Chapter 339 The Battle of Awakening
In the NFL, everyone has their own battle.
Although the spotlight is always firmly focused on the quarterback, the charm of football is that any link or screw can become the key to the game, and even the quarterback is eclipsed.
Standing on the edge of the court, Henry quietly watched Levi and Hill who were celebrating wantonly, and finally lowered his proud head to face the fellow junior who Burns praised so much——
What was once arrogance, disdain, contempt, and neglect are now all transformed into equal observation and gaze.
Then.
Levi seemed to be aware of the sight, stopped and searched the crowd for a moment. The eyes of Levi and Henry collided in the air.
Strange, yet familiar.
Maybe they are not friends, and they may not become friends in the future. From the beginning of the story to the present, they are rivals.
But this does not prevent them from respecting each other and continuing to work hard with each other as the goal, and compete through their performance on the field.
Henry noticed——
Levi's eyes.
There was no provocation, no attack, no contempt, only an upright, aboveboard and high-spirited fighting spirit, and the eyes were clearly sending out a message of war:
May the side with the better performance win!
That fighting spirit is burning in his eyes.
Quietly, Henry straightened his back and opened his shoulders, and the fighting spirit sleeping deep in his soul slowly awakened. This was a flame that Henry himself was not aware of. It seemed that it had never existed but suddenly burst out with incredible energy.
In the past, in the NCAA, the talented Henry could easily crush his opponents without even having to exert all his strength, including the Clemson Tigers.
Later in the NFL, Henry was full of energy but had nowhere to use it. The coach would always let him hit the wall, hit the wall, hit the wall again, with no tactical coordination at all, so that he fell into self-pity and irritability and anger.
Until now.
He cannot and must not lose to Levi.
With a glance, the beast in Henry's body finally woke up.
The eyes only met briefly, but they separated immediately. After turning around, Henry's brain began to work at high speed.
If head coach Mulakai still doesn't change his tactics and continues to let him hit the wall and continue to rely on Mariota, how should Henry change the situation——
think.
think!
Wait, so, is this the advantage of Levi that Coach Burns has been emphasizing?
In the past, Henry had always thought that he was not an idiot, he had been observing and thinking, how could he run the ball blindly without using his brain?
Now it seems that this kind of thinking is not that kind of thinking.
The running back's thinking should be an observation of the offensive and defensive layout. The "hitting the wall" arranged by the head coach is often the running route in the middle, because this is a dense area of forward players, and it needs to rely on the body of the running back to bulldoze the ball. Move forward.
A running back like Levi can give full play to his speed and agility by breaking through from the side; a running back like Henry can give full play to his strength and confrontation advantages by breaking through from the middle.
Breakthroughs from the wing often require the coordination of the wide receivers and tight ends; breakthroughs from the center often require the cooperation of the offensive line. Once the coordination is improper, the result will be a boring collision with the wall.
Now it seems that Henry has been trapped in his fixed thinking——
If his offensive line can't help open the way, will the running back be helpless?
No, of course not.
Regardless of the effectiveness of the offensive line in opening the way, the running back can also observe the position of the defensive front and linebacker to find the relatively weak position in the middle. Even if the gap is not as obvious as the wing, it doesn't matter. Henry doesn't have it anyway. Be prepared to squeeze out of the narrow gap.
what does that mean?
Not only observation, but also interpretation of the team's offensive tactics.
Why choose this offensive tactic? In such an offensive tactic, where are the wide receivers and tight ends, and how do the offensive linemen and quarterbacks cooperate? Only by truly understanding the entire overall layout can we understand the defensive team's tactics and predict the movement trends of defensive players.
This is real thinking and observation.
Running back is not a position that can be played just by working hard. finally!
The unchanging tactical layout and the same confrontation formation finally showed their original appearance in Henry's mind, ever-changing and colorful.
When waiting to appear again in the second half, the world in Henry's eyes was slightly different.
The Tennessee Titans' offensive tactics remain unchanged, with Mulakai still focusing on Mariota——
This is what team management wants to see.
They always believe that the failure of Mariota and other athletic talents to be fully exploited is the fundamental reason why the team has not been able to open up the situation. The head coach can fire him at any time, but the quarterback cannot be changed at will.
Therefore, Mulakai must arrange tactics according to the wishes of the team management.
This time, Mariota finally got out of his game and led the Tennessee Titans across the midfield line. However, he encountered another crisis at the 40-yard line and fell into a third-and-3-yard dilemma. He was about to strike out again——
The opportunity came to Henry.
"attack!"
Henry started immediately, his eyes firmly fixed on the forwards in front of him. He knew that the wide receivers would either run vertically or near the sideline, and the heads piled up in the middle area would scatter in an instant.
However, this is still not all.
The Kansas Chiefs have a "3-4" defensive formation. Their three defensive fronts have performed well this season, especially their tough ground defense in the red zone, which is still at the forefront of the league. They also completely blocked Henry's breakthrough in the first half.
Therefore, Henry needs to adjust, otherwise hitting the wall is a foreseeable result.
Kick the ground.
Hold the ball.
Use force.
Henry's eyes were firmly fixed on the front, and with a burst of determination, he took the football from Mariota's hand and stepped forward.
According to the tactics, Mulakai hopes that Mariota will push Henry to break through the middle, tear a hole and advance three yards. He only needs to complete the conversion of three yards in the third gear, and the offense can continue.
But now, Henry is thinking one step further than Mulakay.
Tap tap, tap tap tap.
Henry's step forward was very firm and powerful, without any hesitation, and he was about to collide with the striker at the critical moment.
One sideways.
Squeeze, move, push.
Henry gave up speed and instead used force to squeeze out a gap. The offensive line just pushed the defensive line to both sides, like opening a door.
Seeing defensive end Bailey stretch out his hands to control Henry through an offensive tackle in an octopus posture, Henry not only did not avoid it, but also went up to him, directly squeezing the offensive tackle like the patty of a sandwich. , and continued to move forward against Bailey's footsteps.
Mariota was dumbfounded, watching Henry carry two mountains of meat forward, as if he were participating in the Guinness Book of Records. He actually forgot to help for a moment.
But Henry didn't mind--
Push on the ground, step on the ground, exert force.
Energy, burst!
(End of this chapter)