University of North Carolina Athletics
Countdown to Camp: Baker Leads Film School
June 30, 2005 | Football
June 30, 2005
Welcome to the third installment of TarHeelBlue.com's "Countdown to Camp" series. Every Thursday between now and the opening of training camp (which opens August 11), we'll have a fresh story on the football Tar Heels. If there's an aspect of the team or player you want to see highlighted, just drop us an email.
Previous Countdown to Camp stories:
By Adam Lucas
Former Carolina quarterback Darian Durant--the word "former" still doesn't sound quite right in that sentence--was back in Chapel Hill recently, fresh off a Baltimore Ravens minicamp. He arrived with a message for senior quarterback Matt Baker, the man most think will inherit the reins of the Tar Heel offense:
You're lucky.
"(Carolina offensive coordinator Gary) Tranquill teaches us so well," Durant told Baker. "When I was at Ravens camp, things came easily. It took a couple days to learn the terminology but the concepts and the way to look at the defense came easily. You should've seen some of the other quarterbacks out there. They were lost."
The comment from one of Carolina's newest pros confirmed what Tar Heel offensive players have known for several years: Tranquill runs a complex, pro-style offense.
"My brother (Matt Heinz) played for Florida State and my cousin (Jon Peattie) plays for Miami," quarterback Roger Heinz says. "Our stuff is like night and day compared to theirs in terms of how complicated it is. It is definitely an NFL offense."
But college football players don't have an NFL amount of time to study the offense. There are classes to attend, papers to write. For freshmen, the challenge is even more difficult, because some come from less intensive conceptual backgrounds. Carolina has a minimum of 12 pass protections and 21 formations, a stark change from most high school offenses.
That's why Tar Heel players have implemented player-run classroom sessions as part of their summer workout program. The usual weekly training regimen is simple: weights in the early afternoon, then conditioning, then a player-run period that has become known as Winning Team Activities, or WTAs (more on those in a future Countdown to Camp story). Those sessions are usually held on the practice field, but inclement weather--as with this week's afternoon rain--can sometimes wash them out.
But Baker wasn't about to allow his teammates to escape that easily.
"You've got to give me 30 good minutes in the film room," he told the offense when Tuesday's throwing session was canceled by rain. "I know you don't have anywhere to go because we had planned to be on the field. So meet me in the film room."
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Countdown to Camp: 42 Days
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Baker plans to expand his classroom offerings next week, as he'll begin regular sessions with the older receivers. He and Heinz have already screened extensive film of the Yellow Jackets--"They blitz on 92 percent of their plays and it always comes from a different place on the field," says Heinz, who has been leading pass protection film classes for the tailbacks and fullbacks--and they're eager to share that knowledge with the players who will be on the field on September 10.
But for now the students are the youngsters. That's why you could find Baker, looking professorial with a red laser pointer in one hand and remote control in the other hand, sitting at the head of the offensive staff room table earlier this week. Carolina's youngest receivers joined him, and senior receivers Jarwarski Pollock and Derrele Mitchell also sat in on the meeting to provide position-specific input ("That little bit of hesitation was the difference between a touchdown and the ball going off my fingertips," Pollock told his charges as he watched himself drop a potential touchdown against Tech). But it was undoubtedly Baker's show.
"OK, guys, what formation is this?" he says, grabbing his laser pointer and highlighting certain spots on the field. "Here's the tight end. He's on the left. And he's off the line of scrimmage."
The answers come slowly at first. It's just the third day freshmen have been in the classroom, and some don't know the difference between an H-back and a tight end. The responses will come more quickly as the rookies get adjusted, but both Baker and Heinz say it will take over a year for freshmen to become fluent in the complex language known as the Carolina offense.
"At this point I could care less if they're recognizing coverages," Baker says. "By the end of the summer they'll have a grasp on that. What we want to understand now are formations. That's the thing that will slow down practice once practice starts. They have to learn how to line up in places they've never lined up before. When you're in the right spot, learning the plays becomes easier. The plays are concepts, and once you learn the concepts it all flows from that."
Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly and can be reached at alucas@tarheelmonthly.com. He is the coauthor of the official book of the 2005 championship season, Led By Their Dreams, and his book on Roy Williams's first season at Carolina, Going Home Again, is now available in bookstores. To subscribe to Tar Heel Monthly or learn more about Going Home Again, click here.
