29. In American football, there’s an offensive method/system called the “Run ‘n’ Shoot.” It was inspired by a high school football coach watching younger kids play football at recess. He watched them as they simply ran everywhere, just trying to get open, with no set routes (the pattern or path a receiver runs to catch a pass).
Normally, routes are very rigid and coached with a lot of detail. He noticed that whoever was playing QB would often be running side to side to get away from the other kids chasing him, then would throw the ball when he found someone open. Another observation is that before the play began, kids would line up all over the yard, side to side, to get as open as possible. He also noticed that the kids were having a lot of fun doing it!
He wanted to have an offense that was fun for his players…so he built an offense based on spreading his players across the field, and having one or more players running “routes on the fly,” where a player would have anywhere from one to potentially four routes they could run after the play began. On almost every snap, his QB would run to the left or the right before throwing the ball, so he could run the ball away from the defense if no one was open.
It fucking worked, and it became one of the most influential pass-first offenses in the game’s history.
TL;DR: An American football coach built an entire offensive system based on observations he made watching a bunch of kids playing football at recess.
EDIT: For those who are more familiar of the game, this was the first true “spread” offense in terms of what we think of a “spread” offense looks like today. It was the first system to base out of 4WR formations, where they’d be spread across the field.
EDIT 2: The coach’s name was Glenn “Tiger” Ellison. Accidentally put Darrell “Mouse” Davis’s name originally. Ellison fostered the idea, Davis is more known for perfecting it. Run ‘n’ Shoot guys had a thing for animal nicknames apparently.
