Philadelphia Eagles coaches game analysis

Originally posted by thl408:
Goal Line Stand

4th and Goal
PHI uses playaction left, then floods the right side with a QB rollout. The TE in the backfield just motioned from the right side of the formation into the backfield. Bethea followed him.
49ers man up on the their right side (Cully, Ward), but use a form of pattern match elsewhere.


Playaction to fake a run to the left, then have all WRs flow to the right. The TE that went in presnap motion, that was followed by Bethea) is shown in red.


Ward is seen staying very close to the slot WR. The TE (red from above) is now covered by Cox, who is already in position with an advantageous leverage. Had it been Bethea trying to work his way through the formation, this is an easy TD.


Cox stays home and doesn't allow the playaction to cause him to lose his position as the outer most defender. An unblocked Lynch hurries the throw out the back of the end zone.

What are the downsides to pattern match? it saved our butts right here

I was hoping to do more breakdowns of the defense since that was the real story of the game, but got a little too consumed with the offense, as usual. Here is the Bethea INT in the 3rd Quarter.

2nd & 3
49ers: cover3 shell with 5 underneath.
Foles has a few options on this play and will work off of playaction.


Foles performs playaction as well as looks toward the WR on the quick swing pass. Both the playaction, and the look to the WR swing pass, is done to get Willis and Wilhoite to take false steps forward, towards the line of scrimmage. The TE (red) is looking to quickly get behind the ILBs.


49ers rush only 3. Justin is initially double teamed by the LT and LG.


With Skuta near the WR, Foles red lights the swing pass to the WR and looks to the TE over the middle of the field. He is starting the throwing motion, but will eventually think twice and not throw to the TE (red). My guess is that it is the combination of Willis and Reid that makes Foles think twice about targeting the TE, most likely Reid. Bethea is shown looking at the TE.


Same moment in time as pic above. Foles starting his throwing motion. The LT has left the double team block on Justin and allows Justin to go 1 on 1 with the LG. Why the LT did this I have no idea. There was no other 49er for the LT to block.


Once Bethea sees that Reid is in a good position to defeat the TE's route. Bethea gets his head on a swivel and is seen identifying the most dangerous threat at the moment - the deep Post. With Cox playing outside leverage, the Post has a chance to win if Bethea doesn't respond properly. Justin just got around the RG.


Bethea flips his hips and takes a good pursuit angle to the Post route. When playing this deep in open space, don't attack the WR, use route recognition to attack the path that the WR is running.


Justin gets there just as Foles is releasing the ball causing Foles to float the pass.

Originally posted by defenderDX:
What are the downsides to pattern match? it saved our butts right here

- Pre-snap motion and shifting can confuse the pattern match rules.
- Although pattern matching can help sort out bunch/stacked formations, not having defenders on the same page can cause bunch/stacked formations to confuse pattern matching defenders.
- When defenders don't properly pattern match, it can end up in a situation where 2 defenders unintentionally double cover one WR while another WR is running free through the secondary. An example of this was shown in the DAL film thread where Cully and Reid covered an underneath WR while Dez Bryant ran untouched right by the both of them. Luckily Romo didn't see.
- Double moves by the WR can confuse pattern matching defenders.
- Much harder to teach on a team wide scale.

^^^^just a beautiful defensive play. From the pressure from justin, to the pick by bethea just all around great play. Gotta give Vic huge credit for coordinating a helleva game plan.

Originally posted by thl408:

Originally posted by defenderDX:
What are the downsides to pattern match? it saved our butts right here

- Pre-snap motion and shifting can confuse the pattern match rules.
- Although pattern matching can help sort out bunch/stacked formations, not having defenders on the same page can cause bunch/stacked formations to confuse pattern matching defenders.
- When defenders don't properly pattern match, it can end up in a situation where 2 defenders unintentionally double cover one WR while another WR is running free through the secondary. An example of this was shown in the DAL film thread where Cully and Reid covered an underneath WR while Dez Bryant ran untouched right by the both of them. Luckily Romo didn't see.
- Double moves by the WR can confuse pattern matching defenders.
- Much harder to teach on a team wide scale.

For a new secondary playing together that seems like it's asking a lot.

Originally posted by Niners816:
^^^^just a beautiful defensive play. From the pressure from justin, to the pick by bethea just all around great play. Gotta give Vic huge credit for coordinating a helleva game plan.

yep. the team was WELL prepared for everything they threw at them.

Haven't watched philly play much this season but I'm gonna assume that screens are a huge part of their gameplan. Our D recognized every screen and stopped it before it got a chance to even start. Even Dial, basically a rookie, was able to detect two screens and move into position to stop them.

Seems like Wilhoite is really getting the depth on his drops into the zone like his should be and it's cutting off a lot of seam routes.

Originally posted by Niners816:
^^^^just a beautiful defensive play. From the pressure from justin, to the pick by bethea just all around great play. Gotta give Vic huge credit for coordinating a helleva game plan.

The pressure I think we just got lucky on. The OT just stopped with the double team for WHATEVER reason.

Originally posted by defenderDX:
The pressure I think we just got lucky on. The OT just stopped with the double team for WHATEVER reason.

Yeah, where does he think he's going there. There's nobody out there. But also, I really like the way Cox is running right with the guy and has the presence to see Bethea coming in from the middle so he stays outside the receiver. Cox is just playing great this season.

Originally posted by defenderDX:

The pressure I think we just got lucky on. The OT just stopped with the double team for WHATEVER reason.

With the way this season is going pressure wise, any pressure regardless of reason is an awesome site