Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots January 16, 2018 - Tape Tuesday

Episode Date: January 16, 2018

Mark Schofield dives into the tape and has some nuggets from his re-watch of both AFC Divisional Round games. Plus, some nerdy football stuff as we break out the Cover 3 beaters in anticipation for Sunday.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Good morning and welcome on into Locked On Patriots for Tuesday, January 16th, 2018. Mark Schofield here with you in the big chair. Happy that you're tuning in to one of those clown shows, shall we say. That being a reference to Boston Globe scribe Dan Shaughnessy, who, well, he just wrote a piece that came out yesterday basically saying that Jaguars shouldn't even bother to show up. There's no way the Jaguars win this game, and he's not going to listen to any clown shows that even try to take this game seriously. Well, as the host of one such clown show, I'm here to take this game seriously. Because what we're going to do today, we're going to do some Tape Tuesday stuff. Some notes from reviewing the game between the Patriots and the Titans, as well as the Jaguars and the Steelers.

Going to get into some nerdy football stuff. Then close it out with some even nerdier football stuff. Jacksonville Jaguars, they have two great cornerbacks, A.J. Bouye, Jalen Ramsey, but they still do a lot of cover three stuff. They played a lot more of it last year before they signed Bouye. Still playing it at a pretty high rate, about 42%, at least last time the numbers were run.

So we're going to talk about some cover three beaters. As a reminder, you can follow me on Twitter, at Mark Schofield. Follow my work over at InsideThePylon.com as well as the Inside the Pylon YouTube channel. Videos up recently on some of the draft quarterbacks. More stuff rolling out. Also, follow LockedOnPatriots.com.

Got a couple pieces up now. Some more stuff going to be rolling out to get you ready for the AFC Championship game. Also, looking ahead. Win or lose, there will be shows all week long next week. Hopefully, it's after our Patriots victory and we start looking forward to a Super Bowl. But regardless, I will be down in Mobile, Alabama most of next week for the Senior Bowl. We will start draft coverage. Whether the Patriots have a bye week headed into a Super Bowl

or whether they're starting their own off-season program, I will be down in Mobile. So follow me on Twitter. I will have updates from Ladd People's Stadium throughout the practices. I will also be doing some podcasting, some shows, some articles up on LockedOnPatriots.com. Starting to look forward to the draft either way.

But let's hope for a Patriots win on Saturday. And to doots.com. Starting to look forward to the draft either way. But let's hope for a Patriots win on Saturday. And to do that, let's start with a look back. I went back and threw the All-22 tape from Saturday night's game against the Tennessee Titans and I got a couple of things that I want to touch on here. First, route

concepts. I loved their first, New England's first conversion on a third and won that throw to Rob Gronkowski. A great route concept that came together was an empty formation. They used three receivers to the right. Gronkowski's the inside receiver, runs just a simple out route. The two outside receivers, Danny Anamadola and Chris Hogan, they run sort of slant post routes.

That's a nice little man beating concept. You get sort of a rub action with Gronkowski working to the outside. Those two post slash slant routes create some traffic. And then on the backside, they had James White split out wide. He comes in motion into a stack with Brandon Cooks. And then White runs a quick little out pattern, which again creates traffic, allows Cooks to release over the middle on a shallow drag concept. Nice little route concept there.

The third and six on New England's open and drive where Brady was pressured, made a quick errant throw that fell incomplete and the Patriots were forced to punt. Brian Arakpo off the edge, a speed rush move on the Adrian Waddell, and he beats Waddell. You wonder if Waddell, who left the game,

was still sort of dealing with lower body injuries there. Something to watch as we look ahead to Sunday. Tennessee's open drive, second and seven. Mariota to Corey Davis for plus 11. This was a cover three look. Malcolm Butler gets beat on the play. He's that outside defensive back in a cover three look, has to respect sort of a deeper route, gets beat there.

What we also saw there was Patrick Chun down in the box as a linebacker. Expect to see a lot of that kind of look Sunday against the Jaguars with New England obviously looking to slow down Leonard Fournette in that run game. The Patriots sack on Tennessee's open and drive on that third and seven play. You get Deron Harmon, Patrick Cheung in a bracket on Delaney Walker. Everybody else is kind of covered. Matthews is open over the middle, but Mariota doesn't see it. I don't anticipate the Patriots using a lot of bracket coverage this Sunday. I don't think that there's...

First of all, I don't think Boros really has a go-to guy in the pass game. And secondly, I don't think that the Patriots want to sort of use bracket coverage even in those long situations because you're still worried about two things. The run game and Bortles with his legs, as we're going to get to when we talk about that Steelers-Jaguars game.

Stephon Gilmore, very very strong game. He had a great pass breakup on Corey Davis on New England's second drive. And I want to recommend James A. Light on Twitter. Some of you may already follow him. Over the past couple of days, he's been posting out videos from Matt Patricia's coaching clinic talk at Notre Dame recently. And he put out one clip of breaking down how the Patriots teach their defensive backs to play sort of in phase technique, which is when you're sort of behind the defender, you're

not right up on him. A lot of coaches tell the defensive backs in those situations to attack down into the pocket. What that means, you sort of rake the arm down as you try to break up the pass. Patriots teach the defensive backs to go up, to attack upward, because sometimes if you go down, you're a step late, and it allows the receiver to make the reception. By attacking up through the ball, up through the pocket,

you're more likely to impact the receiver at the catch point. And on this play, Gilmore does a great job of that. A second and 10 run by Marcus Mariota where they have him keep it. It's a designed read option type play and Mariota keeps it. Two things sort of stood out there.

It was good design. Trey Flowers gets sort of caught there scraping down towards the fake handoff to Derek Henry. Kyle Vannoy is slow on this one play. Vannoy had a very good game otherwise, but he's slow with his eyes here. He's not quick enough to sort of scrape to the edge. He allows himself to get swallowed up by the block

and allows the offensive lineman to get to him. He needs to be quicker with his eyes and his feet there. Get down to that edge so to either keep contain or at least force mariota to bounce it around a little bit to where help can arrive because look jacksonville as we're going to talk about they will design some plays for bortles to make pickup yardage with his legs they will show some designed runs on sunday they did it against the steelers so the Patriots need to be ready for that. Second quarter, a first and ten play at the 1146 mark. Quick smoke route to Brandon Cooks.

That's that play where the receiver simply just stands there and the receiver throws on the ball. Look for that to be part of the game plan also on Sunday against the Steelers Jacksonville as I talked about earlier as we'll talk about in a bit ran a lot of cover three looks but there were times when they had one of the corners usually over Antonio Brown in press coverage other guy other guys were shown off coverage looks if you get off coverage, take advantage of that. Throw a smoke route.

It's a way to get outside guys, Hogan, Cooks, involved in the game against those two cornerbacks. So that's something to look for. I expect the Patriots to incorporate that into their game plan. In this sort of quick look show that I did yesterday, I talked about how you cannot run east-west against this team. If you're going to do it, you need to be decisive in the backfield as a running back, and you need to sort of pave the road a little bit off tackle in that area as an offensive line.

A great example of that, an outside zone play to the left on a 2nd-and- two at the 10-36 mark of the second quarter. Joe Thurney, David Andrews execute a fantastic exchange on the defensive tackle. Then Andrews takes over. Thurney gets to the second level, takes on the linebacker. Deion Lewis carrying the football, sees that. Once it starts to develop, there's no hesitation, cuts and gets upfield for a gain of nine yards. That's how you can run sort of outside or to the edges on these guys. You cannot really stretch it out.

You can't hesitate. You can't slow develop it. It has to be executed up front. Running back has to make up his mind quickly, cut, and go. You can't slow develop those types of plays against Jacksonville's front. We'll talk about cover three beaters at the end of the show. Perfect one, a second and five at the Tennessee 33-yard line, the 3-0-7 mark of the second quarter.

Patriots run a fake bubble screen and then dual seam routes, vertical routes, Gronkowski sort of from the slot receiver on the outside that's a great way to attack either cover three particularly up the seams or even man coverage in that situation because you draw the attention of defenders eyes with that fake bubble screen look allow the receivers sort of get a step or two behind them as those defenders are looking for the screen to develop. That should be a part of New England's game plan. Show Jacksonville those bubbles.

Throw behind them. Getting into the last couple of things I want to mention here. The back-to-back sacks of Mariota in the third quarter. That's what we're going to want to end it there. I know we talked a little bit about one, the first one, with that twist between Flowers, Trey Flowers, and Ricky Jean-Francois, where Taylor Luan and Quinton Spain get up pointing at each other. Whenever you see offensive linemen get up and start pointing at each other

after a play, you know that there was an issue with the communication and the exchange there, and that was exactly what happened. But on the next play, the next play is a great sort of do-your-job moment, you know, a mantra of the Patriots for years now. And they have Trey Flowers, the Patriots do, lined in the gap between the lawn and Spain. And also, play Collin as a defensive coordinator. I thought this was brilliant from Matt Patricia because you just got a sack against these guys off of a twist. Attack them again. They're still sort of overthinking things at this point.

They don't want to give up another sack. Attack them again, and that's exactly what Patricia did here because you put Trey Flowers in the big gap between Luan and Spain. He does a great sort of do-your-job play where he attacks straight ahead first to occupy both those guys. On the outside, Marquis Flowers shows a delayed blitz, takes two steps back off the line of scrimmage like he's going to drop into coverage. He sees Luan engage Flowers. Then he attacks to the upfield outside shoulder of Luan. Luan is slow to disengage because, again,

they just got beat on a miscommunication issue. You don't want to see it happen again. So he's helping his guy next to him. He's slow to come off of that. By the time he peels off, Marquise Flowers is already behind him and into the backfield for the sack. I thought it was a great sort of do-your-job execution type moment, but I love Patricia with the play call right there.

You just beat these guys. Just go after them again. You know they're in their heads at this moment. You know they're overthinking things. Attack them again, and that's exactly what they did. I think that's a great way to sort of end this film review of that Saturday evening game, some of the nuggets that I pulled from the tape.

Up next, we're going to look at that Jacksonville-Pittsburgh game, pull out some film nuggets from there to help you get you ready for the AFC Championship game. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield, in Locked on Patriots. Now let's take a look at Jacksonville against Pittsburgh, some of the film nuggets I pulled out of my rewatch of this game. And at the outset, Jacksonville does do a lot to sort of protect Bortles in the passing

game we saw that early on this drive on this their opening drive of this game and not that there's anything wrong with that look the Patriots do stuff in the passing game as well to sort of help Brady to give him some you know defined pre-snap throws or at least an idea of where he should go pre-snap should everything unfold the way he expects it to. On their open and drive, there was a second and five play, the second play of the game. Jacksonville aligns with 13 offensive personnel. That's a three tight end package

with just one wide receiver in the game. That's a run heavy type look. And then they use play action boot concept. They bring the backside tight end Benkoyak underneath on a sort of underneath, under route, down the line of scrimmage. It's an easy throw for Bortles.

Coming out of that run heavy look, Steelers expect and run so they're not ready for it. Next play, first and 10, Yankee concept. something that the Patriots use max protection just two receivers a deep post route sort of a dig route underneath that very safe type of design with max protection there you're not going to get pressure on the quarterback especially on first and ten when the

defense is thinking run perfect time to call that as well. So they will do stuff to help Bortles in the pass game. Final play action play on that open and drive, a mirrored passing concept. Post route, flat route from both sides of the field. It's simple. It's a high school, college type play, but it helps the quarterback. So he knows if you get cover two, you do this, you get cover one, you do this, which side of the field you're going to open up to. This is something that Sean McVay did with Kirk Cousins when he was still in Washington. On this play, James O'Shaughnessy, their third tight end, chips and releases late to the flat. That's where Bortles goes with the throw. So they'll do some things with Bortles to protect

them in the passing game. So the Patriots need to be ready for those designs they also need to have some stuff that you know if you see these sort of merit concepts you have late rotation in the secondary you show cover two pre-snap you rotate it to cover one cover three something different to at least slow down his decision making process make, make him read and react to that. Don't just show him one look and stay in it because that will just make things easier for him in an offense designed to make it easy for the quarterback. Talked about cover three and why it's important. We'll get to some cover three beaters in a second,

but why it's important is this. I mentioned the 42% number. Jacksonville's first three defensive snaps, cover three, cover three, cover three. Now, they will do some other stuff. They will do some cover one. They will do some man. They were a cover three heavy team last year, around 60%.

Dipped down a little bit. Now that they have A.J. Boye, they can do more man coverage looks, but still, cover three is sort of their base coverage. You've got to have your cover three beaters in the game plan. But those first three offensive plays, all cover three looks. There were times when they had somebody, whether it was Ramsey or Bouye, depending on where Antonio Brown lines up, impress, but it's still the same coverage, still the same read.

Fournette's second touchdown run. Bud Dupree just gets bullied, and I mean bullied, on the edge by Julius Thomas. Can't lose one-on-one matchups like that. You just can't do it. If it's Trey Flowers, if it's Vandal, whoever's on the edge there, you can't get bullied like that. You've got to sort of stand your ground, set the edge.

Don't lose those one-on-one matchups because it just gives them easier run lanes. So that's something to watch. Le'Veon Bell, 20-yard run at the 526 mark of the first quarter. This is what I've been talking about. Got to get upfield fast against this defense. Straight inside zone play. Bell, no hesitation in the backfield, gets north and south right after taking the handoff.

That's how you run the ball against these guys. Get north and south on the inside very quickly. You can do stuff like that in the run game against them. Second and nine play, Steelers have the football for 10 mark of the first quarter. This is something to watch. Steelers go wide iso with Vance McDonald alone on the right. It's Barry Church who travels with him. Twins look to receivers to the left.

Both Bouye and Ramsey are in off coverage. So here we get into some of the stuff we've been talking about. You see off coverage, smoke routes. Take advantage of that. It's a way to get your playmakers like Brandon Cooks, the football in space against those corners. Make them miss. We saw the smoke route against Adoree Jackson on Saturday night. Look for smoke routes to be an adjustment that Brady can make up the line of scrimmage on Sunday against Jacksonville. When you see this Y isolation look and they use Church on

the tight end, I think Gronkowski against Church is a matchup the Patriots can take advantage of. So I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of Y isolates early, see what Jacksonville wants to do in those situations, and try to take advantage of that matchup, Gronkowski versus Berry Church. Third and fives, I've talked about these before. Stick concepts, that's what the Jacksonville Jaguars like to do. Third and four, third and five. Again, helping your quarterback out,

giving him sort of an easy read progression system. Throw the stick. You know where you're supposed to go with the football. It's up to you and the inside receiver to make the right sort of read and conversion on it. Stick concept, your inside receiver, settle down and find space versus zone. If it's man coverage, run the out route. Run away from your defender. The rest of the receivers basically

clear out space for that route. It's a defined read. Easy sort of high school type play. Help your quarterback out. Designed runs for the quarterback. This will be something the Patriots need to be ready for. First play of the second quarter, designed run for Bortles. Jacksonville runs what looks to be a stretch zone type of play. Bortles takes the snap, puts it in Fournette's belly. Fournette coming right to left. All the offensive linemen flow to the left. Looks like outside zone.

But Bohannon, the fullback slash H-back, who's in a wing to the left, he comes across the formation like you sometimes see on zone runs with a fullback or tight end coming backside to block the backside defensive end. But he pulls around the end, and he simply leads Bortles to the edge. Pickup of 11, first down Jacksonville. Got to be ready for that. Quarterback power, quarterback runs. Along those lines, Bortles, if he sees space, if he sees grass, he will take it.

There was a first and 10 play at the 441 mark of the second quarter. Bortles doesn't even finish his drop into the pocket, but he sees a twist up front from the left side, open grass to the outside, doesn't even finish his drop. He immediately tucks and goes.

You cannot lose contain on him. If you have a twist where the defensive end cuts over the top of the defensive tackle to come inside, that defensive tackle has to get outside and up

the field immediately. Because Bortles will tuck and go. He does not care about the critics. He does not care about winning games from the pocket. He just wants to win. So he will just tuck it and go. He does not care about winning games from the pocket. He just wants to win. So he will just tuck it and go. He would rather pick up 11 yards, throw in the ball, than eight yards, I mean, excuse me, 11 yards running it and looking ugly than eight yards making a perfect throw.

And I don't blame him. but if you're the Patriots if you're Matt Patricia you have to instill in the guys now cannot lose contain cannot lose pocket integrity you have to keep him in the pocket because he will look to tuck and go 11-23 marker the second quarter

another cover three look from Jacksonville this is where we start to see that press look over Antonio Brown. It's still cover three, but they get press on him to try to jam him. I wonder if Brandon Cooks will see sort of the same treatment. And on Brown's first touchdown, it was the same thing. A cover three look, but with press man over Antonio Brown. I do wonder if Cooks gets the same treatment or if they just stay in sort of soft off coverage.

If they do, smoke routes. Lead zone from Le'Veon Bell for a 21-yard gain. Another cut-and-go decision by the running back. Again, that's what you have to do. Be patient. You cannot delay when you're running the football or trying to east-west. You've got to get north and south against these guys.

Another third and fourth throw for the Jaguars. Stick concept. Steelers decide to blitz this time, and it forces a low throw and an incompletion. Bortles' numbers dropped, according to PFF's grading, when he faced pressure. So I anticipate the Patriots will do some stuff to pressure him, force him into quicker reads, speed up his process.

That's how you can get him into some mistakes. Touchdown throw to Le'Veon Bell. Expect James White to be a factor in the passing game, and here's why. Steelers go empty. Bell in the slot. Another cover three coverage scheme. Steelers run post-wheel. Outside receiver runs the post.

That occupies the cornerback. Wheel from the inside receiver, the running back. Linebacker has to stay on that. Telvin Smith, he can't stay with Bell on that. Roethlisberger with a perfect throw. Anticipate a lot of wheel routes from James White, whether out of the backfield or even in the slot. Try to get that matchup.

Draw the corner away from the sideline. Run White to the boundary on the wheel. Final play, final thing to note, as we'll set the stage for cover three beaters. Third quarter, 431 mark of the third quarter pittsburgh runs hoss concept outside receiver hitch inside receiver seam they do it to both sides of the field roethlisberger actually throws the sit route to the running back over the middle but both seam routes were open hoss concept going to be a factor on sunday so that's been a look at the All-22, the tape stuff from Steelers-Jags.

Up next, I'm going to run through a couple of cover beaters. I went back through and watched all of New England's offense against Cover 3 coverages this year. I got some things that they've done with success against that coverage scheme. So here's some plays I anticipate to be in Josh McDaniel's call sheet on Sunday. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots. Okay, let's close this show out with some cover three beaters. And we covered a few of these in the buildup to the Pittsburgh game.

There's a piece on LockedOnPatriots.com about attacking up the seams. And that's where we can start. Against Carolina all the way back in week four, 533 of the second quarter, Gronk up the seam. Same game, 1201 mark of the fourth quarter. That fake screen play that we talked about that the Patriots ran against the Titans, and then you get guys up the seams as well, this time Gronkowski. You've got to attack cover three up the seam because take a step back here.

Remember what cover three is. Three deep defenders. Every coverage has weak spots. For example, cover two with two high safeties, the middle between those guys, as well as sort of the outside on the boundary. You know, Gruden's famous turkey hole. Those are weak spots for cover two. With cover three, one of the weak spots is bracketing that middle of the field safety,

up the seams, up the hashes. That's an area to attack. Defenses will need underneath guys to sort of carry seam routes, but you're talking linebackers against Gronkowski or nickel corners or even safeties against a guy like Danny Amendola up the seam. And so seam routes will be a big part of this game. I anticipate Haas concept like we talked about to be a part of this because that's a perfect play call against cover three because if you think about it seam route from the inside which attacks that soft area and then on the outside you get a hitch comeback type route against a outside boundary

player that has no safety help over the top so he needs to respect that vertical route. Both of those routes should be open against cover three. So I expect Haas' concept to be a big part of the game plan for the New England Patriots. Another thing that the Patriots have done this year is mold in slot fade and the smash concept and sort of a slot smash type concept. And it's somewhat similar to Haas where you you see a hitch route on the outside and it's a vertical route from the inside

but this time that vertical route from the slot sort of fades towards the boundary and what it sets up is a high low over that outside defender that corner easily has to read the play, be aware, and get under that vertical route from the slot receiver, that vertical fade route. And if he does, then the hitch route on the outside is open. But if he's slow to recognize that and stays on that hitch, then you have the chance for that throw on the boundary to sort of that slot fade. They did this against Carolina, 921 marker the fourth quarter. They did it against the Steelers as well, third quarter, 1354 mark. Both of those routes were open. Brady actually checked it down on that play, but both of those routes were open.

A similar design is go flat. That's where you have inside receiver running a quick out, outside receiver going vertically. That vertical route from the outside receiver, cornerback has to carry that, which gets you that slot receiver matched up against that flat defender, usually a linebacker or a safety. Great way to sort of attack that vacated space by the corner,

creates a one-on-one matchup, usually a slot-type guy, against a safety or linebacker. That's a route concept the Patriots can use and exploit. Cover three looks. They ran that against Carolina. 648 mark of the fourth quarter in that game back in week four. The first big play they hit against the Steelers a cover three route from Brandon Cooks

he starts on a post breaks late to the boundary what was great about the route that Cooks ran there is against cover three that corner thinks that he gets post route he's going to be able to pass it off to the middle of the field safety so he'll carry it for a bit anticipates that it's going to be post you run something else into the intermediate boundary area that corner anticipates

he has to get off the post route and get to that other route. So when he comes off what looks to be a post and breaks to that shorter route, then Cooks breaks back on the outside on that corner that's now been vacated. And from the free safety's perspective, he's going to see that develop, thinks he has a post coming his way, but then once Cooks breaks back away from him towards towards the boundary he thinks that's not my responsibility anymore beautiful route well designed well called

at that time they did it off of play action to look for cooks to run at least one of those designs at this cover three coverage we're going to see from the jaguars spacing concepts pretty simple you match you know receivers to soft areas in the under underneath coverage quick curls maybe even stick things like that where you try to find space underneath if you're worried about what those outside corners are able to do run them off try to find some grass underneath, whether it's Gronkowski, whether it's Amendola, whether it's the running back. They did that against Carolina, the 5.06 mark of the fourth quarter.

They also did it, and I love this design, look for this one, against the Jets, quarter two in week 17 at the 2.01 mark. Spacing concept to one-sided on the backside a post concept post route with a wheel from the inside receiver we just got done talking about that route combination against jacksonville if they're in cover three outside corner has to stay with that wheel for that post for a little bit he'll be late to come off towards the wheel and what happens is get that nice matchup with a slot receiver against a safety or linebacker on the wheel route expect j is get that nice matchup with a slot receiver against a safety or linebacker on the wheel route.

Expect James White to be running a ton of those. Final concept brings us back to sort of where we started here at Locked on Patriots, the Yankee concept. Yankee, deep post, dig route underneath it.

Great way to attack that safety in the middle of the field, you high-low hem, particularly off max protection. Look, use their own medicine against them. Started this show talking about, or at least the Jaguars segment, talking about Yankee concept, max protection scheme, give Bortles time to throw in a defined read progression. Patriots have used Yankee this year. It's sort of the in play right now. They'll use it Sunday to try to attack the middle of the field,

whether it's usually Gibson back there is that deep free safety. Expect to see it on first and 10, maybe second and short type situations where you can show run, sell out, the run look, and get a deep shot maybe down the middle against this defense. So that's some nerdy football stuff for you on this taped Tuesday edition of Locked on Patriots. Got a full week for you. Tomorrow will be a crossover show with the guys from Locked on Jaguars.

We'll be talking to Mike Kay from First Coast News as well who covers the Jaguars down there. That will all lead us into your game day edition of Locked on Patriots. It's going to be a fun week. We're going to have everything we can do for you here to get you ready for Sunday. Until next time, keep it locked right here

to me, Mark Scofield, and Locked on Patriots. Thank you.