Questions about Steve Owen's "A" Formation

[Bryan]

Kind of a weird formation with wide splits, and unbalanced line, and an actual QB position.

1) What prompted Owen to create the formation? Did he have a unique offensive talent (other than Hein's snapping skills) that was best served by the A formation?

2) Owen used the formation from 1937-1952. How often did he use the formation? Was it New York's base offense? How often did the Giants use the formation in the late 40's and early 50's?

3) The Giants did have success with the formation and won titles...why didn't other NFL teams copy the A formation? Was it too difficult to teach? Were the personnel requirements specific to the formation?

4) What brought about the demise of the A formation?

[JohnTurney]

Coach TJ may have the most information about this . . . but maybe others, too.

[Byron]

Kind of a weird formation with wide splits, and unbalanced line, and an actual QB position.
3) The Giants did have success with the formation and won titles...why didn't other NFL teams copy the A formation? Was it too difficult to teach? Were the personnel requirements specific to the formation?

The "A" formation was basically a riff on the Single Wing. If I recall correctly, it was used after the "T" formation took the league by storm and was basically Owens' adjustment to the Single Wing to update, but not abandon, it. It required a top-grade Center and Hein was considered one of the few that could handle the requirements and still play at a high level.

I'm at work right now so forgive the generality of the post! I'm sure Coach TJ can actually provide a ton of detail and any corrections that are necessary.

[Bob Gill]

According to a 1963 book called "The Giants of New York," Steve Owen instituted the A formation in 1937, long before the T became commonplace. The diagrams make it look like a lot like the single wing, the main variation being that the backfield would be "strong" to one side and the line would be "strong" to the other. If I recall correctly, in the single wing the line and backfield were both strong to the same side. The diagram in the book also shows a couple of gaps (or wide splits, or whatever) in the line, which I don't remember seeing in any diagrams of the standard single wing.

[oldecapecod11]

Coach Steve Owen experimented with the A from the early 1930s on. Mel Hein joined the Giants in 1931, but Owen didn't use the A full-time until 1937. The Giants, using the A, became the first team to win their second official NFL championship games when they defeated the Green Bay Packers 23-17, adding this 1938 title to their 1934 defeat of Chicago. Green Bay ran the Notre Dame Box, another unique single-wing variant. The 1938 win was the last time the A brought the Giants a title, however, as George Halas' modern T formation began to dominate professional football after 1940. Mel Hein retired after the 1945 season and proved difficult to replace. The Giants and their A formation were beaten for the NFL championship by the Chicago Bears and the T in 1941 and 1946. Owen finally installed the T formation as an additional offense in 1948, although the Giants continued to run the A through his retirement in 1954. No other team used the A formation in the NFL and the offense today is used only by some aficionados at and below high school varsity level. Ted Seay is known to many of them as a coach who decades later developed greater passing possibilities from the nearly forgotten A.

Successful Operators
1933 New York Giants [11-3]: TB Harry Newman threw for 973 yards and 11 TD and ran for 437 yards. FB Kink Richards ran for 4 TD and had 3 receiving TD.
1934 New York Giants [9-5]: TB Harry Newman threw for 391 yards and ran for 483 yards. FB Ken Strong ran for 431 yards and 6 TD.
1935 New York Giants [9-3]: TB Ed Danowski threw for 794 yards and 10 TD and ran for 335 yards. FB Kink Richards ran for 449 yards and 4 TD. End Tod Goodwin had 432 yards receiving and 4 TD.
1937 New York Giants [6-3-2]: TB Ed Danowski threw for 814 yards and 8 TD. FB Tuffy Leemans ran for 429 yards. FB Hank Soar ran for 442 yards.
1938 New York Giants [8-2-1]: TB Ed Danowski threw for 848 yards and 7 TD. FB Tuffy Leemans ran for 463 yards and 4 TD. FB Hank Soar ran for 401 yards.
1939 New York Giants [9-1-1]: TB Ed Danowski threw for 437 yards. FB Tuffy Leemans ran for 429 yards and threw for 198 yards. B Len Barnum ran for 237 yards and threw for 3 TD.
1941 New York Giants [8-3]: TB Tuffy Leemans threw for 475 yards and ran for 332 yards and 4 TD. WB Ward Cuff had 317 yards receiving
1943 New York Giants [6-3-1]: TB Emery Nix threw for 396 yards. TB Tuffy Leemans threw for 360 yards and 5 TD. FB Bill Paschal ran for 572 yards and 10 TD. WB Ward Cuff ran for 523 yards.
1944 New York Giants [8-1-1]: TB Arnie Herber threw for 651 yards and 6 TD. FB Bill Paschal ran for 737 yards and 9 TD. WB Ward Cuff ran for 425 yards. End Neal Adams had 342 yards receiving. End Frank Liebel had 292 yards receiving and 5 TD.
1946 New York Giants [7-3-1]: TB Frank Filchock threw for 1,262 yards and 12 TD and ran for 371 yards. FB Bill Paschal ran for 362 yards and 4 TD. FB Merle Hapes ran for 5 TD. End Frank Liebel had 360 yards receiving and 4 TD. End Jim Poole had 307 yards receiving and 3 TD.

See Above at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_formation

[rhickok1109]

Pop Warner used three formations at Carlisle and Pittsburgh before he developed the double wing formation. He called them "regular formation," "A formation," and "B formation."

Regular formation was basically the T; his teams always lined up in the regular formation and sometimes ran plays out of it, but more often they shifted in one of the other two formations. B formation was the single wing, which was the formation the used mose often. I wonder if his A formation was what Owen used?

[oldecapecod11]

rhickok1109 » Fri Jan 16, 2015 5:13 pm
"Pop Warner used three formations at Carlisle and Pittsburgh before he developed the double wing formation. He called them "regular formation," "A formation," and "B formation."
was what Owen used?"

If you glance at the wiki article, you will see Owen followed the same practice: A for A, B for SW, T for T, but no two for tea.
So, I bet Stout Steve took more than a few pages from the PW book?

Somewhere, there is a great article on the A with diagrams and a few basic plays. More important, the illustrations show the shift movements between the three formations. Darn! I might not have saved it. I bet it is on one of the NYG site pages and they have trimmed some of those.

[John Maxymuk]

Pop Warner used three formations at Carlisle and Pittsburgh before he developed the double wing formation. He called them "regular formation," "A formation," and "B formation."

Regular formation was basically the T; his teams always lined up in the regular formation and sometimes ran plays out of it, but more often they shifted in one of the other two formations. B formation was the single wing, which was the formation the used mose often. I wonder if his A formation was what Owen used?

Ralph,
According to warner's 1927 book, football for coaches and players, formation a was sw and formation b was dw. Since you are referring to Warner from the Pitt era, do you have something earlier in which he describes it as you say?

FWIW, I think Owen took full credit for his A formation in his book.

[rhickok1109]

Pop Warner used three formations at Carlisle and Pittsburgh before he developed the double wing formation. He called them "regular formation," "A formation," and "B formation."

Regular formation was basically the T; his teams always lined up in the regular formation and sometimes ran plays out of it, but more often they shifted in one of the other two formations. B formation was the single wing, which was the formation the used mose often. I wonder if his A formation was what Owen used?

Ralph,
According to warner's 1927 book, football for coaches and players, formation a was sw and formation b was dw. Since you are referring to Warner from the Pitt era, do you have something earlier in which he describes it as you say?

FWIW, I think Owen took full credit for his A formation in his book.

That was stupid of me! The book is sitting about 18 inches from me and I wrote blithely on without bothering to look at it

Yes, you're absolutely right. I stand corrected. Formation A, diagrammed on P. 140, is quite clearly the single wing and Formation B, diagrammed on P. 157, is the double wing.

[John Maxymuk]

Pop Warner used three formations at Carlisle and Pittsburgh before he developed the double wing formation. He called them "regular formation," "A formation," and "B formation."

Regular formation was basically the T; his teams always lined up in the regular formation and sometimes ran plays out of it, but more often they shifted in one of the other two formations. B formation was the single wing, which was the formation the used mose often. I wonder if his A formation was what Owen used?

Ralph,
According to warner's 1927 book, football for coaches and players, formation a was sw and formation b was dw. Since you are referring to Warner from the Pitt era, do you have something earlier in which he describes it as you say?

FWIW, I think Owen took full credit for his A formation in his book.

That was stupid of me! The book is sitting about 18 inches from me and I wrote blithely on without bothering to look at it

Yes, you're absolutely right. I stand corrected. Formation A, diagrammed on P. 140, is quite clearly the single wing and Formation B, diagrammed on P. 157, is the double wing.

No big deal. Thanks for the clarification