Again, it's not about the % of runs. Its the fact that no matter how well we have thrown the ball we haven't opened up the run game. And it's not because teams are stacking the box. It's because we have two separate offensive identities.
One identity recognizes the matchup problems our depth at WR create. It gets in Shotgun/Trips/Trey formations and throws the ball all over the field. Schaub gets to stand in and make quick reads and accurate throws both down the field and short. Screens work great because the formation encourages pass rush from the defense. Slaton is maximized because of the space he has. Daniels and Anderson are at their best because they get favorable matchups underneath due to AJ. Kyle Shanahan has shown great creativity in these sets with misdirection and screens. It should theoretically put the defense in 5 and 6 man fronts which we can actually run against. New England has been doing it for 3 years. Make the Defense bracket AJ and cover your possession guys underneath, and then run the draw for 7 yards. This offense suits our personnel perfectly.
The other identity gets in the "I" with Leach and attempts to run the ball into the teeth of the defense. Slaton, the o-line, and Daniels are all ill-suited for this. The one advantage is that it creates play action passing attempts off of the bootleg (schaub is ill suited for this by the way due to lack of mobility). That means that this formation has lots of drawbacks for our personnel and the one advantage is it helps the passing game (the part of our offense that needs no help).
So why do we insist on doing our running from under center exclusively and in the I most of the time. The only thing I can think is that it's what Kubiak knows best. Did anyone see Ray Rice's go ahead TD yesterday. The same counter play we run, but it came from the shotgun after 350+ yards of passing so all he had to do was beat the safety and then jog to the endzone. If they had gone into the I there like we do for our running plays, then they would have had to block it perfectly to make it work for 4 yards. And we don't block anything perfectly.
We need to take advantage of our personnel. No more I formation. No more Leach (I am a fan but he doesn't fit). No more running on running downs. Start running from passing formations when the Defense is having a nervous breakdown about AJ and JJ bunched on the outside about to run deep routes. Then you are facing 5 in the box with 6 DBs and the safety bracketed over the top. Start using formation to allow the pass game to help the run game, not the other way around.
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