Oregon quarterback Dante Moore was revealing run or pass by his foot placement

Hines Brian September 16, 2026No Comments

Unbelievable. But true.

Thanks to Oklahoma State players who revealed one of the secrets to their unranked team’s huge upset 38-31 victory over #6 Oregon last Saturday, we now know that Dante Moore, the Oregon quarterback, was telegraphing “run or pass” by his foot placement before the ball was snapped.

A painful illustration of this was the first play in the game against Indiana last season in the playoffs. Moore threw an interception that was returned for a touchdown. The screenshot above shows Moore’s foot placement, which screamed “pass” to the Indiana player at the bottom of the screen who jumped in front of the Oregon receiver.

I learned about this from sportswriter John Canzano’s substack post (I’m a subscriber), “Oregon Ducks get poker lesson.” Just as there are tells in poker, indications about what kind of hand a player has, so are there tells in football. Check out this video for an entertaining discussion of how both Moore and the Oregon coaching staff missed something so obvious.

Canzano writes:

Not all of what happened to Oregon last Saturday in that 39-31 loss at Oklahoma State can be attributed to Dante Moore’s pre-snap foot position.

The Ducks need to be tougher, more physical, and more fundamentally sound. There’s time to salvage the season and make the College Football Playoff, but Oregon definitely missed a ‘self-scout’ opportunity. There’s way too much money invested in the operation to allow yourself to get submarined like that.

What Oregon missed wasn’t just Moore’s foot position (staggered for a pass… even for a run). The Ducks missed something far more basic.

…Moore’s pre-snap foot position was a tell? Opponents picked up on it?

Troubling, for sure. Knowing pass/run helps the defense. It appears that tendency may have first been picked up by UO opponents late last season. I do wonder, though, why the Ducks didn’t note it themselves.

I also wonder why nobody who is friends with anyone on that massive Oregon coaching staff told anyone as a courtesy in the offseason, “Hey, you guys might want to look at Dante’s feet.”

Maybe a byproduct of a 12-team playoff is that there’s a chance that anyone plays anyone? Would that have kept opposing coaches from talking about it? Or maybe Oregon, with miles of resources, isn’t well regarded by others? The Moore tendency is out there now. I’m sure USC and Ohio State, if they were aware, aren’t happy about it getting fixed before they had a chance to see it up close themselves.

That ‘tell’ doesn’t, however, explain how Oklahoma State’s offense piled up 554 yards of total offense on Saturday. And it doesn’t explain the missed assignments, fumble, and generally sloppy play. Oregon hasn’t appeared consistently sharp in any facet. That’s as troubling to me as anything.

Also, along those lines, if the defenses indeed knew what you were running and you still managed to move the ball somewhat effectively, stay in games, and score points, what happens when you shore that issue up?

You soar, don’t you?

I guess we’re about to find out.

That’s the good news from this fiasco. Oregon has been shooting itself in its foot, metaphorically, by allowing opposing teams with a decent scouting program to have a good idea, almost a certainty, really, of whether the Ducks were running or passing. Take that handicap away, and Oregon football should have a better chance of winning.

A Sports Illustrated story, “Dante Moore Weighs In After Oregon Tendency Goes Viral,” says that Oklahoma State did Oregon a favor, probably for a selfish reason.

Oklahoma State made a valuable discovery during their film prep, executed it for a historic win, then pulled the ladder up so that no other teams could follow them.

In fact, it’s likely to the Cowboys’ advantage to disclose their findings. Oklahoma State will see its strength of schedule and FBS rankings benefit from every Ducks win the rest of the way.

Moore now gets a chance to self-correct as Oregon looks to prove that one early loss is not a season-ender. They do so against a Portland State (0-3, 0-1 Big Sky) squad that now must prepare for a version of Moore that it hasn’t seen on film.