High School Scouting

Different methods of scouting share common aim
by: Ben Taylor
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It’s Wednesday night, and for Salt Fork coach Brian Plotner and his linebackers and defensive backs, that means film night. Every Wednesday during the season, that group meets at the home of a player or coach to learn more about its next opponent.

“They pick up on tendencies,” said Plotner. “They re-familiarize themselves with the formations they’ve seen in practice.

“Sometimes they pick up on things I didn’t see by looking at it from a different perspective.”

All-State senior linebacker/fullback Travis Ferber agreed, “You can always learn better hands-on. It’s a lot easier to put (a team’s tendencies) together in your head when you see them on film.”

Besides giving the players more information about the upcoming foe, the film session furthers the bond among the defensive players, a necessity for a unit that must communicate so much during each game.

That communication is something that does not necessarily come naturally for the Salt Fork Storm, which is a cooperative effort in all sports between Catlin and Jamaica High Schools. The Storm is classified as 2A in football in an eight-class system that ranks the largest schools as 8A.

“We put people together that maybe wouldn’t hang out,” said Plotner. “The co-op already brings together two schools, and with this, sometimes you have sophomores together with juniors and seniors.”

Scouting opponents means a couple of things to most coaches: studying film of opponents and having a coach or scout watch an opponent’s game in person. Of course, no two coaches do either task exactly the same, and the assumption is that larger schools do more scouting than smaller schools.

Since the creation of the Salt Fork co-op in 1995, the Storm has reached the playoffs four times. All four appearances have come since Plotner joined the staff in 1998. His dedication to scouting opponents and preparing his team extensively seems to be paying off.

“It’s been pretty vital to the success we’ve had by getting the kids as ready as possible,” Plotner said. “The kids have done a good job of taking it to heart and working at it.”

Rossville-Alvin/Armstrong-Potomac coach John Neubaum prefers to focus more on teaching the basics of the game instead of focusing on individual opponents.

“(We show film) only a half-hour or hour a week just to show them what to expect,” Neubaum said. “We’ve got to concentrate on technique and fundamentals more than tape. That has a lot to do (with being a) small school.”

R-A/A-P has an enrollment of 295 – a figure that would have placed it in the smallest third of class 2A had it made the state playoffs in 2002. Neubaum points more specifically to the lack of support for his program as one reason for the limited scouting he does.

“I had one coach I could count on – how can I compete with that?” Neubaum asked. “Schools like LeRoy (classified as 1A in 2002) have eight paid assistants.”

Plotner faces the problem of having only one of his assistants working with him at Jamaica. Offensive coordinator Chris Hodge is the school’s athletic director, but the other six staff members work outside the building.

“(Scouting) is harder as far as numbers,” Plotner said. “Certain people from other schools have that as their No. 1 job. Having other coaches in the building would be an advantage for other schools, so that’s why we (watch film together on) Sunday night.”

Jay Willaman, Danville Schlarman’s second-year coach, said scouting has more to do with the support a program has than the number of assistants on staff. Willaman, who is a sergeant at the Danville Correctional Facility, has a co-worker assist him with scouting.

Schlarman’s enrollment placed it in the middle of class 1A in the 2002 playoffs.

“I have a guy I work with at the prison who scouts for me,” he said. “It’s a tough thing for any small school. Some schools don’t have that kind of support.

“I only have four assistants, and one of those is always a volunteer. There’s only so much money allotted for coaches.

“We pay my scout for gas and one of the coaches will give him a pass so he doesn’t have to pay to get into games, but he just enjoys going to games.”

Willaman’s scout attends games and reports to the coaches about the speed and quickness of their opponent’s skill-position players. He also diagrams a few plays he sees, which allows Willaman and his staff to focus more on finding tendencies than simply tracking plays.

To illustrate the amount of support some schools have, Willaman recalls what he saw at the 2001 second round class 2A playoff game between Salt Fork and Auburn at Jamaica High School. Fifteen miles away in Westville, Aledo was playing Westville for the right to face the winner of the Salt Fork/Auburn game.

“Standing in the end zone of the Salt Fork/Auburn game, there are four coaches from Aledo,” Willaman said. “When Auburn has the ball, one guy is drawing up what Salt Fork is doing on defense, and (another is drawing up) what Auburn is doing on offense, and each guy has another guy helping him.

“Then at the Salt Fork/Aledo game (the next week), Aledo had seven guys on the sideline and those same four guys scouting their next two possible opponents. That’s 11 coaches! Some schools have that kind of luxury; it depends on the support you have for your program.”

Willaman credits this kind of support to the extensive success Aledo has had, including winning the 1998 and 2001 class 2A championships and qualifying for the playoffs in seven consecutive seasons. Aledo also lost in the semifinals in 1996 and in the quarterfinals in 1997 and 1999.

“Schools that are consistently good get more and more support and get more people to help them out,” Willaman said. “It’s a big disadvantage when you’re new to a program and it’s up and down every year.”

Plotner uses a scouting method similar to Willaman’s, but does not send a scout to watch every opponent on the schedule.

“When we send somebody, it’s to see a team we’re not familiar with,” Plotner said. “They look mainly at their personnel to see the size and speed of their kids.

“Any trick plays or passing routes you don’t see on film are things somebody at the game can pick up on.”

Mark Dodd, who recently finished his third season at Danville High School, a 6A school, had more than a new school and new players to adjust to. Dodd previously coached at Richmond-Burton, a 4A school, which belongs to the Big Northern Conference. The BNC allows scouts to film games from the stands.

Most conferences have rules that permit scouts only to watch the game and take notes, and have stipulations about how many game films coaches must trade with opponents, usually one or two.

“You have to make (scouting) important,” Dodd said. “I don’t have my coaches scout. We hire people and pay them $40 per game.”

In addition to the focus on scouting, Dodd puts a great deal of time and effort into preparing his team for the next opponent. He watches each game film three times, with a specific purpose for each viewing.

“It’s almost like a math equation: what are they going to do out of which formation?” Dodd said. “Then I do a little hole-hit scorecard for the number of times they run through each hole. I record down and distance and then the same thing dealing with the hash mark. So I write down the formation, the down and distance and the hash mark the first time I go through a film,” he said. “I look for tendencies by formation, down and distance and hash mark.

“The second time, I try to watch the game knowing what play’s coming up. I try to get a feel for what the other team is looking at – what are they seeing and why are they running what they’re running?”

“The third time I look for tells: changing positions in the line, the quarterback’s positioning, the running backs’ splits.”

Despite the huge size difference, Dodd faced many of the same challenges in his first few years at 6A Danville as Neubaum does at 2A R-A/A-P. Dodd said many of the players who tried out for football knew so little about the game that they did not understand the process of scouting opponents and adjusting schemes to stop specific plays opponents ran.

“The last two years I’ve totally gone away from a lot of (detailed scouting) because we have such inexperienced players – kids who aren’t football kids,” Dodd said. “I was giving them way too much information.

“The first year, I gave the players scouting reports and they didn’t know what to do with it. They thought we were changing our (base) defense every week.”

But Dodd’s players quickly caught on to their coach’s methods of preparing for individual opponents, and, Dodd said, it added a new element to the game for them.

“That’s where it gets good: when kids get that you’re just trying to make adjustments and not changing everything. They would come in and say ‘What are we going to make fun this week?’”

Besides the fact his players had to adjust to the information, perhaps one reason Dodd had trouble getting his point across was the wealth of data he presented. Dodd said he watches each film at least three times, with a different purpose for each viewing.

“I need to know it all, but the players just need to know what they need to know,” he said. “In a way it’s taken some of the fun out of it for me. I enjoyed trying to outwit the other coach.”

From the information he gleans from film study, Dodd devises a defensive scheme designed not only to stop an opponent’s offense, but to fool an opponent into running a certain play or taking a particular option based on the pre-snap read Danville shows.

“It’s kind of like a mind game,” Dodd said. “I try to give the opponent’s offense a defense that will give them what they want to see, then maybe change out of it before the snap.”

Plotner understands what Dodd faced at Danville, and he and the Salt Fork staff strive to prevent their players from experiencing information overload.

“We keep things pared down enough so the kids don’t get overwhelmed,” Plotner said. “For example, (watching film before Salt Fork’s 2002 second round playoff game) with Tremont we introduced their double-slot (offense) the first day and we introduced their double-tight end wishbone (package) the second day. We try to introduce the main thing and then the secondary thing.”

Clifton Central coach Brian Spooner disagrees with Dodd’s method, and uses his freshmen and junior varsity coaches to scout opponents. Central is listed as 3A by the IHSA.

Spooner has his scouts chart formations and plays, but especially wants them assessing how Central will match up with the opponent.

“ We try to get a general idea of the other teams’ favorite formation and plays. (Scouting) gives us an indication of things that don’t show up on film like team speed and true size. We get an indication of how we’re going to match up speed-wise and size-wise.”

Although he may not scout as extensively as other coaches, Neubaum still watches film in order to discover an opponent’s tendencies and execution.

“We look for line splits, tendencies, what side they run to, what they like to do on first down, second down,” he said. “Defensively we see if they blitz, what coverages they use.”

“Scouting is key to watching film more critically,” said Willaman. After hearing about a team from his scout, Willaman said he is able to concentrate more on what individual players do and their personal styles of play.

“You pick up what the guards are doing – the key to an offensive team is what the guards are doing, he said. “Does the quarterback read defenses and audible, or is he just getting a call from the sidelines?

“Is the tailback a slasher – a person who cuts real well – or does he take a run for the sideline? Does he look for contact, or does he shy away from it?”

Willaman looks for many of the same characteristics from a team’s defensive personnel.

“Defensively, how do they react to motion? Do the linebackers shift, do they move to the motion?

“Do they dominantly play zone (coverage) or do they play man-to-man? Are they hitters or guys who make arm tackles?”

Most importantly, Willaman said scouting teams lets him focus on the seemingly minor things that can make a big difference in a game.

“You look for little things you can tell your kids that will give them a head start,” Willaman said. “If you’re just sitting watching film after film, you might not pick up on those things.

“(For example), I always tell my linebackers and defensive backs to look at the tailback. Does he look the same way every time, or does he look one way first, then the other, and run the first direction?”

Plotner said the Salt Fork staff spends up to three hours watching each film of an opponent in order to first get a general idea of a team’s plan, then to chart formations and plays.

“We get an idea of what they do offensively and defensively, then we start charting plays and looking at tendencies,” Plotner said. “I try to get a gut feeling of what they do.”

At every walk-through practice the day before a game, Plotner gives each defensive player a scouting packet. This packet includes every play and which direction it went out of each formation the coaches have seen the opponent run. It also contains any defensive changes the team instituted in practice that week.

In addition to the Wednesday night sessions, Plotner also shows his players film at two other times.

“We introduce most teams to the kids on Monday and they can watch films during the week if they have time,” said Plotner. “This year we started having them watch it before the game.

“It’s good for them to watch it, but if it’s in a large group, it’s kind of like a movie house: you don’t always get everything out of it.”

Plotner’s method is unique by showing players film at times other than Monday at practice. Many coaches prefer the more traditional method of showing players film during Monday’s practice when many teams lose a significant amount of players to that night’s junior varsity game.

“We watch film for an hour with the kids on Monday and use a half-hour with the kids on another day,” said Spooner. “The first time we show the kids the lesser of the two films, the second one is maybe a little more competitive.”

Drew Woodruff, first year coach at Milford – a school classified as 1A by the IHSA – takes a slightly different approach to showing his players film of opponents.

“Generally we watch it Saturday morning,” Woodruff said. “If the film is not representative of the opponent, I won’t show it, I’ll just give the players the scouting report.

“High school kids have a tendency to make assumptions about whether they’ll win or lose based on the tape.”

Ultimately, scouting is part of the never-ending search for a competitive advantage. What starts with players’ dedication and hard work in off-season weight room programs and continues with intense workouts and seven-on-seven passing leagues and tournaments in the summer finishes with detailed preparation by coaching staffs every fall.

“We do a great deal of scouting on our division foes,” Spooner said of the Sangamon Illini Red division, which sent four teams to the IHSA playoffs in 2002. Spooner’s Clifton Central team advanced to the quarterfinals, the deepest into the playoffs any SIA Red team progressed in 2002.

“As tough as our conference is, you try to find any advantage you can.”

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