First, the guys on the Head Coach crew studied teams from all around the league and their play calling tendencies. They used that to build the teams playbooks and how the play calls work. For example, Pittsburgh, a very smashmouth style of team, will almost always run the ball on 1st and 2nd down. Then, on 3rd and short, you can expect the run. However, if it’s a little bit more than that, watch out, cause Big Benny is coming with a 4 Wide Set to either air it out on you or take himself and run you over en route to the 1st down marker. The Colts, when they run, will be handing off to Joseph Addai and Mike Hart on those stretch plays that they use so effectively. Will the Colts use a fullback? Absolutely not. After all, they dont use one in real life, and if it’s not in real life, why should it be in the game. The slogan is "If it’s in the game, it’s in the game." So why add something that’s not in the game.

That’s pretty basic, but this is where it gets interesting. The league in Madden 09 uses what Donny Moore calls "Copycat" logic. Every single coach in the league (Coach, Coordinator, what have you) has his own personal playbook that he carries around with him. When two coaches are on one roster, and one of them leaves to be a Head Coach for another team, not only does he take his own Playbook to the next team with him, but he also takes what he’s learned from every other coach on the rosters playbook with him as well. The more coaches your around, the bigger your playbook gets.

So, if Monte Kiffin leaves Oakland to coach in San Diego, San Diego can feel welcomed to the Tampa 2. But, all the coaches at Tampa Bay also still have the Tampa 2 down pat from all the years they spent with Monte. So lets say that the Defensive Coordinator in San Diego leave’s Kiffin’s team for San Fransisco. He’ll take the Tampa 2 with him to San Fransisco. The chain goes on and on.

This would seem overly repetitive (although its still a good idea), however EA spotted that problem early and threw their own sort of monkey wrench into the equation. Every year, top Coaches from elsewhere (such as college coaches) will enter the NFL. Lets say you hire somebody whose been coaching at Air Force for a while. All of a sudden, his run heavy offense comes with him to your team. But Air Force’s offense is based mainly on the option? Oh man, are you serious!?! Fans have been begging for the option to come to the NFL for years, and now, you have the chance to make it happen.



But it doesnt just stop there. Maybe you want to bring the oldschool Wishbone into the NFL? Hire somebody from Navy. How about that spiffy Pistol formation that is like having Shotgun and Singleback all at the same time? Man, if somebody uses it, you can get it on this game.

I mentioned earlier how if you call the right play at the right time, it can determine whether you win or lose. Whether you win or lose can determine whether or not you keep your job. Therefore, if A=B and B=C, then A must equal C. If you call the right play at the right time, it can determine whether or not you keep your job. Think back on some of the great moments of all time. Dan Marino’s fake spike was one of the defining moments of Don Shula’s career. Don Shula is considered one of if not the greatest coaches of all time. On the other end of the spectrum, the Miracle in the Meadowlands is considered one of the worst defining moments in a career. All the Giants had to do was have the Quarterback kneel the ball down, but instead they tried a handoff, the ball was bobbled, and Herm Edwards recovered the ball for a Touchdown. The entire Giants coaching staff was fired the next day.

Defining moments. In critical moments of critical games, coaches must make tough decisions. On 4th and goal with a second left, do you kick the field goal to send the game into overtime, or do you try and go 1 yard for the win? When you score at the end of the game, do you kick the extra point and go into overtime, or do you try for the 2 point conversion and the win right there? When times running out, do you spike the ball, or do you let Dan Marino trick the defense? You catch my drift. These moments, and the results that come from them, have a huge impact on your Approval Rating.

So what’s an approval rating? Every single move you make in Head Coach 09 affects it. It’s the trust, or job security, that your owner has for you. If your on a tight leash, you better make the right decisions. If your on a huge contract and your owner cant fire you, or if you’ve proven yourself in the past and your Owner already trusts you, you have more leeway than the Coaches on the Hot Seat. When you have the #4 Draft Pick and the choice between Glenn Dorsey or Darren McFadden, who you pick and how they play out will have an effect on the approval rating.

But wait, the draft has already happened. How can I pick Glenn Dorsey over Darren McFadden? Check this out. You have the option of starting your career at the beginning of the 2008 Pre-Season and rocking the rosters as they are now, OR, you can start at the beginning of the 2008 Off-Season. Thought that Miami should have taken the other Long? Make it happen. But beware, if Jake Long is a perrenial Pro-Bowler and Chris Long is an epic bust, your approval rating will shoot way down.

If you recall, the Draft was the most organized and funnest part of the original Head Coach. Will that be the case on Head Coach 09 as well? Well, all signs point to a yes.

The most exciting thing, at least in my oppinion, about Head Coach 09’s draft, is future draft picks. That’s right, fans have been begging for it for forever, and now everybodies dream is coming true. You can now trade this year, or next year’s draft picks, just like real life. Say Terrell Owens is becoming a problem, but you want this year and next year’s 3rd round picks out of him. Well, if you can find a team to agree to it, it’s done. Watch out though, other teams will trade during the draft too. In past games, the only trading that was ever done was by the User. No longer are those days. The computer AI will now have trades between other teams without the User involved at all! And will those trades be rediculous and more harm than good? EA has developed a new trading logic that says nay.



Trades (as well as drafting) are far more civilized than they have ever been before. No longer will Chris Gocong be the 5th player drafted. No, players are actually ranked in a way differently than ever before. Each player will be ranked by each team differently. For example, the Raiders (Al Davis in particular) likes players who are big, fast, and strong. Therefore, a player who is smart but lacks physical ability will not be as high on the Raiders draft board as a player who is, well, fast and strong. Same with trades. You’d be much more likely to trade Tavaris Jackson to Al Davis than you would Jeff Garcia.

Each player is graded on their size (sorry MJD), their intangibles, their durability and their ability to learn a scheme. It is important to remember the way your team grades players when drafting and signing Free Agents.

The ability to learn a scheme isnt something we’ve quite gone over yet, however, it does factor in. No longer do you just have to go through one practice to get a player up to snuff. It takes YEARS to develope knowledge of a play.

Oh yeah, you can sorta know how it works. That’s why theres now a rating, thats right, a RATING system for how well you know a play. 0-99, just like players in Madden, only with how well you know a play as opposed to how good of a player you are. If a player is in a play he hasnt learned yet, not only is he going to get knocked attribute points, but theres a chance he’ll do the wrong thing all together. A receiver may block instead of running a route, the Runningback may forget to pick up a blitz, the Safety whose supposed to be your last line of defense may blitz straight into a Tight End and let your defense get burned deep. If your players have learned a play, theres no chance they’ll make a mistake on it, but there also not getting any boosts on it. Now, if your guys have MASTERED a play, then your set. Tom Brady is going to get huge boosts on 5 Wide Receiver plays, while Peyton Manning will run the Play Action to perfection and the entire Broncos Offensive Line will block perfectly on run plays.

How does this factor into your decisions? Well obviously your going to need to have your boys study up, but theres more to it than that. Now, your going to want to sign your guys right out of the draft instead of having a lengthy hold out, because you really will need your rookies to learn the playbook before the season starts. So, your going to want to draft a guy with a good personality that way you can sign him quick and get him studying.

Wait a minute, a good personality? Thats right. No more senseless random personality in the AI players, but complex, layered personalities that truly reflect the real life player. So if you trade for Terrell Owens, you better get your popcorn ready.

But really, this will affect the way you draft and sign players. You get somebody with a bad attitude that’s going to want a ton of money, and it may be a while before you can get them into camp learning the playbook. So this star Receiver that you’ve drafted is a smart guy? It doesnt matter if he’s only been in camp a day before he has to play. Then comes game day, you’ve finally got the guy signed the day before, you put him in the lineup, and he runs the wrong route! But wait, that route is all about timing, your Quarterback is expecting him to be here and he’s there! All of a sudden, you’ve thrown an Interception. Every little thing matters.

So how do I sign players in Head Coach 09? Is it just toggling some numbers and then seeing a yes or a no? No way, thats no fun. You actually sit across the table from your player and his agent. He gives you a price, you give him a price, and then comes the tug of war to meet in the middle. Some guys will be willing to give in early and go with the money you want to give him, but beware. Some players have tempers, and if you dont give them the deal they want, they’ll simply walk away. It’s all about player personalities. Trades work the same way. You now go across the table with one or more general managers working on a deal. A timer adds pressure, because teams will only take so much. At any point, a manager can walk away, and he may or may not come back.M

So we’ve went over Rookies and Trades, but what about plain old Free Agents? Once again, the number toggling is no longer the way to go. Who likes EBay? Welcome to the era of Free Agent bidding. Using a very EBay like system, teams will have a minute or two to bid over each other. When the time is up, the highest bidding team will get the chance to hammer out a contract with the Free Agent. If you cannot, then the player is back on the market. Restricted Free Agency works the same way. Feel free to take your young studs and dangle them over other teams who may be willing to give up draft picks.

In the NFL, teams dont start the season with a 53 man roster. They start with a 75 man roster that eventually whittles down to a 53 man Regular Season roster. And during the game, can you use all 53 guys? In the NFL, your only allowed to have 45 of your 53 men active on game day. Well, if it’s in the game, then it’s in the game. You can hold up to 75 men on your roster. When training camp begins, your General Manager will give you a list of men being invited to camp. This will include your roster, free agents, and those diamond in the rough Undrafted Free Agents. The more you work the guys out, the more you learn about them. Then comes cut day. You’ll have to make some tough choices to get your roster down to size. EA promises some future pro-bowlers in these undrafted Free Agents, but will you sign the right guy and find the next Deacon Jones? Or will you be the Pittsburgh Steelers that cut Johnny Unitas before he left for Baltimore?



We mentioned that you will bid on players, but how does signing new coaches go? Well, you bid on those too. But it’s not just money there after, no sir. You bid on them with power. Are you willing to let Mike Martz take full control of your offense? Are you willing to let Monte Kiffin replace your playbook with his Tampa 2? If so, you can sign some of the best coordinators in the league.

Madden franchises have allowed you to import NCAA draft classes for years. Can you now import classes to Head Coach? Unfortunately no, but I think EA has come up with something even better. EA has hand crafted 21000 rookies, and Adam Scheftner will provide you with commentary on these rookies all year long. From the fake Top 25 college schools, the fake Heisman Race anaylisis, the step by step coverage of the combine and workouts, Scheftner will cover the Rookies so carefully that they will truly become alive, and you’ll likely know more about them than you will the real rookies. Adrian who? Forget him.

Team Philosophies is another step EA has taken in making the CPU as realistic as possible. If a team prefers to build through the draft as opposed to signing big name free agents, they wont sign many free agents in Head Coach 09.

But what if I want to change these philosophies? The article keeps talking about how the philosophies work, but maybe I dont want to be run of the mill. Maybe I think the Steelers should let Big Ben air it out more often than not, and maybe I think Fast Willie should be hitting the corners instead of trying to run up the middle. Well, EA has come up with something called Adaptive Playcalling. Every team has a history for their playbook. Every single time you call a play, it is recorded and remembered forever. This is both cool, and a little bit difficult. You can start to see tendencies in other team, however, if you get into play calling ruts, the computer will see it. So if you come into Pittsburgh, you spend 5 years playing a vertical pass heavy offense, and then you leave, does Pittsburgh go back to it’s smashmouth style? No sir, it remembers your pass heavy style, and it becomes the style that Pittsburgh uses now.

Ok, so trick plays. Everybody likes trick plays. Can I line Darren McFadden up at Quarterback? Can I just put Reggie Bush at receiver a few plays for game? No more are the days of complicated packages. I remember when I wanted Teyo Johnson and Joe Klopfenstein to split time on the original Head Coach. I spent more time substituting them in and out than I did playing the game. It was easier just to make one of them the starter. Now, however, all you have to do is press a button and highlight a player on a play, and you can replace him with any player on your roster.

So lets say you run a 4 Wide Receiver offense, but you face a team who is blitzing you to death. You cant complete a pass because you dont have time, but you dont have any plays in your playbook that use more blockers. Dont worry about it. Now, you can create plays DURING A GAME. Make a 3 Tight End Set that gives your Quarterback more time in the middle of a game, and if it works, download it to your playbook at the end of the game and save it there. You can eventually export these created plays into your Madden game as well.

Here comes a really fun part. Head Coach 2009 will now have online features. Sure it’ll have Head-on-Head online, so you can match wits and bang heads with people all around the world, but more importantly, it has what’s called Gamernet. You can now upload your plays and your playbooks online for other people to look at. These other people can download your plays, and the world can grade your plays so that you have an alternate oppinion on how it looks.

So does a team with two 35 year old 90 Overall Quarterbacks sign a Quarterback whose 36 and has an 89 Overall? Only if Jon Grudens the coach. But really, Team Roadmaps now help the AI make the smartest decisions they ever had. AI looks at who is going to become a free agent, whose already on the roster, whose going to be available in the draft, and what positions they truly need to upgrade.

The sideline got alot more active in Head Coach 09. Nearly 300 animations were added in for when you walk up and down the sideline. Watch the Kicker warm up as you get inside the 40. Go check out that trainer looking at your injured player. During the game while your on the sideline, you now have the ability to decide how you react as well. When your Quarterback throws an interception, do you take it in stride and call the next play like Tony Dungy, or do you blast him for it for the whole world to see, just like Jon Gruden? Your reaction works along with the player’s personality to see how he responds.

How am I going to keep up with all of these new features? Do I still have that complicated computer that takes forever to sort through? No sir. As a more realistic touch, everything you need in Head Coach 09 is at your fingertips in what is called your "Coaches Clipboard." It acts as your to-do list and your scoreboard. It is your primary everything in Head Coach 09.

In Head Coach 09, if you simulated anything, then someone was inevitably injured in every simulated activity. If you played every single activity, then no one was ever injured. Wheres the fun in that? Well now, injuries work by what EA calls the Wear and Tear system. Everytime a player makes contact, depending on the type of contact and how severe it was, your player loses life points on that part of his body. If his life points fall to low, then he is at a risk for injury. Also, Head Coach 09 now brings forth Game Changers. It’s something that Head Coaches have to deal with every day. Off the field injuries, players coming out of retirement (oh Hey Brett, how’s it going?), players leaving the team for personal reasons, and great players from other leagues joining the NFL. How will you react when Brett Favre says he wants to lead you to a Super Bowl, or when Antonio Gates decides he’d rather play professional Basketball, or when Danny Wimprine comes out of the AFL and wants to be the most accurate QB in NFL history, or when your star Wide Receiver breaks his arm slipping and falling on a Cheeseburger Wrapper...

Finally, as a last addition in Head Coach, Adam Scheftner of the NFL Network will keep you up with whats going on around the league. His 3D character will keep you aware of Signings, Retirement, anything going on in the NFL all around the league.

In summary, for me at least, this game honestly sounds too good to be true coming out. But if EA backs themselves up with NFL Head Coach 09, then it may be the best Football Simulation style game ever created.  I hope this has been as exciting for you as it has for me, because of EA, I truly "have my popcorn ready."