Cards week 3 coaches film analysis

Well that SUCKED again.

After watching the game through a few times I found myself running through a gamut of emotions: frustration, anger, exasperation, sadness and finally hope.
I was frustrated with the missed opportunities, angry at quite a few "Turrible" penalties and others that were missed, exasperated at plays that were there to be made but one guy messed up, sad that we let such a great chance to win go to waste and finally given hope that I can pull my hand back from the panic button a little bit.

First, let me address our coordinators. While the game wasn't perfectly called, I truly can't fault them in their gameplanning.

I'll start with the Defense with Fangio:

The more film I've watched on Fangio the more I've been impressed with him as a coordinator. He really does vary what he does and does a great job of the "chess match" in his calls. He's looking to set the other team up from the defensive side - which you don't see a whole lot. His scheme is rather complex and has a lot of moving parts, but he's almost always got his guys in a position to succeed - not all coordinators can say that. He's rarely beat by scheme and really makes a team play left handed. Sometimes, players make great plays and you have to tip your cap. I don't think anyone expected Drew Stanton(seriously?!?!?) to play like he did. He made some great throws, stepped up in the pocket and played ball. He blitzed a lot more than I'm used to seeing to try and take advantage of a QB who hasn't played in over 3 years.

The Cardinals were helped by some TERRIBLE calls - I 100% agree with Harbaugh when he said Willis, "saw what he was hitting". You could clearly see Willis facemask up when he went in for the hit on Stanton.(that's just one of many BAD penalties I saw).

The big plays we gave up were blown coverage - simple as that. Guys blew assignments that they've done well at in our other games. I'll show it a little later but, the first Cards TD was one of those exactly. We ran a coverage that we got an INT with the first week against Dallas - it was the same route, same defense, but we blew the coverage this time.

Offense, Greg Roman:
I know there's quite a few people who will disagree with me on this simply because you've already made up your mind about Roman but, I can't fault him for our offensive struggles in this game. He called a good game that consistently put our players in positions to succeed. Players gotta make plays - it's as simple as that. You are more than welcome to disagree with me but I couldn't find the evidence on film; of course I don't see everything, but that's what it looked like to me. We had plays to be made, guys didn't make plays. In our first 5 possessions we should've scored on all of them. But, we had 3 vital miscues that blew good opportunities that stalled drives and then had 30 yards of penalties after getting to the 5 yard line on the 5th.....(Boldin's bad one and then a stupid, bonehead clipping penalty).

To the players: First we'll start with the negative on defense:

It was hard to say, "man this guy really cost us in this game" because almost everyone on the defense blew something at some point. There were times I saw all these guys at fault on critical plays: Bethea, Cox, Reid, Culliver, Wilhiote, Ward. Overall, our defensive backfield played very poorly. Not as much in they were outplayed - but mental errors. I think this group is really trying to gel and all click together. Bear in mind, none of these guys played together last year. Cox was in a reserve roll, Culliver on IR, Bethea in INDY. So there's some growing pains going on in the secondary. Our OLB's played much better than last week, but, it wasn't good enough. Willis continues to be a stud as well as Justin Smith. We just gotta shore up and eliminate the stupid penalties and mental errors and we will be back to an elite defense.

The negatives on Offense: Martin and Boone continue to struggle gelling together. Martin played a terrible game, he missed blocks, got beat and had that stupid clipping penalty. Iupati struggled, at times, in space against Campbell; however, you do have to understand that Calais Campbell is Arizona's version of Justin Smith. He's a dominant player that is difficult for anyone to stop every time. But, Iupati does continue to show heavy feet at times.

It's hard to pinpoint what's going on with the offense because it's a lot of "little" things that can blow up plays and they're coming from almost everyone at some point. It's never the same thing over and over again. Which I think is why it's so hard to nail down what needs to be fixed because it's not like you can just say, "well we've got to make a change here".

As I was watching film it seemed, to me at least, that the biggest deficiency on that side of the ball is solid leadership to make each player better and consistently execute well. Michael Jordan made all those who played with him better and play at their best. We're not seeing that with our guys. We're seeing supremely talented players, guys who will dominate at times, have mental lapses, technique lapses and just get beat at times.

The plays are there to be made - we're just not making them.

Bright spots: Dan Skuta continues to really impress. He's very solid, sound football player. He's not going to flash on a lot of plays and he's not a guy to really highlight from film, he just does his job well and doesn't make mistakes. He's very consistent and I have a hard time seeing Ahmad Brooks around next year at a 9 mil cap figure with how Skuta has played.

Hyde shows explosiveness and a "nasty" running style.

Stevie Johnson continues to show that he's a very tough to cover in man coverage and is a nice big body in the shallow middle. He will force a lot of teams to try and stick to zone coverage. Which will open up more things down the road against different teams.

As usual, breakdowns to follow:

No more arrow tips on the routes. Takes too long to draw and with the 49ers airing it out, it saves a lot of time to not draw tips. If it's a line that doesn't end with a half arrow, the route continues on. If it ends with a half arrow, it stops. The idea is to get a visualization of how the passing game is attacking the defense and to recognize the concepts.

Yellow is completed passes. Orange is incomplete. Only throws that show up on the stat sheet are shown. No sacks, scrambles, penalties.

1st Quarter

2nd Quarter



3rd Quarter



4th Quarter

The big positive so far for the season is kap is completing passes at a 70.2% clip and was over 78% last game. Regardless of outcome, this increase in % is a huge plus and if it continues this offense will be a handful.

The short passing game from an uptembo spread attack really impressed me. I wonder if we just had alittle installed in the game plan for this week to see how it looked on film. I hope we continue to utilize this strategy because our offense looks down right scary with it. I'm interested to see the play thumbnails to see what concepts we were running, because guys were breaking wide open.

Nice breakdown jonnydel. I agree that the ARI TDs were a result of blown coverage assignments, not necessarily being physically outmatched like what happened versus CHI. The pass rush is the main culprit in allowing Stanton to having a good 2nd half. Absolutely no pressure when coming with a 4 man rush.

ARI played a very funky coverage many times. They manned up on the outside and played a zone in the middle of the field. This is part of the reason why we saw all those short throws over the middle. There were definitely catches made by SJ and Crabs against man coverage over the middle, but some were against zone. To get ARI to play zone, something I rarely saw from them in other games, they had to have been wary of something. My guess is Kap's scrambling.

I'm just getting through the rest of the game. Anxious to see the cut ups.

Occam's Razor. Due to injuries etc. we have a lot of guys playing together that have no chemistry. It will take some time to correct that. Our 1-2 this year is much different to our 1-2 last year. Last year we just got clobbered by teams that played superior ball. This year, it's mistakes, lack of execution (to borrow a phrase) and penalties. All of these can be fixed. I continue to blame all of this on offseason injuries preventing us from gelling in preseason.

We are in limp-along mode until we get some guys back.

EXCELLENT job!

I'm a firm believer that the wars are won in the trenches and we lost both wars in the 2nd half.

We haven't scored a TD in the 2nd half in our first 3 games, and only managed to score a FG in the 2nd half of the first game. This failure is not exclusive to player execution but in large part,IMO, due to coaching.

Although I think this game's first half was coached better than in any game before; our 2nd half performances are atrocious. IMO, most of that lies w/Roman and Fangio - ultimately on JH. We don't seem to be countering the adjustments made by the other teams.

Getting a FG blocked w/9 players on the field is another example.

Also, our pass rush is almost non-existent and as a result our secondary is getting torched.

Thanks again, and please keep these fine posts coming.

Originally posted by NinerGM:

Originally posted by jonnydel:
Well that SUCKED again.


Offense, Greg Roman:
I know there's quite a few people who will disagree with me on this simply because you've already made up your mind about Roman but, I can't fault him for our offensive struggles in this game. He called a good game that consistently put our players in positions to succeed. Players gotta make plays - it's as simple as that. You are more than welcome to disagree with me but I couldn't find the evidence on film; of course I don't see everything, but that's what it looked like to me. We had plays to be made, guys didn't make plays. In our first 5 possessions we should've scored on all of them. But, we had 3 vital miscues that blew good opportunities that stalled drives and then had 30 yards of penalties after getting to the 5 yard line on the 5th.....(Boldin's bad one and then a stupid, bonehead clipping penalty).


The negatives on Offense: Martin and Boone continue to struggle gelling together. Martin played a terrible game, he missed blocks, got beat and had that stupid clipping penalty. Iupati struggled, at times, in space against Campbell; however, you do have to understand that Calais Campbell is Arizona's version of Justin Smith. He's a dominant player that is difficult for anyone to stop every time. But, Iupati does continue to show heavy feet at times.

It's hard to pinpoint what's going on with the offense because it's a lot of "little" things that can blow up plays and they're coming from almost everyone at some point. It's never the same thing over and over again. Which I think is why it's so hard to nail down what needs to be fixed because it's not like you can just say, "well we've got to make a change here".

As I was watching film it seemed, to me at least, that the biggest deficiency on that side of the ball is solid leadership to make each player better and consistently execute well. Michael Jordan made all those who played with him better and play at their best. We're not seeing that with our guys. We're seeing supremely talented players, guys who will dominate at times, have mental lapses, technique lapses and just get beat at times.

The plays are there to be made - we're just not making them.

Here's the problem I have with the argument that it's player execution .....

If this is true then let's say we lost because our players suck, and let's make the argument that we don't have the right players on offense on this team. I'm more than willing to hear that argument. The 49ers lost because our players simply don't execute Roman's offense. I guess my next question is are we talking about breaking down each play at a time, or are we also breaking down the context of each play. For example, is it a 3rd and 7 in the 4th quarter while trailing or is it 3rd down and 10 in the 1st and the game in tied 3-3. I'm just making that point that sometimes film study slows the game down and removes other important factors like rhythm, momentum, the impact of the play just previously, or the impact of the plays in the previous quarter. I just want to make sure the argument defending Roman via FILM is correct here.

Secondly, I'll say this; if our players consistently have trouble executing the plays they're asked who's at fault? If my boss continues to ask me to do work I fail at, at what point am I either asked to do something else or fired? In this case it's a little too late to "fire" players so what's the alternative? That's my problem. I'm not saying Roman's isn't calling play that could work, I'm asking if Roman is calling plays that most likely will work given the players he has. As others have said, you fight with the army you have TODAY and not fight with the army you'd like to have.

So we then have an impasse; either we ask the players to do something they will have a propensity to accomplish (whatever that might be and that's why we have an offensive "guru" in Harbaugh/Roman), or we continue to fail at what we would like to do.

If Martin and Boone continue to fail together and this is now documented over 2 games, why aren't we adjusting in game 3? If Solari, Roman and Harbaugh can't put there heads together to either coach these guys, help them OR think about alternative players/formations/etc., then I'd like to know what a coach does? Again, the offense might be great if everyone does their job perfectly, but when are the coaches going to start asking "maybe there's something different we can do when people aren't executing our plan perfectly."

Right...but you are talking about a BACKUP tackle and guard who held out all of training camp and preseason.

Please tell me what game plan is recommended when you have trouble on the line and are missing both your #1 and #2 TE?

How about a short passing offense where they don't have to protect very long.

Wait...isn't that what Roman did?

Here's the first big play we gave up. Really, the only play we gave up on this drive that allowed Arizona it's first points. This is where you have to tip your cap to the Cards. You don't expect a career backup to make this throw, or a rookie kicker to make a 51 yard kick and stay perfect on the year.


What we're doing is trying to double Larry Fitzgerald on 3rd and 6. So, we show a DB blitz at the bottom but back out on that side and send Ward on a blitz. We're showing a form of cover 2, but end up in more of a cover 1-man. But it's kind of funky what we do - which is even more impressive that Stanton saw this. Bethea takes the receiver out of the bunch with the vertical release. Wilhiote acts as a double team against Fitzgerald on the slant. The call by Fangio is good, Floyd is running a clearing route for the underneath slant -which we take away. But Stanton recognizes it, and makes a great throw.


You see Bethea take the vertical receiver - almost in a cover 3 zone position - which may be what we're running here with man-coverage on Fitzgerald so it effectively doubles him.


Further in - you see the slant taking out.


We've got the underneath routes taken out - which is what you look to do on a 3rd and medium, and Bethea is in good position on Floyd.

The only thing is, that because Floyd is running the fade from the inside of the bunch - he's got a lot of room to work towards the sideline.


You can see though, it was a good throw - right on the money.


You can see how good the throw and catch are. This is the only reason they scored on the opening drive. Sometimes you gotta tip your cap and move on. Players making plays.

Originally posted by NinerGM:

Originally posted by jonnydel:
Well that SUCKED again.


Offense, Greg Roman:
I know there's quite a few people who will disagree with me on this simply because you've already made up your mind about Roman but, I can't fault him for our offensive struggles in this game. He called a good game that consistently put our players in positions to succeed. Players gotta make plays - it's as simple as that. You are more than welcome to disagree with me but I couldn't find the evidence on film; of course I don't see everything, but that's what it looked like to me. We had plays to be made, guys didn't make plays. In our first 5 possessions we should've scored on all of them. But, we had 3 vital miscues that blew good opportunities that stalled drives and then had 30 yards of penalties after getting to the 5 yard line on the 5th.....(Boldin's bad one and then a stupid, bonehead clipping penalty).


The negatives on Offense: Martin and Boone continue to struggle gelling together. Martin played a terrible game, he missed blocks, got beat and had that stupid clipping penalty. Iupati struggled, at times, in space against Campbell; however, you do have to understand that Calais Campbell is Arizona's version of Justin Smith. He's a dominant player that is difficult for anyone to stop every time. But, Iupati does continue to show heavy feet at times.

It's hard to pinpoint what's going on with the offense because it's a lot of "little" things that can blow up plays and they're coming from almost everyone at some point. It's never the same thing over and over again. Which I think is why it's so hard to nail down what needs to be fixed because it's not like you can just say, "well we've got to make a change here".

As I was watching film it seemed, to me at least, that the biggest deficiency on that side of the ball is solid leadership to make each player better and consistently execute well. Michael Jordan made all those who played with him better and play at their best. We're not seeing that with our guys. We're seeing supremely talented players, guys who will dominate at times, have mental lapses, technique lapses and just get beat at times.

The plays are there to be made - we're just not making them.

Here's the problem I have with the argument that it's player execution .....

If this is true then let's say we lost because our players suck, and let's make the argument that we don't have the right players on offense on this team. I'm more than willing to hear that argument. The 49ers lost because our players simply don't execute Roman's offense. I guess my next question is are we talking about breaking down each play at a time, or are we also breaking down the context of each play. For example, is it a 3rd and 7 in the 4th quarter while trailing or is it 3rd down and 10 in the 1st and the game in tied 3-3. I'm just making that point that sometimes film study slows the game down and removes other important factors like rhythm, momentum, the impact of the play just previously, or the impact of the plays in the previous quarter. I just want to make sure the argument defending Roman via FILM is correct here.

Secondly, I'll say this; if our players consistently have trouble executing the plays they're asked who's at fault? If my boss continues to ask me to do work I fail at, at what point am I either asked to do something else or fired? In this case it's a little too late to "fire" players so what's the alternative? That's my problem. I'm not saying Roman's isn't calling play that could work, I'm asking if Roman is calling plays that most likely will work given the players he has. As others have said, you fight with the army you have TODAY and not fight with the army you'd like to have.

So we then have an impasse; either we ask the players to do something they will have a propensity to accomplish (whatever that might be and that's why we have an offensive "guru" in Harbaugh/Roman), or we continue to fail at what we would like to do.

If Martin and Boone continue to fail together and this is now documented over 2 games, why aren't we adjusting in game 3? If Solari, Roman and Harbaugh can't put there heads together to either coach these guys, help them OR think about alternative players/formations/etc., then I'd like to know what a coach does? Again, the offense might be great if everyone does their job perfectly, but when are the coaches going to start asking "maybe there's something different we can do when people aren't executing our plan perfectly."

But, I tried to point this out but I made not have said it clearly - I can write a little cluttered at times. The problem isn't that it's ONE or TWO players who consistently give us problems. It's one guy here, another guy here, another guy here and sometimes it's not in execution in: run the right route, block the right guy, make the right read, it's the little things that great players and great teams get that edge on. It's looking at the vertical release on an underneath out route to keep the corner from jumping the route, it's keeping good balance when trying to block a guy, it's throwing the ball from a good platform, it's knowing when a defender has taken himself out of a play and not doing something stupid to that guy to draw a penalty.

Those are the things that we have seen each of these guys do - so they've been coached, it's a matter of the player going out and doing it consistently. There's only so much you can coach and reiterate. If you've already taught it and the player has already learned it, then there's not much more the coach can do. The onus is on the players to do what they've been coached to do.

I'm also talking from a schematic point: From what I see in our route combo's/concepts and our defensive adjustments - adjustments were made and we were doing things to counter what Arizona was doing. It's really easy to see a lack of production as equaling a lack of adjustments - but, adjustments were made and the plays were there, we just didn't get it done.

Also, bear in mind that I watch the game about 3 times and most of the key plays 3-4 times, some up to 10 times before a lot of the stuff I'll make conclusions about and I always look at the down and distance, score and time on the clock(the game film shows that before every play, the camera shows the scoreboard for a couple seconds so you know the context of the play). Also, because the game film is one play after another with only the 2 seconds of the scoreboard in between you actually get a really good feel of plays in sequence. You see the plays immediately after one another so you see how the teams are, "punch, counter-punch" from play to play really well.

Great Post! at least reading this will somewhat make me feel a little different about the game, But like what I said on the Jimmy Ward thread.. The DB's can only do so much especially in the 2nd half with all the time in the world to throw an NFL QB should be able to find a WR that is open, Without any Pass Rush coming the defensive backs will look terrible.

Originally posted by NinerGM:

Originally posted by Marvin49:

Originally posted by NinerGM:

Originally posted by jonnydel:
Well that SUCKED again.


Offense, Greg Roman:
I know there's quite a few people who will disagree with me on this simply because you've already made up your mind about Roman but, I can't fault him for our offensive struggles in this game. He called a good game that consistently put our players in positions to succeed. Players gotta make plays - it's as simple as that. You are more than welcome to disagree with me but I couldn't find the evidence on film; of course I don't see everything, but that's what it looked like to me. We had plays to be made, guys didn't make plays. In our first 5 possessions we should've scored on all of them. But, we had 3 vital miscues that blew good opportunities that stalled drives and then had 30 yards of penalties after getting to the 5 yard line on the 5th.....(Boldin's bad one and then a stupid, bonehead clipping penalty).


The negatives on Offense: Martin and Boone continue to struggle gelling together. Martin played a terrible game, he missed blocks, got beat and had that stupid clipping penalty. Iupati struggled, at times, in space against Campbell; however, you do have to understand that Calais Campbell is Arizona's version of Justin Smith. He's a dominant player that is difficult for anyone to stop every time. But, Iupati does continue to show heavy feet at times.

It's hard to pinpoint what's going on with the offense because it's a lot of "little" things that can blow up plays and they're coming from almost everyone at some point. It's never the same thing over and over again. Which I think is why it's so hard to nail down what needs to be fixed because it's not like you can just say, "well we've got to make a change here".

As I was watching film it seemed, to me at least, that the biggest deficiency on that side of the ball is solid leadership to make each player better and consistently execute well. Michael Jordan made all those who played with him better and play at their best. We're not seeing that with our guys. We're seeing supremely talented players, guys who will dominate at times, have mental lapses, technique lapses and just get beat at times.

The plays are there to be made - we're just not making them.

Here's the problem I have with the argument that it's player execution .....

If this is true then let's say we lost because our players suck, and let's make the argument that we don't have the right players on offense on this team. I'm more than willing to hear that argument. The 49ers lost because our players simply don't execute Roman's offense. I guess my next question is are we talking about breaking down each play at a time, or are we also breaking down the context of each play. For example, is it a 3rd and 7 in the 4th quarter while trailing or is it 3rd down and 10 in the 1st and the game in tied 3-3. I'm just making that point that sometimes film study slows the game down and removes other important factors like rhythm, momentum, the impact of the play just previously, or the impact of the plays in the previous quarter. I just want to make sure the argument defending Roman via FILM is correct here.

Secondly, I'll say this; if our players consistently have trouble executing the plays they're asked who's at fault? If my boss continues to ask me to do work I fail at, at what point am I either asked to do something else or fired? In this case it's a little too late to "fire" players so what's the alternative? That's my problem. I'm not saying Roman's isn't calling play that could work, I'm asking if Roman is calling plays that most likely will work given the players he has. As others have said, you fight with the army you have TODAY and not fight with the army you'd like to have.

So we then have an impasse; either we ask the players to do something they will have a propensity to accomplish (whatever that might be and that's why we have an offensive "guru" in Harbaugh/Roman), or we continue to fail at what we would like to do.

If Martin and Boone continue to fail together and this is now documented over 2 games, why aren't we adjusting in game 3? If Solari, Roman and Harbaugh can't put there heads together to either coach these guys, help them OR think about alternative players/formations/etc., then I'd like to know what a coach does? Again, the offense might be great if everyone does their job perfectly, but when are the coaches going to start asking "maybe there's something different we can do when people aren't executing our plan perfectly."

Right...but you are talking about a BACKUP tackle and guard who held out all of training camp and preseason.

Please tell me what game plan is recommended when you have trouble on the line and are missing both your #1 and #2 TE?

How about a short passing offense where they don't have to protect very long.

Wait...isn't that what Roman did?

And agreed Roman did do this... there's no argument there. Again the criticism isn't that the offense wasn't effective at all. I watched the game as well as many of you. The criticism is why STOP the short passing offense, no-huddle that prevented substitutions and provides a QB who historically has had trouble reading defenses, providing him more time to read - along with calling a play (no more play clock issues). We come out during the second half and STOP doing exactly that. We go back to it in the 4th and surprise, it's working again....

And let's not act like Jonathan Martin has been completely terrible. Granted there are times he needs help. The real problem is the interior line - between Kilgore and Boone. The decision to sit Looney who clearly had chemistry with Kilgore because up until this game we had been talking about problems only on the left side of the OL, now we're seeing problems on the interior right side. Again, it was a COACHING decision to bench Looney and start Boone. I understand it, but let's not kid ourselves; if they didn't anticipate there would be major problems on the OL by running our standard stuff with all the changes, then again someone isn't doing their job....

agreed. this line was fine with looney in. better than fine.

as far as roman. i disagree with his 2nd half game calling. the 1st half, like every 1st half of the season he's been on the money.
2nd half he has struggled imo and it shows.
unless we're saying that the team that comes out in the 2nd half suddenly forgets how to play after dominating in the 1st?

Originally posted by 49ersOnMINE:
Great Post! at least reading this will somewhat make me feel a little different about the game, But like what I said on the Jimmy Ward thread.. The DB's can only do so much especially in the 2nd half with all the time in the world to throw an NFL QB should be able to find a WR that is open, Without any Pass Rush coming the defensive backs will look terrible.

that's the entire problem. they are nfl quarterbacks and stanton is better than palmer in the 1 key area that counts, decision making.

you let a qb sit back there he'll pick you apart every single week as we see 2 weeks in a row.

Here's a little bit of how G-Ro used sequencing to get Arizona out of their comfort zone of defense during the opening drive.

Arizona LOVES to play straight man coverage with little safety help to the outside corners. They trust both of those guys(Peterson and Cromartie) a lot. Which, why not? They're big and very fast. So, you're not going to see those guys get beat a lot. So, because we don't want Arizona stacking the box and blitzing all game while locking down our receivers, G-Ro decided that in the opening drive he was gonna get em off balance. The next few posts will be on a 3 play sequence to show how he was forcing them out of what they wanted to do.


Here Arizona is going to play straight man coverage with a single safety and bring 5 on the rush. We have Johnson as the inside receiver on the 3 receiver side working against Cromartie.


You see Johnson matched up on him with a lot of space to work the middle of the field. We run verticals out from the two slot guys so it gives Johnson every direction available. This is so that Cromartie can't play with any leverage, he has to play straight up open because he doesn't have any help.


Johnson uses a little stutter, shake n' bake move to create separation and cross the face of the defender.


He's won to the inside and you see Cromartie has no help.


It's just a pitch and catch for a nice little 5-6 yard gain.

Here's the very next play after the Johnson catch:


This time they'll run almost the same defense, but with a "Spy" on CK. So, again, we'll work Johnson in the middle.


Because it's the 2 receiver side and the inside help from the safety, the Slot corner is playing with outside leverage on Johnson. The DB isn't going to squeaze the route for the shallow inside because you can't count on your "Spy" for help in passing drops.


Johnson is then able to utilize his inside leverage for a little "hook" route to the inside to get himself in between the defenders.


you see how he's able to hit johnson in the window - again beating man coverage.

Here's the 3rd play in the sequence. Since Ari got beat twice on short routes against their man coverage - they switch to a zone to combat it, which is, in turn, defeated well for an even bigger gain:


This time Ari runs a cover 2 "soft" zone. It's "soft" because the outside corners aren't playing the "flat" they're playing the in "hook/curl" zone. We're going to run 2 vertical clearing routes on each side of the field with a short in at the bottom and a short out at the top - same concept. This isolates Crabtree on their MLB Larry Foote - that's a win all day.


Just showing how Crabtree is working against a MLB with inside leverage already.


Further into the play


You can see how the concept defeats the zone on both sides of the field


Crabtree is able to catch the ball in space to get YAC


He's able to work the space and get 10 yards on the play.

This was a great sequence to work the leverages in man coverage to force a team into zone and defeat the zone for a bigger gain.