What is the west coast offense these days?

When asked about the style of offense the Miami Dolphins would use moving forward new coach Joe Philbin joked he doesn’t even know what the west coast offense is during his introductory press conference. Or maybe Philbin wasn’t joking because when I asked Redskins coach Mike Shanahan, who has supposedly used the west coast offense and concepts since his Denver days, to explain the west coast concepts he had the same response. “I have no idea what the west coast offense means anymore,” Shanahan said with a light chuckle. “I use to know 20 years ago when Bill Walsh used the term.” Shanahan is referring to the former 49ers and Stanford coaching legend, who is viewed as the father of the West Coast offense, which you can read about here. Philbin has utilized many of those concepts successfully for the past five seasons as Green Bay’s offensive coordinator. However, he’s non-committal about the type of attacking approach he’ll bring to Miami. A lot may depend on the offensive coordinator...