.
Will the new idea book a trip to Atlanta or be reduced to bad science?
Will someone fall flat and be bounced from the game plan, or could one seize the offense for good?
Is this a solution or a means to one?
“I don’t think they feel like one guy is definitely the best way to go,” Spurrier said. “When I played two quarterbacks, I always said they both have their talents and similar ability, so the best way to win the game is play both of them.
“I’m sure that’s the way the Florida coaches look at it: To win the game, they have to play all three of them.”
Indeed, all three will play Saturday. But Meyer stressed that there’s no open competition for the starting gig.
That, he says, is all Brantley’s.
“Johnny is our quarterback. The other guys are tempo,” Meyer said. They’re curveballs and things we’ve done here in the past. You’ll see a lot of tempo, and you’ll see a lot of curveballs.”
