This is the million dollar question, but ever since Zac left the Rams, McVay doesn’t run pistol AT ALL now. Zac played in the Pistol at Oklahoma State, and he’s used the formation a LOT in the pros. It’s not even that the pistol is a bad formation, but if you can’t SEQUENCE plays I don’t care what your base formation is, you will SUCK.
I lean Zac. Penix rarely played under center in college as well. Not ready to say he can’t do it, but there’s clear development he needs while taking snaps under center.
They had Kirk on pistol. There’s your answer
Personally if Zac wanted to run plays under centre you’d think he would work with his QBs to bring his playbook to life and make adjustments as he saw the need.
9/11/25
“The Pistol does keep you pretty balanced from a run-pass standpoint,” he said. “Obviously, in the offset gun, there are tendencies to throw the football and so being able to stay completely balanced with what we’re doing is what we’re trying to do from a run, play-action, keeper, screen, all those things that come with it. Again, it’s part of our offense. We’ll pick our spots when we need to go under. But our guys feel comfortable with it. Our quarterback feels very comfortable in it knowing that’s the way he operated, mostly, in Washington.”
Whether you believe in what Robinson shared is entirely up to you, but there is a method behind a formation fans are calling madness. Namely, it allows for the most variety in what you can call. Robinson explained another benefit that cuts against the popular belief that backs are disadvantaged by starting so far behind the line of scrimmage.
“It does get the ball in our runners’ hands a tick quicker there,” he said. “Obviously, the faster that we can get number seven — and obviously, Tyler [Allgeier] — the ball in their hands so that they can see the proper cuts and those things with the stretch of the wide zone and being able to cut some of those things back when we need to, is definitely part of it.”
-Zach Robinson
I’m once again reminding everyone that the formation was never the problem, it was the predictability from within those formations that was the problem.
Say shotgun for example, you can run a good run game out of shotgun with Pin Pull concepts. You can run an effective play action out of Pistol. However, the pass rate out of Shotgun was near 100% and the run rate out of Pistol was around 90%.
Falcons had the second lowest play action rate in the NFL, which is criminal when you have Bijan Robinson. The Bears with Ben Johnson also laid out a formula for running an offense out of primarily shotgun with an effective run game.
tldr the problem was play calling and sequencing
Obviously the guy who creates the game plan and calls the plays each week is responsible for the formations used in the game. ZR always defended his overuse of the pistol, while Penix always stated that he just goes with the plays that ZR called.
ZR had no idea how to actually develop Penix by making him learn how to play under center and just went with what Penix was used to from time in college. The exact same approach was taken with Caleb Williams in Chicago until Ben Johnson took over as head coach this year. Caleb never played from under center in college, but Ben Johnson actually developed his young QB by teaching him how to run a pro style offense from under center, and we can all see the difference it made for the bears.
It’s gonna be really funny when Penix is uncer center a ton and ZRob is sending Baker under center – guess we will never know
Can’t wait until Baker starts crying about Pistol!
The truth is – he wanted an edge and picked this as his edge. As the season went on, he did more things UC to shake things up because obviously pistol wasn’t hitting like he estimated it would.
He’s not an idiot and I think there’s a good chance he switches it up for Tampa Bay in his next shot. Everyone is laughing at the Bucs for hiring him but I’m low key a little nervous.
The question no one is asking is how will this third ACL tear and tear to his other knee affect how mobile and scheme diverse he will be. Especially in 2026 coming right off of his rehab and no camp. Kevin and Tommy could very well have to tailor the offense towards what he ran in college and what he’s run in the pros as well when he’s playing.
Penix’s knees
Me, sorry guys.
Raheem
When Kirk took over for Penix all of a sudden we start running way more under center. I think Kirk definitely told Zac that he was not gonna run all of his Pistol bullshit.
This year, if Tampa’s offensive play calling or Penix all of a sudden seems like the first rounder we drafted him as, I think that will show us who really was the big shitter.
But i think it was definitely Zac until i see otherwise
its zac at the end of the day even if penix is “comfortable” its his job to get him comfortable
Let’s bffr. It was Zac’s call. We saw him trying to run mostly pistol with TWO QBs. Not just Penix. Let’s not even act like it was a Penix thing.
The offense was built to minimize mistakes and turn overs. Penix can play under center but he’s less experienced playing under center (as are basically all QBs coming into the NFL). There is a learning curve and that means he will screw up in game and make mistakes….possibly costly mistakes.
Ideally, you’d let your young QB make mistakes and then hopefully he learns over the course of the season and gets better. Penix wasn’t allowed to do that because the coaching staff decided that the best way to preserve their jobs was to play conservatively (spam the ball to Bijan). I think that’s just an effect of having a playoffs or you’re fired mandate. The coaches will take (what they believe to be) the safest path to the playoffs and if that’s not what’s best for Penix’s development (which is in the long term interest of the organization) then so be it.
Terry Fontenot is at fault. They knew all of this when they drafted Penix
That was on both Zac & Raheem. Raheem has final say/approval & allowed it to continue.
Okay Penix we shall see .
Really hope we get away from this being an issue next year.
I think they may have gone pistol so much with pistol because Penix is a lefty, they wanted to try to give him a chance to identify pressure from the right a little better.
Y’all holding on to hard for sorry ass penix. Admit it was the worst draft pick in a while your gm fumbled big time. Everyone called it when it happened.
Well its zacs decision as the OC and playcaller so zac
It’s a mix of both, I bet Penix can learn to play under center but he isn’t as comfortable as he is in shotgun. That makes it a coaching problem then right? His job is to teach the players how to be the best they can be.
Ugh. So another “development” year it is! Do we at least still have a first round pick in 27? Or did we already give that away..
So u not gone try to develop him and run plays under center anyway. When u was willing to let slow knee cousins , who could barely make it to the hand offs, play in pistol. Shit don’t add up. Definitely Zac. Penix played under center more than Williams did in college. And oh look Kyler Murray 2.0 is doing pretty good.
28 comments
This is the million dollar question, but ever since Zac left the Rams, McVay doesn’t run pistol AT ALL now. Zac played in the Pistol at Oklahoma State, and he’s used the formation a LOT in the pros. It’s not even that the pistol is a bad formation, but if you can’t SEQUENCE plays I don’t care what your base formation is, you will SUCK.
I lean Zac. Penix rarely played under center in college as well. Not ready to say he can’t do it, but there’s clear development he needs while taking snaps under center.
They had Kirk on pistol. There’s your answer
Personally if Zac wanted to run plays under centre you’d think he would work with his QBs to bring his playbook to life and make adjustments as he saw the need.
9/11/25
“The Pistol does keep you pretty balanced from a run-pass standpoint,” he said. “Obviously, in the offset gun, there are tendencies to throw the football and so being able to stay completely balanced with what we’re doing is what we’re trying to do from a run, play-action, keeper, screen, all those things that come with it. Again, it’s part of our offense. We’ll pick our spots when we need to go under. But our guys feel comfortable with it. Our quarterback feels very comfortable in it knowing that’s the way he operated, mostly, in Washington.”
Whether you believe in what Robinson shared is entirely up to you, but there is a method behind a formation fans are calling madness. Namely, it allows for the most variety in what you can call. Robinson explained another benefit that cuts against the popular belief that backs are disadvantaged by starting so far behind the line of scrimmage.
“It does get the ball in our runners’ hands a tick quicker there,” he said. “Obviously, the faster that we can get number seven — and obviously, Tyler [Allgeier] — the ball in their hands so that they can see the proper cuts and those things with the stretch of the wide zone and being able to cut some of those things back when we need to, is definitely part of it.”
-Zach Robinson
I’m once again reminding everyone that the formation was never the problem, it was the predictability from within those formations that was the problem.
Say shotgun for example, you can run a good run game out of shotgun with Pin Pull concepts. You can run an effective play action out of Pistol. However, the pass rate out of Shotgun was near 100% and the run rate out of Pistol was around 90%.
Falcons had the second lowest play action rate in the NFL, which is criminal when you have Bijan Robinson. The Bears with Ben Johnson also laid out a formula for running an offense out of primarily shotgun with an effective run game.
tldr the problem was play calling and sequencing
Obviously the guy who creates the game plan and calls the plays each week is responsible for the formations used in the game. ZR always defended his overuse of the pistol, while Penix always stated that he just goes with the plays that ZR called.
ZR had no idea how to actually develop Penix by making him learn how to play under center and just went with what Penix was used to from time in college. The exact same approach was taken with Caleb Williams in Chicago until Ben Johnson took over as head coach this year. Caleb never played from under center in college, but Ben Johnson actually developed his young QB by teaching him how to run a pro style offense from under center, and we can all see the difference it made for the bears.
It’s gonna be really funny when Penix is uncer center a ton and ZRob is sending Baker under center – guess we will never know
Can’t wait until Baker starts crying about Pistol!
The truth is – he wanted an edge and picked this as his edge. As the season went on, he did more things UC to shake things up because obviously pistol wasn’t hitting like he estimated it would.
He’s not an idiot and I think there’s a good chance he switches it up for Tampa Bay in his next shot. Everyone is laughing at the Bucs for hiring him but I’m low key a little nervous.
The question no one is asking is how will this third ACL tear and tear to his other knee affect how mobile and scheme diverse he will be. Especially in 2026 coming right off of his rehab and no camp. Kevin and Tommy could very well have to tailor the offense towards what he ran in college and what he’s run in the pros as well when he’s playing.
Penix’s knees
Me, sorry guys.
Raheem
When Kirk took over for Penix all of a sudden we start running way more under center. I think Kirk definitely told Zac that he was not gonna run all of his Pistol bullshit.
This year, if Tampa’s offensive play calling or Penix all of a sudden seems like the first rounder we drafted him as, I think that will show us who really was the big shitter.
But i think it was definitely Zac until i see otherwise
its zac at the end of the day even if penix is “comfortable” its his job to get him comfortable
Let’s bffr. It was Zac’s call. We saw him trying to run mostly pistol with TWO QBs. Not just Penix. Let’s not even act like it was a Penix thing.
The offense was built to minimize mistakes and turn overs. Penix can play under center but he’s less experienced playing under center (as are basically all QBs coming into the NFL). There is a learning curve and that means he will screw up in game and make mistakes….possibly costly mistakes.
Ideally, you’d let your young QB make mistakes and then hopefully he learns over the course of the season and gets better. Penix wasn’t allowed to do that because the coaching staff decided that the best way to preserve their jobs was to play conservatively (spam the ball to Bijan). I think that’s just an effect of having a playoffs or you’re fired mandate. The coaches will take (what they believe to be) the safest path to the playoffs and if that’s not what’s best for Penix’s development (which is in the long term interest of the organization) then so be it.
Terry Fontenot is at fault. They knew all of this when they drafted Penix
That was on both Zac & Raheem. Raheem has final say/approval & allowed it to continue.
Okay Penix we shall see .
Really hope we get away from this being an issue next year.
I think they may have gone pistol so much with pistol because Penix is a lefty, they wanted to try to give him a chance to identify pressure from the right a little better.
Y’all holding on to hard for sorry ass penix. Admit it was the worst draft pick in a while your gm fumbled big time. Everyone called it when it happened.
Well its zacs decision as the OC and playcaller so zac
It’s a mix of both, I bet Penix can learn to play under center but he isn’t as comfortable as he is in shotgun. That makes it a coaching problem then right? His job is to teach the players how to be the best they can be.
Ugh. So another “development” year it is! Do we at least still have a first round pick in 27? Or did we already give that away..
So u not gone try to develop him and run plays under center anyway. When u was willing to let slow knee cousins , who could barely make it to the hand offs, play in pistol. Shit don’t add up. Definitely Zac. Penix played under center more than Williams did in college. And oh look Kyler Murray 2.0 is doing pretty good.