there is a difference between the RPO and the read option game. As you know, RPO stands for run pass options. There are 2 kinds of RPOs, pre snap and post snap.OK, I'll bite, since I don't follow the NFL closely anymore. (Can't stand the prima donna lack of discipline, the tattoos, the look-at-me shows, and the long hair.)
Who are these QB's that are at the pinnacle of both running and passing ability? When I mean "run" I don't mean "scramble" to avoid contact, or a situational play on occasion. Have these QBs been doing it for a long time to demonstrate this as a viable approach to using a franchise QB?
The great passers in my mind have been guys like Favre, Marino, Brady, Manning, Roethlisberger, Brees, and so on. Some of these guys could run, but they were not used as runners. These are not guys putting their head down as ball carriers against NFL defenses, at least not to any great extent. If there are QBs out there now that really are being used as runners in a QB run option offense, then it must be a new thing, or they are doing it to the detriment of passing. Despite rules changing to favor passing, these guys are not on any all-time leading passer lists. And I wouldn't expect them to get there either, before they get banged up.
When your head and shoulders are taking a pounding something is being given up in your ability to throw. The run isn't free to someone who must think, keep their wits, read defenses, and throw accurately. If you run a lot as a QB, I'd say that a true passing pinnacle has not actually been achieved. You may be helping the team with that run, or so it would seem, but it doesn't come for free. It comes at the cost of something else that you may not be able to definitively quantify.
Robert Griffin III is a classic case of what can happen when you run your quarterback, to illustrate an extreme of what I'm saying here.
Maybe rules are changing to the point that you can't tackle the QB anymore. Then it would make sense.
In a pre snap the play call may be some run to the right with a WR screen to the left. if the screen is there, the QB will just rise up and throw it out there, while the OL and RB's run the running play.
in a post snap RPO, the offense tries to isolate a 'conflict' defender, that might be the 7/8th guy in the box. So while the QB reads this guy,and if he stays back for pass,the QB hands the ball off, the D crashes on the run, throw the ball into the hole he just left. The OL blocks a run play, the QB decides what to do with the ball post snap.
If you read the article that was linked, you can see Andy Reid's coaching tree has a lot of RPO's , KC, Eagles, Indy, and now the Bears. I am pretty sure the Rams are running it as well plus a few others.
This offense doesn't really put the QB in harms way
In the QB read offense, this is where they leave a guy unblocked, and the QB 'reads' him, and these are the guys getting hit, And you are correct relative to RGIII. Most people wouldn't leave a $30 million computer out in the rain unprotected, the same ,your $30 mil QB can't be left unprotected either.
Now relative to PSU offense, we do some of all three (pre and post snap pro, QB reads) The thing that I do not like about our schemes is how we block for runs. We use man blocking. I am more of a zone blocker. That is, I want 2 double teams at the hole, and then come off to get to the second level. Watch the pros, most do it that way. It isn't anything new, and I think it would clean up 1000 of our problems. If we had blocked the last play vs OSU that way in 17 or 18 the RB would have hit his head on the goal post.
here's a break down from 2016, note the second play is more of the QB read/run variety
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