HOG CALLS: Hogs QB will make most of his Shot

FAYETTEVILLE — Ryan Mallett and the Shot don’t start the Arkansas Razorbacks’ preseason as perfect strangers.

More like imperfect acquaintances, Arkansas Coach Bobby Petrino implied.

Mallett, Arkansas’ quarterback, missed all of last spring’s drills with a broken foot when new offensive line coach Chris Klenakis fully integrated the Pistol offense into Petrino’s Razorbacks.

Under Coach Chris Ault in 2005 at the University of Nevada, then offensive coordinator Klenakis helped develop the Pistol offense that Petrino calls “Shot” in Arkansas’ offensive terminology.

The Pistol shot out of Reno, Nev., to many places, including occasional use by Petrino with Mallett last year.

“He’s worked the Shot before,” Petrino said. “We did call runs with it but didn’t run it very well. I told our staff last year, ‘When we run the ball out of the Shot, have a second-andlong call ready to go.’ We did throw the ball well out of it.”

At least the 2009 Razorbacks profited by air and didn’t put it on the ground running while occasionally using the Shot.

That performance surpasses Klenakis’ description of Nevada’s first spring using the system, when the Pistol mostly misfired in Reno.

“You should have seen the circus going on in our practice field,” Klenakis recalled in June while speaking at the Arkansas High School Coaches Clinic. “Snaps going everywhere. The only thing we did right as coaches was we had enoughguts to stick with it.”

So the Hogs are ahead when it comes to incorporating into Petrino’s record-setting offense a change of pace attack that operates with a running back directly 3 yards behind a quarterback deep in Shotgun formation.

While the 2009 Hogs threw well in their occasional Shot formation, Nevada’s 2009 Pistol led the nation in rushing and passed productively.

Nevada had a running quarterback.

Arkansas doesn’t.

At least not with Mallett, 6-7, 238 pounds.

“Obviously there are faster guys than me,” a laughing Mallett said of running the option in the Shot, “but I know what to do.”

Mallett’s size in the Shot may offset his lack of sprinter’s speed.

“From a defensive standpoint, it is hard to find the running back, especially when you have got a 6-foot-7 quarterback,” Klenakis said, referring to the tailback’s depth in the Shot.“They can’t see the first steps of that running back because it’s hidden.”

Arkansas defensive coordinator Willy Robinson said it was hard enough last spring locating the running back behind quarterbacks shorter than Mallett.

“It gives that running back a little longer to read the schemes and read the defense,” Robinson said. “It is difficult. You add the play-action passing game to it and run the option and things off of it, it can stretch you pretty good.”

While no sprinter, Mallett is “athletic,” Petrino and Klenakis say, citing his ability to throw on the run and his Shotgun experience and ballhandling prowess so critical to the Shot.

“It will take him some time and reps to get used to some of the things we are doing out of it now,” Petrino said. “But the good thing about Ryan is he is a very quick learner. He carries out his fakes.

“I don’t think it will take him long to pick it up.”