Watch the Tape, Bro — How My Philosophy On Football was Born in 2014 (and then reborn in 2026.)

In the year of our lord 2014, The New York Giants hired Ben McAdoo as their Offensive Coordinator.

McAdoo was a not a household name. In fact, his only real claim to fame was that he was the QB coach of Aaron Rodgers, Green Bay’s not-yet-so-controversial quarterback. McAdoo brought with the pedigree of shaping the league’s best quarterback from bench warmer behind Brett Favre into a perennial all-pro.

It wasn’t the worst plan I had ever heard, but I had a specific problem. Everyone kept saying that McAdoo’s offense would eliminate Eli Manning’s biggest issue — turnovers. Eli had a specific issue which was he has never seen a throw he felt like he couldn’t make it. It’s not the worst quality for a Quarterback to have — but it’s not the best one either. I also knew that Kevin Gilbride’s offense might have gotten Eli a couple of rings, but it required a lot from the QB. It was a series of big boy throws — Deep Outs, Posts and Back Shoulders — that required precision timing and all around gangsterism from the signal caller. People had gotten tired of the interceptions and a head had to roll, so Gilbride took the hit.

I wasn’t the all around ball-knower that I am now, but I took enough time to understand the basic difference between Gilbride’s vertical passing game and McAdoo’s West Coast centric offense. McAdoo would require fewer of those big boy throws, replacing them with slants and hitches that used horizontal spacing to create good matchups and give Eli easier windows to throw into. It sounds good in theory — but I had my doubts.

It was than that I decided that I had to figure this out. It wasn’t going to be solved by listening to the narratives that beat writers spun up. They were just repeating what they heard from the players and coaches — McAdoo’s magical turnover limiting ability was going to work wonders. Luckily, I worked for a company that actually provided the video for NFL Gamepass International, which meant that I had access to watch every game as many times as I wanted, not to mention access to the coaches tape, the most underrated part of that while product. I decided that my stubborn ass was going to sit there and watch these games until I understood how McAdoo was going to fix Eli Manning.

I was going to watch the tape, bro. I got a clipboard. I looked for a template online to chart plays. I quickly got rid of the template and clipboard and created my own charting form in Excel. I was going to find the truth.

I quickly started to realize that the whole thing was a mistake. Eli Manning was many things but a west coast point guard was not one of them. For every good throw, there were two or three off target, not by a mile, but by just enough to limit yards after catch. For every time Hakeem Nicks went 40 yards on a slant, there was another 3rd down that sailed just out of the reach of the receivers hands.

I tried to create a grading system. I threw out the math A LOT. I couldn’t figure out why Darius Slayton was grading out higher than D.K. Metcalf until I realized I had put a perentheses in the wrong place in the formula. I cried that night in frustration. I woke up the next morning and kept at it. By 2025, I had graded nearly 210,000 Offensive and defensive plays. I had charted over 100 coaches and nearly 300 quarterbacks. I had stats I liked for pass rushers and skill players. I had lived through the frustrations of watching corners that I liked grading out poorly and ones that I thought couldn’t play gaming bad quarterback play to good grades. I had tableau visualizations. I finally felt like I had figured it out.

So, I started over.

I know that sounds insane. It felt insane. That being said, the primary thing that the 1.0 version of my grading system is that there is no right or wrong way to play football. There are a million different ways to move the football and they all have their place. There’s dozens of passing concepts and even more ways to tie them to the rest of the offense. The key to football is not who is right and who is wrong — but it’s who best executes on their idea. Who is able to take the players they have and merge their strengths with their philosophy on how to create (or deny) explosive plays. It’s not just about how much pressure you generate — but the quality of that pressure and it’s effect on the other team. In 2014, the name of the game was getting the quarterback off his spot. In 2025, every quarterback can create in the scramble drill. Now, it’s about getting that guy to the ground come hell or high water.

So, we keep grinding. Version 2.0 of my grading system is now in full swing, and I plan on writing a little bit about here for no one in particular. Call it the writer’s deep desire to be understood and need to create something that will live longer than him/her. I don’t know if this means anything, but I’m also not so sure that I care anymore. I’m going to leave a lifetime’s worth of football knowledge here. What the zeitgeist does with it is up to them.

We’ll talk more about the system in future posts — why it is the way it is and the million little decisions I made along the way to craft it into the idea that it wound up being — but more than anything I don’t want you to trust it. I want you to use it as a single person’s perspective. If you find yourself agreeing with it, that’s awesome. If you find yourself hating it — click here. Get out the credit card and sign up for NFL Pro. Watch the tape, bro. Come up with something better. Spend the time. The more people we have thinking about this shit, the better we will understand it in the long run.

For now, I’m going to go ahead and give you my perspective. Come along for the ride.