What a Quarterback Sees in 2.5 Seconds: The Real OODA Loop | Dub Maddox

A quarterback gets about two and a half seconds to read a picture that eleven people spent all week building to deceive him, and the picture usually changes anyway. No Way Out host "Ponch" Rivera calls that an orientation problem, and it is the subject of this conversation with Dub Maddox, creator of the R4 Football System.

It started with a pick six. Twenty years ago Maddox's high school quarterback came to the sideline and said he had no idea what he was seeing. Maddox went looking for a way to train a young brain to process under pressure, and the search took him to John Boyd. R4 stands for rhythm, read, rush, release: four separate decision phases inside one play, each one its own orientation problem.

They get into hip angle and what a defender's hips tell you, route timing and why a quarterback locked on a dig has already missed the throw that was there, and what Maddox found inside SEC and NFL quarterback rooms. He also tells the story of asking one of the most respected quarterback coaches in the country how you teach a kid to recognize open, and being told the quarterback just knows.

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John R. Boyd's Conceptual Spiral was originally titled No Way Out. In his own words: 

“There is no way out unless we can eliminate the features just cited. Since we don’t know how to do this, we must continue the whirl of reorientation…”

Stay connected with No Way Out and The Whirl Of ReOrientation

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Substack: The Whirl Of ReOrientation - www.thewhirl.substack.com

Transcript

Introduction

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 0:20

All right, in about two weeks' time on a Friday night in Oklahoma or Texas, and even right down the street here in Virginia Beach, there's gonna be a 16-year-old who is walking up to a line of scrimmage and he's gonna look across the line and see eleven people who spent the whole week trying to figure out how to lie to him. He has about two and a half seconds, he reads the picture, there's two safeties deep, there's a corner squatting at about seven yards, and he knows exactly what that means because his coach drilled it into him all summer. He's a starting quarterback. So he trusts it and he lets it go. And by the time the ball leaves his hand and the receiver, the picture completely changes. One of those safeties spins down into a throwing lane, the corner who was squatting is now running or sprinting, and the ball gets picked off. The kid comes off the field and everyone in the stand says the same thing. Man, he forced it. That kid read exactly what he was shown. What he was shown was a lie, it was deception, and that lie is was installed on purpose by the opposing team on a Tuesday in a meeting room. Now, here's what I want to get out of today. Every quarterback who's ever gotten good says the same thing about their experience. And they almost have the same words for it. The game has slowed down. Lamar says it, Burrow says it, Manning says it, Brady says it's a superpower. It wasn't how fast he could run, but how fast he could diagnose what the defense was doing to him. And he actually said this, and I think it's kind of funny. He was Starlink before there was Starlink. For a 12-year veteran or or a or a rookie quarterback, the only thing that's changing for them is their processing speed, how well they get through an oodaloop. So my guest uh today is Dub Maddox. He built a system for it and he has it on a headset, and he also talks about the Oodaloop. So welcome to the show, Dub. Did I get anything wrong with that opening?

Dub Maddox 2:03

No, it's great, man. It's very common. A lot of coaches are getting ready to endure that scenario.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 2:08

A week from the, I think uh what, two weeks? We're about a week out right now.

Dub Maddox 2:12

Yeah, a lot of places are starting two weeks. Some have even started already. So depending on what region you live in.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 2:17

But when you're running to starting quarterback through this, you still have a second string and a third string quarterback that aren't getting the reps, right? And it's likely that the first string quarterback may be starting for the first time this season and not seeing the game represented the way it's going to be played on a Friday night. So can you talk a little bit about that and the problem you're trying to solve with your R4 system?

Dub Maddox 2:38

Yeah, it's a it's a problem I've been trying to answer for the last 25 years in coaching high school football. And just going back to my first year as a coach, I'll I'll never forget coaching quarterbacks that first year. And really, I thought when I started out, it's pretty simple. I I was lucky enough to have a very high-level quarterback, my first year coaching quarterbacks in 2006. He was the epitome of Maverick and Top Gun, didn't get rattled. Anything I gave him, he could process. And, you know, back then everything was pretty simple, defender key read-based. So you would teach a quarterback to lock on to one primary threat, and you're putting that primary threat into a two-on-one mismatch with routes. And if he drops to the flat, you throw the curl, he drops to the curl, you throw the flat. And we had a lot of success with that. The problem is that defenses have got more complex with how they bait you into those those and trap you into those throws. But even back then, we got into the playoffs that year, had a lot of success up to that point, on the road, hostile environment, chaos all around. We call that same curl flat concept. My quarterback drops back, and the flat defender didn't go to the flat. He didn't drop to the curl, he just stood there. And it, my quarterback had never experienced that scenario before. He locks in, throws a pick six right to the guy, comes to the sideline, eyes as big as saucers, and he says, Coach, I have no idea what I'm seeing out there. And that's not a place you want to be as a coach. I had no tools or tactics or training on how to pull him out of that tailspin. Our head coach is upset because we're behind now. And luckily we're able to run the football and squeak out a win. But that offseason, my mission was to find we've got to figure out a better way on how to train our quarterbacks how to process under pressure. Because that game was different than the other games that we experienced before. Because if we lost that game, we go home. Season's over.

The origin of the R4 system and its development

Dub Maddox 4:24

And so that that sent me on a journey to find like how do we train these young men whose brains aren't fully developed on how to process better under pressure. And that's what led me into finding the UDLUP concept and going in deep with John Boyd's tactics and training. And that kind of laid the foundation for what we we began with the R4 process. And that's really where where we're at today is the evolution of that. And we feel like we've really built a system that's helped thousands of quarterbacks and coaches across the country now.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 4:56

We'll get into the R4 and all that and the connection, but we do have a lot of listeners that tune in from overseas, or they may not be familiar with the game of football. Uh the football they're familiar with is soccer. But I want to put some context in people's head on what's actually happening here. And let me start off by saying um football is not a high flow sport. What I mean by that is there's no reciprocal teaming. There's no offense going to defense unless it's by accident. There's breaks in it and things like that. So when when outsiders look at the game of football, they're like, well, why does it stop so much? And they're I think they're looking at it incorrectly. It's the speed of the game that is absolutely fascinating, what's going on in the short window. Uh so can you take it from there and kind of help our listeners understand the game of football if they, you know, if they're looking at it from a lens of of basketball or soccer or one of those high flow uh sports?

Dub Maddox 5:40

Yeah, there's gonna be, you know, your your shot clock, I mean, between plays is around 40 seconds. So, you know, after a play expires, you have about 35 to 40 seconds to you know get the next play in, to reset offense gets lined up. Depending on the tempos, teams are running anywhere from 20 to 40 seconds in between plays. And and so there is a resetting there, and there's a lot of things that are occurring during those breaks between plays with coaches and players. That there's a lot of mental stuff going on, a lot of ooh-loop processes being being incurred there because you're trying to observe, okay, what happened on the previous play, right? You're running through all your mental models in your head of what they could do, what you've game plan, then you're making decisions and then you're acting on those. And so the the loops never never end. It's a constant ooh loop process, but there's there is breaks in times, you know, different than free-flow play of basketball and soccer. And so there's a lot more strategy, I think, that goes into it than the other sports where it can ends up being kind of more free-flow. I think coaches have a little bit more impact on the games because of the plays they're calling and the time that they have the process on how to counter the previous play.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 6:48

So the the you know, from the time the ball is snapped to let's look at an average play, a passing play, how much time elapses from the ball being snapped to a quarterback uh releasing the ball into a receiver's hands? And we don't have to cut, you know, not the continuation of the play, but just that that that's the point. Right.

Dub Maddox 7:03

So the quarterback on a typical pass play in a perfect world, you have three seconds of time or less. Typically in the NFL, it's about two and a half seconds, uh, depending on how good your offensive line is. And so there's 20 to 30 different things that a quarterback has to process just before the snap to that termination of that three seconds. It's amazing how much information and how many decisions he has to make in roughly five to ten seconds from the pre-snap process into those three seconds after the ball snapped.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 7:33

But they're doing this other pressure too, right? You got these big linemen running after you and you got hands in front of you that are blocking your view. Um, what else is going on? And I again it's just creating the context here because I think where we want to go with this is the the way you're coaching quarterbacks is no different than the way we learn how to fight in fighter aviation.

Dub Maddox 7:51

And I just I think I think there's a lot of carryover there. And in in building R4, I I did a lot of research on you know, fighter pilots, on obviously that we talked about Boyd because there is no absolutes in football. And you know, we'll call a play, the play has a progression, it has a plan, but that thing can just on the fly because what you see pre-snap today in today's game is not what's gonna happen post-snap.

The importance of perspective and environment in training

Dub Maddox 8:18

I mean, the the picture changes, the pattern change, the environment changes drastically. And so a lot of times you can't see. I mean, you're gonna see a quarterback's gonna really see his space, the open space. He's gonna see it 60% of the time, 40% of the time, he's he's gonna be the view's obstructed. And so there's a lot of timing and trust between the receiver and the quarterback that have to be there. So the receivers have to see space the same, have to understand how to get in the space at the right time. So again, a lot of moving parts there and a lot of uncertainty. And that's I think where the the O loop can help uh fill in those gaps for the quarterback because the the uncertainty and the chaos is just like a fighter pilot endures. The only issue is that your your life's not in danger. But there is a threat of danger when that 250-pound defensive end's coming off the edge.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 9:05

Yeah, and I would say this one of the biggest differences between sports and what we did in fighter aviation, we've always said this, is that the way we prepare for anything in fighter aviation was we we're gonna play one game, one Super Bowl, right? Whereas a team or a business is gonna have multiple opportunities to get to get ready for that Super Bowl. So the way we trained in in aviation is valuable because we're always looking at scenarios and we're always running through things, and clearly we're always debriefing, and that's where the key thing is. But I I recently ran a um a conversation with Dan Pederson, who who is godfather of Top Gun, the guy that stood up Top Gun, and he pointed out that when he did a debrief, and I missed this when I sat down with him, it was really about looking at the opportunities the the new pilot missed or the new crew missed. And I think that's what you're trying to develop through the the um R force system is provide those early opportunities in a safe environment, kind of like what we want to do, so they can start to pick up those, we'll call it affordances or opportunities for actions, or notice those things or attune to those things in the environment that are important. And that's exactly what we did in fighter aviation is when you do a dog fight, which lasts maybe 20, 30 seconds max, you're you're spending hours debriefing that that 30 seconds because it's all about what are you paying attention to? What did you notice? What are you noticing when you get up there, right? Did you notice, uh, you know, though in our case, it was where's the sun? Where's the wind coming from? Uh how many angles did you have on him? How many angles did he have on you? What was his airspeed? What was your airspeed? Right. It's it's so many things that you have to process in that in those few seconds that I don't think it's any different than what we're learning about from uh what elite quarterbacks are saying. And I want to point out one thing again. Elite quarterbacks are saying that the game is slowing down for them, and that is a state of flow, a flow state, right? You're present, uh time seems to you know slow down around you uh and focus. So that's that's what you're trying to get done with R4. And I I do want to bring it back to um the language you use in R4. You also use like, first off, what does R4 stand for? And then um uh you you also talked about cushion and I think collision in there as well. Can you talk about that?

Dub Maddox 11:06

Yeah, R4 R4 is stands for rhythm read rush release. It's the four decision-making oodle loops that a quarterback has to incur post-snap. So there's a rhythm phase of the oodle loop, and that's the first route in the progression. And so that quarterback on the drop, he has about 1.4 to 1.5 seconds as as the ball snapped to before he gets to the top of his drop. And he has to confirm is that first route space viable? Is that a throw or no throw decision immediately? Like he and so he's got to process a lot of information, a little amount of time. Novice quarterbacks or quarterbacks that never see the field, they they stay locked onto that space and they struggle with making sense of that picture. Essentially, their Polaroid develops too slow, right? If you're talking about the old Polaroid, you know, cameras where you have to, you know, let you know, take the picture that shoots out and you have to let them dry and that picture develops. So again, how do we get that picture to develop as quickly as possible? We have to teach our quarterbacks how to read the reality of what they're seeing. And there's non-negotiables in there that if they learn how to anchor their eyes correctly, they can pick up patterns that reveal the reality faster. And so that's really the secret of sauce of R4 is that we we've identified the non-negotiable patterns of

The R4 decision-making process explained

Dub Maddox 12:21

coverage. And so we're able to see things that others can't. And I'll get into more of that later, but but the the read the the go back to the R4. We have the rhythm phase of the oodle loop, that's the first route phase. If that's capped and taken out by the defense, then we have to get off to the next best phase. That's the read phase. That's the the next route in the progression. And and that and that is gonna be another oodle loop that happens quicker. So each time it's like a funnel, right? So so that first that the top of the funnel, it's longer, even though it's it's a short amount of time, it's longer for the quarterback. That's the first phase. We've got it, we've got to decide how fast do we get off, can we get off that route? And then then we get to the read phase, that's the second part of the funnel. That's the second route in the progression, then the rush phase is the third part of the of the Oodaloop progression, that's the third route. And then in football, if you've taken a drop and two hitch steps in the pocket and haven't thrown the ball, if you've gone through three decision-making phases and haven't thrown the ball, you're you're gonna get sacked. So that's where we get into the release phase. And so, and so we what we've done is we've mapped out the the average timeline a quarterback has in the game, and we've we've put, okay, what is the the most decision-making process they can make within that. So, and then that's how we structured it. So we we start to train our quarterbacks. Listen, you have a rhythm phase, a read, a rush in the release phase. And once we were able to drill that with their footwork and build the clock, and then teach them how to anchor their eyes and how to process those patterns within those phases, we were able to get him through that decision-making cycle faster. We were able to accelerate his cognition essentially.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 13:52

Yeah.

Dub Maddox 13:52

And so, and so now what you're seeing is quarterbacks dropping back and building anticipation faster. They don't get the the sacks are reduced, the interceptions are reduced. And so that's really the genesis of the system. And and and it grew from there, but that was really the impetus of it starting back 20 years ago.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 14:10

I'm gonna share something with you, and I I do want to come back to rhythm in a in a moment, but I want to talk about the way I look at what you're trying to do. And this is through the you know, the science of flow, peak performance, and and based on what I'm learning about uh the speed of the game and things like that is uh on the left side you have the challenge of the environment. You can think of this as the the defense, and then uh on the bottom is your skills of your quarterback. What's happening in in sports or in in football right now is generally the game is up here, right? Uh the environment uh the challenges is just too high, and your skills are right here. So uh you get a lot of anxiety, stress, you're you're unable to read anything, you need your quarterbacks just can't function well without the the reps, without the repetition. What needs to happen is you need to bring your quarterbacks up to this channel uh and their skills, right? So the way we do this is you have to give them some type of re representative design, either through simulation or reps you know, that they're actually gonna experience during the game, and you bring that up through there. So what we're trying to do in any type of skills development, which includes teaming skills, the teamwork skills, is you want to move up to the right in the skills, that way you can meet the challenge of a changing environment. So ideally we want to be in some in that type of state and just keep moving up and right as the environment continues to get more challenging. So that representative design is absolutely critical. But we can't just throw the throw them in a football game. Although I I think there's stories that that the Colts did that with Peyton Manning just said, hey, look, let's let them fail as fast as possible. But we want to create an environment where they can fail and and uh in a safe environment and move their skills to the right as fast as possible so they can meet the challenge of the environment. And and that in in that flow state, in that peak performance state, uh the game actually slows down. And that's what we're try talking about here. So uh can you share some insights on on how you start progressing the the you know, what what things are you looking at or helping the quarterback attune to in the environment uh that helps them move their skills to the

The significance of language and mental models in training

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 16:20

right to meet the challenge of the environment of the game.

Dub Maddox 16:24

Yeah, well, the first thing you have to have as a coach and is you have to have frames of reference. Right? I mean, and and you have well, I'll even go back a step further. The first thing you have to do is you have to establish what are the non-negotiables of the environment we're operating in. Like, like, you know, what are the cons what are the what creates the boundaries of our environment? And and in football, it's space, it's time, and it's talent. Right? That th those three elements work together to create the environment of football. And so we have to operate. Everything we teach has to operate, has to define those. We have to learn how to read those, how to how to code them, how to coach them. And so um the name of the game of football from an offense perspective is we want to create space and we want to attack space. The the defense wants to close space and wants to constrain it. And so that's where the battle is. And whoever does it the best wins, right? So so we have to define what is open. That's the number one question our quarterbacks have to be able to answer. We have to define open. And that was the the question I would go around asking coaches. As a young coach, I was trying to find out well, how can I kick my quarterback from locking up and throwing that pick six? How can I keep him from from um locking up under pressure? Well, the problem was I haven't defined what open was. Like he has no clue. He's operating from his own like experiences. Right. And he thinks, you know, and and every time I called the post play, the quarterback he's dropping back, he's throwing the post. It doesn't matter if it's open or not. And he comes to the sideline, I was like, why'd you throw the post? It was triple cover. He said, No, it wasn't. And I'm having an argument with the 16-year-old, right? Well, I it's it it's it everybody's blaming the kid, but it's my fault as a coach because I haven't defined it. Right? We have to define what open is. And so no matter what domain you're in or sport or business, it's like, what is the number one thing that question we gotta answer that you got to start there, right?

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 18:10

Go ahead. This is great. So you're you're talking about orientation, and and there's a couple uh ways we can look at this. So your orientation as somebody with experience is gonna be different than that 16-year-old. There's no doubt about that. But your perspective of the game is you you have video, you're you're looking at it from a uh either if you have a drone or if you have a God's eye view, you can look at it from there, or you have cameras that can look at it from there. What you don't have is you don't have the what what exactly the quarterback is seeing, right? And that's perspective. That is the most important thing is we can look back at a game and Monday morning quarterback it and have the God's eye view and the stadium view and all that and analyze it, but that's not the perspective the quarterback has, right? And I think that's what this type of training does. It goes, okay, based on all these inputs we have from different perspectives, the most, and this is my opinion, and and tell me where I'm wrong on this or right, is the most important perspective is the perspective of the quarterback. What do they see? And let me let me throw this at you. I learned this when I was an F-14 instructor, right? And we just go through a natural progression of plan brief, execute, debrief, we go through the oodle loop, we do all these things. And it isn't until uh you realize that the the pilot you're flying with, his his he's looking through soda straws because his skills aren't there yet, right? And you have to kind of not dumb it down, but kind of go, okay, baby steps, what do I need to give you right now? So your soda straws open up to this, and that's situational awareness. And I remember, and I tell the story often is just even landing on an aircraft carrier where the pilot is just, you know, like really tight and really worried, his first time doing it, their awareness is really small, right? So even though we may have briefed something that allows them to really fly this thing, you know, into the groove and get a three-wire, they just need a little bit of coaching from time to time. So you have to let them, as a coach, you have to understand what they can see. And I think this is important. What you just pointed out is the quarterback telling you that that's what he saw is exactly what he saw, right? And you can't say you're wrong. It's like, okay, I need to correct that. And you're right as a coach, you need to help create the conditions and the constraints that uh that allows that kid to see. So again, a lot of parallels between uh, you know, my background and what you're doing. But is that true? Is that is that kind of how you see uh the landscape and what you're doing is is really helping their perspective?

The importance of perspective and environment in debriefing

Dub Maddox 20:23

Yeah, and and I think I I've had the unique opportunity the last couple of years to get behind some high-level programs in the SEC and even some NFL rooms and and just and just be a fly in the wall. And and what what was interesting is when I got into these these upper echelons of football, I thought I was gonna, man, I'm really gonna learn something. And and and I was I was shocked at how these guys are are being trained. I was like, this can't be this can't be the case. And and a lot of these guys are are just kind of left on their own, quarterback-wise, or left on their own to just kind of self-discover and learn on their own. There's there's not a lot of higher level teaching there. Do you think it's hard for me to know? I mean, I think every place is different. I think ego is a big thing. I think uh a lot of these guys are are stuck in silos and they they aren't given the freedom to go out and explore and experiment on ways to train. Uh it's such a high, high-stakes job, and and there's so much time spent recruiting and doing other things. I don't think they have a chance to really research and explore and experiment.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 21:24

All right, so you're talking about the coaches or the the players?

Dub Maddox 21:27

I'm talking about the coaches. Yeah. Okay. I think I think I think the I think the coaching at the higher levels is maybe not what you think it is. Now, I I'm sure there's there's guys out there that are doing things, but I just I don't I don't think they're they're on top of of cutting edge. I I think that that that's what I found as a young coach, Ponch. I mean, I my mission was to find the best quarterback coaches in the game when after that that year 20 years ago where my quarterback failed under pressure. I was like, I've got to find who who's the who's the Obi-Wan Kenobi of quarterback coaches that I can go figure out the answer on how to get my kid just to know what open is. And so I'll never forget I I I I identified one of the guys, and and he's written a lot of books, and and so I went and watched their spring football and uh was so excited, I was like, I'm finally gonna get the answer. And you know, watch practice, and then I got in the film room with him after practice. We were going to a practice film, and it was just Me and him. It was very rare. Usually there, you know, you have other coaches in there. So I'm like, man, okay, I have my book out, I have my notes, I'm ready to get the answer on how do we teach our quarterbacks to know what open is and how do we build anticipation? And so I just raised my hand and asked him on it on a specific play, and you know, the receivers run that dig route, and and uh and uh and and he you know made a completion and tight window. I said, Hey, I said, Coach, I go, how how do you teach your quarterback, how do you coach open? How do you teach him to know what open is, what how to have anticipation? He's he looked at me like I was an alien and he said and he said he just knows. And and I and I just I was I was so defeated because I thought I was gonna get the answer, but in college, you the you you play the guy who just intuitively has figured it out or has a natural gift for that anticipatory feel. And if he doesn't, then you you recruit another guy that can. In high school in the world I live in, we can't we we can't recruit. We have to we have what we have, we have to learn how to develop it. And so I think that's the difference between maybe some of the coaches at the lower levels is is they have to figure out a way to develop and and they're and they have more time and freedom to experiment and a little bit more freedom to fail as as the guys at the higher level. They it's a it's a dog eat dog world. Let's just go get it, let's go recruit a guy that can do it already.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 23:29

So I don't I do not find this shocking at all, and here's why. I I spent a lot of time in in corporate America with some of the biggest leaders in the world, and it's the same thing. And leader leaders need to know how to coach, as coaches need to know how to lead. So what you discover is um just because they're in a position, in a coaching or leadership position, doesn't mean they they read. That's number one. They don't look outside their own domain. They follow a dogmatic, uh, dominant approach that they learned over time, generally, so and the ego, like you pointed out. So if you come in with new information and challenge their assumptions, you're you're challenging them and they're gonna push back. So what we see, what I see happening in in like the world of basketball is you get coaches that are coming from outside the domain that didn't necessarily come up through, you know, college, D1, or excuse me, D1 high school, and then on into uh the pros or anything like that. They're they're coming in from the outside, maybe a D2 school, a little bit of experience, and maybe they ran a camera for uh an NBA

The need for common language and communication

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 24:21

team. So these folks that come in with a different view are the ones you ought to be listening to. And and it's very rare to find guys like you that pick up a book and read and try to figure out how something else works in another domain and bring it in, right? So so I don't what you're sharing with me isn't surprising at all. I mean, I I've seen this in corporate America is that you you're sitting there with the the the gurus of lean and and agile and you're you're like, oh, I'm gonna learn something valuable, and they don't know either, right? They don't know. So you got and this is the the whole thing about leadership and coaching is you don't know. You can't know, right? And you gotta go out and find out who who those uh philosophies and and first principles that can help you learn and know. And I think that's that's what you're doing. Anyway, uh I just wanted to point that out that uh it's it's not uh a shocker to me.

Dub Maddox 25:05

Yeah, no, it's it it's uh I think that's what led me to and and a lot of your guests you've had on Ponch uh are are are some of my heroes that that helped me the the books that I read. I mean, Gary Klein was a huge one. Uh I I have you look at all these books back here on my desk, there's probably I I think I have every one of Gary's books. He opened my eyes and helped me tremendously with his research uh and the and the things that he's written on to help help our decision-making process and going in and identifying the things that matter most in a Catholic environment. I mean, the non-negotiables. Like, I mean, I as a quarterback coach, I I wanted to give my quarterback all the answers that it and we have to have everything solved, right, that the defense could do. And there's no way he can drop back in three seconds and and be ready and process all the 50 things that could happen, right? Uh what I had to do is I had to boil it down to, hey, here's the three to four things that matter most, right? And and if we we can spot these three to four patterns that matter most, then that's gonna eliminate interceptions and sacks. And that's the two things that we've got to stay away from on pass plays. And and so I mean, I think that's the that's the the secret, I think, for a lot of people if you're listening and and you're and you're stuck on finding the solution to a problem in your business or your domain, is get outside of your domain, find the experts in other fields and start reading, start listening to these podcasts, and then you'll start to see connections and analogies that you can bring over to your world and solve those problems much faster.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 26:35

I'm a little curious. Have you you you come across ecological dynamics and constraints-led approach? Have you looked at that?

Dub Maddox 26:41

Yeah, yeah, I've done a little bit of research on those.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 26:43

Yeah. Yeah. So so um I uh again, I didn't know that there's a strong connection to like optic flow that we get from fighter aviation or or aviation in general. And that's exactly what you're trying to help your players under or your quarterbacks understand is just uh the affordances, those opportunities for action. And then I think when we were going back and forth in our emails, you mentioned I I don't know if it was you mentioned it or if it was mentioned in one of your blogs about hip angle, right? Yeah. Of the cornerback. And let's talk about that because uh there's there's something powerful here. Uh and and and I think hip angle, and I'm learning more about this when I watch the girls play basketball, is a defender's hip angle tells me where they can see. Uh is that is that about right?

Dub Maddox 27:21

Yeah, there's a lot. And I think that's if you if you look at the R4 process, there's there's many, there's m many layers to it. But one of the one of the biggest layers in the in in the I guess benefits of the R4 is that we're able to give frames of reference that allow you to read the reality of what you're seeing, and we're able to provide a lot of context with the with the with the language, a common language, to help you learn things faster. And I think if you look at um linguistics and language, as if as a fighter pilot, you understand this. I mean, you guys have a whole probably language you speak in the air. It's what I call heavy codes. Yep. It's it's short, simple words that pack a lot of information with with the with the little word, right? And and what it allows you to do is it allows you to say a lot with a little and and build those mental models faster just on one word recall. That is mission critical in the football world. I mean, you know, having that common language, being able to Does it exist? I I mean Well, that's what R4 is. But it does it doesn't it does not exist, but

The impact of perspective and situational awareness

Dub Maddox 28:21

the whole the R4 process, if you look, we have a we have a manual and it's it's a glossary full of brevity codes. And it and what that is, is it allows us to to uh paint pictures for our players and as coaches on the reality of what we're seeing based on a little one word. And I think if you look at any business, I mean that's that's what sets him apart.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 28:39

Yeah, yeah, I agree. So I I didn't know like when you're looking at a and and we'll come back to that uh hip angle thing. The if we go to any high school football team here in Virginia or Colorado or Texas or Oklahoma at the moment, what are the chances we're gonna hear a common language in there?

Dub Maddox 28:58

It's it's not you're not going to like that's the biggest issue, is like, and that's my first year as a as a as a football coach. We're we're in a game plan meeting with our staff. It's like a three-hour game plan meeting. We're all in there and everybody's watching the video, and head coach is rewinding it over and over, and and everybody, all the coaches in the room are are using these words like, oh that well, that's a tight front, that's an equal front, that's an overfront, that's a bare front. And I'm like, this is are they speaking Greek? What is this? I've never heard this before. Yeah. And it took me like three to five years to figure out what those words meant. And then more importantly, what I what was causing me a lot of confusion that really delayed my development as an early coach was coaches were using different words to explain the same pattern of front. Yeah. It's like being a bartender.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 29:45

Yeah.

Dub Maddox 29:45

Yeah, exactly. And so that's a and so I'm I one of my hobbies is collecting playbooks, and I love like getting new playbooks and going through and seeing different ideas or how people construct them, and what's what's amazing to me, and it's for whatever reason, it's the defensive world is way more of a mess than the offensive world, but defensive playbooks in college NFL, like the the the different words and the language they use to mean the same thing, or they'll have the same word that mean two different things. So imagine a player getting traded from you know Baltimore to you know to the Browns or whatever, and you know, he's been playing for five years and and this word meant one thing, and then here it means a whole totally different. I mean, that that's that's a huge problem. It could be fixed. I mean, listen to some of these play calls, quarterbacks are making NFL are like two paragraphs long, right?

Speaker 2 30:32

Yeah, yeah.

Dub Maddox 30:32

Yeah. I mean, I mean, we are slowing down the processing uh ability of these guys. It could be so much simpler.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 30:39

So so back to comp brevity, in in fighter aviation, we have it. It's we actually have standardization across NATO and across the US and things like uh we for example, this connect I think this connects to hip angle, and that's target aspect. And what we mean by target aspect in the Navy, it's different than the Air Force. In the Navy is how does that bad guy see me? Right. So if he's if he's flying directly at me, he can see me and he can shoot a lot of missiles at me. If he's flying like this, he can't shoot a missile at me. He can't see me really. Maybe he can. So same thing with a hip angle. If if if a cornerback is and and and I want you to take it from here, this is why brevity makes sense, is is from that aspect and from let's use empathy here. When you put yourself in the shoes of your defender, that changes things, right? That changes how you look at the game. And I think that's what you're trying to do with the language you're using. Is that correct?

Dub Maddox 31:29

Yeah, so some of the some of the challenge I had, like, for example, let's take cover three, all right. Cover three from a defensive standpoint is we have three defenders bailing deep. And so in theory, the three deep zones of vertical space downfield should be covered in cover three. Well, what happens is you'll get in a game, and let's say that left cornerback who's who's supposed to be that deep third defender to the left, well, he's dropping back, but he's he's dropping back with a different hip angle, and that hip angle's weakness is allow is opening us up to we could still throw that vertical shot. Like, so like that's what I call like what teaching my quarterbacks to learn how to read the reality of what they're seeing. Because a lot of coaches, we live in this whiteboard world. Hey, we're seeing cover three this week, we can't throw deep outside. Well, then you get in the game and the corners are not playing it like you think they are.

Simplifying complex decision processes in football

Dub Maddox 32:18

Right? I mean, like we don't live in in a vacuum here, like in especially in if you're a fighter pilot, right? I mean, like there is no absolutes in in our game, right? And so so what we had to do is we had to develop a language to code the reality of what we're seeing, and we had to under and that allowed us to basically define the strengths and weaknesses of that defender. All right. So we start with hip angles, right? So again, if the defender's hips turn and they're facing the end zone, like he is like fully turned and the hips are pointed to the end zone, like he's running downfield. A full hip angle means that he can close on vertical space. He is in a dominant position to defend that vertical go ball, right? The weakness is anything in front horizontally. So what we try to do is teach a quarterback, hey, what is this? What does this look like to you? I'll stop the film. Oh, that's a full hip angle. So full. So now we've got everybody in room aligned, coaches and players alike. All right, we all define what a full hip angle is, and now we know the strength and weakness, right? And that's a very simple concept, but it saves a lot of issues and it's it's an accelerant to processing. All right. And a and a lot of the higher-level quarterback rooms don't have that language.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 33:25

Right. But there's still a danger with this because even though you can see it from a stadium view or a camera view, there may have there may be a blocker where the quarterback can't see it at that moment, right? And this is why it's important, it's very important when you do a debrief, it's multiple perspectives that matter. That's great, coach. That's what you saw, but I can't see that because I've got this, you know, six foot five lineman that's his arm arms are up in my. I can't see that from here, right? Yeah. So so um again, there's a little bit of danger at this because if even though we have the same language, we may not have the same perspective. And that's what matters when we do a debrief. And I I want to point that out. Going back to hip, I can use basketball as an analogy here. So watching the girls play basketball and understanding the the forward foot or the foot that's forward from the defender helps them understand affordances. What can you do with that? That's what you're trying to teach the kids to understand. Not how do you dribble a basketball better, not how you shoot a basketball better, but how do you look at the environment and see what the environment affords you for opportunities for action, right? And this is this is ecological dynamics, and this is why it's so darn important that we get the reps we get, and you're giving quarterbacks to the system, therefore that that is so critical. That doesn't happen um in most practices, uh, right? Because your your second string quarterback doesn't get to do that, you don't get to run live reps all the time. So so how do you how does that system help a quarterback see those hip angles, or does it at all?

Dub Maddox 34:50

Can you can you say that again one time just to make sure I understand the answer correctly? Yeah, yeah.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 34:55

So so so you know, we're trying to provide rep repetitions without repetition for everybody on the team, right? Yeah, so but you can't do that all the time. You can't afford to put 11 on 11 and run that over and over just to get the reps. Yeah, so and and to show that the hip angle and all that. So so how does R4 account for that? How do how do you create those repetitions?

Dub Maddox 35:15

Yeah, well obviously watching film is one thing. The thing that we've gotten in the last probably five years is VR training. And and so and so I'm a partner with Reps Um VR. It's it's a company based out of Seattle, and and so it's a we can film all of our reps, live practice reps, uh in a GoPro 360, right? So we get 360 degree view and we put in the computer in the program, and then we can get the quarterback in the headset, and we can basically train him live 360, and I can coach him from what we call the shooter's view. And this was a this was a huge, I guess, light bulb moment for me the first time we got our quarterbacks in there, because again, I'm training from drone view, press box view, and when I'm teaching and coaching from his perspective, the spaces that I'm pointing out from that crow's nest view is entirely different from the shooter's view.

The future of training with VR and real-time feedback

Dub Maddox 36:08

Yeah. And so it really changed the entire way we we trained. And so again, you you have the backup quarterback, the third string, they can jump in, headset, get the same reps that they may be missing out on from the live perspective. And so it it was a it was a it was an accelerant for us with our with our guys. We're basically, I feel like we're getting one to two more years of growth with our kids now because of the additional repetitions they get in the headset. And they're they have freedom to fail in it. You know, I mean that's that's another another big thing. We talk about flow state and and anxiety and stress, and and a lot of kids are so worried about failure of failing and and looking bad that it actually prevents them from growing. And so when you get in the headset, they have a free space similar to a fighter pilot in a simulator, right, to to wreck the plane, right? To get blown up. Okay, well, I learned I learned I'll never do that again, right? Um, because we can't do that in real life, we'll never come back. So so I think that's probably the the biggest leap in our training is is now teaching those R4 processes through the headset and through the shooter's view. And you'll see a lot of NFL teams, when you watch them practice now, they'll have the GoPro in their head during practice. Wow. And you're yeah, and you're thinking, well, that's pretty cool. Well, the problem with that is is they'll go in and they're just watching it from the quarterback's perspective, but the coach doesn't have the ability to take that film and and control the spotlight of attention. See, with with our technology, we we we can go back through a rep, put the quarterback in the headset, go back through a practice rep from practice, let's say he threw an interception, and then at the point where he made his decision, we can stop, you know, say, hey, stop, and I can say, hey, look to your right, and he can look over to his right and we can see exactly what is going on to the right. See, you can't do that when you're just watching film from an affixed 360. We can actually move around in this environment. So I can grab the spotlight. Think if we were underwater and I was an expert scuba diver and I'm training you how to find, you know, whitetailed sharks or whatever, and and uh, and I can grab the spotlight underwater and shine it where you should be looking. Well, that's what we can do with the rep stuff that most coaches can't because they're just watching a replay of the film, what the quarterback saw from his attention. When you can grab the camera like in the film room and like act and say, hey, no, look to your right at this point, okay? What do you see back there? Oh, the corner has a full hip angle. Yeah. We shouldn't have thrown that, right? I mean, so this is fantastic.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 38:34

Yeah, yeah. So the going back to that point about uh Dan Pedterson, uh the godfather of Top Gun and the opportunities that they didn't use. So because the information's in the environment, and if I hear you correctly, that that camera that's on the quarterback is only focused kind of like a soda straw isn't in the full picture. Correct. What we want to do in a debrief is we want to provide the full picture. What what is available for you and all of us, even though you can't see it, right? Uh or you you're not looking at it. Because that is where we want to help them attune their attention. And and and may may I don't know if this is true or not, but if you're going down to your progressions on your on your different receivers, you can actually do train that with this approach too. I mean correct. Yeah. Pre-snap and post-snap, or how does that work? Pre and post-snap, yeah. Okay. And this is this is important because let's talk about progressions and how you can train that. And uh the way I like to think of it is is you know, opportunities for action. There's a plan, a play. There's the snapshot you get right before the ball is snapped and moments before, and then there's what happens afterwards, right? So I believe in the game of football, that that first image you get, you know, that last image you get before the ball snapped almost determines where you're gonna be looking, or does a play determine where you're gonna be looking? How's that work?

Dub Maddox 39:49

It depends on the play. I mean, different plays are structured. In the NFL, a lot of plays are more pure progression based, where you're starting to the left, let's say to the sideline, and you're working at you know, you know, receiver one, then two, then three, and and the way the coaches in the NFL design their plays, they got they break open in a one, two, three, four, five like order. Okay, whether it's be field or boundary, boundary to field, you know, high to low, low to high, there's different ways you can construct them. And other coaches have, hey, we're just gonna operate this side of the field based on coverage A, and if it's coverage B, we're gonna work on this side. There's a different, million different ways they structure plays. In the R4 world, we structure our progressions based on the DNA of the route in the space it's designed to attack. So different routes, routes are in families. Routes have like DNA structure. Like so rhythm routes break open in 1.8 seconds

Rhythm Routes and Timing Principles

Dub Maddox 40:41

or less, right? And they attack vertically. Right? So your seam, your post, your corner, your fade, your cross route, all those are rhythm based. They become open in around 1.8 seconds and they attack vertically. They stretch a defense vertically. So they have specific spaces that they attack and they have specific times where they break open. And when your quarterbacks and receivers understand those non-negotiable space and timing traits, they can learn how to fit them in the best progression that allows the quarterback to get to them just as they break open. And that's what made the West Coast offense so good back in the Bill Walsh days of the 1980s and with Joe Montana and Jerry Rice, if you're a football fan. Um, if you're on the East Coast, the Joe Gibbs, uh, watching Redskins, I mean, they were a very explosive uh passing offense. They were timed, rhythm-based timing offensive progressions. They were able to sync those routes up where the quarterback's coming into them just as they break open. So the next family routes is read routes, those take longer to develop. So routes like digs, curls, comebacks, any kind of route that's a double move, though those break open at 2.2 seconds or 2.6. So you don't want to look at those first. Though those those take longer to develop. They attack intermediate space. All right, and so I'm gonna come to those as a secondary option. What what the problem is is you'll watch a lot of NFL quarterbacks, they're dropping back and they're locked on to a dig route that breaks 10 to 12 to 15 yards, it takes 2.2 seconds to develop. And so they're missing out opportunity to hit a rhythm route first, and they're taking the defense to that route space. So if you don't understand those space and time like laws or rules of nature of in the football element, and you and you don't operate within those, then then you're gonna put yourself in bad situations. So those are just passing game principles. And I think that's important is that

Principles of Space and Time in Passing Game

Dub Maddox 42:30

you've got to understand the principles of space and time. So you can make sure whatever strategy you do use, it it obeys those. Now we can bend rules, right? We can we can work outside those things in situations, but I think a starting point from a coach is you want to train that the the principles of a good passing game. And and that means that your eyes are coming to routes just as they break open and you're sequencing your progression to make sure that as my quarterback scans through this play, he is not coming to a route late or early. He's coming to it right before the break point happens, and that's what R4 um helps you design.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 43:04

Okay, so the the you know, we use rhythm quite a bit in Boyd Doodle Loop. Rhythm is more important than more important than uh speed. So I'm glad you're using that. The the principles here are based on data, you got you got the timing right. Do all football coaches know this? I don't know. I'm asking, do

Teaching Quarterbacks to Dissociate Vision

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 43:22

they No. No. Okay.

Dub Maddox 43:24

I I think I think I I think a lot of coaches understand how to sync eyes and feet up with route breaks. Okay. What they don't understand is that you have to teach your quarterback how to dissociate his vision and get off a route faster in order to stay ahead of the break points of the of the next routes and the progression. So there's really two things that that coaches don't understand, even at the highest levels. A lot of coaches will do a pure progression play, right to left, left to right, and they'll go receiver one, receiver two, receiver three, four and five. That's how they'll teach it. Well, if I'm a quarterback and I'm dropping back and I'm looking at receiver one, then hitch up receiver two, hitch up receiver three, hitch up receiver. I mean, I'm sacked. Right.

Expertise and Teaching Methods

Dub Maddox 44:09

And I'll give you a quick story, and this is kind of interesting for your maybe your listeners. Okay, so this is from Gary Klein's book. All right. When I when I heard this, uh I was like, I dog eared it, marked it, and then I I Came back and dog eared it and double marked it a year later after I heard this story from it. So Gary was on, I think, Air Force Base and or some military base in Kansas or something, and his job was to run there to do some research. And then in the break room, there's these two pilots over there talking, and they have these big binders. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah, keep going. I love it. Yeah. Yeah. All right. And so he goes over there and he's like, hey, what are you guys doing? I might be botching this story, and you can fill in the blanks if I miss it. But they're they're writing a procedural manual. They were they were tasked to write a procedural manual on how they do what they do. I think they were, you know, some of the best uh in their their squadron or whatever. And and and they were they were, you know, hey, whatever you guys do that's so good, I need you to proceduralize it and write it this manual. So they had this big thick manual, and he's looking like, wow, this is like, how do you process all this stuff? And they're like, We we don't we don't do it this way. Yeah. And in fact, if we did, you would probably be an average pilot. And and so the the context was that it's very difficult for experts in any field to teach or extract on how they do what they do, right? And and so give you, let's give you, I'm gonna give you a football story here real quick, okay? That that's that that is an analogy to what Gary did. So last year I did some consulting with some with the NFL quarterback,

NFL Quarterbacks and Intuitive Decision-Making

Dub Maddox 45:31

and uh, and he was looking to use some of the R4 principles. And so we we met weekly on Zooms and we were going through the stuff, and he just said, Man, this is fascinating. Like, I wish I'd have had this 10 years ago. And he's like, What I would he was with the LA Rams four, four or five years ago, Matt Stafford's first year with LA. Okay, so he's in there in the quarterback room, Sean McVay comes in and gives his, you know, goes through the concepts, they're doing their install, and he's talking about going through a one, two, three, four, five progression. And and and the quarterback that I'm consulting with is like just intuitively, he's like, there's no way I could process five receivers in a three-second timeline. How how I mean, and so he asked Matt when he walked around, he goes, Matt, how do you do this? Like, how how are you able to operate this play like you're being coached? And he's like, Oh, I don't do that. And when when the quarterback told me this, I immediately go talk to Gary's story. He's like, you know, here's Matt Stafford, arguably one of the best in the game now, right? I mean, he is, you know, he's he is like master decision-making under pressure, and he doesn't operate those plays like he's being taught because intuitively he's figured out that doesn't work, right, within the within the reality of the game. So he has to shortcut it. He has to eliminate options pre-snap based on whatever he's you know seeing, indicator-wise. And he has to cut the play down into a way that can fit into the realistic world of the timeline. And see, that's what R4 like leapfrogs, R4 is identified that because we work off the rules and relationships of the reality of the game. And so I think that's the biggest issue with a lot of coaches is is they, well, this is a cool, this is a really good way to teach, it's a cool way it makes sense to me, but does it work in the real world? Does it work when that gun is pointed in your head and and you know, and and and and you you know have to get that done in in two

Shortcutting Decision Processes in High-Pressure Situations

Dub Maddox 47:20

point seconds, six seconds or less. And so I think that's a thing you'll see in a lot of industries is is the the best in the game have figured out a way to shortcut or cheat code the way those are being taught.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 47:32

So it's interesting, I just start thinking about this. Timelines in in aviation are critical because they're actually they're they're top gun timelines. We can't get into all the details of them, but they tell us uh when and where things should happen, no later than, no earlier than, that type of thing. And we also use heuristics quite a bit. So going back to you know, looking back at at John Boyd when he before he created Oodaloop, he wrote the aerial attack study. He broke down how you actually fight an aircraft, right? And this is in the 50s. And and so uh where I'm going with this is that the the lessons of what Gary Klein was trying to do or discovered with these expert pilots that were trying to explain how to do an intercept or some basic BFM, they're like, that's not how we do it, right? Uh so you gotta learn those heuristics and what what do things look like from your perspective in a cockpit? What are the indicators? What is the airspeed? You I think you use closure in in your language as well, collision. We use the exact same language, collision, closure, uh, opening, uh, all that. So it's it's very similar to what we did and do in fighter aviation and how we perform so well. Uh I I do want to do this with you. Uh hopefully we have some coaches listening to this for the first time and trying to figure out what does this OODA loop thing mean and all that. I'd like to take them through that with you so we can talk about some of these principles. But before we do that, and anything else uh you want to explore?

Using VR for Cognitive and Skill Development

Dub Maddox 48:49

Yeah, I just going back I think to the uh to the to the VR training element and we're talking about I think coaching from the shooter's view, I think that's if you're a coach listening, or even if you're you know listening in in another domain, I think you know, being able to see things through the people that you're working with or their training, I think is critical. I think that you know have it that perspective. Um that was an eye-opening moment for me as a coach, and I've never gone back. And I think as I look and when I go visit places and talk to people, I I see if man, if they would just if they could just do it this way, I think they would a lot of quarterbacks would benefit from it.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 49:25

Well, let's do this. Uh what you just brought up here is orientation. We can call it perspective, but orientation matters. It's the short punct of the oodaloop, it's what drives everything. And I think uh what I'm gonna share with you, and I want us to have a back and forth on this to make sure

The OODA Loop and Perception-Action Pathways

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 49:39

if we uncover something, that'd be pretty cool. So I'm gonna share a screen, see how this works, and we'll build this up. So uh there it is. Okay. So most people get the oodle loop wrong. They don't take a look at it as a performer agent or quarterback, that's what that is in the box, and the environment, right? The the it's a relationship between them. And what we get first is we get to the perception action loop. Perception is is what do I see? How do I see things? What am I attuned to in the environment? And action is just the action I take to influence or perturb that environment, a throw, a pass, a look off, uh, whatever it may be on, right? So that is key to the oodaloop. And unfortunately, most organizations, when they talk about the oodle loop, they talk about this oodle loop, right? The observer orient decide act from the perspective of uh you know, it's a four-step thing. First you observe, then you orient, then you decide, and then you act. That is okay. If that's all you understand of the OODA loop, that's okay. But it's bigger than that. It is much more powerful than just first you observe, then you orient, then you decide, then you act. So I'm gonna take us to something we brought up earlier, uh the constraints letter approach. So CLA is based off of uh really three components, if you will. Constraints being we have I'll break those down here for you in a moment. Constraints, you have three of them, and you already talked about them earlier when you brought up the time space talent. Yeah. That's kind of in there. Then you get perception action, and then you also have uh skills, right? And that's what you're trying to develop with R4 are the skills that that yellow line up there at the top of the screen. So they're your constraints uh that you we've already talked about. The one at the top there, the the blue one, I don't know if you can all see this very well. They're they're task constraints inside the OODA loop. When we get to that, it's unfolding circumstances. So the actions the safety the cornerback take during pre-snap or post-snap or whatever they're doing, their hip angle, that is a constraint. They're they're they're excuse me, they're unfolding circumstances, right? Their actions they take on the environment is information we can take in. That's that that top task constraint. And then on the bottom left there is uh environment constraints. That could be weather, that could be uh a game in the winter time, it could be the constraints of the football field, right? Those things we can manage from time to time, but for for the purposes of uh developing skills, the ones that we can really worry about are the task constraints. And I think that's what you're doing with the uh with the R4. And of course, individual constraints is just our orientation. It's actually built off of uh several components. One is genetics, so height, weight, you get into epigenetics and things like that, culture, and of course previous experience. What did I eat yesterday? What did I learn last week in the game? What did I learn from my debrief last week? What did I experience in the last 48, 72? Where did I go to school? Right. So that is that individual constraint there as we build this up. And I'm I'm reasonably the reason I'm using constraints-led approach is a lot of coaches are thinking like this now. And that's great. And it happens to be part of the OODA loop, and there's your perception action loop right there. This is a perception action inside the oodle loop. A couple things to think about attunement, right? So when you're your system is is a is a constraint or it's helping the quarterback

Constraints-Led Approach and Environment

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 53:10

understand what to pay attention to. And that's that green line up there, that perception. Any comments or questions at this point? Have you seen it presented this way? Okay. No, I haven't. This is good. Yeah, we'll keep building on this because uh I want I want to see if this helps you out. And then you get into skills, skill acquisition. Remember that that uh challenge skills balance thing we showed earlier where the challenge of the environment and then the skills. That's what we're trying to build up here. This is called implicit guidance to control. We'll build that up here in a moment, but inside of the constraints led approach, uh, which I'll show again, it's all there, right? So you have your your task constraints, uh, internal, external, you have your action, you have your perception action loop, and you have your skills. In the OODA loop, we want to develop these. That's that is key. That yellow pathway and that green pathway, perception. Uh it may show up twice. That's what you're trying to develop. What are you paying attention to? Where are you putting your attention, your attunement, and your intention, your skills, right? And and that's CLA from the lens of the OODA loop. What I'm gonna share with you now is the real ODA loop, right? There it is. That's the real OODA loop. Observer white decide, act is not as important as the pathways. And the key pathways for you as a coach are the top green one, implicit guidance control, and the yellow one, implicit guidance control. How do you build those skills up? How do you do that? You manage the constraints of the environment, those things on the left side. And that's what uh you know, running plays do. That's what uh that's what your system does. It focuses on the left side, as well as the uh uh they call it of effectivities, uh, which would be the orientation thing there in the middle. I'm gonna share one more thing and I might have to pop this up. Yeah. So uh I'm gonna stop share there. I'm gonna share one more window with you and see if I can get this to share. All right, let's give this a shot. So orientation. And this goes back to uh things that we've already talked about in here. So let me see if I can navigate this. All right. So orientation, there it is. It really starts with genetic heritage, right? This is kind of like our genes, our DNA, what we're born with, uh our heuristics, uh, our biases and things like that. You get in the culture that we're brought up in in the US, maybe we play football on young, younger, things

Orientation and Building Perception

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 55:34

like that. Previous experience could include TBI, um, getting hit in the head, uh, and that's the outer outer layer there. What you're trying to do with your system is really bringing this new information to build that previous experience up so they have a better orientation to the environment they're playing in, right? And the last piece of that is analysis and synthesis. So what we get with uh this is this is the most important part of the OODA loop. It determines how we perceive reality, how we plan, how we predict, how we adapt, how we learn, right? I just want to share this with you and and our listeners because I think uh that might help you in communicating to folks, uh coaches, first principles. What are we trying to develop with this, right? By the way, um, you can use the same approach to develop leadership skills, teamwork skills, strategy development. Uh, you can even look at it for mental health. So but I want to ask, man, have you seen it presented this way before? No. Okay. That's good. Yeah. No. Yeah. So I encourage folks to look at the real OODA loop. I mean, there's there's value in the OODA loop, don't get me wrong. When you look at it from the lens of, and I'll bring up something else real fast, uh, information processing and ecological dynamics, it actually brings them together. And I think that's what makes this a very powerful system. So we just went really technical, really academic real fast. But at the end of the day, you learn these principles, you learn what you're trying to do, you'll start to see why things like

Training the Real OODA Loop

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 56:59

how does virtual reality help and how does it hurt? And one way I'll say it will hurt is it's not a replacement for actual reps, right? It can't be. It's a supplement. How do I accelerate performance using this thing? And I'll tell you one thing, in fighter aviation, what you don't want to do is you don't want your fighter pilots not flying, right? You you want air under the butt. You you've got to put them in the real situation. And the way you get them accelerated for their learning is through simulation, and and that's key there. So any any thoughts, concerns, questions, comments from you on what we just went through? I know it's kind of fast, but no, it's good. It's good as helpful. Good, man. Yeah, dude, I'm I'm fired up for you. Uh, how is business and uh what's uh you know what what's it like this time of year for you?

Dub Maddox 57:42

It's busy, but so when the season hits, so I got out of coaching two years ago to to get more into consulting, and then the VR training was growing. We were heavily involved with colleges and and even some NFL teams on implementing uh VR training with with those guys. So with all those new opportunities, I was like, I really need to focus on this because this like it's a new frontier. You know, there's just there's a lot of I think of of of margin that hasn't been explored in terms of uh how to train cognition under pressure from from from the quarterback standpoint, and having these tools really helps you know give quarterbacks a way to accelerate that. So again, so during this season, I'm doing a lot of consulting. So like this week, I'll I'll start watching practice film, guys will share the practice film, I'll make suggestions, recommendations. I'm building some new VR training protocols right now uh that guys can get on.

Applying Principles to Different Sports and Domains

Dub Maddox 58:33

I train mobily, so like quarterbacks, I'll meet with them, we'll get on the Zoom. I can watch their reps on my computer as they're in the headset so I can see what they're seeing, so I can basically coach them virtually. And and so there's some cool things we're doing there. So again, I'm I'm staying busy, but it's more in-season maintenance with with high-level quarterbacks right now. And then in the offseason, I travel and speak across the country, coaching clinics and whatnot, and run camps.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 58:58

Well, I I came across this book recently. I don't know if you've seen it, mathletics. Uh, I think there's some updates to it. One of the data points that I think you'll like is uh hopefully I get this right. One yard of passing yard efficiency over the season equates to 69 more points during the season, right? So just and I I can give you that data. Um I think that's from four years ago. So again, they were looking at a run game versus so all things being equal, if you're going to increase any part of your game in football, it should be passion passing efficiency, right? Not and I think there's a difference between passing yards and passing efficiency, right? Most people look at the you know, hey, we've got 500 yards passing, but that may not be efficient. Right. So that data are telling us that uh all things being equal on offense, you need to focus on your passing game. Trying to get one more yard average per year leads to 69 more points in the NFL. I don't know what it looks like in college. Yeah. But uh that's why this is so damn important right now, is is uh the running game. I believe the data show that it doesn't matter if you have an established running game, it doesn't really help your your passing game. Is that true?

Dub Maddox 1:00:04

Is that yeah, I would I would think so. Now I mean I think you need to be able to run the ball, but I think the analytics stuff they're finding with the analytics is fascinating to me. I mean, it's it's really it's really spotlighting some things that are helping coaches.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:00:17

Well, the analytics are no different than what you gave me for the the dig and the other routes, right? I mean it's just correct it's just data. I mean, it's how do we use that data to come up with a first principle approach to train quarterbacks? Yeah, right? And that's what you're doing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's another aspect of this too, is is okay, if we can use this for a quarterback, what can we do for a a linebacker? Or what can we do for a safety, you know? And how much faster does this make the game when people realize it's really about cognition, right? Sure. Yeah.

Dub Maddox 1:00:50

No, a hundred percent. I I I think uh the game's evolving more and every every year and getting better, and and hopefully we're having a little small piece and moving that needle. So

Adapting to Context and Environment

Dub Maddox 1:01:00

it's getting faster. Have you come across Sean Mishka? I think I'm saying his name correctly. Yeah, yeah. I I I watched that, the pod that you had him on.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:01:07

Okay. Yeah, and the same thing, you know, his story about um you know, just looking at the combine and and looking at those hard numbers. It's like looking at passing yards uh per game. It doesn't really say a lot, right? I mean for I know we we love we all love those big numbers and things like that. But his view of that and from his experience and and the data tell us that uh those are not good predictors of success in the NFL, right? Right. That it's actually what's up here. Um and that that's again going back to what you're doing. So Sean's been uh a big advocate of the CLA inside of uh football, right? And that's exactly what I I still think you're doing the same thing, by the way. It's it's yeah.

Dub Maddox 1:01:44

I think there's there's uh I have I have friends that test cognition affiliated with with a company called S2 Cognition, and they bring their quarterbacks in and and test them, uh run them through tests. It's and they do all the NFL quarterbacks too, and it's amazing to see there's like nine areas, cognitive areas that they train, and you can see how they rank, and they have enough data now over the last you know 10, 12 years. I mean, they have Patrick Mahomes score, they have Tom Brady's score, I have Drew Breeze. So so they're starting to see like if you score high in these areas, then your ability to to be an elite quarterback is is a lot more favorable. So they're finding like how these guys are hardwired. It's pretty interesting on some of these things they're discovering with these cognitive tests

Cognitive Testing and Elite Performance

Dub Maddox 1:02:27

now.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:02:27

Yeah, you you know what just to get into fighter aviation, we have to be able to pass some of those uh those tests that were actually developed out of perception action uh coupling. I think, you know, like just how do you read things? And and I've I I can't confirm this, but I've heard there might be a connection to when you and I were younger, uh, I don't know how old you are, I'm I'm 54, but when I was younger growing up in the 70s, uh my dad used to throw me up in the air, right? And that our parents used to do that type of thing. We used to be thrown around in trucks and all that, you know. So uh there might be a correlation between that type of um environment and and how you can perceive the the speed of of anything now, right? Like so if and I I again I'm not gonna say that's definite, but those are things that we want to look at to to look back at how kids were brought up. And generally fighter pilots are uh they're not straight A students generally. They're really they've had a lot of failures in the past, uh, which is good. You want people that are used to failure because that's the whole game, right? You fail and learn from that. Yeah. Um so there's a lot of things that uh I think coaches need to look at when they're when they're bringing in players, right? 100%.

Dub Maddox 1:03:32

No, it's it's if they ever find out how to truly do that, you're gonna make a lot of money if you can figure out how to pinpoint that.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:03:39

Well, I I think I think these things should be uh trained uh as well, right? Yeah. And I I you know, I'm not saying that every kid could be a a great quarterback, but however, with the right coaching system, the right environment, you're gonna get the best out of them you can possibly get.

Dub Maddox 1:03:55

100%.

Speaker 2 1:03:55

Yeah.

Dub Maddox 1:03:56

That's and that's that's uh that's our should be our goal as coaches, is is can we take this kid to his ceiling and just a little bit beyond?

The Future of Training and Cognition

Dub Maddox 1:04:02

Yeah, yeah, man. Dude, I'm excited, man. Uh anything else for me? I mean No, I mean, we could probably go, I mean, a million different directions and go longer. I thought it was good. Yeah, no, I appreciate it.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:04:15

I I got one last question for you. Yeah. What's it like for you to watch a football game now? I mean, are you do you enjoy it or do you get it? I mean Yeah.

Dub Maddox 1:04:23

No, I enjoy I enjoy it. I love watching. I I'm a big fan of obviously good offensive coaches and good offenses. And uh just it to me it's an art form. When you when you see a a good offensive coach that has distilled his game plan and the fundamentals and techniques, and and the quarterback is always getting them to the best play, and they have the answers. That chess match is just fascinating to me. And then, you know, I I respect good defensive coaches too on how they're you know disguising things and setting traps. And so again, I I enjoy that and put trying to put myself, okay, what would I call here? You know, how would I coach coach this quarterback through this situation here? So again, it's it's what I do. I don't play golf, I watch football and watch film.

Enjoying Football as Art

Dub Maddox 1:05:01

Yeah, that's great.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:05:02

Any predictions for this year, college or NFL?

Dub Maddox 1:05:05

I think you know, I think the Chicago Bears are gonna have a good year. Obviously, I think they got you know a great quarterback in Caleb Williams and and a good uh head coach in Ben you know Johnson and and uh and I enjoy them. I'm a big fan of any coach from the NFL uh Shanahan tree. You know, so you got like Matt LaFleur, the Packers, you know, obviously Kyle Shanahan, 49ers, Sean McBay, I think all those guys in that tree, they understand you know how to build offenses and and constrain you know plays and keep the defense off balance. So again, I I think anybody that's that's coaching from that tree is always gonna have a good year as well.

Predictions and Insights for Football Seasons

Dub Maddox 1:05:40

Hey, I I lied to you, I got another question for you.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:05:42

Uh and I'm gonna give you some context. So um you brought up Shanahan and and how uh uh you know that tree coaches, and I think it connects to they don't necessarily come in with a a system. They come in and look at how the context creates the system, right? What do I have here? And I see this in basketball where a lot of coaches come in and go, hey, we're gonna implement this thing and do that because that's what I know. But I think the better approach is looking at the context. What do I have, right? Yeah. What what's what what do I have on offense and defense or offense? What can I do with it? Yeah. Any thoughts on that?

Dub Maddox 1:06:18

Yeah, I think well, I think that's what when you look at innovations in the football realm, a lot of it, a lot of the innovations they happen bottom up, uh, meaning that you'll see a lot of of things uh evolve from high school to college, college NFL. And that's not the case all the all the time. But but the but and you know, Andy Reid kind of went on a a spill on that a few years ago in a in a in an article. And and the reason being is is because they they they have their they understand they don't get to recruit or they don't get to draft players. So so you have you have what you have as a high school coach, and you have to figure out a way to every year that offense is going to change, right? Ba based on on the clay that you have. And so I think the best coach is learn and build a system, whether it's you know, that can adapt. And I think that's what you want in your offense. You you you have to have adaptability. You have to be able to shape shift, you know, based on every year based on your your talents. And a lot of times, you know, if you have a guy injured at high school, you're not losing one player, you're losing two, because he's a lot of times he's a two-way guy. You know, he's he's a he's

The Importance of Context in Coaching

Dub Maddox 1:07:20

your defensive, your safety is your is your is your star you know running back or your star receiver. And and so when you lose one guy, I mean the dominoes fall. So you know, you have to have a system and operation um that can fill those gaps quickly and then can adjust on the fly. And I think you also, as a high school world, you see so many different offenses and defenses. Like in NFL, there's really kind of two families of defensive structures, maybe three you're gonna see. But it's a copycat league. A lot of the offenses and the defense are somewhat the same. And and as you go into college and go down to high school, it gets more broad. I mean, you're gonna see you know, wing T, triple option, spread, pro. Um, you're gonna see a lot of uh variability. So again, I think that plays into it as well in terms of of of why of why I think those lower level coaches are a little bit can handle it can handle that better. And I and I think but and I think that's the I guess that's the idea of a good coach. So again, the Shanahan guys, they figured, I mean, I they figured it out. They they they can they can shape shift and adapt very very well. And I think if you live in a silo, you you don't you don't have the ability to do that. So you so being those lower levels sometimes forces you into that environment.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:08:31

Well that's fantastic. Uh, can you let our listeners know where to find your uh your work, uh how to find you on online?

Where to Find Dub Maddox's Work

Dub Maddox 1:08:37

Yeah, I'm on a variety of platforms, uh a lot on X at Coach Dub Maddox uh on there. I will post on there and put ideas, articles. I have a substack, R4 Football System, uh Substack that I'll write articles on as well. Uh I got a YouTube channel, uh R4Football System.com is our website. So there's a lot of different areas you can hit me up, or if you're interested in some of these things we talked about, I go in deeper. But I really like using football as just uh a tool, as a as as an analogy, and I I I like like bringing other things into it. So I think that's the thing. Anytime I meet you know guys like you Ponch or anybody else, I I just it's a friend for life because I'm I'm I'm wanting to learn. How can I take your expertise and and make me a better football coach? And I think if a lot of people would would get better in their specific domain if they understood the value of of of building those relationships outside their their domain.

Brian "Ponch" Rivera 1:09:28

Well, I appreciate that. I think that's a great place to wrap up. I'll keep you online for a moment. Uh but thanks again, Dub. Really appreciate it. Yeah. Thanks, guys.