NFC Championship Preview @ Philadelphia

Date: Sunday, 1/29
Time: 12:00 PT for some reason
Location: Lincoln Financial Field (where they threw snowballs at Santa Claus)
Opponent: Philadelphia Eagles

At 14-3 (13-1 with their starting QB), the Philadelphia Eagles are the league’s winningest team. With a +133 point differential and no losses by greater than ten points, they’re the league’s most consistent team. And with six first- or second-team All-Pros and an MVP finalist at quarterback, they’re the league’s most talented team. But it’s worth noting how they got here.

The Eagles are one of the rare organizations who had a wide-open championship window, but—other than one special post-season—flubbed it enough to get their Super Bowl-winning coach fired, then rebuilt their coaching staff and roster and created a second championship window—all in the span of five short years. 

Head coach Nick Sirianni—whose “I got a bone to pick” press conferences, sideline demeanor (I had to pause an All-22 clip after seeing him yelling at an opposing player), and hilarious alleged interactions with civilians are as Philly as it gets—deserves a ton of credit for rejuvenating the Eagles. So does his excellent coaching staff. But GM Howie Roseman deserves a shoutout as well.

Roseman, who was both the architect of the Eagles’ Super Bowl run and the primary hand behind a slew of personnel follies that prevented them from returning to the promised land, easily could have been canned alongside Doug Pederson in 2020. In fact, I thought he should have been. But Roseman—who is also as Philly as it gets—fully accepted his many mistakes and—in the two years since—has moved with incredible speed to rectify them.

Months after Nick Foles led them to a Super Bowl, Carson Wentz was anointed with a massive contract as the next sovereign king of Philadelphia—only for it to turn out that he was a weirdo who nobody really liked, who killed a bunch of ducks (way way too many ducks), and whose MVP-caliber season was a mirage of statistically unrepeatable variance. So Roseman drafted Jalen Hurts, despite this openly affecting Wentz’s play and his relationship with the organization, and—two years after Wentz left—Hurts is an MVP front-runner.

The Eagles were probably the only team (other than the Cardinals lol) who did NOT get a stud wideout from the 2019 and 2020 drafts, as Roseman drafted JJ Arcega-Whiteside over guys like DK Metcalf, Terry McLaurin, and Diontae Johnson, then tried to fix that mistake a year later by selecting Jalen Reagor one pick before Justin Jefferson and with guys like Brandon Aiyuk, Michael Pittman Jr., and Tee Higgins still on the board. Roseman jettisoned both the wideouts he drafted then traded a first- and third-round pick for AJ Brown to pair with 2021 first-rounder DeVonta Smith. Now, Brown and Smith make up one of the best wide receiver pairs in the league.

In the post-Malcolm Jenkins era, Philly played musical chairs in the secondary in hopes of patching over a weakness at a key position. In the past two years, Roseman has traded for Darius Slay, signed James Bradberry from the rival Giants, and sent two third-day picks to the Saints for nickel pest Chauncey Gardner-Johnson to form one of the best cornerback trios in the country. 

These massive positional overhauls, combined with the continued bolstering of the core of their original championship window (elite offensive and defensive lines) with draft picks (Landon Dickerson, Jordan Davis) and savvy veteran adds (sack-leader Hasson Reddick, Ndamukong Suh, Linval Joseph) has led to an Eagles team that is top-to-bottom as good as any in the country. 

OFFENSE

Offense DVOA: 3rd
Weighted: 6th 
Pass: 9th
Run: 1st

The league’s second-highest-scoring offense is back at full strength with the return of MVP finalist Jalen Hurts and First-team All-Pro right tackle Lane Johnson. This unit put up 400+ yards of offense in a whopping 11 of 18 games (including last weekend) and boasts—by DVOA—the NFL’s top rushing attack. According to Football Outsiders, the Eagles’ rushing attack is nearly 50% better than second-best and is as valuable as the league’s #2 and #7 rushing attacks combined.

When Jalen Hurts has been healthy, the Eagles have rushed for upwards of 100 yards in 13-of-16 games, over 200 yards five(!) times, and over 300 yards(!!) once. These guys like to run and everything they do stems from that. But that doesn’t mean their passing attack is lacking. In two of the three games the Eagles didn’t eclipse 100 yards rushing, they threw for upwards of 300.

Fun stuff.

Beauty in simplicity. I’ve always believed that in order to field a championship-caliber offense in today’s NFL you have to have a certain level of complexity in your scheme. The league is too smart and too good and when defenses are given two weeks to prepare (like for the Super Bowl), offenses that are too simple in their approach (2018 Rams, 2015 Panthers) tend to have their tendencies and weak spots exploited. 

But the Eagles hope to have found somewhat of a loophole in this argument by developing an offense that employs largely simple plays and concepts but with enough variety and versatility that it has answers for whatever defenses throw at it. In doing so, they’ve created an offense that is simple in its plays but multiple in the many ways it can attack defenses that try to take away those plays. They have embraced an identity of flexibility.

At their core, the Eagles want to predict and assess what defenses are trying to take away from them then pivot to something else that’s more open. While that can be said of many good offenses (and, on some level, any good offense), the Eagles differ in that their entire playbook is built like a closed-loop rock-paper-scissors game—with relatively simple answers to different fronts and coverages—and they have the utmost confidence and commitment in deploying heavy doses of any one of their answers if the moment calls for it. 

But ultimately, they want to run the ball.

It’s basically the triple option. Other than incredible talent across the board, the Eagles’ option run game has been so successful because—unlike a team that dabbles in the zone read here and there—their zone reads are foundational to their playbook and designed like the 2022 equivalent of a triple option.

The traditional triple option has (surprise) three options: the dive to the fullback, the QB keep, and the pitch to a tailback outside. While the Eagles don’t use a fullback and run their scheme mostly out of the gun, their “triple option” attacks defenses in a similar way to the traditional one—by presenting a give option up the middle, a QB keep option off-tackle, and an outside option that replaces the tailback pitch.

In the original shotgun zone-read system, that third “pitch” option was the bubble screen. With time—and a shift to the NFL—that bubble screen has largely been replaced by RPOs, which aim to stress alley defenders on quick hitters if they commit to the run. The Eagles love RPOs but those are largely eliminated with tight man coverage, so they’ve leaned heavily on having a tight end or wideout come in motion (or start in tight and delay release) before doing a quick shoot route to the flat. This serves the same purpose as the bubble screen or the traditional tailback pitch—it presents a third option on any given play that stresses defenses laterally. And considering the Eagles’ have two 1,000-yard receivers and one of the better tight ends in the game running this shoot route, it’s proven to be quite effective.

This variation of the triple option also lets the Eagles build their option looks directly into their play-action bootleg game, which relies heavily on sail route combinations (streek-deep out-flood). Since a flood is basically the same as a shoot, teams may think they’re guarding the Eagles’ triple option, but once they realize it’s actually a play-action pass, the Eagles have already completed the deep out over their head.

Reactive but Rugged. In the absolute simplest of terms, this is what the Eagles would like to do versus what they will likely do depending on the looks they get. 

• What they would like to do… Run the ball, run zone read, and generate easy sideline reads and deep shots off of play action.

• If shown one-high safety man coverage… Run the ball, run zone read with the weird shoot thing, and rely on crossers and deep jump balls to your stud wideouts.

• If shown one-high safety zone coverage… Run the ball, run zone read with RPOs, and challenge alley defenders with sail routes and in-breakers.

• If shown two-high safeties… Run the ball and run zone read.

This isn’t to say the Eagles can’t just sit back and throw the ball when teams leave that wide open, but they want to run the ball. That makes sense given they have the best offensive line in football—with no real weak spots across the front five—a talented backfield, and one of the best running quarterbacks in the NFL.

Given their heavy heavy use of option runs and option looks, the Eagles typically have a numbers advantage on the ground. Against any two-high shell, that number advantage is multiplied. If you want to play one-high and start sending edge guys to stop the option, they’ll RPO you to death and make your second-level defenders run sideline-to-sideline chasing deep outs from the slot. If you play man, they have two dudes out wide who can win on all three levels, one of the league’s top two-way tight ends, and a quarterback who can gobble up yardage on the ground when defenders turn and chase their men downfield.

Again, this is an oversimplified version of the Eagles offense, but the strength of the scheme isn’t that they catch you by surprise, it’s that they already have answers baked into what they do best (and those answers happen to be the thing that they’re “second-best” at).

summoning Shooter

Definitely Not Carson Wentz. Equally as impressive as their offensive balance is the fact that the Eagles have shaped their entire system around the strengths of their personnel while hiding their weaknesses. That starts at quarterback, where third-year signal-caller Jalen Hurts is likely to be the winner or runner-up for the MVP this year.

Not since Lamar Jackson’s breakout year with the Ravens have I seen a team so fully commit their scheme to maximizing a young quarterback’s talents, but—unlike the Ravens’ scheme—the Eagles’ system also seems poised to let their young quarterback grow to his full potential as a passer. 

Hurts doesn’t have a great arm—he turfs some balls and doesn’t have crazy zip—and his accuracy is improving but wavers at times. But he’s an elite-level runner with tremendous instincts in the open field, an intelligent student of the game, and he’s shown the fastidiousness and work ethic-bordering-on-psychopathy that is often required of elite quarterbacks. 

The Eagles offense heavily features Hurts’ legs, both in the option game, on designed runs, and with a heaping dose of bootlegs. Whereas less athletic quarterbacks are often taught to get more depth on their bootlegs—with the hope that as long as they get outside the end they’ll have enough time and space to throw—Hurts often sprints laterally to get width on his bootlegs—forcing shallow defenders on the boundary to either commit to him as a run threat or guard the receiver who is almost certainly shooting to the flat or crossing on a shallow from the backside. They want to put you in a run-pass bind in as many ways as possible.

In his first two seasons, Hurts famously just did not throw the ball over the middle. While he’s improved in that area, it’s still not a strength, and the Eagles—whether it’s on bootlegs or not—throw mostly levels (sails, so many sails) and high-low concepts outside the hashes. While I don’t want to knock him for something he’s not asked to do much, my guess would be that Hurts is a better vertical processor than a horizontal one, thriving on passes like sails, high-lows, and shallow-digs versus full-field progressions that make him read left to right or vice versa. Thus, the Eagles have built mostly passing concepts where the side of the formation that Hurts is throwing to is determined by defensive alignment, relying on his penchant for film study and knack for pre-snap diagnoses to effectively split the field in half for him post-snap.

Pessimists may say these facts—and the unreal talent surrounding him—make Hurts a “system quarterback,” but that’s massively shortchanging both him and the Eagles coaching staff for creating such a well-balanced and explosive offense.

DEFENSIVE KEYS

Don’t let them do that thing they’re the best at. Obviously, stopping the run is easier said than done against a team that spams option runs and has the top offensive line and rushing attack in the country, but the one major constant of this Eagles offense is that if you can’t stop the run, they won’t stop running. However, if you get them into third-and-mediums and third-and-longs—where play action and RPOs are less effective—their playbook shrinks considerably. 

This will be the biggest test yet for our front seven and making sure we are decisive and sound in our option responsibilities, rush lanes, and run fits, will be a constant point of emphasis throughout this week. This shouldn’t be a “sell out to stop the run and deal with the pass later” approach. The Eagles are too explosive through the air for that strategy to be successful. But if we can slow their running game without committing more bodies to the box or abandoning our pass coverage responsibilities, then we’ve got an excellent chance at slowing down what can otherwise seem like an unstoppable train.

That means stopping Hurts on scrambles as well, which has been an issue for us over the years. Last year, in what was a physical defensive battle, a green Hurts was largely ineffective through the air, but he led all rushers with 82 yards and a score on ten carries. That’s not something we can let happen again.

Bosa Breakout? While the term “breakout” may not apply for the odds-on favorite to win DPOTY, Bosa has had only one QB hit and zero sacks in the past two games. Much, if not all, of that is due to teams game-planning and devoting extra attention to him. In fact, in this game, I would assume he’s made the unblocked read key more often than not.

But while the Eagles’ OL is the best in the business if they have a weakness it’s in the pass pro of left tackle Jordan Mailata. Due to that, I’d expect heavy snaps from Bosa opposite Mailata and hopefully he can bust out of his “slump” in a big way.

Win the alleys. Our defense may be built from our defensive line out—and they’ll need to win some battles at the point of attack for us to have success against this offense—but our outrageously fast linebackers are what makes our defense truly unique. The Eagles rely heavily on option runs and RPOs against zone coverage—which we run more than almost anyone in the country—so whether it’s disguising our fronts and slow-playing mesh points on options and RPOs to muddy the reads, preventing small gains from becoming big ones on the ground through proper angles and strong tackling, or taking away large swaths of ground in the passing game, our linebackers will be paramount to our success on Sunday. 

Last weekend, Dre Greenlaw and Fred Warner’s ability to cover slot receivers deep down the field allowed us to disguise coverages and blitzes in a way that few—if any—other teams are capable of doing. This week, Ryans will once again need to gamble at times with matchups that—on paper—are less than ideal, and Greenlaw and Warner’s unique skillset will once again be relied upon to minimize the potential downside when we roll the dice. Against an offense that is capable of attacking so many different fronts and coverages, the added flexibility and range from our linebackers will likely be a major factor in our defense’s performance. 

Go’s and Gooses. Due in part to a few blown coverages and losses on jump balls down the stretch run, the Niners’ have one giant statistical weakness on their defense, and that is that their deep ball defense is bottom ten in both DVOA and EPA ratings. Expect the Eagles to test that weakness early and often with their dynamic duo of wideouts—both of whom excel at coming down with deep balls and generating big plays down the field. But don’t sleep on Quez Watkins. The Eagles’ third receiver (but fourth option at best) is typically used to stretch the field vertically—often in the slot—with his 4.3 speed. I’d guess the Eagles take at least one shot with him, whether that’s targeting a safety out of the slot or out wide in one-on-one coverage if Philly slides Brown or Smith inside for a play or two. 

The Niners’ other statistical weakness is that they’re 31st in the league on third-and-short defense. Against a team that runs the ball so well, has one of the league’s top option attacks, and loves loves loves the QB sneak (which they often do out of a formation that almost looks like a kneel down), stepping up on third- and fourth-and-short could prove pivotal in this matchup. 

Force intermediate dropback passing. The Eagles’ strength in the running game and top marks in short-yardage situations are enough reason to emphasize keeping them out of third-and-shorts. But if we can force them into downs and distances where RPOs and quick game aren’t viable, we start to push them into an intermediate passing game that doesn’t play to their strengths.

We’ve talked about how Hurts has improved targeting the middle of the field, but it’s still not a strong suit, and it says plenty that it’s an area of the field that they largely avoid outside of RPOs, slants, and the occasional shallow-dig. While his work ethic and astronomical improvement over his short NFL career suggest that he’s likely only getting started, at the moment I think he’s a better preparer and pre-snap guy than he is a fast processor. To me, that’s one of the reasons why they bootleg him so often, throw so many sail and high-low concepts, and often split the field. And that’s likely why they still avoid the middle of the field in true dropback game. At the moment, going quickly through horizontal progressions just isn’t one of his strengths, and—as stated before—they want to cater to their quarterback’s strengths.

But the Eagles’ commitment to (and avoidance of) certain concepts has led to some odd statistical marks, which (hopefully) are markings of potential weaknesses. Hurts has spent all season eviscerating defenses that try to simplify option responsibilities and take away RPOs by playing man coverage, but his EPA/dropback falls from third overall to 21st when facing zone looks. And that includes the easy yardage he’s gotten off the quick screens with numbers and RPOs that the Eagles deploy against zone looks. Against four or fewer rushers, Hurts is 5th in EPA/dropback, but against five or more that drops to 19th. And against zone coverage with five or more rushers? He ranks 32nd out of 33 qualifying passers.

I’m not saying we immediately become the throwback zone blitz-crazy Steelers. But zone coverage is what we do best and what we do most of the time and under Ryans we’ve blitzed at a rate that’s about league average. So it’s in our wheelhouse. If we can’t get home with four then pairing zone coverages with the occasional well-timed blitz could be crucial to get the Eagles off the field. But in order for that to be an option, we have to force them into traditional dropback passes.

Reverse engineering? There’s one other thing that may not even be a thing, so I hesitate to even bring it up, but if anyone’s gonna figure it out it would be DeMeco Ryans (or possibly a future Super Bowl opponent because they’d have two weeks to study film).

The Eagles offense is built like a triple option. It’s reactive to what the defense does in order to generate the best possible look. In the triple option, if the end stays home, the fullback gets a dive up the gut. If the end crashes down on the fullback, the quarterback pulls it and runs. And if the end crashes down on the fullback and the alley defender hits the quarterback, the QB pitches it to the tailback out wide.

Proponents of the option claim that the option is never wrong. How could it be with all those reactive elements based on its read keys? But the option in all of its forms has one very distinct weakness. When other people know those same read keys, they can basically force you to do what they want. They end up calling your plays.

Take for example a zone read with Lamar Jackson (with knees) at quarterback and Practice Squad Joe who runs a 5.3 forty at tailback. In theory, option plays allow Practice Squad Joe to run against better numbers while Lamar can pull whenever his read key tells him to and scramble for a big gain. But in practice, the defense knows the read key and just forces the tailback to get the ball every play. And then your best player winds up with zero carries.

This is a little bit like what we talked about last year against the Packers. Rodgers and Adams feasted off of a mental link that operated outside of the playbook. They both knew what to do and how to adjust against each alignment and depth they saw, and the result was a bevy of fades, nine routes, and slants—regardless of what play was called. So in that divisional matchup, the Niners—knowing exactly what Rodgers and Adams were keying—decided to regularly show one look then rotate into something else on the snap. They knew that Adams against press man would get a fade. So they had a safety lineup in the box to goad the fade, then sprint over the top to double Adams at the snap. They knew when Adams was doubled opposite trips Rodgers would go the other way. So they showed a double then rotated off it at the snap to effectively force Rodgers to ignore his best receiver.

I’m not saying this is the case with the Eagles offense. The schemes they draw up and the way that they make decisions are considerably more complicated than a triple option or a dynamic forged over the years between an elite quarterback and receiver. But I am saying that a scheme that relies on simple answers against specific looks runs some risk of a savvy defensive coordinator—with a full season of film to determine tendencies—showing one look pre-snap, predicting the counterattack, then rotating into a trap once the ball is snapped.

Would be sick.

lol

DEFENSE

Defense DVOA: 6th
Weighted: 9th
Pass: 1st
Run: 21st

Spent a ton more time on the Eagles’ offense because (1) I am busy and running late on this post and (2) this defense is very familiar, but make no mistake, the Eagles D is just as loaded as talent as its offense.

While DC Jonathan Gannon came with Sirriani from the Colts he is actually a Vic Fangio protege. Since Fangio probably has his fingerprints on as many defenses across the league as Shanahan does on offenses, this is a scheme that we’re well familiar with. They are a 3-4 base with a ton of split safety looks who can pressure with four or more (middle of the pack in blitzing). They a more varied in their man vs pattern matching zone coverages than many Fangio schemes, but—overall—they’re not super tricky.

They’re just supremely talented and well-coached.

Pass Rush. First things first, we gotta talk about the Eagles’ defensive line. It’s long been a strength of the franchise, and while this unit may not quite reach the level of singular talents as their Super Bowl-winning squad, it’s hard to imagine this isn’t their deepest crop over.

The Eagles totaled 70(!) sacks this season, which is 15 more than second-best in the league, and two shy of the all-time record set by the 1984 Chicago Bears (in one less game). Their overall pressure percentage is a fraction shy of the best in the country (literally, one-tenth of a percent less than the Cowboys’ mark). They have FOUR players with double-digit sacks, which maybe has happened before but—if it did—I can’t remember when. Their rotation genuinely goes eight-deep with real guys. Not just randoms. Real guys. And seeing as this is a Fangio scheme and they will certainly be keying our run game, that means we’re likely to see a ton of five-man fronts.

Like any Fangio scheme, these guys can line up around the line, stunt, and play games, but the Eagles honestly just are so deep along the d-line that much of their pass rush success relies on them trotting dudes out, pulling them before they’re tired, then trotting out another unit that’s nearly as strong.

Island life. While much of the Eagles’ #1 pass defense metric can be credited to their relentless pass rush, the secondary shouldn’t be slept on. The Fangio scheme is notoriously friendly on cornerbacks (after all, we started Tarrell Brown and Carlos Rogers and were tops in the league) but the Eagles’ duo of Darius Slay and James Bradberry have done plenty well for themselves in man coverage as well. While their play has dropped off a tiny bit since the early portion of the season—when they were 1 and 2 amongst cornerbacks in nearly every metric imaginable—they’re still arguably the best cornerback duo in the country and they make it very difficult to throw outside against the Eagles.

Chauncey Gardner-Johnson will man either the free safety spot or nickel corner (depending on Avonte Maddox’s health) and is—per usual—a disruptive force in playing the ball (his six interceptions lead the team) and playing his way into the mind of opponents. Since our team is devoid of diva receivers, all of our guys block, and he’ll be lined up over George Kittle half the time, I’m not worried about how much he talks, but Vegas odds are high that CGJ and Jauan Jennings will have words in this game.

Their safeties are very well protected in this scheme, but they also don’t seem like liabilities. From what I’ve seen, they perform their roles well and can hold up enough in man coverage to let them ditch zone coverages more than most Fangio disciples.

But what about that run defense, hmmmm? Based on their DVOA rating and the general narrative around this team, the obvious potential weakness in this defense would be its play against the run, but I don’t think their issues are as pronounced as their ratings may imply.

They had significant issues against the run in the first half of the season, but—after nose tackle Jordan Davis went down to injury—they re-stocked the cupboard with Suh and Linval Joseph. On the basis of EPA/play, their run defense has actually been one of the best in the league since the addition of Joseph, and—now that Davis is also back healthy—it’s not the glaring weakness that it may look like on paper.

OFFENSIVE KEYS

But yeah, we still gotta pound that rock. Despite what I just said… we should definitely run the ball in this game. We’ve faced multiple Fangio defenses this season (the Rams and Chargers being two of them) and we know that their goal is to take away the big play through the air, rally up to shorter passes, and force you to manufacture long drives down the field to score. Luckily, long drives with plenty of runs is kinda our thing.

Granted, the Fangio defense and its five-man fronts have caused issues for many a Shanahan system in the past. This is very much a game where we have to stay balanced in order to keep the run game viable. That may mean we have to open things up a bit early before settling into the run game late. Or it could mean we need to keep things balanced from the jump with a good collection of chunk plays and intermediate routes. But getting the defense to a point where we can rack up major carries would be a big win for us.

I do think we have a chance to get outside on this defense. When the two big-time additions that moved your run defense from one of the league’s worst to one of its best are massive waiver wire DTs in their mid-30s, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say they’re not going to be running sideline-to-sideline on you for forty snaps a game. Both the Cowboys and the Packers seemed to find some holes in the Eagles’ run defense on outside zone looks—they just didn’t always have the outside blocking or execution to fully capitalize. I have more faith in our receivers as blockers, and if we can find some success on outside runs, that could open up cutback lanes. After all, if the benefit of putting five and six dudes on the LOS is to fill every gap, the innate drawback is that you oftentimes only have a single linebacker on the second level if a running back breaks through, and—even though I really like TJ Edwards—that’s a lot for any one linebacker to handle.

This is a game where successful incremental gains are going to be our best way to move the ball down the field. How better to do that than with a successful run game?

Play the slots. My guess based on their personnel and the success the Cowboys just had against us with heavy man coverage is that the Eagles are going to come out with more press-man than usual. In doing so they’ll hope to nullify as much misdirection as possible, keep guys tight on receivers to prevent YAC yards, mess up timing in our quick-to-intermediate passing game, and—in doing so—let their defensive line get after Purdy.

Last week, the Cowboys did just that—largely eliminating our outside receivers with blanket coverage—and pressuring Purdy on 16 out of 33 dropbacks. When pressured, he completed only 4-of-12 for 55 yards and two sacks. If the Eagles aim to replicate that scheme, we may pivot to attacking them from the slots.

Other than the occasional double move or play action shot play against an overzealous corner, I’d guess our plan is to largely avoid work outside the hashes and instead focus on the interior, where I think—if you can block it—there is space to be had, particularly on digs and second level balls between the hashes. While Kittle and CMC naturally cause problems with matchups on linebackers and safeties, it will be interesting to see if Shanahan devises more ways to get his outside receivers—in particular Deebo—off of outside man coverage and into the middle of the field via motion, formations, personnel shuffling, etc.

A side of beef. Our unique set of skill players and our affinity for 21 personnel will be something to watch in this matchup. While the Eagles have performed well against two-back sets, it’s not something they’ve seen a ton of throughout the season, and I’d expect us to try and use our swiss army knife skill players to hunt for matchups on the ground as much as through the air.

The Eagles have done a good job of eliminating YAC yards (the natural funneling system of two-high looks helps in that regard) and—if they go man coverage—they’re certain to hope that they can deny passes and tackle our ballcarriers before they get going. But I don’t know how well these DBs will hold up when they’re repeatedly put in compromising positions in the run game. The Eagles have missed some tackles this year, and Shanahan is creative enough to mix and match his personnel to pull linebackers out of the box and/or use motion and closed formations to force cornerbacks to play the role of play-side fill defender or back-side pursuit against the cutback.

If we can start beating on some DBs in the run game, the Eagles will need to make a decision about whether or not they have to match our physicality with size. And if they start subbing out nickels for seldom-used additional linebackers or playing coverages and fronts that protect their corners more in the run game, that opens up space for us through the air.

To sling or not to sling. It’ll be interesting to see what Shanahan’s confidence level is in both Purdy and our passing attack against a historically productive pass rush and the #1-ranked passing defense in the country. After all, this is a pass defense that has allowed upwards of 200 passing yards only five times on the season and upwards of 300 only once (to the Cowboys in December).

The Eagles are deep enough along the DL that they could feasibly start three tackle-like bodies along the interior, load the LOS with five or six, and dare Purdy to pass while they bluff and disguise who on that line is dropping back into coverage to try and rob slant routes. Just like against the Rams last year, they could sell out completely and quite literally force the Niners to pass. If that’s the case, don’t be shocked to see the Niners motion into some empty sets to force the Eagles’ bigger players to run more while hoping to create quick passing lanes for Purdy before the rush gets home. Again, that will depend on how heavily the Eagles key the run and how confident our staff is in throwing on early downs.

Regardless of how we get there, if we can keep things balanced and keep Purdy upright, there will be openings through the air, and our young QB will have to take advantage. The name of the game isn’t volume, it’s efficiency, and as scary as the Eagles’ pass defense may appear, elite QBs have had success against them. This isn’t to say that Brock Purdy is an elite QB, but since Halloween, the Eagles have faced Kenny Pickett, Davis Mills, Taylor Heinecke, the ghost of Matt Ryan, Ryan Tannehill, Daniel Jones (3x), Andy Dalton, Dak Prescott, and Aaron Rodgers.

The absolute max number of those quarterbacks who you could qualify as “good” is three, and Rodgers left the Packers game due to injury while Dak threw for 347 yards and three scores on the Eagles while going a perfect 24-of-24 for 300 against their zone coverage looks. Again, this is a tall task for Purdy and for our passing attack. But it’s not impossible to move the ball through the air on these guys.

[cartoon jumping sound]

OVERALL

Top-to-bottom, the Eagles are the best team that we’ve played all year and—on paper—the best team in the NFL. While we’d be the last to shed a tear over missed snaps from starting quarterbacks, they easily could have finished the season 16-1 if not for Hurts’ injury.

While Philadelphia’s the favorite for a reason, they’re far from bulletproof, and I have to wonder if the same simplicity of scheme that helped catapult their offense and defense to such elite levels so quickly has any blindspots that have gone unnoticed (or incapable of being exploited) as they buzz-sawed through the regular season.

But—magical cipher or not—this is a stylistic matchup we can work with. We can play stout defense, run the ball, throw haymakers, and make things messy. It’s part of our DNA. Teams aren’t 0-15 the week after playing us for no reason. Win or lose, you know the ice baths are gonna be ready to go.

Go Niners 👍🏈

Divisional Preview v. Dallas

Date: Sunday, 1/22
Time: 3:30PM PT
Location: Levi’s Stadium (Santa Clara, CA)
Opponent: Dallas Cowboys

Despite our offense driving up and down the field at will, Seattle Seattle-d their way to a one-point first-half lead in the wildcard round, doubling down on the ground and loading up with designer runs to minimize possessions and keep the game (in typical Seattle fashion) annoyingly close. But after entering the half celebrating like the Cleveland Cavaliers getting not-swept by the 2016 KD Warriors (“Cavs in eight”), the Seahawks—just like those Cavs—promptly folded under superior talent and coaching. Now we face the Cowboys.

But first, a few quick hits on our victory over Seattle:

From a simmer to a boil. Brock Purdy started a little off, missing some dudes and showing nerves a bit more than we’ve been accustomed to. But then, as he has done up until this point, he clicked into gear, and once that happened our offense was unstoppable. The 505 total yards and 41 points were both season-highs for our offense, and the 324 passing yards were our second-best output of the year. 

Once again, Purdy showed that his deep ball may not be great (he missed a wide-open TD to Jennings early then barely fit the ball into Jennings on that third quarter toss), but the fact that he throws it opens things up for us offensively. And his ability to extend plays in the passing game let him find two wide open running backs for scores in the redzone. 

Perhaps the most telling part of how this offense has evolved to its current state was in Shanahan’s fake pitch naked bootleg touchdown to Deebo, a call that faked out the entirety of the Seahawks defense and once again added credence to the idea that Shanahan—and this offense—are more willing and able than ever to be aggressive in putting feet on necks when they smell blood in the water.

Someone’s never watched Friday. Shit-talking is equal parts art and math equation. There are some guys who are easy targets because you believe you can get under their skin and throw off their game. You hope that the sweet nothings you whisper in their ear will make them fold into a fit of rage where they get out of rhythm, their play falters, and/or they make dumb mistakes. Doing that well is the art. Picking the time, the place, and the target is the math equation. Pick right and your opponent’s play suffers. But if you pick wrong…

Granted, twisting a recently sprained ankle post-play is a bit more than shit-talking. And doing that to the dude who just broke four tackles to secure a first down, has a highlight reel composed of plays that resemble a power running back, and is the emotional leader of an offense that’s just itching for a reason to break things open makes for some fuzzy math to say the least. There’s a reason someone like The Rock can walk down the street alone and not get mugged. It’s cause most people just aren’t that stupid.

It’s not a coincidence that Shanahan called five straight runs after the incident that caused Trent Williams—who ranks incredibly low on the “would want to start shit with in an alley” power rankings—to rush to the defense of his star receiver and start a team-wide skirmish in the process. Nor is it a coincidence that the Niners would rack up three straight touchdowns and scores on all four of their second-half possessions after that occurred. And it wasn’t a coincidence that—after Deebo started hunting down and chirping in the ears of defenders after every big Niners play then cemented the victory himself—Seattle’s only retort was to let out their feelings on a helpless yard marker.

the grounds crew wants a word

The eyes have it. Just weeks after erasing DK Metcalf in Seattle, Charvarius Ward wound up on the wrong end of a number of big plays to Seattle’s star receiver—the most obvious being the 50-yard go route that gave the Seahawks an early 14-13 lead.

It was all-in-all a forgettable game for Ward, but what stood out the most was that he was clearly keying back shoulder passes down the sideline. This got him tangled up and opening early and/or at the wrong angle on Metcalf’s vertical stems. And from there he was too out of position to makeup the ground. My guess would be that DK was using head or eye fakes—triggering the DB coaching point of turning for the ball when the receivers eyes look up for it—before continuing up the field. Based on what we’ve seen from Ward the majority of this season, the hope is that this is more of an aberration than a long-term issue.

On the plus side, Deommodore Lenoir had an excellent game after being picked on a bit over the past month. The second-year corner gave up two grabs for 16 yards, held Geno Smith to a 20.8 QB rating when targeted, and picked off a pass intended for Tyler Lockett. More deep balls are coming for both of these guys. But it was nice to see Lenoir with a strong outing as we move onto more explosive offenses.

Slim Charles. In a game where Bosa not only failed to register a sack but —for the first time in his career—failed to register a pressure, Omenihu came up big with two sacks and the red hand slap that forced the game’s first turnover and sent the Niners off to the races. 

Omenihu, who we got from the Houston Garbage Fires for a sixth-rounder last year (and whose 98th percentile DE arm length would make even Trent Baalke blush) has quietly put together a nice pass-rushing season in year two under Kris Kocurek. After the Texans bulked him up to play more on the interior, the Niners asked him to slim back down and play an outside-in role on their defensive line. He obliged, shedding 15 pounds to get down to 265, and—despite a modest 4.5 sacks on the season—his 54 pressures rank 20th among all edge rushers.

This was Omenihu’s second career multi-sack game. The first? Last year’s wildcard win over the Cowboys, when he put up 1.5 sacks and forced another fumble.

And that’s what we call a segway!

trying to save the world from seeing this again

THE COWBOYS

Long a playoff laughing stock, the Dallas Cowboys are fresh off a 31-14 thumping of the Buccaneers, their first road playoff win in thirty years and just their fourth playoff win since 1996. Given an entire generation has been born and joined the workforce since the Cowboys were a true contender, it’s easy to poke fun at them (and, to be clear, I’m not saying you shouldn’t), but it’s worth remembering that the clean and tidy narratives that we give to players, coaches, and teams are often lazy shorthand for what’s really going on—the Sparknotes version of an actual accounting of the facts. And for all of us who “read” Shakespeare during school, we should know how reliable cursory skimming is versus the actual unabridged text.

Sports narratives are largely the result of an echo chamber of talking heads and mercenary bloggers turned “reporters.” Some of their takes are never true. While those that are true, only exist that way until they’re not. Jim Harbaugh can’t beat Ohio State… until he does so in back-to-back years in emphatic fashion. Phil Mickelson can’t win a major… until he wins three Masters in seven years. You can’t win championships with three-point shooting… until the entire NBA does exactly that. All this to say, feel free to laugh at the Cowboys, but don’t overlook them. Sports memes and five-second hot takes are far from predictive. This team is as talented as we are. And now that the playoff monkey is lifted off their back, we’ll need to bring our A-game to make sure last week wasn’t a stepping stone towards their ascension to the Super Bowl contender that they’ve long been thought to be. 

OFFENSE

DVOA: 15th
Pass: 13th
Run: 10th

All offenses operate somewhere on the spectrum of (1) building an attack around an identity and (2) being multiple to keep defenses off-guard. Regardless of the direction a team leans, it can have success if the execution and the details of its choice are on point.

Imagine a graph (that I was too lazy to make) with offensive efficacy on the x-axis (horizontal) and offensive identity on the y-axis (vertical). A team like the Niners or the Eagles—with potent offenses stemming from clear identities—would be in the upper right quadrant. A team like the Ravens would be even higher on the identity scale but would skew left with decreased offensive success (depending on if we include Lamar Jackson in their performances, it would skew A LOT left). A team like the Chiefs would be in the lower right quadrant. Super effective and very multiple in their attack. A team like the Raiders would be a little less multiple and a decent chunk less effective. And a team like the Chargers would reside in the bottom left. No identity and—given the talent at their disposal—little offensive efficacy.

Teams in the upper right quadrant—like us—build their playbooks around what they want to do (in our case, run the ball and generate YAC yards in the passing game) and then layer in lots of misdirection, window dressing, and counter punches to keep defenses honest. When an offense built that way struggles, it’s often because those counter punches aren’t varied and/or effective enough to keep their bread-and-butter offensive identity viable against the opposing defense that’s keying it.

Conversely, when a team in the lower right quadrant—like the Chiefs—struggles on offense, its often because their wide array of plays isn’t working, and—since they’ve gone wide instead of focused in their offensive approach—they either aren’t practiced enough in their many concepts and/or lack the ability to lean back on the bread-and-butter “staples” that a team with high identity has more readily available. 

The Cowboys very much fall into that latter camp. And while their offense isn’t as highly touted as in the past, that’s largely due to Dak’s early-season injury and consistency issues. When they’re on, they’re as explosive as any team in football, as evidenced by the 35.5 points per game that they’ve scored against opponents who made the playoffs since Dak returned from injury mid-season. 

The greatest constants this Dallas offense has schematically are that they want to stay balanced, they want to set up the run, and they want to use those two things to get Dak into rhythm as quickly as possible so that they can hum on all cylinders.

Same backs, different roles. 2022 officially marks the last year that Ezekiel Elliott will be drafted ahead of Tony Pollard in fantasy leagues, as the latter clearly emerged as the Cowboys’ top back this season. With his speed and ability in the run and pass game, Pollard’s become one of the most dangerous big-play threats in the league, and the Cowboys do a great job of being creative in getting him the ball in multiple ways. If there’s any way in which the Cowboys have definitely improved this season on offense, it’s largely due to their increased utilization of Pollard. He’s measured out as the more efficient and dangerous of the two Dallas runningbacks for quite some time, but 2022 was when the coaching staff finally was willing to accept that.

Throughout the regular season, Dallas was careful in keeping Pollard’s total touches and hits down, but now that we’re into the playoffs he should be more of the lead back than ever. But don’t sleep on Zeke Elliott. The Cowboys like to deploy both of them at once and the elder statesman still led the team in carries and rushing touchdowns. He’ll be used heavily whenever the Cowboys are looking for less of a chef’s knife and more of a meat tenderizer.

Shuffleboard. Part of the inconsistency of the Cowboys’ offense has come with the decreasing health and increasing permutations of their offensive line. A torn ACL to starting LT Terrence Steele caused a late-season shakeup that—in addition to C Tyler Biadasz going down with an ankle injury in week 17—has left the Cowboys scrambling to reassemble what has long been a strength of this team.

In the wildcard game against Tampa Bay, Dallas made the bold move of trotting out a starting OL arrangement that they hadn’t used all season. This was due in part to necessity but also to accommodate the healthy return of Biadasz. The resulting lineup of (from left to right) Jason Peters—Tyler Smith—Biadasz—Zack Martin—Tyron Smith proved formidable on Monday, limiting the Bucs to only one sack early in the first quarter, and the decision to move former LG Connor McGovern—their OL’s biggest weakness—to an auxiliary sixth lineman role—where he can play jumbo fullback/wingback and kick out linebackers and defensive ends—has paid early dividends.

From the one-game sample size, the Cowboys’ sporadic offensive line issues seem to have been solved, but the Niners’ front seven is a whole different beast than Tampa Bay’s.

The Housewives are on the field! This AT&T commercial may be the best of their “hybrid sports viewing” ads, but—if we’re being honest—it’s mid at best. Advertisement quality notwithstanding, the idea of keeping Prescott uncomfortable to stymy the Dallas offense is a legitimate one.

Dak has a tendency to start games slowly, with his accuracy a little off, balls sailing high, and his reads a tad fuzzy (0-4 with one sack against the Bucs on Monday). But once he figures out what the defense is doing and gets going he can heat up in a hurry (25-of-29 for 305 yards and 4 TDs the rest of the way), and when Dak is playing like a Tier 1 quarterback, this offense is operating like a Tier 1 offense. 

In order to get Dak into rhythm the Cowboys like to start with heavy doses of the running game and by utilizing motions, various formations, and delayed TE releases to generate a bunch of easy bootleg passes to the flat. It sometimes makes for a slow build-up offensively, but the return is well worth the investment. 

Dak is an interesting case because he seems like a solid dude, a well-liked leader, and a good NFL quarterback. But the lack of team playoff success, the spotlight that is constantly put on Dallas quarterbacks by the media and ownership alike, and the never-ending debate about whether or not he is a “great” quarterback have probably—at least to some degree—contributed to a season that’s been largely out of character.

Dak has historically protected the ball well, made smart decisions, and put up the occasional monster stat line, but the knock has always been that he hasn’t made enough big-time throws to elevate his team when the stakes are highest. I have to believe that—in conjunction with some injury rust—this narrative has played some part in a season that saw Dak—despite playing in only 12 games—lead the league in interceptions, lose 2+% off his completion percentage, and set career-highs in picks and lows in YPA and passing TDs during the three-year Kellen Moore era. 

In short, he’s pushing the issue too much, trying to fit the ball into tighter spots than he should, and taking more risks than needed. Granted, these issues aren’t all the time. Dak has put up plenty of good tape this season. But until last weekend against the Bucs, he'd thrown a pick in seven straight games. The Cowboys know that in order to get the best out of Dak they need to establish the running game off the jump, stay balanced in their attack, and give him a few lay-ups early so that the doesn’t feel the need to push and play hero ball as the game goes on.

DEFENSIVE KEYS

The Last Time… In our 2021 wildcard matchup with the Cowboys, our defensive line basically feasted, sacking Dak five times and hitting him 14 times while our defense held the Boys to 77 yards rushing on 21 attempts (w/ 27 of those yards coming from Dak himself). While Dallas would put up 17 points and make things interesting late, their scoring drives were largely the result of Josh Norman being the only dude in the building not expecting a fake punt and a Jimmy G being returned to our 28-yard line.

The Lamb Plan. CeeDee Lamb ascended to the Cowboys’ No.1 receiver role last year and rightfully so. But the off-season jettisoning and then weird shit-talking of fellow starting wideout Amari Cooper left a massive hole opposite Lamb. Michael Gallup is that No.2 wideout, but while Gallup can run and make the occasional splash play, the drop-off from Lamb is steep.

How the Niners guard Lamb will be a major factor in how they do in pass coverage on Sunday. We’ve seen Charvarius Ward shadow a top wideout like DK Metcalf, but the Cowboys are aware of their wide receiver room and do a much better job of moving CeeDee into the slot and putting him in motion to avoid shadow corners. Also, as one of the most zone-heavy defenses in the league, there’s only so much true shadowing we can do while still adhering to the principles that make our defense elite. 

Regardless, Lamb is a genuine three-level threat at wideout who can both run after the catch and high point the ball down the field, and allowing him to go off is the easiest way to ensure Dak is comfortable all game. 

Test the new blood. Surprise, surprise, if we dominate the LOS the way our defense has been assembled to do, this offense will have tough sledding this weekend. The Cowboys employ one of the best guards in the league and two tackles with a shot at Canton once they retire, but those tackles are getting long in the tooth and we applied plenty of pressure last year against a more established starting five. There are bound to be hiccups in communication with players shuffling to different positions and the stunts and slants that we are so adept at along our DL—along with the mug looks and simulated pressures we like to employ on passing downs—will be an excellent test to see how solidified this Dallas front really is. 

That applies to the Dallas tight ends as well. They have two guys with good athleticism who can both run and catch the ball, but neither are exceptional blockers. Dalton Schultz is often the barometer for their offensive success and their safety blanket as their No.2 option in the passing game. If we force him into pass pro to account for heat from our DL, that’s an absolute win for us. I’d expect to see Bosa get a lot of chip blocks and delayed releases, with the Cowboys trying to get the best of both worlds (slowing down Bosa and getting a quick outlet to the flat). Some of those will be unavoidable, but slants and stunts can help in the matter—particularly on passing downs. 

In the run game, it’s more of the same. While our run defense is one of the best in the league, teams have had some success pounding the ball for short gains if they can stick to it and show enough different looks. Save for Javon Kinlaw—who is only now getting his sea legs after being out with injury—we’re a relatively small front seven on top of being a wide 9, so we’re only okay on short-yardage runs and generating tackles for loss. Where we excel—and are best in the league—is in using our team speed to limit runs of 5-10 yards and 10+ yards. The Boys like to run out of double-tight sets. If we pound them on the edges and force them into more 11 personnel, they lose a big chunk of their play-action game and may have to abandon the looks that let them run the ball inside.

Show don’t tell. Dak is an elite-level pre-snap player. He’s great at diagnosing what defenses are presenting and checking into plays that attack the defense’s weaknesses. But he sometimes gets caught up in his pre-snap read, and that can get him into trouble. Hiding coverages and rotating safeties late—although not too late, as they like to run tempo—will be important. 

I expect teams to attack our defense by trying to throw over us in the secondary and over our linebackers on deep crossers (or outside alley shots) off of play action. If we can stay disciplined with our eyes and eliminate those big plays outside, then we should be at an advantage inside the hashes. While the Cowboys are certain to try and scheme up some shot plays and one-on-one matchups between Lamb and one of our safeties out of the slot—our rangy linebackers mean there’s little room for error in the middle of the field. This is doubly the case against Prescott, who has struggled with picks across the middle of the field throughout his career. 

As stated in last year’s write-up, Prescott has thrown 18 of his 25 picks prior to this season across the intermediate and deep middle zones of the defense. While I don’t know how many of his 15 picks this season were between the hashes (thanks for nothing Gamepass), I know both of his interceptions against the Packers were late throws taken away by DBs jumping routes. In this game in particular, those hidden coverages could result in valuable takeaways. 

Make them break tendencies. Despite their weaponry and the various route combinations and gadget plays they draw up, the Cowboys were torpedoed in last year’s playoffs in part because the Niners heavily keyed their formational and situational tendencies. I don’t know if those tendencies still exist to that level, but if they do, you’d better believe the Niners are aware of them. 

Our two worst defensive performances this season were against offenses with multiple attacks who employed misdirection well enough to generate shot plays and neuter the aggression and speed that feeds our defense. But in order to do that successfully, you need to regularly break tendencies. Otherwise, all your effort to scheme up a wider array of plays is done under by the fact that the opposition is expecting them.

let’s avoid this

DEFENSE

DVOA: 2nd
Weighted: 6th
Run: 5th
Pass: 3rd

Cowboys DC Dan Quinn is a hot head coaching candidate for a few reasons: (1) he’s done the job before, and some teams (see: Broncos) remain shell-shocked from their recent whiffs on inexperienced HCs; (2) he quickly turned a bottom-of-the-league Cowboys defense into one of the best units in football; and (3) he sustained that success while continuing to change and evolve the scheme in his second year in Dallas.

Once synonymous with the 4-3 Under Cover 3 system that he created alongside Pete Carroll (and that gave berth to the Legion of Boom and the golden era of Seahawks football), Quinn’s defenses in Dallas have been much more variable in their approach.

At its core, the Cowboys’ defense wants to cycle a deep crop of defensive linemen into mostly four-man fronts, leaning more on stunts—which they run at one of the highest rates in the league—than blitzes to generate a top-five pressure and hurry rate while playing a well-balanced mix of Cover 1, 2, and 3 on the back end. They are very much a penetrating one-gap scheme that is aggressive up and down the field, and they’ve pushed aside mass cynicism from the analytics community—who felt their ability to generate turnovers would regress to the mean this year—to lead the league in takeaways for the second straight season—a feat that hasn’t been accomplished in at least twenty years.

The Cowboys are better known for their offense, but their defense is the more consistent group, and it’s only getting better. While Dallas has been diced up a few times over the past months by the Jags and the Hurts-less Eagles, they have since returned two key contributors—340-pound defensive tackle Jonathan Hankins and starting mike linebacker Leighton Vander Esch—and their performance against the Bucs should be a more accurate indicator of their ability than the four weeks before it.

The man in the mirror. On paper, the Cowboys’ use of four-man fronts, heavy DL rotation, a general reliance more on stunts than blitzes to generate high amounts of pressure, and variable coverages on the back-end sounds familiar. Because that’s what our defense does. But there are a couple of key differences.

Our coverage preferences lean heavily towards zone, and—all else being equal—we’re most likely to sit in Cover 3 and Cover 4 and rally up to the ball. While it’s impossible to get inside Dan Quinn’s head, I think he would like his coverages to skew more aggressively toward pressing wideouts and jumping routes. 

Against the Bucs, they did exactly what I would have (and what I think they’d like to do in any given week if the matchups allowed it). They sat in Cover 2 and man, were physical at the LOS to mess up route timing, and dared anyone on that Tampa Bay offense to beat them with speed. Unafraid of the Bucs’ nonexistent run game, they were totally fine deploying two-high safeties on early downs because they know how hard it is to throw the short game (Brady’s favorite) into those Cover 2 windows, and they knew the Bucs couldn’t throw the ball deep given the pressure up front. 

Cover 1 and Cover 2 need to be paired with a strong pass rush because they’re both susceptible to multiple long-developing routes down the field, but Dallas believes their pass rush can consistently get home (which it largely has) before those deep crossers or multiple verticals can spring open. Additionally, the ability to oscillate between Cover 3 and Cover 2 looks means the Cowboys can show a soft corner pre-snap and then sneak that man down into the flats to jump balls and create turnovers. Given this defense is very much built off of a strong pass rush and turnover-hunting, those coverage combinations make a ton of sense. 

Conversely, we’re more of a Cover 3 and Cover 4 team because of the incredible range that our linebackers have in coverage. When the underneath run defenders can get the depth that our guys can, we can play a bigger shell over the top, force shorter passes, and fly to the football for minimal gains after the catch. This is a more conservative coverage approach that allows our safeties—who are not known for their pure speed—to have extra support deep so that they’re less likely to get picked on down the field in 1-on-1 matchups. 

Dudes at DE. This Dallas defense is powered by its deep rotation of pass rushers and supercharged by the NFL’s #1 defensive freak, Micah Parsons. Nick Bosa’s greatest competitor for the DPOTY award is an absolute monster of an athlete and—in his second year in the league—Quinn has moved him more and more toward the LOS. Last year Parsons played off-ball linebacker about 60% of the time and the rest at defensive end. Now, he’s about 80% along the DL and 20% off-ball. Much of that is matchup dependent and—with Parsons playing five or fewer off-ball snaps in 10 of 18 games—there are some weeks where Parsons basically only plays along the D-line. It makes sense, given Parsons is at his best and most disruptive laser beaming toward quarterbacks with his 4.3 speed. 

Opposite Parsons, don’t sleep on DeMarcus Lawrence—whose counting stats aren’t as impressive as in past years but who is still plenty disruptive. He’s the lead dog of the rest of the defensive line, which includes five dudes (four of them defensive ends) with over 23 pressures on the season. For any fans of PFF ratings, they have six dudes on the DL whose pass rush grades rate in the green (for good), and they use all of them in a healthy rotation.

Despite Tampa Bay having a top-three Pass Blocking Efficiency (PBE) rating (an ESPN metric given to OLs for how frequently they can block the pass rush for 2.5 seconds), the Cowboys absolutely harassed Brady all night. This is what Trent Williams and the boys will be up against.

LVE FTW. Mike linebacker Leighton Vander Esch has had an interesting career, going from ascending superstar as a rookie to injury-prone and largely-lost replacement level player through various schemes, before cementing himself this year as the unquestioned leader of the Dallas linebacker corps. LVE’s emergence (or re-emergence) likely has played a part in Quinn’s comfort level sliding Parsons down to DE more often, and when LVE missed the last month of the season, he left a sizable hole.

The Cowboys have played 194 def. snaps this season without LVE. And while on/off field splits can have some noise. The dropoff in success rate is *steep*:

Def. Rush success (w/ rank)
On: 65.3% 2nd
Off: 47.3% 32nd

Def. success
On: 61.5% 4th
Off: 55.8% 26th

(via @TruMediaSports) https://t.co/hjlzqHzsog

— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) December 20, 2022

When Parsons is on the DL, Anthony Barr typically is his replacement at weak-side backer. When LVE went down and Barr had to man their linebacker corps solo the results were… not great. Excluding the week 17 game against the Josh Dobbs-led, Derrick Henry-less Titans and the week 18 matchup against a Commanders team where half the team didn’t dress and the other half played like they didn’t dress—the LVE-less Cowboys got gashed for 40 points and 503 yards by the Jags and 34 points and 442 yards by the Gardner Minshew Eagles. While the defense still generated a whopping 7 takeaways in those games, they lose a lot of their fundamental drive-stopping ability without LVE. 

Realistically, the depth the Cowboys have at linebacker is opposite what they have along the defensive line. They just don’t have anyone with the range and recognition skills to do what LVE does, and that’s part of why they lean so heavily on extra DB personnel sets and have safety Jayron Kearse regularly moonlight as an extra LB. 

Moar Shuffleboard. While cornerback Trevon Diggs’ otherworldly interception numbers from last year have regressed to the mean, he’s put together a more well-rounded 2022. Diggs still has great ball skills (three picks, 14 pass deflections this year) and will still gamble at times, but he’s no longer the dude with the binary outcome of “generate a turnover” or “get roasted.”

Granted, there’s been less of a reason to hard target Diggs this year given the dire situation opposite him. Anthony Brown started the season as the Boys’ second outside corner, and—while he wasn’t exactly killing it—his replacements have been getting dunked on with regularity. Kelvin Joseph came in and got roasted by the Texans and the Jags. Nahshon Wright replaced him then gave up 157 yards in completions to receivers catching balls from Josh Dobbs and Sam Howell. Trayvon Mullen got a shot to close the year and promptly gave up two grabs for 58 yards before getting hurt.

So for the wildcard round, the Boys decided to approach things differently. Just as the Cowboys offense pulled OL weak-link Connor McGovern and put him into a support role as they attempted to play their best five linemen forward regardless of position, the Dallas defense shifted rookie DaRon Bland—who has had a strong first season playing almost entirely in the slot—to the outside corner opposite Diggs. Bland was peppered with targets and wasn’t a lockdown presence by any means, but the defense had one of its best performances in months.

OFFENSIVE KEYS

Last time… the Cowboys opened up with Cover 3, were promptly torched by a balanced attack as we ran the ball and hit the alleys in the quick game, and then promptly moved to an aggressive Cover 1 for much of the day. That led to a few tough third-down completions, then—once Jimmy got banged up—an airmailed long incomplete to Aiyuk, the pick, and a more conservative approach from there on out.

Stay on the sticks. As always, keeping our offense balanced and on schedule will be key to keeping us operating at a high level. Against the best pass rush we’ve faced all year, that will require some extra effort. This is a great litmus test for our revamped interior offensive line as well as Mike McGlinchey—who has settled into a solid season at RT—but also for our rookie quarterback.

While Brock Purdy’s ability to extend plays has greatly increased the ceiling of our offense, he’ll need to be careful about scrambling into trouble against this team and—in particular—the edge duo of Parsons and Lawrence. Purdy has a tendency to flush outside the pocket when pressure comes—rather than step into it—and it will be considerably harder for him to turn back shoulder and get outside of the athletes that Dallas employs on their edges. In this matchup, every time Purdy chooses to lose ground and bounce outside rather than stay in the pocket and keep his eyes downfield, the cost-benefit analysis will be calculated in a way that he hasn’t yet seen in the NFL.

While Purdy has been up to the task since taking over the starting gig, he’s done so largely against average-to-below-average defenses. The Bucs were a bit banged up when he faced them in his inaugural start. While against the Commanders— a top 10 unit—our offense was greatly aided by Taylor Heinecke, and we settled for far too many field goals. This Dallas defense—now at full strength—is unquestionably the best defense Purdy has seen in his young NFL career. 

That Hangover meme. It’ll be interesting to see how Dallas mixes up their coverages against us this time around. We’re clearly adept at attacking Cover 3—as much of our passing attack thrives on putting alley defenders in binds versus the run and pass—but it’s hard to show two-high against us and stop the run with any consistency. 

Cover 1 clearly worked the best against us last time as it not only gives numbers in the box but also lets a linebacker or the occasional safety sit in the hole as a rat defender and try to jump the underneath routes that we love so dearly. But that game plan is tougher to implement in 2022. Aiyuk is a year better and has excelled against man coverage, CMC is now on the roster and is a matchup nightmare one-on-one, and the presence of McCaffrey and a healthy Elijah Mitchell means Deebo now moonlights as a back—by choice, rather than necessity. We’re just much more capable than we were last year at mixing and matching personnel and offensive looks to find matchups that we like.

Perhaps Dallas tries to stick mostly to man but hide it more pre-snap, hoping to confuse our rookie quarterback. Or maybe they sprinkle in more Cover 2 to clog the underneath passing lanes and tell their safeties to fill hard against the run—deep ball be damned—as a way of daring us to throw it down the field with any consistency. That doesn’t seem fundamentally sound to me, but people have done crazier things against Niners offenses. Whatever Dallas does, I can’t imagine they’ll be able to keep things simple against us. 

Seconds plz. Regardless of what coverages Dallas deploys it will be worth targeting second linebackers and second cornerbacks in the passing game. This Cowboys defense is well-coached and talented, but they’re lacking in depth. DaRon Bland has had a promising rookie season in the slot, but he is largely unproven outside. While the Bucs threw the ball 66 times last week, Bland still gave up nearly 100 yards receiving. Guarding Aiyuk down the field while tackling Deebo on underneath routes will be quite the task. If the Boys stick to last week’s lineup then will Jayron Kearse—who has played mostly box safety and bonus linebacker—be able to cover our guys in space in the slot? The same question could be asked of Israel Mukuamu, who was mostly a backup safety this year but played a season-high snaps as Dallas’ dimeback against the Bucs.

Likewise, at linebacker, Anthony Barr has never been a stellar coverage guy. When Parsons slides down to defensive end—which could be the large majority of the game—can we make Barr chase CMC out of the backfield while trying to drop deep enough to stop Kittle on digs and crossers? LVE is a talented linebacker, but if he doesn’t have any coverage support from his fellow LBs, how much ground can he really cover?

There are matchups to be had, and much of our success in the passing game—past the line of scrimmage at least—could be determined by how well Shanahan’s multi-tool of death matches up against the Cowboys’ linebackers and their menagerie of safeties.

The Shanny Special. Despite the return of a healthy LVE and Johnathan Hankins, I think we can run on this team as long as we stay diverse in our schemes. Against a defense as aggressive as this one—which likes to shoot gaps and get upfield to create havoc—all those little Shanahan wrinkles and misdirections could pay dividends.

Fly motions that freeze backside pursuit and force the linebackers to shift over just a hair right before we snap the ball, split zone looks that give cross-flow backfield action, weave back tosses and faux pulling guards—anything that freezes the flow of the linebackers for just a split-second could pay dividends against this team because that could not only lead to missed assignments but may prevent them from playing as aggressively as they want to. I think that if we can take away the confidence and speed of their reads, we can out-physical them in the box. 

When running outside, I think we can get the edge against this team with pitches and condensed formations, and I’d expect a heavy dose of motion across field and crack blocks to create closed or faux-closed formations that make their corners have to take on the point-of-attack run game responsibilities that often fall on safeties and linebackers. I don’t know if these Dallas corners can hold up as tacklers if put in that position on enough tosses and powers. 

Speaking of powers, gap runs should be a healthy part of our run game in this matchup, both because they are a natural complement to our zone runs and because they can punish teams for big gains when they shoot upfield or stunt too aggressively. At full health, this Cowboys defense has been stout against the run—I don’t want to make it seem like it will be easy sledding on the ground—but when you can get push off the line they’ve struggled to tackle on the second level. The Boys have allowed the fourth-most runs of 10+ yards this year, and—despite our newfound quest for offensive balance—gashing teams for big gains on the ground is quite literally the first foundational tenet of Shanahan’s offense. 

SUMMARY

There are a number of different ways to look at this Cowboys team. You can say they’re products of variance and that they aren’t fundamentally better than the temperamental squad we saw slap-dick through narrow wins over the Texans and listless Titans. Or you can say they’re an early-season juggernaut—who has won or been in every single game—and who is just now getting healthy and playing their best ball of the season. Perhaps last week’s performance was a monkey off their back that will allow this team to finally live up to its potential. Or perhaps it was an aberration against a horrid Bucs team, and they’ll lay their playoff egg in this round rather than the last.

In some ways, this game will seem like a litmus test of what’s more legit: the Cowboys as a genuine contender—envigorated after shedding years of playoff baggage—or Brock Purdy as a QB who can contend for a Super Bowl despite his age and limited tools. While many expect one or the other to turn into a pumpkin at any given moment, that doesn’t need to be the case. And although the talking heads will almost certainly peg the results of this game as a statement of fact against the legitimacy of the Cowboys, Brock Purdy, or whatever draws the SEO clicks, there’s very much a world where this game is—like so many other football games—a matchup of two good teams that comes down to a few key moments and lucky bounces.

I don’t know which Cowboys team we’ll see on Sunday, but I know that at their best, Dallas is one of the top teams in football and a difficult out. Luckily, so are we.

Go Niners 👍🏈

2022 Playoff Preview

After a year-long hiatus, I just couldn’t help myself. The Niners are back in the playoffs so this blog must be reactivated. For numerous reasons, I won’t be able to do weekly previews for each matchup, but I wanted to take a quick look at how the team has changed over the past year, how those changes could help us finally get over the hump, and what obstacles could blue ball us once again in our pursuit of the Lombardi Trophy.

But first…

More like Game…ass: The NFL has done countless things worse than screw over my blog, but one of the reasons this site has been dormant for the past year—other than my overall busy life and hectic schedule—is because the league basically bricked NFL Gamepass, which was the paid subscription All-22 service that I used to illustrate my play breakdowns. 

You used to be able to look at an entire play-by-play sheet of each game and click on a specific play to watch its footage. Now, they’ve removed all means of sorting or selecting footage and crammed every play from each game into a single, unsearchable, 30-to-40 minute video clip. Since I don’t get paid to do this—and since the new “scroll and guess” method leads to some fat buffering times—that was a dealbreaker. So sadly, there won’t be any in-depth breakdowns of plays in this write-up. 

This ends my rant about things no one cares about. Now, on to the rants about things that people maybe care about.

OVERALL

According to Football Outsiders’ DVOA, we’re the #2 ranked team in the country. Based on their weighted DVOA metric—which aims to adjust for how well teams are currently playing—we’re #1 overall. Like every ranking system, there’s some statistical noise in DVOA, but it’s generally a strong barometer for team performance, and it should come as no surprise that we—in the midst of a ten-game winning streak—are at or near the top of its rankings.

But there are a few caveats worth noting. While DVOA accounts for the quality of competition in its calculations, according to pure wins and losses, we had one of the easiest strengths of schedule in the NFL. That’s due to the fact that the NFC West had a rare down year, our intraconference crossover was with the lowly NFC South, and we finished third in the division last year—meaning we played the third-ranked teams in the NFC East and North this season. Realistically, you could make the argument that we’ve only really played one truly elite team (the Chiefs), and that happened to coincide with our last loss of the season. But if we’re noting that then it’s only fair to also comment on how our plus-173 point differential was best in the league and so was our 5-1 record against playoff opponents. So while the competition is about to take a step up, there’s no reason to think we shouldn’t be up for the challenge.

OFFENSE

Offensive DVOA: 6th
Weighted DVOA: 2nd
Passing: 3rd
Rushing: 13th

In what is quickly becoming a Niners tradition, our offense started slowly before picking up steam mid-season and finishing the year with an elite unit. While our 26.5 points per game gave us the nation’s sixth-best scoring offense, when looking at Purdy’s five starts (plus the Miami game where he entered in the first offensive series), that number jumps to 33.5 ppg—which would have been best in the league by 4ppg.

All this to say, we’ve hit our stride at the right time.

levitation = intangibles

Purdy Good. We obviously have to lead this section with our boy Brock—first of his name, (originally) fourth on the depth chart, whose Mr. Irrelevant draft status is required by law to be mentioned multiple times in every broadcast and who looks like he’s twelve years old. He leads us into battle against Seattle this week, and for us to get to where we want to be, he’ll need to fight back a lot of historical ineptitude from his draft cohorts.

To give you a sense of how rare it is for a quarterback drafted this late to have any type of NFL success—much less as a rookie who was thrust into play with functionally zero practice reps—here are a couple of fun facts. Since the turn of the century, there has only been a single quarterback drafted in the 5th round or later to start a playoff game (TJ Yates in 2011). During that same time frame, non-Purdy quarterbacks drafted in the seventh round have gone a combined 1-14 in their rookie years (ironically, Ken Dorsey has that single win while playing for the Niners). If you Google “best seventh-round quarterbacks,” your search returns are filled with non-sarcastic namedrops like Trevor Siemian, Matt Flynn, and Tim Rattay. Purdy’s run as our starter is already unheard of. If he has any success whatsoever in these playoffs (and/or beyond), ESPN will shit themselves before drawing straws to determine which of their unintelligible talking heads declares him the next Tom Brady and/or the second (third?) coming of Jesus Christ. 

So why has Purdy had so much success so early in his career? Well, the scheme, the surrounding talent, and a supporting locker room that’s used to powering through massive injuries to key positions are a fat piece of that puzzle. But it would be absurd to believe that the only factors contributing to Purdy’s success have been external ones.

Mentally, Purdy plays like a veteran. He’s smart, reads the field quickly and accurately, and—whether it’s scrambling and sliding with the ball extended to ice a game late in the fourth, throwing from a lower arm slot to work around a defensive end trying to disrupt a quick screen, or spinning outside of a DB blitz then squaring up to make a safe throw out of bounds—Purdy does a lot of little things well in a way that you just don’t see from young signal callers. His game and field awareness are advanced, and—based on stories of him going over every play call of team drills in his mind after practice while piloting the scout team—his preparation is equally as precocious. Much of that is likely attributed to him being a dude who doesn’t have ideal size or physical tools and who started 46 games at Iowa State—a historic Big 12 doormat which he helped lead to its most successful string of seasons in school history. When you’re that guy playing for that team, you kind of have to be better on the preparation side otherwise you’re never going to have success.

While his typical “measurables” don’t pop off the page (height, weight, arm strength, etc.), Purdy’s quick release, ability to throw from multiple arm slots, and sneaky athleticism and pocket presence have greatly aided in his ascent. While no one would mistake him for Trey Lance as a runner, Purdy has good short-area quickness and elusiveness and a great sense of feeling and avoiding initial pressure. We’ve talked a lot about how improvisational ability greatly increases the snap-to-snap floor of Shanahan’s notoriously complicated offense. While Lance could pick up yardage on the ground and Jimmy was connecting on more off-book plays this year than in seasons past, Purdy has been consistently strong at buying time and keeping plays alive since taking over the lead job. By turning negative plays into positives or net zeros and net zeros into small or large gains, Purdy has shown—albeit in a small sample size—the ability to keep us on schedule, avoid big losses and mistakes, and—like a running back who always gets more yards than are blocked—gain hidden yardage that not only accumulates over the course of a game but makes every ensuing down and distance more manageable. For a team like the Niners—with an elite defense and a style that emphasizes complementary football through a physical run game—those hidden yards matter more to us than most.

It’s also worth mentioning Purdy’s deep ball, which is actually not that great (his lack of arm strength was why Purdy fell so far in the draft), but differs from Jimmy G’s deep ball in that he actually throws it.

Jimmy Garoppolo is a notoriously bad deep ball thrower, particularly outside the hashes, but throwing the deep ball successfully (or not) is about more than just arm strength. If you want to throw the ball well vertically—especially if you don’t have a rocket launcher strapped to your shoulder—you need to throw early, throw with anticipation, and throw confidently. Jimmy’s accuracy wavered down the field but it was never as much about a lack of arm talent as it was about a lack of confidence to just pull the trigger and let it rip.

People have been critical of Shanahan not throwing the ball enough deep, but not all deep balls have to be completed on schemed-up shot plays and Bruce Arians-esque aggressive downfield passing. Nearly every passing concept has built-in deep balls—or pre-snap alerts—if for no other reasons than to easily hunt alignment and personnel matchups, to force DBs to drop deep, and to create spacing and passing windows between routes. Yet we rarely—if ever—saw Jimmy G recognize these alerts and let it rip down the sideline. Purdy, on the other hand, showed the ability to see and take these opportunities in just his first career start.

⚠️ ¡Y OTRO! ¡’TOUCHDOWN SAN FRANCISCO’!

👨‍🍳 Brock Purdy y Christian McCaffrey cocinan el 3º TD de los #49ers.
21-0 lidera #FTTB tras cuarto y medio de partido. pic.twitter.com/BtMLSnG1uA

— NFLSpain__ (@NFLSpain__) December 11, 2022

On this play, the Niners have flexed CMC out wide and are running Jennings on a Y-cross concept to the left of the formation with a slot pivot from Aiyuk underneath it. It’s a pretty standard concept in the Niners playbook, and—knowing how much we love leveling routes across the middle of the field—the cornerback on CMC false steps on the snap in hopes of jumping a short route inside. This is an outrageously aggressive move that can only be done if a corner (a) doesn’t fear the man out wide (which we’ll get to later) and (b) doesn’t fear that the offense will throw the deep ball. Purdy sees this aggressive approach from the corner—which is basically the equivalent to lining up in press and getting beat off the LOS—and lets it rip to CMC for a back-breaking TD near the end of the first half. 

To be clear, I wouldn’t consider Purdy’s deep ball a strength. He has to put more effort on balls over 20 yards than most QBs, he was a bit off-target on back-to-back fades against the Raiders, he’s had a few instances of missing deeper receivers to take safer passes underneath, and—also against the Raiders—he tossed a pick to Kittle that someone like Lance would have threaded upfield for a touchdown. But the willingness to see and throw the deep ball opens things up for our offense because it makes defenses FINALLY respect us just enough vertically that they can’t just crowd the box to play the run and short game.

Even when Jimmy is playing well, he always seemed to leave yards on the field because he would skew so heavily towards underneath routes and rarely take the deep shots that were baked into concepts. That led to a lot of short-yardage passes in lieu of early skinny posts or nine routes or the digs that often open up behind those contested passes. Then, in turn, those underneath windows would shrink tighter and tighter as teams began cheating away from anything down the field. As we move into the playoffs, teams are going to continue to do what they always do—load up the box against the run and crowd the middle against our intermediate passing game—but at least Purdy has shown he’s got the anticipation and the confidence to toss the occasional long ball. And you only need a few of those passes to be successful to open everything else in our playbook. 

More Like Christian Mc-Catch-rey HAHAHAHA, okay I’ll show myself out. Speaking of raising our offensive floor, Christian McCaffrey probably does that as well as any non-quarterback in football. We know that our emphasis on running the ball, completing intermediate passes, and play action means that we need to stay on track more so than most offenses. And CMC has been—in John Lynch’s terms—a force multiplier at turning negatives into positives and short gains into medium ones.

Shanahan has long been looking for a running back with high-end potential in the passing game, shelling out loads of money (McKinnon) and draft capital (Sermon) in the process. He’s finally found that man in McCaffrey, and the result is a dude who just prints first downs. 

Like the NBA’s push to entire squads of long, athletic wings, Shanahan knows that his various motions, formations, and schemes become exponentially more potent when he can mix and match personnel sets and hunt matchups across the board. The addition of Juice in 2017 let us use heavy doses of 21 personnel to create mismatches in the passing game on linebackers. The emergence of Kittle a year later furthered that trend. Deebo’s full ascent into the “wideback” destroyer of defenders in space gave us a weapon who could create issues for everyone from corners to linebackers in both the pass and the run game. And CMC’s mid-season addition gives us the same thing as Deebo, but in reverse. 

Last year, the Rams won a Super Bowl by (1) loading their roster for a short-term push, (2) peaking at the right time, (3) landing on the right side of an outrageously lucky string of high-leverage, high-variance plays (recovering Matt Stafford’s late-game fumble against the Bucs, Tartt’s dropped pick, the Bengals’ called-back TD in the Super Bowl), and (4) spamming the ever-living shit out of the choice route with Cooper Kupp.

While CMC isn’t on Kupp’s level as a receiver, he’s functionally the running back equivalent in the passing game. McCaffrey’s ability to regularly beat every linebacker in coverage on option and angle routes out of the backfield gives us a guy who is always open underneath—and often in the check-down role when shit gets hairy. His gravitational pull creates more horizontal space for Deebo and Aiyuk’s slants and more vertical space for Kittle and the receivers’ digs and crossers. And his ability to routinely make the first man miss en route to the first down marker can turn safe check downs into wins for the offense rather than consolation prizes. All that and he can still threaten as a receiver out wide against cornerbacks, whether that’s by gobbling up slants, hauling in back shoulder fades like mentioned above, or—like he did against Arizona—running hitch-and-go deep outs on the boundary. 

“B” is for “Better Than We Could Have Hoped For”. Banks, Burford, Brendel, and Brunskill haven’t been perfect this year, but props to the four of them for solidifying an interior OL that was a big question mark going into this year. Equal credit to the coaching staff and scouting department for knowing that they had the pieces in place to replace three departed starters on the interior. Interior pressure at the wrong times has been our Achilles heel during recent post-season runs, and while this unit isn’t impervious to the occasional rusher, they at least give us a fighting chance to flip the script on that trend.

While we’re on the subject of players whose play has allowed us to combat past weaknesses (and whose names include the letter “B” so that I can cram him into this category), Brandon Aiyuk’s emergence as the team’s top route runner gives us a true man-beater outside who could prove vital in the playoffs. Often times when our offense bogs down it’s because we simply can’t win enough outside against press man coverage, and that allows defenses to outnumber us in the box. Aiyuk has blossomed into an excellent route runner, and—in an offense that put a higher priority on downfield passes outside the hashes—it wouldn’t have taken him until Week 18 to eclipse the 1,000-yard mark.

Touchdowns Not Turtles. The confidence of Purdy and the “floor-and-ceiling riser” that is CMC have also led to a very important development on the coaching front: Shanahan is calling games more aggressively. Shanahan has long been lambasted for calling a single passing play in the Falcons’ Super Bowl loss when the run game was getting absolutely stuffed—leading to the narrative that he is “too aggressive” in these close games. This was hammered down in the Chiefs Super Bowl, when he called a few passes in the fourth quarter that fell incomplete (even if both were wide ass open). But in reality, I think our sporadic issues in closing games have been more of a product of (a) interior pass blocking, (b) the high variance nature that came with Jimmy G piloting a meticulously schemed offense, and (c) Shanahan becoming too conservative late in some games. 

It makes a lot of sense. He openly regrets that pass call in the Falcons’ Super Bowl—even if it’s lost in the narrative that he got the Falcons into would-be-game-winning field goal range multiple times in that game but each time those plays were called back on holding—and he also was the coach behind the absolute roller coaster that has been Jimmy G’s tenure as our starting quarterback. If that was your background, and you saw Jimmy collapse in the Chiefs Super Bowl and then perform as he did after getting dinged up in that wildcard win against the Cowboys, would you be apt to sling that shit all up and down the field? Probs not.

But the reasoning behind that approach—as understandable as it was—was a genuine threat to capping our ceiling as a team for years to come. Ultimately, it didn’t matter if Jimmy was more or less at fault (or more injured) than he seemed in these high-leverage situations. The fact of the matter was that as long as Shanahan couldn’t trust the passing game (and by proxy, the quarterback) to complete open passes to close out games, we wouldn’t be able to finish those games at a high clip. 

For the longest time, commentators and coaches have chirped that the only way to close out games is to run the ball effectively. And yes, if you’re lacking in the run game, it’s going to be harder for you to ice games. But if running the ball every down was the best way to close out games, how come the Ravens—who employ Lamar Jackson and an entire offense built on pounding the ball—and the Raiders—who have the league’s leading rusher in Josh Jacobs—have combined to blow eight(!) double-digit second-half leads this season? Running the ball into loaded fronts that have a numbers advantage and know that you’re running decreases the effectiveness of your running game. Closing out games is less about killing clock and more about accumulating first downs. And in today’s NFL, the best way to do that is to keep your late-game passing attack threatening enough that you can still be effective on the ground.

Despite starting a rookie quarterback, Shanahan is calling games with the confidence needed to close them out. Weird Juice-to-CMC option pitches notwithstanding, Shanahan may be in the best overall play-calling groove of his career, and his willingness to mix things up and lean on the pass when required late in the Miami and Las Vegas games has led—alongside good reads and good luck from Purdy—to some impressive closeouts from our offense. That cohesion and confidence between a coach and his offense is a potentially massive development for this post-season and moving forward. 

DEFENSE

Defensive DVOA: 1st
Weighted DVOA: 2nd
Pass: 5th
Run: 2nd

The Niners D leads the league in nearly every meaningful statistical category, both advanced and otherwise, as we also lead the league in points and yardage allowed. Unlike our offense, our defense fired out of the gates to start the season and—save for a few hiccups against AFC West opponents—has largely maintained its high rate of play. But we’ve been a bit leakier in the past month and teams are starting to gameplan more specifically against our weaknesses. Hopefully, that means that—entering the post-season—this unit will be energized and re-focused after a string of games against backup quarterbacks on non-contending teams.

Secondary Adjustments. DeMeco Ryans’ first year as a DC was basically a ten-to-twelve-week workshop on how to hide an absolutely atrocious cornerback situation. But that experience, and what I can only imagine included a string of night terrors involving Josh Norman playing jump balls, led to the Niners pursuing and signing Charvarius Ward in the off-season, and Ward has turned out to be one of the best (and best-priced) free agent pickups in the NFL. With the exception of the Chiefs game where he came back from injury rusty, Charvarius has played like a lockdown No.1 all season while being paid under market (his $14M payout next year barely eclipses Robbie Anderson’s $12M). But he’s only one part of what has become the Niners’ best secondary of the Shanahan era.

Ward’s ability to eliminate a side of the field and/or blanket No.1 receivers has helped us weather the storm that comes from losing both Emmanuel Moseley and Jason Verrett to season-ending injuries. In their place, Deommodore Lenoir has emerged from our crop of first- and second-year corners and played admirably. He hasn’t been perfect—and his ability to play the ball in the air has been challenged as of late—but he’s largely been a feisty presence in the secondary who stays in good position.

With the departure of Jaquiski Tartt in the off-season, Jimmie Ward was expected to be the veteran voice at safety holding together a young secondary. But when Jimmie went down late in the pre-season to injury, the Niners signed 32-year-old journeyman Tashaun Gipson—who some of the younger DBs nicknamed “dad.” Together, Gipson and Talanoa Hufanga have formed a safety pairing that combined for nine interceptions this year and which allowed Jimmie Ward to slide into the nickel position, where he can be incredibly disruptive against both the pass and the run.

While Gipson has been a solid stabilizing presence on the back-end, Hufanga took a massive step forward in his second-year, exploding out of the gates with a ton of splash plays early in the season that helped catapult him to a 1st-team All-Pro selection. While his first-team spot was a bit surprising considering he’s had some issues missing tackles and has gotten picked on a bit for his aggressive/instinctual play-style as of late, Huf is a big-play presence on the back-end and we can only hope his trajectory mirrors that of Fred Warner’s—a fellow first-team All-Pro who emerged as a second-year player before becoming all-world in his third NFL season.

Despite these improvements, the secondary is still the only unit with any real weaknesses, even if they’ve been largely hidden throughout the year. Huf is so instinctual that he can get caught guessing at times, and we’ve had a few busted coverages that often involve a miscommunication somewhere on the backend springing a receiver free. That makes me think that teams are scheming up ways to bait our safeties out of position and test them—and Lenoir—on jump balls down the field. 

bullying we can get behind

Adam Peters, plz keep turning down those GM interviews. But Hufanga and Lenoir aren’t the only former fifth-round picks to take a step forward this year. While considerably more established than his DB counterparts entering this season, Dre Greenlaw made the leap from “consistent high-level starter who loves goalline plays” to “high-end heat-seeking missile who still loves goalline plays.”

Props to the Niners’ brass for giving Greenlaw a two-year extension entering the season because his growth—particularly in coverage—has been just as much a factor as Warner’s stellar play in the Niners’ ability to eliminate underneath zones in the passing game and hunt running backs sideline-to-sideline. Greenlaw comes in too hot sometimes (and other times he gets booted out of games even when he doesn’t ¯\_(ツ)_/¯), but we’d much rather have that than the opposite, and having two linebackers who excel in coverage eliminates a great deal of what offenses can do to attack us.

As an aside, even if you exclude players like Juice, Samson Ebukam, and Charvarius Ward who we signed to big free-agent deals, the Niners currently start 10 players who were either drafted on the third day or went undrafted coming out of college. Gipson was an undrafted journeyman. Brendel, also undrafted, started three games across six years before this season. The rest were all selected and signed out of college by the Niners.

A bear’s gotta eat. The likely DPOTY gets his own category, as Nick Bosa’s performance this season has been truly spectacular. Despite missing a game-and-a-half due to injury, Bosa led the league in sacks with 18.5 and dwarfed his competition in knockdowns with 48, a figure that not only paced the league by 13 but—based on a general average of 45% of knockdowns becoming sacks—put him on pace for somewhere around the single-season sack record. Again, this is while missing a game-and-a-half due to injury.

Bosa has recorded a sack in all but three games this season, had a six-game mid-season stretch of at least one sack, and was PFF’s third-highest-rated edge rusher despite no other player on the team registering more than five sacks and Arik Armstead missing nearly half of this season’s games (thus tempering the inside stunt work that has terrorized teams for years).

That thing that every coach always talks about. The Niners’ 30 takeaways are tied for second-best in the league, and—in conjunction with their third-best giveaways mark—their +13 turnover differential is tops in the league. For a team that preaches complementary football as much as any in the NFL, this is a massive win, and the record follows. In games with an even turnover differential, the Niners are 3-0 this year. In games with a positive turnover differential (such as the last eight straight), the Niners are 10-0.

Special teams role reversal. Last year, our special teams were among the league’s worst, which led to a coaching change and us adding standouts Oren Burks, George Odum, and Ray-Ray McCloud. After a slow start to the season, Ray-Ray has really come along as of late in the return game and Odum was just named a second-team All-Pro specialist.

But now, the main thing holding back our unit from ascending past league-average status, is the one guy who has been rock solid for years. Our field goal and extra point unit is ranked 26th in the league, and Robbie Gould has missed key kicks in crucial moments of one-score games against the Chargers, Raiders, and Seahawks. Kicking is a fickle business in the NFL, and in last year’s post-season Robbie was a perfect 6-for-6—including a game-winner in sub-zero temperatures against the Packers. Hopefully, he can rekindle that consistency when the games get tighter in the playoffs.

graphics like this are why we don’t trust clutchpoints

THE MATCHUPS

Since all we know about the playoffs is our wildcard game against the Seahawks, here are a few quick write-ups on how we might match up against every team in the NFC (if we make the Super Bowl, I’m sure I’ll find the time to do a write-up). Due to time and NFL Gamepass restraints, these are based more on general knowledge than in-depth film study.

SEAHAWKS

Long the thorn in our side based on their propensity for staying in tight games and Russell Wilson running around long enough to pull them out of said tight games, the Seahawks are same same but different this year. Russ NBA’d his way out of town, the Broncos couldn’t get through a single season with him at the helm before axing their coach, and now the Walmart heirs are interviewing everyone they can think of who will establish a run-heavy offense in a desperate attempt to make Russ cook less. Meanwhile, the Seahawks have (unfortunately) re-emerged into a playoff team sooner than expected on the backs of a return to their intended team identity, a talented crop of rookies, and the resurgence of Geno Smith.

Neither of our first two matchups were particularly close—the second only being more of a game due to a terrible call on a would-have-been-game-ending pick six and a late Seahawks score—but there’s rain in the forecast (potentially very heavy rain) and that always hurts the team with the more explosive offense.

Offense: Seattle wants to operate a run-first offense that utilizes play-action to open up easy completions while limiting turnovers. While I’d expect lots of bootleg passes and attempts to set up misdirection to target our DBs deep down the field, it’s TBD how they plan to gain incremental yardage between their shot plays. Usually, that would be via the running game, but—despite the promise of their rookie tackles—the Seahawks should know that they don’t have the talent to run the ball consistently against our front seven. Nor can they be confident in their ability to drop back each play and let our pass rush tee off. Will the Seahawks open up their formations, shuffle DK Metcalf around (last matchup he was shadowed and shut down by Charvarius Ward), and rely on the quick game rather than run directly into a wall on first and second downs? And if so, how long can they keep that up given their preferred identity and Geno Smith’s uneven play to finish the season?

Defense: Seattle’s defense has been below average all year, particularly against the rush. But Pete Carroll is no idiot, and you have to think he’ll load the LOS and force Purdy into some passing situations early, otherwise, we’ll just bleed them dry on the ground. Getting into a rhythm in the passing game early is key so that we can stay balanced, and hitting the defense with some misdirection runs and counters will likely be in the game plan against a defense that will be trying to offset front seven talent with aggressiveness. They did a good job of shutting down our Deebo-less outside passing attack in the last matchup, but Deebo’s back now and Purdy no longer has an oblique strain. This Seapenises defense is one of the worst in the league at defending YAC yardage and we’ve led the league in that category for (I think?) every single one of Shanahan’s years at the helm. Gobbling up some chunk plays would be a nice way to keep them out of formations with too many down linemen, which should in turn open up numbers on the ground.

GIANTS

Brian Daboll’s first season has gone about as well as anyone could have hoped, as he’s piloted a team largely devoid of premier offensive talent to a winning record and a six-seed. They don’t have the horses to win pretty, so this is a team that has fully bought into winning ugly. While I’m bullish on Daboll and the direction of the franchise, I don’t think this team is particularly good. But they’re well-coached and they can definitely capitalize no your mistakes.

Offense: Daboll is very multiple in what he does on offense and his creativity has led to a top 10 offensive DVOA. If there’s anyone on this side of the bracket likely to put together a highly specialized gameplan against our defense and hard target the eyes of our safeties to spring big plays, it’s probably Daboll. Keys will be expecting the unexpected, settling in quicker than we did in games against the Raiders and Chiefs, accounting for Daniel Jones’ legs at all times, and forcing them to win at the catch point on any deep ball. While that got hairy against a Raiders team that has Davante Adams and Darren Waller, the Giants have speedy outside guys but not really anyone who can high-point like that Raiders duo, and this OL would be hard-pressed to hold up regularly against our pass rush on deep dropback passes. This is not an inherently explosive offense, so the key is not to gift them explosives through blown assignments.

Defense: Giants’ DC Wink Martindale plays more man and blitzes more than anyone in the league. When you have interchangeable players who can hang with whoever in coverage, that can be highly effective, and that blitz heaviness—alongside a talented defensive line—can create havoc when it gets through. But the Giants’ linebackers are major weak spots in coverage and—while safety Julian Love has had a solid year—they don’t have the secondary support necessary to hide those linebackers consistently. They want to throw them forward as pass rushers and let them do what they do best, but Shanahan is one of the best linebacker hunters in the game, and you gotta imagine that—after allowing lines of 7-88-2 and 13-109-2 against the Cowboys and Vikings—we’d be hard targeting those guys in the passing game.

COWBOYS

Unquestionably one of the most talented teams in the field and with high-end potential on both sides of the ball, the Cowboys—fair or not—are always looked at through the lens of their nearly endless string of butthole-tightening fuck-ups come post-season play. This is a team that stomped the Vikings 40-3 on the road then nearly lost to the Texans at home. They can hang with anyone and they can lose to anyone and regardless of which of those outcomes occur, Jerry Jones is gonna have something to say about it.

Offense: OC Kellen Moore isn’t as hot an HC candidate as he was last year, but he should be lauded for his work with Cooper Rush while the Cowboys stabilized through Dak’s early season injury. The problem is that this offense, which momentarily took off when Dak came back healthy, has been massively inconsistent to finish the year (including a six-point stinker against the Commanders to close out the season). When they’re on, they’re explosive and multiple. CeeDee Lamb is a genuine No.1 receiver and three-level threat and—given their second-best wideout is Michael Gallup—I wouldn’t be shocked if we shadow Lamb with Ward. Tony Pollard is the explosive head of their backfield and a homerun threat on the ground or as a receiver while Zeke remains as their sledgehammer on the inside. Tight end Dalton Schultz is often their metronome. If he’s getting his, the offense is likely operating well because he lives for intermediate routes. Taking away easy leveling concepts with Lamb and Schultz across the middle with our linebackers and generating pressure on an OL that has had to shuffle a bit due to injuries will be key. Prescott has been interception-happy to wind down the year. This would be a good time to be opportunistic.

Defense: The Dallas defense is equally as formidable as their offense (and has probably been the more consistent of the two this year). Their headliner is edge defender/linebacker Micah Parsons, who’s likely Bosa’s greatest competition for the DPOTY award. He’s a supreme athlete and a rocket shot off the line, and—when paired with fellow elite edge DeMarcus Lawrence—there’s a high likelihood we don’t run a ton of deep dropback passes (which we don’t run a ton of anyway). As everyone knows by now, Trevon Diggs is a big play guy who you can target if done smartly, but opposite him, Anthony Brown has gotten picked on throughout this season. The emergence of Aiyuk should help as one of him or Deebo will likely be matched up on Brown at any given point. Despite the strength of their edges, Dallas relies on a rotation of replacement-level players on the interior. Winning there will be important to establish our run game and keep their edge rushers at bay.

BUCCANEERS

Back by no one’s demand, Tom Brady is once again in the playoffs. While the Bucs’ place in these playoffs is mostly due to the large-scale ineptitude of the NFC South, this is a team that is finally finding its stride at the right time and you can never discount that.

Offense: The Bucs finally had an explosive passing performance in their last competitive game, torching the Panthers for 430 yards through the air and three tugs. Granted, this was a Panthers team that was so ravaged at cornerback that they signed Josh Norman off the street… but nonetheless, it was a good time for Brady and his two big wideouts to get on the same page. This Bucs offense isn’t fast anywhere and we have a sizeable athleticism advantage, but they are as good as any at winning jump balls if they have the chance. The last thing we want is Lenoir and our safeties having to box out Mike Evans and Chris Godwin forty yards down the field, so we’ll likely lean on our DL to force them out of those jump ball looks and into their quick game—where Brady has always excelled but where the Bucs lack speedy options who can get open early. If the Buccaneers’ historically inept rushing attack has improved it’s only slightly, but OC Byron Leftwich has found success as of late in leaning more into play action passes regardless. Stuffing the run game via minimal effort so that we can hedge play action passes would go a long way toward us repeating a similar performance. If we eliminate the deep shots, they’ll have to paper cut us down the field, and it will be hard for them to do that against our team speed.

Defense: We rushed for upwards of 200 yards on nearly 6ypc in our last matchup so it’s safe to say the Bucs will be keying the run in this one. This time they’ll also have a healthy Vita Vea, who is a huge presence (both physically and figuratively) on the interior and a big part of their run defense, but I’m not particularly scared of the rest of their d-line. Their secondary is talented, and they have two of the better cover guys in those hook-to-curl zones with linebacker Lavonte David and nickel corner Antoine Winfield Jr. If anything, I would expect our gameplan to look like a classic Jimmy G one. The Bucs play Cover 3 as much as anyone, which means putting their alley defenders in run/pass binds and pounding the edges makes some sense. As does threatening the alley defenders via seam routes, digs behind them, and the layering concepts across the middle that we love so much. Bowles is a savvy DC. Purdy will have to be smart in diagnosing coverages and noticing any safety rotations that attempt to jump routes over the middle.

VIKINGS

Much-maligned by the analytics community (and basically every other community outside of Minnesota), the Vikings are notorious for winning only close games and having a -3 point differential (a worse figure than the 8-9 Packers or 9-8 Dolphins) despite their 13-4 record. Football Outsiders has them as the 27th-ranked team in terms of DVOA, which has got to be the greatest disparity between on-field record and projected (they estimate the Vikings should have 6.3 wins). But, you know what, that’s why you actually play the games.

Offense: The Vikings offense rides the wave of variance. They’ve started multiple games with Kirk Cousins 0-for-something and digging them a hole, but—more often than not—they climb out of that hole (see: largest comeback in NFL history vs Colts). This is a Shanahan scheme that leans more McVay, and when they’re humming it’s often because they’re force-feeding the ball to Justin Jefferson (just as Kevin O’Connell learned to do to Cooper Kupp with the Rams). Hitting him off the line and disrupting his timing with Cousins is probably the biggest key, as Cousins is a big-time rhythm guy. When he’s on, he’s on, and when he’s off the nadir is very, very real. The Vikings have a strong OL—especially if center Garrett Bradbury comes back healthy—but Cousins is tied for the third-most sacked QB in the league. If you muck up his initial reads, he can hold the ball too long and good things (for the opponent) typically result.

Defense: Minnesota’s defense is much more consistent than its offense, but that’s not always a good thing. Since a week into November, this Vikings defense has allowed 29.6 points per game, with games against Mike White and the Jets and the first-pick-hunting Bears the only contests where they’ve allowed fewer than 24 points. They have a lot of pieces—even if some of them are getting long in the tooth—but to this point, the product simply hasn’t matched its parts. Despite having two high-tier edge rushers in Danielle Hunter and ZaDarius Smith, the Vikings have one of the worst pass defenses in the league. There will be guys open through the air. Get them the ball, let them run after catch, and keep their defense from keying the run game.

EAGLES

Seemingly unstoppable for much of the year, the Eagles are still very much a contender (and the front-runner) to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl, but how likely that occurs hinges largely on the health of second-team All-Pro quarterback Jalen Hurts and first-team All-Pro right tackle Lane Johnson. They have an extra week to get healthy courtesy of the first-round bye, so maybe when we see them next they’ll look more like the team that started the season 13-1 versus the banged-up squad that finished it 1-2.

Offense: The Eagles have done a tremendous job of building their offense around Jalen Hurts’ strengths in a way that is flexible enough to target multiple different defenses. They want to run the ball, both with Miles Sanders (except for when you start him in the fantasy playoffs) and Hurts, and they give a lot of option looks and designed runs to their QB. How Hurts’ shoulder feels will be paramount here because when you take away his legs he uses a lot of his effectiveness. They are a heavy RPO team when paired with their running game, believing that their strong OL and excellent running QB means QB runs are too mathematically difficult to defend while in heavy man coverage, but if you do go to man coverage, they love to toss contested fades to AJ Brown and DeVonta Smith. Obviously, we’d like to avoid having to rely on Lenoir beating either of those guys on jump balls. Our wide-9 system can make us slightly more susceptible to running quarterbacks at times, so we’ll need to rush smart and with proper lane integrity. Bosa on their backup right tackle could be huge. Bluff blitzes, rotating safeties, and disguising coverages pre-snap will be important to get them out of their RPO game. It’s not an easy task, but if you can force them out of their comfort zone and into a more traditional dropback passing attack, they're not nearly as effective.

Defense: The Eagles are—as always—loaded along the defensive line, with a rotation that goes eight deep and genuine players at each position. They lead the NFL in sacks with a whopping 70 (second place has 55). They also spent the past two off-seasons loading up at cornerback, with Darius Slay and James Bradberry making up one of the better cornerback pairs in the NFL and Chauncey Gardner-Johnson continuing to badger people from the safety/nickel slot. This combination gives them Football Outsiders’ #1-rated defense against the pass. But their greatest weaknesses on defense actually align rather well with what we’re trying to do offensively. The Eagles are one of the league’s worst defenses at missing tackles, and we love to get our players the ball quickly in space where they can catch and run. While linebacker TJ Edwards is having a career year, the Eagles follow the analytics trend of minimizing team investment in the linebacker position, and thus, those non-Edwards linebackers can and should be targeted in the passing game. Employing misdirection and play action to open up seams and make those linebackers hesitate on their assignments will also help us run the ball on their front seven. Despite the strength of their DL and the return of first-round NT Jordan Davis, the Eagles are 26th in generating tackles at or behind the line of scrimmage and dead-last in stopping short-yardage runs. This isn’t a team that gives up many long runs, but it is a team that—in the few times its faltered—can be susceptible to a run-heavy plan. So while the personnel that we’re up against would present quite the challenge, it’s not the worst stylistic matchup from our POV.

While these are far from in-depth or detailed looks at these matchups, hopefully, they’ll do for now. And hopefully, we’ll string off a few wins and there will be another one coming in the lead-up to a Super Bowl appearance.

Go Niners! 👍🏈

NFC Champ Preview @ Los Angeles Rams

Eyes on the prize [George Rose/Getty Images]

Opponent: Los Angeles Rams
Date: Sunday, 1/30
Location: SoFi Stadium, Los Angeles
Kickoff: 3:30PT
TV: FOX, or wherever you stream it illegally
Line: Rams -3.5

You can almost see it already.

The slow-motion, sepia-toned photos of Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay as friends. As colleagues. As opponents during post-game handshakes. While they slowly zoom in on each frame, a Keith Jackson wannabe—or some celebrity you didn’t know gave a shit about football (and maybe doesn’t)—waxes poetic about friends turned foes. Of a Niners team looking to avenge a Super Bowl loss. Of a Rams team just as eager to re-write their own Super Bowl history and break an embarrassing streak in the process. There might be a comparison to similar coaching rivalries of yesteryear. Or perhaps even an allegory to something. Sound bites from Aaron Donald mix in with those of Kittle, bulletin board material, as FOX scores it all to something poppy and kind of cringe in a desperate attempt to appeal to the youths.

As has been the case all postseason, this is just the latest moment in a long and winding narrative. While an NFC Championship against Tom Brady would have made it back-to-back matchups against Bay Area-raised, first-ballot HOF quarterbacks looking for revenge against the childhood team that spurned them, our trilogy fight against the Rams seems born out of its own kind of destiny.

Two months ago we were sitting at 3-5 after an embarrassing loss to the Cardinals’ backups. The following week’s 31-10 trouncing of the Rams—then the Super Bowl favorite—became a turning point in our season. There we found our offensive identity—running 44 times for 156 yards—while our defense—spurred on by a players-only meeting led by our defensive captains—reached a new level of cohesion and consistency that is just now peaking.

Three weeks ago, we needed an 88-yard drive in less than a minute and a half to send the rubber match to overtime. Robbie Gould’s game-winning kick launched us into the playoffs, where his latest game-winning kick has us right back where we came from. Regardless of how you swing it, our season has hinged largely on matchups against the Rams, with the third dictating the second Super Bowl berth for either team in the past four years.

Given our first two wins against the Rams—and our six-in-a-row dating back to 2019—it’s a matchup we like. But it’s important to note that three of those wins were decided on game-winning field goals in overtime or as time expired. While we certainly know how to beat this team, the Rams are in the NFC Championship game for a reason, and it would be wise not to forget that.

OFFENSE

Scoring tugs and slapping fives [Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images]

Another week, another offense built from the same bones as ours. But to Sean McVay’s credit, while he learned under Shanahan, it was his stylistic and personnel changes that have trickled more to the head coaching ranks around the league. Matt LaFleur of the Packers was the offensive coordinator in McVay’s first year in Los Angeles. Zac Taylor of the Bengals was an assistant WR and then QB coach for the Rams from 2017-2018. Shane Waldron was the Rams’ passing game coordinator for three years before getting the bump to a play-caller in Seattle. While Shanahan has had Mike LaFleur follow Robert Saleh to New York, McVay’s version of this offense—particularly following their last Super Bowl run—has been considerably more in-vogue among team owners.

Personally, I’m perfectly fine with that because I prefer Shanahan’s approach to this offense. But there’s a reason why McVay disciples have been in high demand across the league. When the Rams are clicking, they can score bunches in a hurry.

Atkins Diet Swiss Army Knives. The biggest calling card of McVay’s version of this offense—and the style of the Los Angeles Rams specifically—is their steadfast commitment to 11 personnel. They trot out three wideouts, one back, and one tight end a whopping 84% of the time, which is BY FAR the most in the league. The mindset behind that approach is two-fold.

First, they follow the mentality that it’s better to do a few things really well than a lot of different things at a less efficient clip. In many ways, it’s a professional evolution of the "college spread” mindset. They focus on fewer concepts, but employ tons of formations, pre-snap motions, and other types of window dressing to get into said concepts.

Second, the Rams believe that if all their wideouts are versatile enough to line up everywhere and do everything, they’ll have an innate advantage in the passing game against bigger defensive groups and in the run game when defenses adjust personnel to match DBs on their wideouts.

In the simplest of terms, while we ask big bodies like Kittle and Juice to flex out and do receiver stuff from time to time, the Rams ask smaller guys to mix it up in the box and do tight-end stuff on occasion (they don’t have any fullbacks. Hence, no fullback duties). We’re both relying on versatile players in hybrid roles, we’re just coming at it from two different perspectives.

Hella tight. For those who ask their receivers to block heavily in the run game, tight alignments are nothing new. We use them plenty with our wideouts and there’s a reason that’s the most likely place for Kittle to line up when he’s not being used as an in-line tight end. But the Rams’ commitment to 11 personnel means they lean on tight alignments on more plays than not.

The tight alignments allow their wideouts to operate like tight ends in the run game, digging into the box as extra blockers and giving them the ability to motion quickly across the formation—whether for fly sweeps, shifting defensive run fits, or kick out blocks. In the passing game, tight alignments let them force mismatches with linebackers, who—against a traditional formation—would be covering tight ends and create natural leverage plays by creating more open grass down the field.

The Rams also love deploying their wideouts out of stack and bunch formations—largely to benefit the passing game. Stacks and bunches force defenses to communicate one more thing after every offensive snap, and the Rams have broken many a big play simply by wearing down defenses and attacking them when there’s a blown switch out of the bunch.

Against man coverage, bunches free up wideouts from press and sticky coverage by creating natural rub routes and allow the offense to force mismatches based on defensive rules (such as forcing a linebacker to cover Cooper Kupp). When defenses successfully switch on the bunch release, crossers and double moves and false stems can kill defenders that are already playing hard leverage to one side or another. Against zone, the Rams use bunches to pull defenders’ eyes, force constant communication, and target the open space that comes with two-receiver layered concepts and three-receiver triangle route combos.

Finally, tight alignments and stack and bunch formations make for easier access (and a higher likelihood of unguarded receivers) on deep crossers off of play-action, which—as we all know—is a major staple of the Shanahan/McVay offense as it complements outside zone action.

The Triple Crown (for humans). While an extra game certainly helped his efforts towards chasing a few longstanding single-season receiving records, Cooper Kupp has nonetheless had one of the most impressive wideout seasons in quite some time—becoming only the fourth player in the Super Bowl era to secure the coveted Triple Crown of receptions, receiving yards, and touchdowns. To put that in perspective of a 17-game season in 2022, here is his stat line.

145 receptions, 1,947 yards, 16 TDs

Kupp’s emergence has coincided with his healthiest season to date, and—in no small part—the team’s off-season acquisition of Matthew Stafford at quarterback. More physically talented and better off-script—and with valleys that don’t dip as low as the departed Jared Goff’s—Stafford started the season red hot and was an MVP front-runner a month into the season. While he cooled off since then and hit a rough patch of turnovers, he

While Stafford cooled down after a red-hot start that had him as an MVP front-runner a month into the season, he’s rounded back into form these playoffs, throwing for 568 yards, four scores, and zero picks over his first two post-season games. Of those totals, 246 yards and two tugs have gone to Kupp.

Unlike the All-Pro wideout we saw last week, Kupp gets his yardage mostly out of the slot, and about half of his targets are on short passes. That said, he’s efficient on all levels of the field—with 600+ yards at all three depths of the field—absolutely shreds man coverage, and is adept at getting open in the two-man games that the Rams like to employ underneath. But even when he doesn’t, Kupp’s gravitational pull opens up passing lanes for others.

On this play, the Rams are running a variation of a standard deep cross route combination, stretching the field horizontally with Cooper Kupp (teal) while creating a three-man triangle read with the hook and the post layering on top of them.

Despite showing two high, the Niners actually have a decent play call dialed up. They’re rotating down into Cover 3, with Jimmie Ward (red) stepping down into the middle of the field to wall off any crossers from the trips side.

As Kupp advances, Ward steps into his way, effectively taking away the crosser. But both Ward and Fred Warner—knowing how heavily involved Kupp is to this Rams offense—are eyeing the star receiver at his break point.

By the time Warner gets his eyes back to the field, he sees the hook forming in front of him and both he and the nickel corner take the bait.

With no inside help from the second level and the safety not jumping the route, the outside receiver is able to flatten out his post and secure the pass right in the hole of the defense—a hole created at least in part by the attention that Kupp gets on every play.

👀 pic.twitter.com/OgUfIbJCCr

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 27, 2022

That’s a tiny glimpse into the impact Kupp can have on the passing game when he’s not even getting the ball.

Although he’s usually getting the ball.

A lot.

DEFENSIVE KEYS

Detroit PTSD? [Mark J. Terrill/AP Photo]

DeMeco Ryans has been on an absolute roll this post-season, stifling back-to-back top 10 offenses with game plans built off of stopping the run and confusing quarterbacks via pass rush and coverage disguises. This week we’ll need more of the same, as familiarity (and recency) mean execution—and a few well-timed play calls—could be the difference in a matchup where the X’s and O’s are otherwise familiar.

Weird shit incoming? At times McVay can get pass-happy, which can lead to explosive highs—like the offensive outbursts the Rams were riding to start the season—and valleys of inconsistency. Ultimately, when the Rams drift too far away from the run (not because teams are loading up to stop it but due to their own accord), they lose some semblance of their identity and can have stretches where the offense seems inefficient or rudderless. That leads to more of a burden on Stafford’s shoulders, more one-on-one match-ups in pass pro along their offensive line, sloppy play, and turnovers (Stafford led the league in interceptions with 17 this season). Sean McVay knows this and wants to stay balanced. Needless to stay, we want the opposite.

In our two matchups this season, the Rams have averaged 58 yards rushing on 3.1 yards per carry. McVay is a smart dude. He knows that has to change this time around, and he also knows that the fix isn’t as simple as “sticking to it.” Don’t be surprised if the Rams start the game with an offensive game plan hell-bent on slowing up our defensive flow and preventing our DL from teeing off. That could mean a bunch of bootlegs and screens—like the second 2019 game—in hopes of softening up our pursuit in the run game and getting Stafford in a rhythm. That could mean a few early handoffs on fly sweeps opposite run action so that we can’t pursue the front side of their zone/stretch runs so aggressively. It could be both. Whatever the game plan, I’d expect McVay to lean into lateral misdirection to try and gas our defensive line by making them run side-to-side and cut the overall aggressiveness of our defense.

Per usual this post-season, if we can stop the run (especially with a light box), we’re setting our defense up for success. As was the case with the Packers, this is an excellent offensive line as a collective unit—and one that’s ranked #1 in pass win rate—but isolated (and without a run game to lean on) they have weaknesses on the interior in pass protection. In week 18, we pressured Stafford on more than half of his pass attempts. In 37 dropbacks, the Rams’ starting guards allowed a combined 15 pressures, ten hurries, and 3 sacks. Those are matchups we like, so—per usual—mug looks, inside twists, and overloads on long downs and distances will be our friend.

The shell game continues. Part of the reason why Ryans has been shutting down offenses in the back half of this season is that he’s been able to put himself in the heads of opposing play-callers. Against the Rams in week 18, he knew McVay wanted to establish the run and work off of that, so we slammed one-high looks on first downs when we expected the run. When the Niners climbed back to within one score off a 17-0 deficit, Ryans knew McVay would try to stabilize in the run game, so he dialed up first- and second-down one high looks the following drive to force a punt. Finally, after he knew the Rams would try to open up things to create spark, we came out—for the first time all game—with two-high on first and long to combat that.

Obviously, passing success is much more complicated than one-high or two-high safeties, but—in general—Ryans has been able to get into the mindset of opposing play-callers and that’s affected what his back seven shows, when, and whether or not our secondary rotates into another coverage post-snap. This is particularly important against someone like Matthew Stafford, who is as deadly as anyone when he knows your coverage. And in particular, when he knows you’re in a one-high look.

On the season, Stafford is #1 in the NFL in EPA when throwing against man coverage. He’s also #1 in the NFL in EPA when throwing against single-high coverages. In short, when he’s protected, he can put the ball anywhere on the field with the best of them. So if he knows you’re in 1 or 3 before the snap, he’s typically going to have success. But while he can also have success against two-high coverages, Stafford—and McVay—inherently want to throw the shot play. They want a big play that breaks open the game and they can get impatient when that doesn’t materialize. Against two-high, those plays can be a bit harder to come by, and when you can disguise the coverage well enough, Stafford’s impatience sometimes leads to him being late (and reckless) at getting to his check down.

Here, the Rams have dialed up what they believe to be a two-high beater. They’re running a hard play action bootleg with the full intention of splitting the safeties with the post, and—if the far safety rotates over—showcasing Stafford’s arm strength by hitting the post curl underneath him off the bootleg away.

Unfortunately for the Rams, the Niners have once again shown two-high before rotating into cover 3. By the time they snap the ball, Ward has snuck into the box and is ready to play the run.

Despite initially biting on the run, the second-level defenders drop quickly into their zones and find their marks. At this point, the play is already busted. The safety rolled into a single high and is cutting off the post. While the linebacker has gotten great depth on his drop and is directly cutting off the throwing lane of the post-curl.

This is 100% a play where you turf it or—because Dennard continued to bail out wide—run for a few yards and call it a day. However, Stafford spots the one “open” man (teal) all the way across the field for a would-be zero-yard gain.

Stafford rips it across the field but it winds up a bounce pass behind the receiver. Which is probably lucky, because an accurate pass in this situation could have easily been completed to Jimmie Ward and taken the opposite way.

😬 pic.twitter.com/VVYWu0vUBH

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 27, 2022

The Rams are a team that wants to take the top off, so if Ryans can get a beat on when the Rams are feeling more conservative vs more aggressive (or better yet, stop the run with a light box), we’ll always have the flexibility to show two-high and rotate to a one-high look (like above) or vice versa.

Two guys, one Kupp. Just like with Davante Adams, we need a plan on how to slow down Cooper Kupp, but it’s a different challenge than last week because of where he lines up and how the Rams use him.

Since the Packers relied so heavily on “alert” plays to Adams when they would isolate him out wide, we could effectively force their hand in regards to whether they were throwing his way or not based on the pre-snap look we’d give them. So when they chose to line up in a formation that would isolate Davante and spring a matchup problem on our end, we’d often give them a bad pre-snap look and force them away from their #1 wideout. The Rams don’t employ anywhere near the number of isolation “matchup hunting” looks that the Packers do, instead relying on their receivers to get open within the greater structure of the play.

Since they’re not just looking for a slant or a fade, it’s harder to just erase Kupp from a play presnap. And even if you do, the Rams’ supporting receivers are head-and-shoulders above the Packers’. A rejuvenated OBJ is their number two—and the guy they love to target when Kupp draws safety help and double coverage—Van Jefferson is a talented overall third option, and Higbee is basically a jumbo wideout. All three supporting receivers are better than their Green Bay counterparts were last week.

Second, since Kupp plays largely out of the slot, if you bracket him with double coverage it’s easier for the Rams to use him as a decoy to open up space for someone else. Whereas the Packers would often isolate Adams away from other wideouts, giving them a numbers advantage but on the opposite side of the field, the Rams often keep Kupp working alongside other wideouts, so the actualization of a double team happens within the quarterback’s field of vision and—naturally—opens space up for another receiver. We already saw how too much attention to Kupp can open things up for other receivers. When doubled, that impact is only amplified.

The hope is that having K’Waun healthy this time rather than Dontae Johnson in the slot and—once Tartt got hurt—Darqueze Dennard(!) in the slot and Johnson at SS—will allow us to survive a bit better when we’re not sending extra help Kupp’s way. Will we still double Kupp in this game? Absolutely. Especially when we’re blitzing and/or forced to go into man coverage and/or on money downs. Stafford wasn’t only #1 in EPA against man coverage but #1 in EPA against the blitz, dicing us in the few snaps where we sent extra men against him, so it’s unlikely that blitzing is a heavy part of our gameplan. But you can’t go an entire game without any blitzing or any man coverage, and—when blitzed—Stafford has targeted Kupp on upwards of 40% of his passes.

If we’re already sending extra guys to get Stafford off his spot, springing a few sneaky double teams while we do it is likely part of the game plan. But just like against the Packers, we need to pick and choose when to double, when to show double, and when to bait a trap to generate a possible turnover.

DEFENSE

Intimidating entrance or crowded club on the west side? You decide

While there’s plenty of familiarity with the Rams’ offense, there’s just as much on this side of the ball, where Raheem Morris—a long-time friend and colleague of Shanahan (and a rumored DC candidate for us when Saleh was hired away)—mans the defense. Typically happy to sit back in a four-man front and two-deep shell, the Rams like to dare teams to run on their light box—a box that still employs the otherworldly Aaron Donald—and force opponents to slowly drive the length of the field and score.

That is until they played us. Running the ball and bleeding clock with double-digit play drives is kind of our thing, and that’s exactly what we did in our week 10 matchup when Jimmy completed over 75% of his less than 20 pass attempts and we bled them out on the ground. So by the week 18 rematch, the early-down fronts that the Rams were showing had changed.

To something different, but all-too familiar.

I Got Five On It. In our last trip to LA, the Rams trotted out a bunch of five-man fronts with two stand-up ends out wide, hoping to cover up every gap, minimize double teams with outside eye alignments, and prevent the OL from getting to the second-level so that their linebackers could fast flow to ball. Simplified, this was the Rams’ version of the defensive scheme that Vic Fangio (and then Bill Belichick) used so successfully against them during their 2018 Super Bowl season.

And if that front sounds familiar…

It’s cause we literally saw the same thing last weekend.

While the gap assignments and D-line alignments will vary from snap-to-snap, we’re likely going to see a whole lot of what we saw last week. Five-man fronts with single-high safeties on early downs (and any downs where they’re expecting run), giving way to four-man fronts with more linebackers/nickels on the second level and two-high safeties on passing downs.

Both the Packers last week and the Rams in week 18 found early success slowing down our running game using this front, but both times we were able to find seams in the second half. Considering how the Packers just held us without an offensive touchdown using this plan a week ago, I’d expect Morris to show us these same five-man (or six-man, depending on personnel and how many gaps we’re throwing out there) fronts on early downs.

We’ll have to attack the front more successfully than we did last week.

At least we’ll always have that hilarious GQ interview. Despite massive whiffs on half of their big contracts, the Rams still have elite high-end talent on their roster, and they get the most out of their blue-chippers by deploying them all over the field.

Aaron Donald is unquestionably the best defensive tackle in football—and arguably still the best overall player in the NFL. He is basically a machine made for leverage and explosive burst, and their ability to put him wherever they want along the DL is a genuine reason why they run the scheme that they do. They’ll matchup hunt with him along the line and pair him with either of their edge rushers on twists and two-man games on passing downs.

In the secondary, Jalen Ramsey—who should be required to play against Golden Tate twice a year—is likely the best cornerback in football. The Rams will flip him outside or in the nickel (aka, their “star” position) depending on offensive personnel, and he’s one of the rare corners who is big enough, fast enough, and good enough to truly excel at either position.

To the Rams’ credit, they’ve been able to surround those blue-chippers with excellent complementary players, acquiring low-cost veterans and draft day finds despite being cash-strapped and never having a first-round pick. But—since the NFL is a hard salary cap league and something has to give somewhere—they do adhere to the popular analytics trend on where to cut costs on defense: linebackers.

Their off-the-ball linebackers are clearly the weakness of this defense, and part of the Rams’ defensive scheme involves protecting these linebackers from what they do poorly while freeing them up to do what they do well. Both are plus pass-rushers and willing run defenders (even if their metrics in that department aren’t super impressive). In essence, they have two two-down linebackers manning the middle. Which is something we’ll rotate back to later.

Don’t let them do as we do unto others. While Aaron Donald is the frontman—and rightfully so—the Rams’ front four is as dangerous (and deep) as any in football. After returning to health mid-season, Von Miller is back to torturing offensive tackles, registering 7 sacks in the past six games (including the post-season). People forgot about him because of the general irrelevance of the Broncos and the fact that he missed all of the 2020 season due to injury, but Miller has rebounded with the Rams to grade out on PFF as a top 5 edge rusher. Opposite him is Leonard Floyd—a bargain acquisition from two years ago now playing on a big-ticket contract. His 9.5 sacks and 18 QB hits are second on the team only to Donald. Behind them, Ogbonnia Okoronkwo has slid into Samson Ebukam’s old off-the-bench pass rusher role and has largely excelled.

Unsurprisingly, the strength of this defensive line—which is rated #1 in pass rush win rate—and the pass rush ability of the Rams linebackers means the health of Trent Williams looms large. The Rams just decimated the Bucs up front—largely by putting Aaron Donald at left end opposite their replacement right tackle—and we struggled at times keeping Jimmy G upright against the Packers. That was WITH our All-Pro left tackle. While our game plan will certainly call for avoiding long downs and distances, we’ll need to drop back and pass at some point. When we do, we’d feel a lot better having Williams guarding Jimmy G’s blind spot versus Colton McKivitz—who allowed 4 pressures and 2 sacks in his spot start in week 18.

OFFENSIVE KEYS

The most beautiful sight in football [Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images]

Counter the counter before they can counter it (potentially with counters). Against the Rams in the season finale, one of the ways we attacked their five- and six-man fronts was by just getting into gigantic personnel sets and pounding face. We spent parts of the third quarter—including plays leading up to and following Deebo’s marvelous WR-RB-jump pass touchdown—in 22 personnel (two backs, two tight-ends) and just mashing for small-to-medium gains on the ground. This was great for team psyche and clearly led to some success (and gets the fanbase going), but it’s better as a mix-up than as the engine that keeps our run game going.

While sprinkling in some 22 personnel certainly makes sense in a game where we want to force the issue on the ground, where we really started to find a groove in the running game was when we started cranking up the diversity of formations and pre-snap looks and using all that glorious Shanahan window dressing to get into the counterpunches to our bread-and-butter outside zone.

Whether it’s split zone handoffs, cutback tosses off of split zone action, or Shanahan-style counter runs where Juice/Kittle/Wilson bend back against the grain to replace the pulling linemen of a traditional counter play, these mix-ups all utilize pre-snap motion and lots of misdirection to pull the eyes of the second-level defenders and prevent them from filling confidently and aggressively at the point of attack.

Once we found success with our interior misdirection runs, the Rams could no longer key so heavily on our core toss and stretch plays, which then opened up what we wanted to do in the first place. Run our core toss and stretch plays. Basically, we used inside-hitting misdirection runs to open up our staple outside runs.

It’s always tough to tell when to start off with your bread-and-butter and when to lead with the counter punch to open it up. If you get to the counter too early, it’s naturally not effective and you end up overthinking yourself into second- and third-and-long. But because this is a three-match and the Rams’ defense is so well-prepared for what we do best, it could make sense to hit them inside with the confusing stuff before we get to our stretch game.

So you wanna play defensive back… Theoretically, every run play is meant to either have a pure numbers advantage or force a safety or cornerback to be the fill defender. The Niners just do a better job than anyone else of making sure your DBs have to play the run.

This is a standard stretch play out of 11 personnel with Troy Reeder (teal) as the second-level defender at the point of attack. While we don’t hate running stretch against this front because of numbers being even, we decide to motion to shift the matchups along the OL.

Sherfield goes in motion opposite the run action. The Rams are probably less afraid of a Sherfield fly sweep and more so of our 220-pound special teams gunner running a kickout block on the backside end like Jeff Wilson often does when Deebo is in the backfield. Nonetheless, they need to shift their gap assignments to the defensive right in order to account for the added “box” player. This shifts Reeder further inside and Ramsey—who was lining up in the nickel—now enters the box as the second-level player at the point of attack.

While the offensive line’s rules haven’t changed, their assignments have, with Brunskill no longer taking on the bigger Troy Reeder. Now he has Ramsey.

Don’t take it personally, bro. It’s just physics.

🤘 pic.twitter.com/UC7zYwdxPV

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 27, 2022

The result is a seemingly innocuous five-yard gain, but it’s a body blow both to the defense and (literally) the DB tasked with filling against the run. While the DBs have to worry about the physical toll they’re taking from getting beat up in a phone booth by someone ten weight classes their superior, their involvement in the run game also starts to chip away at them mentally. After all, defensive backs are still your best (and last) line of defense in the passing game. And when they start playing the run too heavily, that can lead to problems.

While the most obvious example of this was the Deebo jump pass over Jalen Ramsey after ten straight runs, here’s another play that shows how forcing corners to regularly act as primary run defenders can spring dudes open.

This is an under center, hard play-action, max protect play with only two wideouts as options. Deebo and Aiyuk are basically just going to sell their releases like they’re blocking, get to their depths and find space behind the second level of the defense. The Niners actually shifted Juice to the position where he starts in this frame and will send Kittle in motion the other way, which is key because this changes the defense’s run responsibilities.

Since the defense is already in a one-high look, they can’t exactly roll down a safety into the box to the side of the motion. Nor do they want to overcompensate at the linebacker level with Juice on the opposite side of the formation. That’s asking to get gashed the other way.

That means the cornerback at the top of the screen could very well be the unblocked player tasked with filling against the run. So as he sees Kittle motion across, this is what’s going through his head:

The corner is expecting a simple power look, with Kittle kicking out the end, Aiyuk releasing inside and crack blocking on the second level, a double team at the point of attack on Donald, and Mack getting a good angle on the trailing linebacker. With the safety way-way deep, the corner knows that he’s really the only guy who is gonna have a chance to fill against this type of run his way.

Worth noting: this is one of those benefits of tight splits that we talked about earlier. Not only does Aiyuk’s split make it much more viable for him to crack block to the second level and force this cornerback to think run, but it also opens up space for the eventual play-action pass.

On the snap, everything looks exactly like the cornerback had feared. Kittle is kicking out the end, Aiyuk has released inside as if to block the second level, and there is a deep hand-off, downhill play-action look coming straight at him.

Unfortunately for him, he took the bait, and Aiyuk—who is so often the man who the Niners spring open in their hard play-action looks—is wide open for a massive gain. Also of note: Deebo has basically drawn triple coverage on his side because (a) he’s Deebo, (b) his slightly wider split and the rolled down safety to his side allows his cornerback to play off and see the play develop, and (c) Kittle’s motion away gives the defense numbers to Deebo’s side if Juice doesn’t release.

In the video you can see, the corner to the play side (who is a very solid player) basically goes back and forth between run and pass multiple times in his head before finally getting beat over the top

👏 pic.twitter.com/UWsulgI4hz

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 27, 2022

This is a great example of how the constant shifts, motions, formations, and battering of defensive backs in the run game can spring open receivers off of play-action, and how Shanahan’s mastery of the details is such a difference-maker in scheming up these plays.

When the run game can get going, these kinds of opportunities open up down the field.

Jimmy “Goddammit, You Get in Rhythm” Garoppolo. Lost in all the talk of bully-ball and pounding the rock is the fact that—in each of our recent wins against the Rams—the run game hasn’t been dominant with explosive runs and big plays. It’s been incessant and draining with an array of short-to-medium yardage body blows. That’s fine (and is mentally exactly what we’re looking for), but that sort of gameplan requires Jimmy to be on point.

If our misdirection runs can open up our outside running game, so too can our intermediate passing game. The Packers defense played a great game last week, but drops by Brandon Aiyuk and a would-be touchdown to Kittle kept our offense off the field for the majority of the first half. We knew entering that matchup we had to complete some short passes underneath early in order to get them off the run. We didn’t and that led to zero offensive touchdowns.

In our first matchup against the Rams, Jimmy was 15-of-19 for 182 yards and 2 scores. In the rubber match, he threw two ugly picks but was also 23-of-32 for 316 and the game-tying touchdown. As much as we’ve liked this matchup over the years, we can only succeed if Jimmy is efficient, and that is doubly important with the Rams likely selling out to stop the run.

When they’re loading the line of scrimmage, there will inherently be room to throw the ball in the short-to-intermediate game. When they back off into more 4-2 looks, space will open up on those digs that we layer over shorter underneath routes and in passes out of the backfield opposite that two-man action. They want their linebackers to be playing aggressively and instinctively downhill. Making them work in coverage—in particular, Troy Reeder, who has always been more of a pass rusher from the second-level—can not only give us advantageous matchups but slow their ability to key hard on the run.

Jimmy needs to hit those underneath passes to open up the rest of our offense, and—when he sees someone open but lacks the arm strength and or space to get them the ball (like the first pick against the Rams in week 18 and the redzone pick last week)—he needs to throw it away and keep us from losing yardage or possession.

Game flow and staying on schedule are ALWAYS important for a team that’s built like us, but it’s especially important against a squad that has the top-rated pass rush in the country. Staying on schedule means Jimmy playing smart, efficient football and keeping long drives alive.

CONCLUSION

Have more of these than the other guys [Kyle Terada / USA Today]

It’s important to note that all streaks end. The Rams will (eventually) beat us again. They’re too talented and too well-coached not to. But much like the general stereotype comparing Los Angeles and San Francisco, I think the Rams’ offensive scheme is sexier but the Niners’ is smarter. While that opinion on offensive theory makes me bullish on the Niners as a franchise and our trajectory schematically, in order for it to actualize into a second Super Bowl berth in the past three years, Jimmy needs to bring it in a way that he hasn’t quite shown since his game-tying drive against the Rams to cap the regular season.

Eager to wash away their own Super Bowl shortcomings and their recent record against us, the Rams are sure to fire out of the gate swinging. If we can match their intensity and execution—and not spot them another 17-0 lead—we’ll be in great shape to book return flights to Los Angeles two weeks from now.

Go Niners 🏈👍

Divisional Preview @ Green Bay

targeting [Getty Images]

Opponent: Green Bay Packers
Date: Saturday, 1/22
Location: Lambeau Field, Green Bay, WI
Kickoff: 5:15PT
TV: FOX, or wherever you stream it illegally
Line: -5.5

The Niners’ Nineties Nostalgia Tour continues with a divisional-round matchup against the Packers—a squad we played four times in the playoffs during the Brett Favre/Steve Young era. While the Packers have won the last two overall matchups—one in week 3 of this year and the other on a Thursday night in 2020 when Richie James totaled 184 yards receiving because literally every other receiver was either injured or on the COVID list—the Niners have come out on top in the past three post-season meetings. We all remember the most recent of those games.

🏄The NFC Championship turned into a Raheem Mostert clinic 🏄@RMos_8Ball
🚨 220 rushing yards on 29 carries
🚨 4 rushing TD
🚨 Single postseason game rushing record set @49ers | #GoNiners pic.twitter.com/4GhTrWk5L9

— NFL (@NFL) January 20, 2020

It was sick.

Since a Week 1 ass-beating at the hands of the then-relevant New Orleans Saints, the Packers have probably been the single most consistently good team in the NFL. At 13-4 and with the best record in the league, Green Bay has only lost two games in which Rodgers has started and finished: the week one debacle and—somehow—a mid-season shootout against the Vikings.

While it’s up for debate whether the Packers or the Bucs are the favorites to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl, this is an excellent Green Bay squad that could be returning three of their five best players just in time for this matchup. Lucky us.

But like the game against the Cowboys last week, this is another matchup where what we can do well could align nicely with their weaknesses. And while no one will confuse our season’s roller-coaster ride with the consistent excellence of the Packers, at this point in the season those matchups are much more important than records.

PACKERS OFFENSE

BFFs [Jeff Hanisch/USA Today]

Head coach and play-caller Matt LaFleur is from the Sean McVay coaching tree, thus he runs an offensive scheme similar to ours and the Rams’. But while the Packers lean on zone and stretch, play-action passes off that running game, and pre-snap motion, LaFleur’s offense diverges from the norm in a handful of ways. Mostly because Aaron Rodgers—the Vegas favorite to win his second MVP in a row at age 38—is his quarterback.

If there’s something that this offense—and LaFleur—should be known for, it’s consistency and balance. While McVay can get pass-happy and Shanahan would go an entire game without passing if he thought he could get away with it, LaFleur and the Packers are adamant at staying balanced offensively. In 15 of 16 games since their week 1 stinker, they’ve rushed for 90 or more yards on the ground. In all but two of those same games (one being the game that Jordan Love started), they’ve thrown for 200+. That’s led to an offense that is ranked #2 in DVOA, #2 in passing, and #8 in rushing.

This offense can do it all, and they do so at an efficient clip.

It’s What’s For Dinner. While the Packers’ offensive scheme is closer to McVay’s than ours, their investment in numerous beefy skill guys reflects more of our commitment to physicality. While the Rams are famous for their steadfast commitment to 11 personnel—once again leading the league in its usage at 84% of their total snaps—the Packers run the second-most 12 personnel in the NFL (behind the Dolphins, who ran it a laughable 61% of the time).

With three tight ends who had over 28 targets on the season, the Packers use these big bodies in traditional in-line sets, out wide, or even in the backfield in a halfback/fullback-type role. Their most well-known TE is Robert Tonyan—he of an unrepeatable 2020 touchdown rate that foiled many a fantasy manager this year—but since he’s been limited to eight games this season, Mercedes Lewis has been their top dog this year. He’s filled in admirably, earning a top 10 position rating from PFF.

But the heft continues outside of simple personnel groupings. Davante Adams and Aaron Jones—the Packers’ top two offensive weapons—aren’t particularly big, but the supporting cast is XXL. The receiving corps is filled out by Allen Lazard and Marquez Valdes-Scantling—who, together, sound like a sketchy financial advisor driving his dad’s Audi and the oil freighter stuck in the Suez Canal that’s obliterating his portfolio. At a whopping 6-5 227 pounds, Lazard works mostly underneath, while the slightly smaller Valdes-Scantling (6-4, 206 lbs.) is their “fuck it, go deep” guy. Both are expected to block in the run game and beat press coverage for jump ball situations down the sideline. Those guys and their roles haven’t really changed over the years, but the biggest addition since we last saw them is also their biggest load to bring down in the open field.

At 6-0 247 pounds and with quads so massive they’ve gotten their own nicknames (“Quadzilla” and “The Quadfather”), sophomore back AJ Dillon has emerged in the second half of the season to create a timeshare in the Packers backfield. While Jones—with his superior explosiveness and skill in the passing game—continues to be their top dog, Dillon actually has had more carries and rushing yards this year. Granted, some of that is likely due to the Packers trying to preserve the oft-injured Jones for the post-season, but Dillon has made himself a major factor nonetheless. The two backs have considerably different styles, and the Packers use them both in the screen and passing game A LOT (a combined 100+ targets, 86 catches, 704 yards, and 8 scores on the year). Angles and tackling in the open field will be key.

Return of the Bak. 2020 All-Pro left tackle David Bakhtiari returned from a season-long injury last week against the Lions, and—after playing partial snaps in that warm-up game—is probably good to go for Saturday. Considering our best chance of pulling the upset is disrupting Rodgers via pass rush, Bakhtiari’s health—alongside that of Nick Bosa—will be worth monitoring up until kickoff. Last time we faced off, we recorded only two quarterback hits and one sack. Clearly, we’ll need to do better this time around.

Easy-ups. In addition to a heavy dose of diverse and well-designed screens to their backs and wideouts, LaFleur loves to combine alignments, motion, and Aaron Rodgers’ speedy release to get the ball out quick on the perimeter via leverage plays.

❄️ pic.twitter.com/9zYHVANvCC

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

While far from the sexiest, most complex, or explosive of plays, LaFleur dials these up as rhythm starter—like a metronome before the orchestra kicks into full gear. In each of these plays, Rodgers is basically just looking for a slight numbers or leverage advantage (soft coverage, defender too far inside) then getting the ball out in a hurry. Since Rodgers can zip the ball out wide in a split second, the Packers use these throws almost as an extension of the run game. They’re like horizontal handoffs or variations of what a bubble screen can look like when you have a Hall of Fame quarterback throwing it.

As stated above, LaFleur’s calling card has been consistency, and by dialing up screens, play action, and these kinds of layups, he keeps the Packers’ offensive floor high while saving the more complex, higher-risk concepts for his shot plays.

Vulcan Mind-Meld. The other benefit of those easy completions to the boundary is that they often flood one side of the field, forcing defenses to make a choice. They can run with the motion man across, roll their safeties, or shift linebackers so that they don’t get out leveraged play-side, but all those solutions create more space and one-on-one matchups backside, where—you guessed it—they usually play Davante Adams.

Rodgers’ ability to read and diagnose coverages in the blink of an eye, paired with possibly the greatest arm talent the NFL has ever seen and seven years working alongside the best receiver in football, makes for the world’s deadliest game of pitch-and-catch.

One of the major differences between Green Bay’s offense and the other units from the Shanahan/McVay tree is that Rodgers is one of the best and most prolific matchup hunters in the NFL, so LaFleur gives him and Davante Adams great leeway to audible to a quick-hitting pass when they both see a matchup that they like. Namely, any time Davante is one-on-one against press-man.

Davante Adams has the quickest first step and release off the line of scrimmage out of any receiver in the NFL.

And yes, that means everyone. Julio, AB, OBJ, Nuk Hopkins..

Touchdown on a slant route here against the Lions in 2016. Just wait on it. #Packers pic.twitter.com/W4Cyk6zhNt

— Joe Kipp (@joepkipp) June 20, 2018

It’s not out of the question that when Rodgers held up that one finger in the replay, he was telling Adams that they were in Cover 1 and that he was about to make a lot of fantasy owners happy.

Adams has the best release in football, so the Packers go out of their way to isolate him away from trips and empty formations in hopes that defenses give him a one-on-one look and play the math to the other side. When that happens, the Packers will feed Adams until you stop it. Which—in one-on-one coverage—is probably never.

Here’s an example in its most simplistic form. In this case, they don’t even bother isolating Adams. Rodgers just likes the look.

When Adams is lined up in the slot he can run a quick arrow route down the seam off an audible, but when he’s outside it’s typically a fade or a slant. Since he’s not isolated in this situation—and is lined up with plenty of outside space to work with—they’re looking fade.

Despite the corner lining up in press with outside leverage, Rodgers has faith that Adams will beat him outside. With the near safety lined up on the hash, both quarterback and receiver know this cornerback won’t get any help until the ball is already completed. They also know that—since they’re throwing this opposite a called run play—the safety may just stick inside for a second off the run-action look from the box.

Since the corner has lined up outside to begin with—and thus is unlikely to get beat over the top unless he just whiffs at the LOS—Rodgers and Adams expect to throw a back-shoulder fade.

🎯 pic.twitter.com/Yzn51Xck0E

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

Which they complete, rather easily.

Other times, there’s a bit more work involved to set things up. But not by much.

Pre-snap motion to the short side of the field makes the defense adjust. Rodgers sees the high safety move to mid-field where—once again—he can’t play over any fade route that’s thrown early enough. Rodgers takes one peek post-snap to make sure Adams has gained leverage, then drops it over the top for an easy 33-yard gain.

🎯x2 pic.twitter.com/sombjLnBi2

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

On slant routes, the set-up is a bit different, but it’s ultimately more of the same.

Pre-snap, Rodgers and Adams already feel like the near safety is deep enough and far-enough inside that he won’t be a hinderance. In this case, they’re more worried about the alignment of the nearest linebacker. As the running back motions to empty the other way, the linebackers slide over, giving enough room for Adams to work with.

🎯x3 pic.twitter.com/VZdcffDstj

— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

For these two, it’s basically warm-up lines at practice. Davante feasts if given this look—like he feasted against Dontae Johnson and Deommodore Lenoir when they were thrown into play due to injury in week 3. If a defense chooses to keep safety help over Davante, the Packers will gladly chip away with a numbers advantage opposite him using quick game and the leverage plays mentioned above. If defenses go two-high and widen their safeties more to the boundaries, the Packers will pound them on the ground with their two talented running backs then hit them with a skinny post off play-action when they least expect it.

When it all comes together, you get an offense that is schematically sound and unquestionably dangerous but not entirely exciting from an X’s and O’s standpoint. While Shanahan may dial up an RPO slant with motion across and pulling guards to open up a running alley for Deebo or Aiyuk across the middle, Rodgers does a lot of his damage outside the hashes by immediately diagnosing flat defenders and out leveraging them and/or feasting on one-on-one coverage against Davante. Then, when you’ve adjusted your defense to stem the bleeding, Rodgers uncorks one of those wild, unearthly rockets over your defense for six.

If you had to choose one guy between McVay, Shanahan, and LaFleur to scheme someone open, it’s unlikely to be the Packers head coach, but he’s also the one with the winningest record and the highest rated offense. While there’s debate as to how much of that is LaFleur versus him having a significant quarterback advantage over his two colleagues, the Packers coach has done a great job of creating easy completions underneath to raise the floor of this offense. He knows that the Rodgers-Davante combo means a big play could happen at any moment. What differentiates the Packers now from the era of The Thumb is that when that big play is well-covered, they can still stay on track through a commitment to the run game and easy completions underneath.

DEFENSIVE KEYS

When seated, he can’t throw [Mark Hoffman / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

Dudes on Davante. In order to beat the Packers, you have to have a plan for how you’re gonna cover #17. Now it’s easy to yell at a bar to “double team him!” after he gets a clutch third-down reception—and double-coverage should 100% be a part of our plan—but you can’t do that all the time or they’ll just kill you with numbers elsewhere.

The key, as is often the case in NFL pass coverage in 2022, is mixing things up and confusing the pre-snap read. If done correctly, this can be especially effective against a tandem like Rodgers-Adams that relies so heavily on both of them seeing the same thing at the same time.

In week 10, Seattle’s defense did as good a job as any at bottling up the Packers’ full-strength offense, in part by giving Davante a lot of different looks. Here’s a snapshot of one coverage that they’d show pre-snap:

In this case, the safety (Jamal Adams) is CLEARLY in double coverage. So much so that his hips are literally turned away from the center of the field and towards the Packers wideout. While I wouldn’t necessarily support that kind of pre-snap commitment (because—like—what if they just run the ball behind you?) this at least makes it clear to Rodgers that—while the cornerback may be in press coverage on Davante—there’s another dude who is fully committed to denying him the ball.

As the game went on, Seattle would continue to show this look before the play, but instead of always sticking to it, they began to rotate into different coverages post-snap.

In this instance, the Packers are really forcing the issue. They’re in an empty set with four wideouts to the offensive right and just Davante to the left. Once again, Jamal Adams has widened out over Davante’s side, meaning any kind of “alert” passes that the Packers would throw to Davante based on a pre-snap look would be out the window. With a clear leverage and numbers advantage, the Packers CAN’T NOT throw to the four-receiver side.

Based on the called play to the offensive right and the defense lining up in what looks like split safeties with bracket coverage on Davante, Rodgers expects the safety to the top of the screen to widen, Jamal Adams (circled) to stay locked on Davante, and the arrow route (marked in red) to open up right down the seam of the vacating safeties.

But Jamal Adams creeps away from Davante leading up to the snap, and—once the play has begun—we can tell he never had any double team responsibilities based on how he’s turned his back entirely from Davante. Instead, the Seahawks safety is acting as the high wall to any third vertical route from the four-wideout side. He’s meant to block any crosser deeper than the linebackers, or carry any vertical route down the seam.

Rodgers looks to the arrow route that—if Jamal Adams had stayed on Davante—would have split the safeties easily down the middle, but since Jamal rotated to center field, that route is sufficiently smothered. With his timing off and no place to go in a collapsing pocket, Rodgers eventually scrambles for a first down. But it’s called back on holding.

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— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

Showing a double team and then rotating out of it doesn’t just force other receivers to make plays, but it also makes Rodgers get off of his #1 receiver earlier than he’d like to, which at times can be just as effective as an actual double team (but without losing the defender). Sure, the Packers could adjust away from their pre-snap “alert” plays and involve Davante more in traditional passing concepts. In that case, our double-team bluff would be outed within the play and Adams could still get his looks within Rodgers’ standard progression. But we’d still be bracketing Davante on some of those plays, and—even when we aren’t—we’d have taken away the easy pitch-and-catch completions that this offense makes into such a meal.

Mano-a-mano (on the D-Line). While Bakhtiari’s return certainly complicates things, I generally believe the Packers are weaker on the offensive line than many people think. To be clear, they operate very well as a unit, and that matters more. Their adjusted sack rates, adjusted line yards, pass block win rates are all ranked in the top 5. But if you can isolate their three interior linemen, I don’t think they hold up as well.

The Packers struggled to run against Seattle, but that’s because Seattle throws five men on the LOS, is one of the last defenses that is still built to stop the run, and gets heavy snap counts from nose tackles who are 336 pounds and 360(!) pounds. We haven’t really prioritized the same skill-set along our defensive interior, but DJ Jones and Arik Armstead—who rank first and third, respectively, in run stop rate—should be up for the challenge. Our run defense has had the league’s highest EPA/game average since the changes we made mid-season, and winning on the inside—in addition to tackling better than in our first matchup—will be key to setting up longer third downs. That’s where I think we can really take advantage of some mismatches.

In the passing game, the interior line should be our target. Whether that’s utilizing inside twists, presenting overload rushes that force one side to block man up (which can also include twists), sending blitzers up the middle, or showing mug looks by covering up a lineman with a linebacker before dropping him back into coverage, we should be doing everything we can on passing downs to force one-on-one matchups on the inside.

This is also a matchup where those inside blitzes and mug looks could be less likely to punish us. Yes, Rodgers sees and finds openings in zones in a hurry, but the drawback of the Packers’ super-sized skill players is that—other than Davante—you don’t really have anyone who excels at getting open early on the sort of slants, quick-ins, and option routes that can punish interior blitzing or linebackers who are late getting to their spots. If anything, Randall Cobb fits that mold the best, and—all due respect to him—you’d prefer five yard completions to Cobb over the middle versus most other things this Packers passing attack does. And while the threat of a dig getting to the vacated space in the middle of the field is always present—especially against a quarterback as talented as Rodgers—our linebackers are very fast in coverage, and if Rodgers is getting the time to complete that throw because we’re not getting home on a five+ man pressure then we’re probably screwed anyway.

We know—and have seen every year—how this style of offense helps offensive linemen by running the ball and putting them in advantageous positions in pass pro. But if we can force their hand into true dropback pass protection sets and target those interior linemen with our rushers, we can make them block us one-on-one, and that’s where I think we hold an advantage. Obviously, that advantage is exponentially greater if Nick Bosa plays. At the moment, the team seems optimistic, but you can never tell with concussions. That said, we still pressured Dak at a higher rate than he’d seen all year in the wild card matchup, and that was without Bosa for two quarters. Our line in the first matchup was Bosa and everyone else. Now it’s more of a cohesive unit, and one that will have to show up big on Saturday.

Fudge the Flat. Disguising coverages and showing multiple looks pre- and post-snap is absolutely crucial to slowing down Aaron Rodgers. If he knows what you’re in and you stay in it, he’s gonna kill you in the short game and—if they can protect it—beat your corpse again as they throw down the field. Against some quarterbacks, you can get away with rotating safeties and keeping them guessing on the back-end to slow them up, but against Rodgers—and his quick release and recognition skills—you really have to be able to muck up the works on his flat reads as well. Once again, Seattle had some success in hiding what they were doing in their last matchup.

Early in the first quarter, the Packers are in a typical empty spread set. With Davante in the slot to the weak side, they’re trying to work a two-man game for some easy yardage.

At the bottom of the screen, DJ Reed (ugh) does a great job of showing press-bail, keeping his hips open to the formation before the snap as if he’s going to turn and bail with the outside receiver as he runs down the field. Seeing this, Rodgers assumes Adams (in red)—who is matched up on a linebacker (teal)—will be open on the quick out.

But on the snap, Reed squares up his shoulders. While his pre-snap positioning alluded to him being a deep third or quarter defender, he’s actually pressing the outside receiver off the LOS and squatting in the flats. The Seahawks are in a funky variation of Cover 6 and Reed is on the “Cover 2” side. And while he shouldn’t be allowing the receiver an outside release, I’ll give Reed the benefit of the doubt and say that he wasn’t particularly worried about the fade and read Rodgers’ drop to know the ball was coming out quick.

Reed breaks on the ball, forcing an incomplete that just as easily could have been a pick six.

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— DefinitelyNotEric (@TotallyNotEric) January 21, 2022

Say what you will about the Seapenises—like that they’ve benefited more from uncalled PI’s and overly-called roughing calls than anyone in the league, that their fans don’t act like they’ve been there before cause they haven’t been there enough, that their last good first-round pick is older than me, that their obsession with weird highlighter colors on their uniforms will be looked back upon as the jheri curl of this era of jerseys, that their backup quarterback had to spend six weeks sidelined cause he got punched in the face by his own teammate over $600, that their inability to invest in the offensive line is running an elite quarterback in his prime out of town, or that that same elite quarterback, when given the ability to sling it early and often, faltered so heavily down the stretch that they once again returned to an offense that hasn’t had a firmware update since the Bush administration—but… Pete Carroll knows how to coach DBs.

To be clear, some of these snaps—whether feigning double coverage or something else—wind up in press-man. They have to, otherwise, the bluff doesn’t work. It’s one thing to do that every once and a while with Moseley on Adams. With Ambry Thomas—or anyone else—that’s a tougher sell. Especially because Rodgers if you’re in it, Rodgers is bound to find out eventually. But when you’re disguising flat defenders you need to have the threat of the corner squatting and taking away that quick stuff, or they’ll just dink-and-dunk you to death. Sometimes, allowing shorter stuff and rallying up isn't the end of the world. Other times, it gasses your DL and neuters your defense’s ability to dictate game flow. It’ll be up to DeMeco Ryans—who has been DEALING—to keep his pulse on the defense and figure out exactly when and how to crank up the aggressiveness.

Whether it’s disguising blitzers or disguising coverages, the Packers offense is too strong, balanced, and well-coached—and Rodgers is too damn old and good—for us to get away with telegraphing where we’re gonna be. And the more aggressive you are at hiding coverages in the shallow zones and bluffing or delaying blitzers, the more of a shell game it becomes. Every once and a while you can get burned. But those are the risks you take when you’re going up against a HOF quarterback and the best receiver in football.

PACKERS DEFENSE

new blood [Mark Hoffman/Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel]

After the 2020 season, LaFleur replaced former DC Mike Pettine with Joe Barry, who must be a reasonably chill dude because the entire defensive staff—many of whom were Pettine’s guys to begin with—stuck around to coach under the new guy.

Barry, who had unsuccessful stints as a DC in both Detroit and Washington, spent the past four years working with the Rams—first under Wade Phillips, then for a year under Brandon Staley. In the same way that LaFleur and Shanahan are familiar with one another, Barry has butted heads with us plenty of times, with the Niners sending both his former bosses out with 0-2 records against us in their final seasons as DC.

Barry brings with him a two-high, odd-front base defense that looks to rotate coverages on the back end, prevent the big play, and focus on stopping the pass. While his new-look Packers defense started out hot, it’s cooled a bit in the past month or so. While still a top 10 unit in yardage allowed and a top 15 squad in points, analytics are a bit less friendly, with an overall DVOA of 22nd. Is it a unit that was coasting a bit as the Packers approached the post-season? Will it be rejuvenated to early-season levels (and beyond) with the potential return of a few superstars? Or was it simply a defense that was beginning to decline as it regressed to the mean? Hard to say, but I know which one I’m rooting for.

I feel like they should sit out one more week. To be fair to Barry, his first year running the defense has mostly been without the defense’s top two players—both of whom are questionable to play in Saturday’s game.

Our last matchup in week three was the last full game that star cornerback Jaire Alexander played in, as he went down with a shoulder injury the following week that kept him out the remainder of the regular season. He’s questionable to return to a unit that has fared well without him and is suddenly stacked if he’s back.

Meanwhile Za’Darius Smith—the Packers’ best edge rusher—has yet to play a snap all season while dealing with a back injury. Assuming he gets taken off IR at some point in the next 24 hours, he’s also questionable to play. As is the case with Bakhtiari on offense, potentially regaining another two All-Pros just in time for a playoff game is a big deal. If they play, it will be interesting to see what kind of snaps they can give—and at what level they can play—after such a long layoff.

Both men would return to units that have impressed in their absence. In the case of Smith, his absence has partially been offset by the breakthrough campaign of third-year size/speed freak Rashan Gary, who has paired with always-steady Preston Smith to lock down the two edges as stand-up defensive ends/linebackers. While Kenny Clark may be their most important defensive lineman, Smith and Gary are their best pass rushers, combining for 18.5 sacks and 45 QB hits this year.

Great linebacker, greatest chicken soup. De’Vondre Campbell, who the Packers signed to a one-year $2M deal in the off-season, absolutely exploded under the tutelage of Barry, who—as associate head coach and linebackers coach his last year with the Rams—is clearly a linebacker-friendly DC. A 2016 fourth-round pick by the Falcons, Campbell started for four years there before a one-year stint as a starter with the Cardinals—regularly ranking in the 60th-70th range in terms of PFF. This year he blew up in Barry’s scheme, ranking 2nd in PFF among all off-the-ball linebackers and getting a first-team All-Pro nod just last week.

It’s good for the Packers that Campbell has emerged into such a force because their preferred front requires a lot of their middle linebacker, and the other off-ball linebackers who have gotten regular snaps this season have been largely forgettable.

The Packers like to line up in a 5-1, muddy up the gaps, and present a light box. While the two tackles in this photo are in four techniques, the Packers also like the double 4i alignment—which was popularized in college ball to stop spread to run teams (coincidentally, one of the first teams to pioneer the double 4i alignment was Oregon, with their 4is being Arik Armstead and then DeForest Buckner). The thinking in this alignment is that the down linemen cover all the gaps, give the Packers five natural rush options, and prevent the offensive linemen from working up to the second level in the run game. This lets their linebacker run free and fast to the ball, which Campbell has done all year.

In some ways, it’s similar to the scheme that Vic Fangio drew up to halt the meteoric ascension of the Rams offense during their Super Bowl run in 2018. To stop an offense that relied heavily on the run, play-action, and deep shots, Fangio—then the DC of the Bears—loaded the line of scrimmage to prevent double teams and movement along the OL then played a deep two-high shell behind them. This forced the Rams to throw the ball underneath and in rhythm, which they weren’t able to do, and presented the blueprint to slow down their offense—a foundation that the Patriots would use to beat the Rams in that year’s Super Bowl.

But the front has its weaknesses, especially against us. Which we’ll get to in a second.

Trent Baalke would be proud. Like their jumbo wideouts, the Packers have invested in lengthy outside cornerbacks—with Rasul Douglas (6’2, 209 lbs.) and rookie Eric Stokes (6’1 185 lbs.) starting on the outsides with Jaire Alexander down with injury. While we all know how much Fangio’s scheme can help hide average cornerback play, both Douglas and Stokes have played well while stepping into unexpectedly larger roles.

At safety are Darnell Savage—proud owner of just an all-time classic football name—and Adrian Amos, the eraser of the back end. Amos—who likely had an easier transition than many to this defense given his experience in Fangio’s scheme while playing for the Bears—has been playing at a good-to-great level since he entered the league and can do a bit of everything well.

If there’s a weakness in the secondary, it’s starting nickel corner Chandon Sullivan. To be fair, the one linebacker alignments really put him out on an island in coverage, but that island has been visited routinely throughout the year. Additionally, according to PFF, Sullivan has the worst run defense grade of any Green Bay defender—regardless of snap count. As an alley player about to face a team that loves to attack the edge with power runs, you know Shanahan is well aware of this fact.

Special teams…advantage? Our much-maligned special teams unit is ranked 27th in DVOA. The Packers special teams are worst in the league. DVOA is expressed as a percentage, so a team that leads the league in overall DVOA—in this year, Dallas—has a percentage of 30.9%, meaning they are 30.9% better than an average NFL squad. Each unit (offense, defense, specials) contributes a negative or a positive percentage and the aggregate of those makes the overall DVOA.

This year’s top special teams unit—certainly buoyed by the unreal play of Justin Tucker—is the Baltimore Ravens, with a special teams DVOA of +5.3%. We come in at -2.4%. The Packers check in at -5.2%. Their worst-rated special teams area is field goal kicking, which is understandable because Mason Crosby is only hitting 73.5% of his field goals, which is ranked 31st out of 33 qualifiers.

OFFENSIVE KEYS

Not like this, but still run a lot [Kirby Lee/USA Today]

THAT SOFT(ER) NOUGAT INTERIOR. I’m gonna be honest, I don’t know if they can stay in their preferred 5-1 defense against us and have any chance at stopping the run. This Packers team might be 11th in rushing yards allowed, but that’s more the product of game script and their stellar offense. Their defense is ranked #28 in run defense DVOA, has the third-worst yards/carry average in the league (4.7), and has a lot of tape of them being bullied on the ground. The last time we played them they mixed up 5-1 and 4-2 looks, leaning more towards the latter—but there’s a chance that preference was to put more underneath defenders in the middle of the field as we abandoned the run.

Not only did we get down 17-0 early in that game and have to pass, but—if you remember—that was the game where we only had one healthy running back on roster and it was Trey Sermon, who the coaching staff clearly didn’t trust. That led to Juice handling the majority of our snaps at tailback and even getting an inside zone carry on the first play of the game. Love Juice, but he’s not really the type of guy we want threatening the edge in our dynamic stretch game. We only rushed for 67 yards in that game—and that is certainly a data point worth referencing—but MAN there were a lot of extenuating circumstances.

Now that we’ve found our identity on offense and have Elijah Mitchell, Jeff Wilson, and Deebo all healthy and playing out of the backfield, the 5-1 seems like it’s a single missed read/tackle away from a potential house call. There’s a very real chance they show us something completely different than what they’ve been doing to this point. But… less than a month ago in Week 16, while playing a Browns team piloted by a one-armed Baker Mayfield that—as an offshoot of the Kubiak offense—runs a similar base scheme as us and is just as (if not more) run-heavy, the Packers trotted out the 5-1 regularly. And got absolutely shredded on the ground.

Obviously that 5-1 becomes a 5-2 and morphs and changes as we play more heavy personnel. When we grow the box, they will too. They aren’t going to just sit in a six-man box against 21 personnel and wave the white flag. But what happens when we call 11 personnel, split Kittle into the slot, and put Deebo Samuel in the backfield?

The Browns rushed for 219(!) yards in that game and only really lost because of four Baker Mayfield interceptions. So I don’t know, the Packers might have to do something different. If they don’t—or even if they do—we should be POUNDING IT on the ground in this matchup. As mentioned in the Dallas preview, teams that aren’t great at stopping the run can rise to the occasion based on hustle and adrenaline early in games, so it would be nice to start balanced and with plenty of misdirection to keep them off-guard. But this is the kind of prime “our strength vs. their weakness” matchup that could snowball in our favor if we can get some positive momentum (and a friendly game script) early. Let’s be diverse in our run game, mix in gap runs and pulling guards, and slowly drain them on defense while keeping their offense off the field.

If the Packers do stay in the 5-1, our goal should be to hammer those edges between the 4i down lineman and the wide standup ends—both play-side with gap schemes and back-side via split zone—and to free up our linemen with some pin and pull sweeps. If we block down on the two tackles with advantageous angles, we can let our interior linemen pull out into space where their athleticism and our team speed can shine. The Browns murdered the Packers with pin-and-pull sweeps and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to do the same if given the same look.

Digging for Gold. The other reason why I don’t think the Packers will sit in as much 5-1 as they typically do is because that alignment is made for winning upfront and taking away passes deep and outside the hashes. So, you know, everywhere we don’t throw the ball. And with only one second-level linebacker, it is inherently TERRIBLE at defending the short-to-intermediate passing game between the hashes. Which is… everything that we want to do through the air and Jimmy Garoppolo’s wheelhouse.

The idea of deep safeties taking away digs has always been a bit more of a fantasy than a reality. While a dig from the slot can technically be a safety’s responsibility on anything with a vertical stem, driving on digs typically means a safety is exposing the deep post area that they’re required to help the corners protect. And while talented linebackers or a lockdown nickel can help take away those inside routes, no single linebacker can cover that much ground, and the Packers’ nickel—as referenced earlier—is a bit of a weak link.

To be clear, this is less of a problem against slants. They’ll have alley runners and—when they don’t—their safeties do a great job of slipping off slot receivers and jumping the outside slant—something they did multiple times in our last matchup, which led to big collisions and dangerous passes. Digs and crossers—whether they’re coming from the outside receiver or the slot—and post-curls all take time to develop. Naturally, with their five-man front, the Packers are hoping to get home before teams can target that defensive weakness. It just so happens that said weakness—like their vulnerability to the running game—aligns well with our strength.

Contain Kenny. Kenny Clark is the engine that makes this defense go on the interior. He’s the only real inside lineman who makes much of an impact, and when he can shoot gaps and disrupt plays before they get started, the Packers defense typically thrives. Alex Mack had one of his worst games as a Niner in our earlier matchup, in large part due to Kenny Clark’s athleticism and burst at the nose. But if you can prevent him from messing up the rhythm of your plays before they get started, there’s lots of room to run (and pass) behind him.

As always, protect the ball. Yup. No need to bring up any more turnover stats. Or to harp on how Jimmy’s interception—and his torpedoed play afterward—kept a Dallas game close that we should have ran away with. While a turnover could happen at any moment (as we saw last week), it would be smart to watch out for creeping safeties who don’t feel threatened over top, Jaire Alexander if he plays, and any defenders dropping into the hole off the line of scrimmage. While I would LOVE if we could just repeat the run/pass ratio (and the success) of our last playoff matchup with the Packers, the most likely scenario is that we’ll need to complete (at least) some timely passes to win this game. That means protecting Jimmy (and his multiple injuries) and being careful with the ball.

CONCLUSION

victory fist pumps [Tom Lynn/AP Photo]

Once again, our commitment—on both offense and defense—to zagging when most others are zigging gives us a real shot at pulling off another playoff upset. Our run defense held the Cowboys to 77 rushing yards and kept them off balance until late—allowing our pass rush to tee-off on a talented offensive line—while our offense put up 169 on the ground against a top-ranked defense hell-bent built to stop the pass. This week, we’re faced with another situation in which our run defense needs to step up to make things easier on our pass defense and our rushing attack has to carry the load offensively. But Aaron Rodgers and Davante Adams are not Dak Prescott and CeeDee Lamb. And we will not be able to win this game if we play as sloppy as we did down the stretch last week.

I really hope our poor week 3 performance in the run game will give Green Bay a false sense of confidence in how to approach our run game on Saturday. That they’ll just roll out what they’ve shown and we’ll dice it up like it’s 2019. But Matt LaFleur, who knows Shanahan well, is surely, SURELY remembering that NFC Championship Game in preparation for this game. He wants/needs some playoff success after three straight years of 13 wins and he knows we want to run the ball. Maybe that leads to some seriously weird stuff on defense—stuff that they haven’t put on film this year. In the past, due to the complexity of our rushing attack, that sort of strategy has led to some slow starts on the ground and uneven performances. Then again, getting away from what you’re used to doing on defense also leads to busts and breakdowns.

Regardless, this seems like a game where we have to score. That’s not to say I don’t have faith in our defense. I fully expect them to come out with a strong game plan ready to play. But the best way to minimize the impact of a Hall of Fame quarterback in 2022 is to minimize his looks at what you’re doing in coverage. There’s only so many coverages you can run and so many ways you can hide it that are structurally sound, and the more possessions a good quarterback and play-caller get to see those things, the more likely they’ll be able to diagnose what’s coming and target its weaknesses. That means running the ball, shortening the number of possessions on defense, and punching the ball into the endzone so the Packers must stray from their coveted offensive balance and get into true dropback passing situations.

While the faces have changed and the challenge is far greater this time around, the formula for winning this game remains the same. Hopefully, we come out ready to execute it.

Go Niners 🏈👍