Sky Sports' Cameron Hogwood looks at why Michael Carter and Javonte Williams are set for starring roles in wide zone schemes with the Jets and Broncos as they enter year two in the NFL.; follow build-up to the 2022 NFL season across Sky Sports' digital channels.
Thursday 28 July 2022 10:38, UK
When it came to studying Sam Howell at North Carolina it was customary to be preoccupied by the Penn & Teller helping ignite the Tar Heels offense beside their quarterback - now Michael Carter and Javonte Williams are primed for similarly-starring roles as NFL sophomores.
In December 2020 the duo set a new FBS record for combined rushing yards by two teammates in a game as they posted 520 in North Carolina's 62-26 muscle flex against Miami. Between them, across the season they mustered 2,385 ground yards as well as 572 through the air to form part of Howell's crack-team quartet with wide receivers Dyami Brown and Dazz Newsome.
The departure of all four at the 2021 NFL Draft became something of an unofficial asterisk to Howell's decline last year, but also reason to believe there could yet be success for him in the comfort of Scott Turner's Washington run game.
Mack Brown's two-pronged backfield punch donned the authority and charisma of a Penn along with the subtle slickness of a Teller, omitting the latter's silence.
Where Carter would burrow, ricochet, weave and drift through would-be tacklers with stop-start acceleration and multi-purpose agility, Williams would swat and plough and carry bodies to his next destination with more traditional bell-cow vigour tailored to plant-and-go power run schemes to accompany under-sold footwork as an open-field target.
They were the poster boys of a predominantly pin-and-pull power run system, Williams' ability to absorb contact and his low mileage as a three-down back earning a call from the Denver Broncos early in the second round, before Carter was sought to inject oomph into a rebuilding New York Jets offense in round four.
Where Penn & Teller made their bread off illusion, the Tar Heels duo announced themselves via elusion as Williams (0.31) logged the highest rate of missed tackles forced in a season by a rookie running back since 2011 while Carter (0.27) followed Josh Jacobs (0.29 in 2019) with the third-highest (PFF). Carter also ranked first in most forced missed tackles per touch among all running backs in 2021, followed by Williams in second.
Parallels in trajectory extend to year two as Williams adjusts to Nathaniel Hackett's wide zone concept, similar to that in which Carter features under Mike LaFleur in New York.
When Deebo Samuel flirted with wantaway territory in San Francisco this offseason you almost rooted for a LaFleur or Mike McDaniel to drop him into their Pandora's Box of play-calling with the Jets or Miami Dolphins; when news broke of Tyreek Hill's imminent exit in Arrowhead you almost rooted for a LaFleur or McDaniel union of West Coast Three-card Monte, as was eventually the case for the latter.
Both were seamless, transformative fits for the pair's Shanahan-certified schemes predicated on trench invention and toy-and-torment simulation, with their yards-after-catch, system-gazumping versatility to force the Cover 3 looks from which defenses across the league are keen to shift away.
Carter, without being a Deebo or a Tyreek, looked every bit the same perfect match for LaFleur's blue-print with the one-step cut explosiveness to thrive in a wide-zone world and the shimmy-and-go acceleration to make men miss as a pass-catcher.
He became one of few consistent plus points across a season in which Zach Wilson's transition toiled, LaFleur tossing in bundles of pre-snap motion, decoy fullback 'wham' wrinkles and condensed/spread variation with an aim to getting the ball to Carter in space.
Of Carter's 639 rushing yards on the year, 77.46 per cent came after contact to combine with 39 missed tackles and 36 receptions for 325 receiving yards in depicting the slippery do-it-all dagger to LaFleur's offense.
Carter would be ushered into the flat of the ISO matchup or away from the jet-sweep and full-back pull in the kind of counter-flow straight from the Joe Gibbs book of misdirection. As LaFleur opened things up he would steer flood concepts to mid-field out of quad formations as a means of slipping Carter into checkdown positions undetected, or play to two-deep coverages with verticals that enabled sneak routes into soft spots underneath.
Split backfields and the use of Trevon Wesco or Ryan Griffin as bulldozers from fullback may have altered in appearance but often operated on the same premise with regards to late hook/curl disruption to vacate space for Carter, while the scheme-reliant athleticism of the Jets' offensive line was tested with screen plays paving the way for the Tar Heels back.
His usage was focal point-esque and offered Wilson an out, Carter encapsulating much of what his offensive coordinator might have arrived plotting to unleash with the vision and conviction to reward a wide zone approach along with the hand skills and footwork to fulfil receiver requirements.
The introduction of second-round running back Breece Hall could see those pass-catching duties increase, while also offering LaFleur the freedom to play more of the 21 personnel he, Kyle Shanahan and Mike McDaniel found so much joy through with the 49ers. Adding Laken Tomlinson and Connor McGovern alongside second-year guard Alijah Vera-Tucker also points to an enhanced run game capable of climbing to the second level at an efficient rate.
"Michael Carter, we couldn't believe he was sitting there in the fourth round and then skip to this year I was shocked, we had two picks in the 30s, used one to go up and get Jermaine (Johnson) in the first round and I thought there was no way Breece would be there, especially a couple of days and weeks before the Draft started," LaFleur told Sky Sports.
"Two special football players that were produced at a high level in college, but also very very good human beings that come to work every day.
"Very impressed at their age what they bring on a day to day basis and how they understand what needs to get done from a work standpoint at a professional level."
The bootleg threat of a Zach Wilson, in addition to a Russell Wilson for that matter, should also aid things in keeping defenses honest and guessing in the face of LaFleur and Hackett's zone bonanzas.
Jets fans have not seen a 1,000-yard rushing season from a player since Chris Ivory in 2015; a tandem of Carter and Hall offers their best chance since then of snapping that drought.
Williams faces some transition heading into his year two as Hackett revives the outside/wide zone offense Mike Shanahan was renowned for while leading Denver to two Super Bowls in the 90s. The same outside/wide zone offense that the Kyle Shanahans, Sean McVays, Matt LaFleurs, Mike McDaniels, Mike LaFleurs of the league have all sought to adopt and personalise.
Where the inside zone used primarily by Pat Shurmur in Williams' rookie year puts an onus on vertical downhill blocking with sprinkles of power run traits, outside/wide zone attacks the perimeter and depends heavily on lateral agility and horizontal blocking with a view to stretching defenses from sideline-to-sideline.
The challenge posed by wide zone, as can often be the case with inside, is its reliance on not just tackle-shrugging brute force and breakaway speed, but expert vision, clinical decision-making, patience and first-step explosiveness to spot and penetrate the running lane when it presents itself. Brains, brawn, cloak-and-dagger, the whole shebang.
With regards to the 'cloak-and-dagger' component, the zone scheme Williams must adjust to functions on consistency in appearance, much-like identical keepers and hand-offs in play-action, as a source of disguise. Alongside that comes the counter-flow pre-snap motion and lop-sided formations with which to muddle defenses while attempting to combat their own post-snap rotation designed to tarnish a quarterback or ball-carrier's field read.
"Every meeting we have, we always talk about confusion," Williams said recently. "We want everything to look the same so the defense doesn't know when a different play is coming. It's probably the most complex offense I've played in, but I really feel like it's going to be the best because you never know what's coming at you."
Williams' footwork may not be quite as surgical as that of Carter in zone running, perhaps because it has never really needed to be such is the way he carries defenders in tow, but the speed at which he changes direction is sharp enough and the patience with which he locates the gap mature enough to promise a smooth adjustment upon a snap-after-snap routine familiarising himself with the system.
The beauty of Williams in a league when defensive schemes have never been faster or shrewder is that scheme need not always matter. He will crash to ugly extra yardage and dissolve shackles to turn nothing into something, regardless.
A prime example of his ability to adapt and improvise came against the Baltimore Ravens last season when he took off behind guard Quinn Meinerz in a power run design before acknowledging a missed block, darting inside and forklifting Marlon Humphrey to a first down.
He also flashed his awareness against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Week Five when he made the perfect cut inside Noah Fant's seal block to turn a counter-run into a career-high 49-yard gain. On more than one occasion he displayed the bend and relentless leg motor through contact to find production by kicking outside were he initially unable to see a gap.
Meinerz, who became a familiar feature to standout moments on the ground, looks tailor-made to Hackett's desired scheme and is expected to play an expanded role in his second season as a result. What's more, he and Williams find themselves working with a new offensive line coach in Butch Barry, who previously helped the 49ers rank third in rushing DVOA as offensive assistant to Shanahan last year.
Williams finished his rookie year with 903 rushing yards (4.4 yards per carry) for four touchdowns off 203 carries, and again looks poised to share the workload with Melvin Gordon.
He also managed 43 reception for 319 yards and three scores, which bodes well given that Aaron Jones, Jamaal Williams and AJ Dillon combined for 252 catches and 2,022 receiving yards out of the backfield during Hackett's three seasons as offensive coordinator in Green Bay.
Among the wrinkles to the Packers' scheme was a trips off right tackle formation from which receivers might be deployed on crossers and verticals to vacate space underneath or in the flat for Jones to fill. Hackett's arrival will offer a more detailed look at the vast route-tree that went somewhat unsung coming out of college.
Some of Russell Wilson’s most productive seasons have arrived in the company of top 10 rushing efficiency, Williams’ footballing IQ and destructive running style promising key contributions. Elsewhere in New Jersey, Carter is a ready-made flag-bearer and henchman for LaFleur’s West Coast brain.
The Tar Heels are coming.
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