St. Louis Rams week 6 coaches film analysis

Originally posted by thl408:

Originally posted by znk916:

Originally posted by thl408:
No problem about more run game analysis. It's odd that on a night where Kap played so well, I was a little more interested in the run game. It's just that I don't think the 49ers had run the ball so often out of that personnel grouping before in any one game. Couple this with how they seemed to run quite a number of zone blocking plays versus KC and we might be seeing some sort of shift to more zone blocking runs. Not more as in the ratio of zone blocking plays compared to power blocking plays, but as in more zone blocking plays compared to the past.

I believe the Rams did make an emphasis of stopping the run game and forcing Kap to beat them, which many here have mentioned. I think there's execution as well as opponent's possibly being tipped off when the 49ers are about to run the ball. That's why the 11 personnel was so effective because any combination of three WRs that the 49ers can field demand respect as route runners. We don't need all22 view to see the run game so I am really interested in what others have to say as well.

As to Roman throwing away plays, that's a tough way to put it, but I think it's true. A running team has to continue to show it is willing to run in order for the opponent to continue thinking they have to devote attention towards stopping it. We all know the 49ers love using play action and that won't be as effective unless the 49ers show in every game that they are willing to pound the rock.

Out of the 27 carries that Gore/Hyde got, how many were designed to go outside of the tackles? Just offhand I feel like we didn't even bother to threaten the edges, which is mind boggling considering that a huge chunk of our run yards come off tackle, as per PFF or FO, I can't recall which.

Directly off tackle, for this game, I would give a ballpark estimate of 10 or more. Wide outside of the tackles were very few - I can remember 1 off the top of my head as I type this. There were two times that the 49ers faked the stretch run and it resulted in having Vance/VD being wide open (one was Vance fumble). So teams are respecting the outside run even if it's not warranted.

About runs wide outside the tackles, I think the days of offensive guards leading the sweep are over. DLs and LBs are too fast for that now. Most runs wide to the outside are going to be zone blocking runs. So unless the 49ers call more of these outside zone plays and the edge is available to be taken, we may not see it much with this 49er team. Their OL is more lumbering and powerful than they are agile. The PFF/OF stat that says the 49ers had chunk plays on outside runs, was that just for RBs or did it include QB runs? Also, it needs to make the distinction of directly off tackle, or wide outside the tackle box. Directly off tackle, the 49ers run that quite often. Wide outside the tackle box, not so much.

Agreed. I also think we have the capability to run an outside counter with Looney pulling (I don't think Boone or Iupati are nimble enough to hook their kick out block, unless they get a dramatic pinch/crash from the EMOL).

Originally posted by NinerBuff:

Originally posted by thl408:
Here is the big Kap scramble on the opening drive of the second half (Boldin TD). Going back to the KC game and what jonnydel mentioned in post#10

jonnydel wrote:
"The safety over Miller see's Miller stay in to block so he comes on a blitz - some teams with play it that way. If you're man stays in to block - you blitz. We tend to drop our guys into zone if their man stays in to block."

There are three things a defender could be asked to do when he sees that his man coverage assignment stays in to give additional pass protection. Usually a LB with a man coverage assignment on a RB/TE. This was also touched on in the KC thread with a play example.
1. Blitz
2. Play Zone coverage in the middle of the field - 49er defenders do this a lot.
3. Crowd the line of scrimmage (fake blitz but stay disciplined with man coverage) - this was seen versus KC as KC crowded the line of scrimmage to discourage Kap from scrambling. I think this is what we see in the play below. Or the defender could be blitzing, not sure.

49ers: Drive concept over the middle + (I think) a high-low read to Kap's right, but SJ (orange) will slip and fall down on his route.
STL: Man coverage. When a defense plays man coverage, they have 2 spare defenders to use (assuming 4 man pass rush). The Rams choose to spy Kap with one of the spare defenders, and double team SJ with the other spare defender.


Kap drops back and looks to his right. The blue line indicates that the LB has man coverage on Hyde. He sees that Hyde does not immediately release into a route, so that defender starts creeping up to the line of scrimmage. I think he is executing option #3 from the list above on what a defender can do if his man assignment stays in to pass block. Orange is the spy.


Kap red lights the routes on the right side and looks to the Drive concept (VD's In route + Crab's shallow crosser). Both are covered. Hyde has released into a route and the LB assigned to Hyde must honor his man coverage assignment. He has turned to run with Hyde.


Kap tucks to scramble just as Crab's crosser coincidentally sets a pick on the orange spy.


Crab's "accidental" pick puts the orange spy a few steps behind Kap. The defender assigned to Hyde has yet to turn around to see that Kap is scrambling.


Even when a spy is assigned to Kap, he rips off a chunk gain with his legs. This is why I think teams will need to play more zone in the middle of the field. The coverage here - man coverage all around, with a spy assigned on Kap - is still a mismatch. Gain of +23

Kap could have taken this to the house had Hyde continued to block Laurinitas and not switched up and try to block the pursuer.

couldnt he have gotten it to Boldin?

Originally posted by defenderDX:
couldnt he have gotten it to Boldin?

Yes, for like an 8 yard gain. My point was that Kap had the angle on his pursuers, and he only needed to beat Laurinitas for a TD. Hyde either didn't see him or just decided to block someone else.

Here's a play I consider wide outside the tackle box. Not good.


Here's a play that is off tackle, but not wide outside the tackle box. The 49ers do this quite often. The site where you saw that statistic should make the distinction. They kind of look the same, but you can tell the RB is looking to cut upfield at different areas regarding the tackle box. Kilgore gets caught up and can't cleanly get to the second level. Otherwise this run is designed to go directly off tackle. Hyde bounces it out wider because of this.

Originally posted by NinerBuff:

Originally posted by defenderDX:
couldnt he have gotten it to Boldin?

Yes, for like an 8 yard gain. My point was that Kap had the angle on his pursuers, and he only needed to beat Laurinitas for a TD. Hyde either didn't see him or just decided to block someone else.

Oh I don't care about that point. Don't care for nit-picking. Just interested in the shot he could have made at Boldin. hmm. Guess the rush made him red light it right as soon as Boldin came open

Originally posted by defenderDX:

Originally posted by NinerBuff:

Originally posted by defenderDX:
couldnt he have gotten it to Boldin?

Yes, for like an 8 yard gain. My point was that Kap had the angle on his pursuers, and he only needed to beat Laurinitas for a TD. Hyde either didn't see him or just decided to block someone else.

Oh I don't care about that point. Don't care for nit-picking. Just interested in the shot he could have made at Boldin. hmm. Guess the rush made him red light it right as soon as Boldin came open

I guess as a general rule, the 8 yard out to Boldin was probably his best (and most sustainable) play here. But we also have a QB with unique scrambling skills, and 20+ yard pickups are fairly common.

Originally posted by NinerBuff:

Originally posted by defenderDX:

Originally posted by NinerBuff:

Originally posted by defenderDX:
couldnt he have gotten it to Boldin?

Yes, for like an 8 yard gain. My point was that Kap had the angle on his pursuers, and he only needed to beat Laurinitas for a TD. Hyde either didn't see him or just decided to block someone else.

Oh I don't care about that point. Don't care for nit-picking. Just interested in the shot he could have made at Boldin. hmm. Guess the rush made him red light it right as soon as Boldin came open

I guess as a general rule, the 8 yard out to Boldin was probably his best (and most sustainable) play here. But we also have a QB with unique scrambling skills, and 20+ yard pickups are fairly common.

Gore woulda made an actual block. Don't fault Hyde on a play that wasn't a designed run by Kap

Originally posted by thl408:
Here's a play I consider wide outside the tackle box. Not good.


Here's a play that is off tackle, but not wide outside the tackle box. The 49ers do this quite often. The site where you saw that statistic should make the distinction. They kind of look the same, but you can tell the RB is looking to cut upfield at different areas regarding the tackle box. Kilgore gets caught up and can't cleanly get to the second level. Otherwise this run is designed to go directly off tackle. Hyde bounces it out wider because of this.

Thanks, too bad I can't find the stat. I just remember seeing it either last year or during the offseason that alot of Gore's yds if not the majority were classified as off tackle (not wide). The 2nd play is a perfect example of what should be our bread and butter but I don't feel like we ran it enough this past week. Maybe we didn't feel a need to.

Originally posted by Joecool:
I do have one knock on Kap in this play. As much as I love that he did climb the pocket, he made the play more difficult than it should have been. Look at the 3rd and 4th images. Kap should have read blitz with Boldin and Vernon being wide open. He also had a nice pocket to step into instead of declaring to run as the RB came over to help perfectly against the blitz. Take a look at the 5th image. It clearly shows Kap left too early and had plenty of room to make a throw to a wide open receiver.

This will be Kap's next step to evolve as a QB which is make quicker throws in a tight pocket rather than quickly fleeing.

Another example is the last image from the play with the Vernon Curl. If Kap releases that quickly instead of waiting for Vernon to Curl, I think Vernon gets a first down.

I am not complaining here, just noticing the next step Kap needs to take in order to get to the level of guys like Manning and Brady.

originally posted by jonnydel:

Here's a great play made by CK - he climbs the pocket and finds the receiver.


Here, it's early in the game and St. Louis is showing their "blob" like defense. Because the safety is down over Miller - it reveals a blitz in man-coverage. They also use the MLB, #55, as a "spy".

as best as I can figure, the alignment of Miller as a TE confused the LB over VD and he's not sure which side is the "strong" side. So, they're blitz call gets mixed up and he blitzes. He should be in coverage on VD. This puts the corner in a tough spot. He's now stuck between choosing to cover VD or Boldin on the backend. He tries to pick a middle ground and so it looks like he's in zone coverage - but, based off everything else, I think he's just reacting to the blown assignment in front of him.


The safety over Miller see's Miller stay in to block so he comes on a blitz - some teams with play it that way. If you're man stays in to block - you blitz. We tend to drop our guys into zone if their man stays in to block. Because the MLB is "spying" on CK he isn't aware of the two receivers behind him. The corner is stuck between a rock and a hard place.


Miller then releases out of his block so the MLB has to now bail on his "spy" and cover Miller. This opens up the middle for Boldin.



The line does a great job with their 1-1 blocks and Gore saves the day with his blitz pickup. He comes across the formation to pickup the safety.


Here CK had the choice to bail out of the pocket or climb the pocket. He does a good job of climbing the pocket to extend the play.


He climbs the pocket and makes a solid throw to Boldin who picks up 28 on the play. Too bad McDonald fumbled another big pass play on the next play after this.

This is the play in post#10. Mentioned in the first 6 pics in the post quoted above. Kap squeezes in between the RT and the RB that is picking up the blitz. He had to wait until the RB moved out of his way. By then the RT was being shoved back into the pocket.

Originally posted by WRATHman44:

Originally posted by thl408:

No problem about more run game analysis. It's odd that on a night where Kap played so well, I was a little more interested in the run game. It's just that I don't think the 49ers had run the ball so often out of that personnel grouping before in any one game. Couple this with how they seemed to run quite a number of zone blocking plays versus KC and we might be seeing some sort of shift to more zone blocking runs. Not more as in the ratio of zone blocking plays compared to power blocking plays, but as in more zone blocking plays compared to the past.

I believe the Rams did make an emphasis of stopping the run game and forcing Kap to beat them, which many here have mentioned. I think there's execution as well as opponent's possibly being tipped off when the 49ers are about to run the ball. That's why the 11 personnel was so effective because any combination of three WRs that the 49ers can field demand respect as route runners. We don't need all22 view to see the run game so I am really interested in what others have to say as well.

As to Roman throwing away plays, that's a tough way to put it, but I think it's true. A running team has to continue to show it is willing to run in order for the opponent to continue thinking they have to devote attention towards stopping it. We all know the 49ers love using play action and that won't be as effective unless the 49ers show in every game that they are willing to pound the rock.

DO you think the diversity of our run game is occasionally a weakness? I wonder occasionally if the diversity of our ground game limits specific mastery. I don't see many teams run the power runs out of as many sets, AND the zone scheme in as many different ways, AND the Man/Iso scheme from multiple sets. Maybe the diversity results in too much hesitation?

I don't think our run game is as diversified as it would seem. G-ro adds a wrinkle here and there to make the defenses think instead of pursue because so much of this offense is misdirection. But all in all to me the runs are pretty basic. Walsh liked to run the 22-z in (a pass play) from a variety of formations and alignments and so it would *look* like many different kinds pass plays, but it was always in substance - the 22-z in. So once the players master the 22-z in, they've essentially mastered many plays instead of just one.

With thl408's GIF's of the all 22 I'm beginning to understand why the absence of Vernon Davis hurts the run game so much. I didn't know he could execute trap blocks all the way across the formations like that.

Originally posted by Giedi:

Originally posted by WRATHman44:

Originally posted by thl408:
No problem about more run game analysis. It's odd that on a night where Kap played so well, I was a little more interested in the run game. It's just that I don't think the 49ers had run the ball so often out of that personnel grouping before in any one game. Couple this with how they seemed to run quite a number of zone blocking plays versus KC and we might be seeing some sort of shift to more zone blocking runs. Not more as in the ratio of zone blocking plays compared to power blocking plays, but as in more zone blocking plays compared to the past.

I believe the Rams did make an emphasis of stopping the run game and forcing Kap to beat them, which many here have mentioned. I think there's execution as well as opponent's possibly being tipped off when the 49ers are about to run the ball. That's why the 11 personnel was so effective because any combination of three WRs that the 49ers can field demand respect as route runners. We don't need all22 view to see the run game so I am really interested in what others have to say as well.

As to Roman throwing away plays, that's a tough way to put it, but I think it's true. A running team has to continue to show it is willing to run in order for the opponent to continue thinking they have to devote attention towards stopping it. We all know the 49ers love using play action and that won't be as effective unless the 49ers show in every game that they are willing to pound the rock.

DO you think the diversity of our run game is occasionally a weakness? I wonder occasionally if the diversity of our ground game limits specific mastery. I don't see many teams run the power runs out of as many sets, AND the zone scheme in as many different ways, AND the Man/Iso scheme from multiple sets. Maybe the diversity results in too much hesitation?

I don't think our run game is as diversified as it would seem. G-ro adds a wrinkle here and there to make the defenses think instead of pursue because so much of this offense is misdirection. But all in all to me the runs are pretty basic. Walsh liked to run the 22-z in (a pass play) from a variety of formations and alignments and so it would *look* like many different kinds pass plays, but it was always in substance - the 22-z in. So once the players master the 22-z in, they've essentially mastered many plays instead of just one.

With thl408's GIF's of the all 22 I'm beginning to understand why the absence of Vernon Davis hurts the run game so much. I didn't know he could execute trap blocks all the way across the formations like that.

I think the 49ers run game is extremely diversified. Traps (whams), counters, power play, Iso, outside/inside zone, read-option (inside zone), QB bootlegs, plays that look like a pass play but is a designed QB run, jet sweeps. They do it all. The only thing they don't do is toss sweeps. Is there anything you'd like to see them do that you feel is missing?

Originally posted by thl408:
This is the play in post#10. Mentioned in the first 6 pics in the post quoted above. Kap squeezes in between the RT and the RB that is picking up the blitz. He had to wait until the RB moved out of his way. By then the RT was being shoved back into the pocket.

Yes. This is a play that can get him to then next level if he reads it correctly presnap and on his drop back. By the time he was at the top of his drop, Boldin was already wide open. Kap's first look was to his left which means his presnap read was incorrect and he did not consider the combo route on the right. The combo route should have been his first look.

Can't wait until he "gets this" because everything will come much easier to him once he does.

Also, don't forget about the quick hit he could have thrown to Vernon if he read it correctly.

thl + jd :

Some requests:

1) What are your thoughts on the fourth down calls this game? I hated both of them and felt like we were giving the opponents a chance to feel good about themselves when we didn't have to.

2) On the fourth down calls what did you think of the actual play calls?

3) Also, there was one play in the second half -- I can't recall exactly which play -- where kap got blitzed heavy and not a single receiver cut their route short. I think the play ended adversely for us. Maybe it was a third down not sure. It struck me as weird because all the routes were downfield and we didn't need that much for a first down. The call in that situation was a good example of our home run mentality but I was surprised that no one one went hot. Do we have that kind of communication in our offense? I would have thought it would be built in to any pro offense. Maybe I'm reading too much into one play.

Thx.

Originally posted by jonnydel:
I thought this was a great call on 3rd and 1:


We're gonna run a fake handoff to Hyde to the right. Alex Boone is gonna pull a "circle" block. He'll step back for half a second and then take off as a lead blocker for CK. Looney is gonna pull out as well and try and seal the edge.


You see how aggressive the Rams were towards the run. All their LB's are occupied by the run fake.

Because the outside defender was so aggressive against the run fake, Looney is able to easily seal the edge leaving the outside wide open.


CK's out in space with a lot of room to run. Boone thinks he's got a good lead - but, he's just not fast enough lol.

CK's gazelle legs catch up with Boone in about 4 steps lol.


We get the first down and set up 1st and goal. Great call by G-Ro to catch St. Louis in over aggressive behavior.


Boone was trying as hard as he could to lead out on that play -but running really isn't his strong suite.....haha

As I watched the replay, this is where you can tell Kaep isn't a running back lol. Gore or Hyde would have slowed down a sec to allow Boone to take out one of the defenders, cut inside, and perhaps get the Touchdown.

Originally posted by Native49erFan:
As I watched the replay, this is where you can tell Kaep isn't a running back lol. Gore or Hyde would have slowed down a sec to allow Boone to take out one of the defenders, cut inside, and perhaps get the Touchdown.

I'm not sure. By the time Boone was at the 15, there were already 4 defenders in pursuit. I would rather Kap never cut back into the grain unless it is a playoff game.