hen you sit down and try to define a piece for the magazine, you always want to maintain a scope and a purpose; and the hardest part is reigning in the scope of almost any piece on football because the way the rules are structured, every piece touches on another piece.

In this Chalk Talk the subject is formations. Sounds simple: We talk about how players line up. But as soon as you start looking at lineups, the subject of who can catch a pass pops up, or what position or number can run the ball. That is what makes football so interesting, and you always have something to talk about.

Let’s start this Chalk Talk with the simple offensive formation.

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