FLEXBONE HISTORY

“History is written by the victors.” Winston Churchill

History helps us to get a perspective of the past, learn from it and understand present problems. Knowing history and its effects is an integral part of being successful. By eliminating the same mistakes and not stepping in the same trap over and over again allows us to make bigger strides. Don't get me wrong, making mistakes is not a bad thing. Learning things the hard way is the best teacher in my opinion (remember touching the hot oven as a kid) and this process of understanding a subject is important in our development and in dealing with future problems. But you have scratched your head often enough by making one mistake a second time. We don't want to catch ourselves doing that, huh?

So lets see what history and Wikipedia tells us about the Flexbone.

"Air Force Academy Head Coach Fisher DeBerry was once quoted as saying "we need to be more flexible in the Bone." Hence, the term "Flexbone" was born. The design of the formation itself, however, was not created by Fisher DeBerry. The flexbone is a literal carbon copy of the Double Slot formation that Glenn "Tiger" Ellison had created over two decades before the flexbone was born. Incidentally, the option-style running game in the flexbone is based entirely around the Cowboy and Gangster series' of Ellison's Run-and-Shoot playbook."

It may be interesting if you are new to the Flexbone that it was not Fisher DeBerry or Paul Johnson who have invented the formation. Of course the Flexbone as an entire offensive system has flourished under these two masterminds.

Besides of many other great coaches who have helped develop this offense a couple of coaches have to be pointed out because they ran the Flexbone on the highest level.

Fisher DeBerry - Air Force

Paul Johnson - Hawaii, Georgia Southern, Navy, Georgia Tech

Erk Russel - Georgia Southern

Jeff Monken - Hawaii, Navy, Georgia Tech, Georgia Southern, Army

Ken Niumatalolo - Hawaii, Navy


RESSOURCES:
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexbone_formation