Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots January 18, 2018 - Stopping the Jacksonville Run Game

Episode Date: January 18, 2018

Mark Schofield breaks down the three critical questions surrounding whether the Patriots can stop the Jaguars' rushing attack.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Friends, we are just now days away from the AFC Championship game between the New England Patriots and the Jacksonville Jaguars. Mark Schofield here for Locked On Patriots, Thursday, January 18th, 2018. Going to do some nerdy football stuff today. Going to talk about the Jacksonville run game, how teams have stopped them so far this year, and the three pivotal questions, which will decide whether the Patriots can stop them on Sunday. As a reminder, you can always follow me on Twitter,

at Mark Schofield. Follow the work over at InsideThePylon.com. InsideThePylon.com, the YouTube page over there, doing draft quarterback videos all the time. Also, we've got a piece coming out in the next couple of days talking about Baker Mayfield and what I do in that piece. I revisit something I wrote back in December of 2016. That piece was titled Baker Mayfield and the Conundrum of Comfort and Chaos.

An interesting title, but what I dive into in that piece from December of 2016 was this. The notion that Baker Mayfield is a quarterback who, at his core, thrives chaos, almost seeks it out. There were times, looking back at his film from last year and the year before that, that he would forego easy options in the passing game, almost make things harder on himself. So one of the things I was curious about watching him in 2017 was, would he grow past that? Or would he be a quarterback? Is he still a quarterback who seeks chaos out?

I'll have my sort of answer on that when that piece goes up. Also, if you want to revisit quarterback rankings for the Bleacher Report NFL 1000 project you can check those out as well probably no surprise Tom Brady my QB won this year but let's dive in first to this Jacksonville run game and where I want to start are some simple numbers should be no surprise this is one of the top run games in the National Football League. In terms of yardage gained per game, they're number one. Jacksonville averaged a very impressive 141.3 yards per game on the ground.

So you have to stop it not just because it's a good run game, but you have to stop it because the Jaguars use the run game to set up everything else that they do as an offense. It takes pressure off Blake Bortles. The run game sort of sets up their play-action passing game. And by running the football, what do they do? They keep themselves ahead of the chains. They keep themselves on schedule. They keep the playbook open.

Again, they take pressure off of Bortles, and they keep Tom Brady on the sideline. So what I did was I went back and looked at some of Jacksonville's least productive games as a run offense. I also looked at some of Leonard Fournette's least productive games as a runner. Fournette, their rookie running back, has an impressive season under his belt. Eighth in the league in Russian with 1,040 yards to his name in the regular season and nine touchdowns. But two of his least productive games came against the Arizona Cardinals in week nine and the Colts in week 10. Against the Cardinals, Fournette ran the football 12 times for just 25 yards, averaging just 2.08 yards per attempt. The next week against the Colts, 20 carries, 57 yards and a touchdown, and just an

average of 2.85 yards per rushing attempt. So I studied those games as well as some others, and I came away with sort of three questions that I think these teams need to answer on Sunday and how those questions get answered will determine whether the Patriots can stop this Jacksonville run game. First question, will Bortles audible? And maybe a subsection to that is can Bortles audible? Question two, will Bortles be an active participant in the run game? Question three, can New England win one-on-one battles up front? Those are the three questions I'm going to dive into. And for more on this, if you want to see some of the plays I'm about to talk about, some

of the things I talk about, there's a piece up on LockedOnPatriots.com where I dive into all of this as well. But first, the issue of whether Bortles can audible whether he will audible on Sunday and the issue is this one of the easiest ways to stop the run is to stack the box if as a defense you can get in sort of a plus situation from a numbers perspective if you've got more defenders in the blocks and they have blockers ready to block, you should be able to stop the play before it gets going. And a prime sort of example is a play against the Arizona Cardinals back in Week 9.

It's a first and 10. Jacksonville's down by three. They're on their own four-yard line. Bortles lines up under center. They have 22 offensive personnel on the field. So you have two tight ends, two running backs. Fournette's the deep back in an eye. And so Jacksonville,

since you know that Bortles is not going to run on this play, and Fournette does, they have eight guys who can block. You have the five linemen, both tight ends, and the fullback. That's eight potential blockers. Arizona has their base 3-4 defense. They put nine guys in the box. That's a plus one situation for the defense. They've got nine defenders in the box they've got a numbers advantage and they don't do it late in the play they line up

they make no bones about it they show Bortles pre-snap we've got nine guys in the box what are you going to do? and Bortles stays with the play they try an inside zone run and play and the eight guys who can block execute their blocks perfectly Bortles stays with the play. They try an inside zone run and play. And the eight guys who can block execute their blocks perfectly.

Backside left tackle gets a good block on the edge. Bohannon leads to the left side. He takes on the safety. All the other guys sort of flow kind of to the right. You get guys making one-on-one blocks, but they just don't have enough guys to go around. And so one defender is left unblocked, and that's linebacker Josh Bynes. And he executes a great run fit, gets himself right into the hole,

and he makes Fournette attempt a cut in the backfield to try to find another hole. But he just runs out of time. Bynes gets him wrapped up in the backfield. Fournette can't escape. So that's a situation where the quarterback sees pre-snap. He's at a numbers disadvantage. He doesn't change the play. And the result is a loss of yardage for the offense. Now, you might expect Bortles to call an audible in that situation.

One of the reasons I think he might not do it is because they're backed up. It's early in the game. Maybe you stay with it. Maybe Fournette can make a guy miss. You don't want an audible to a pass play and throw an interception in that situation. But there are other examples. You look to Jacksonville's game against the Colts. Midway through the second

quarter, Jacksonville has a 10-3 lead. They face a first and 10 on their own 23-yard line. Bortles is under center. They've got 12 offensive personnel in the game. They use a tight two-by-two alignment with a tight end and a receiver to each side. The Colts put eight defenders in the box, including safety T.J. Green, who puts himself basically right on the line of scrimmage to the inside of the wide receiver, D.D. Westbrook. Now, technically, Jacksonville has a numbers advantage here, given the tightness of the formation. The wide receivers are close enough to the football they can be counted as blockers. But the issue here is not just the numbers, it's the alignment of that safety. T.J. Green pre-snap.

Jacksonville tries sort of a split zone run and play. Ben Koyak, who's the tight end, who's aligned sort of inside of Green, he's going to go away from Green and block to the other side of the formation. That means that Westbrook, the wide receiver, he's sort of responsible for blocking green. Because there are other defenders inside of the safety who need to be blocked by the offensive lineman who will be flowing that way. The only player who can make a block on green is Westbrook. But it's a tough ask to ask that wide receiver from that alignment to make the block. Now given the alignment, given the pre-snap leverage that the safety has,

you might expect Bortles to get out of this play. To say, look, we can't run this. It's going to be impossible to block Green. He's going to be in the backfield before this play gets going. We've got to call something else. But what does Bortles do? He stays with the play. And what do you think happens?

Green gets right into the backfield and chops down Leonard Frenette before the play gets going for a loss of yardage. So that's kind of my critical question one. When Bortles faces these types of situations, because there will be times when you can guarantee it, there will be times that the Patriots will stack the box pre-snap and basically tell Blake Bortles, we're selling out to stop the run.

If you've got a run play called, you might want to get out of it. But will he? Now there are probably times through the tape that you don't see it, and he does get out of these plays. But given that there are other times when there's a clear numbers advantage for the defense pre-snap and Bortles sticks with the play. Patriots should be able to find some situations during this game where they show that numbers advantage, they show their hand pre-snap, and if things play out the way they have, Bortles will stick with what's called and the Patriots should have a chance to stop run plays

before they get going. And there's one last caveat to this and that's teams have been also able to rotate down into the box a defender late in the play and Bortles misses it the Cardinals did that Buda Baker their rookie free safety in one play rotated down into the box late in the play and Bortles didn't see it or maybe it was too late in the play clock where he couldn't change the play. He's unblocked, stops a run play from getting going. Again, will he audible? Can he audible? That's question one. And how that sort of gets determined, how that shakes out on Sunday, is the first thing I think that will determine whether the Patriots can ultimately stop this running game. Ahead, we're going to talk about the other two questions.

But first, I want to remind my friends here of the Locked On Patriots podcast network about the great opportunity over at mybookie.ag. And listen, we're down into crunch time. Conference championship weekend. You've been listening to Locked On Patriots. You've been listening to my friends, Zach and Chris, over at Locked On Jaguars. You've been listening to my friends, Michael and Benjamin, over at Locked on Jaguar. You've been listening to my friends, Michael and Benjamin over at Locked on Eagles.

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talked a little bit this week about Bortles and how you sort of have to treat him much like you did Mariota. There are plays, if you look back at that Steelers game, where he just gives up. He just gives up on passing plays because he sees grass and he runs. Doesn't even finish his drops at times. You remember the old memes about Rex Grossman, forget it. I've censored that, of course, but that little logo, forget it, I'm going deep. Bortles has basically become the anti-grossman over the last couple of weeks of the season into the playoffs.

He's just going to bail in the pocket and run. Forget throwing it, I'm just going to run. If he sees grass, he will run. But that's sort of in the pass game. Will he be an active participant in the running game? Because I've said it earlier this week, Jacksonville likes to design some easy read plays for him in the run game because one of the easiest ways to sort of neutralize a numbers disadvantage as an offense, flip the script a bit.

When the quarterback's carrying the football, that changes the numbers a bit. And there are some great examples of this from their game against Indianapolis, from their game against Arizona, where they might be at a numbers disadvantage, but when they use Bortles as a runner, that changes things.

There was a great sort of quarterback power play they ran against the Colts, where it looks like split zone. Bortles is in the shotgun, running backs to his right. All the linemen flow to their left. Bortles meets the running back at the mesh point, and it looks like he's running to the left. But where it's split zone, you have Ben Koyak, their tight end.

He's aligned and winged to the left, and he cuts across the formation to the right. It looks like just your split zone run and play. But what happens is Koyak isn't just blocking to the backside, he's a lead blocker because Bortles pulls it and just follows the tight end. They run it on a first and ten play, it's an easy gain of seven yards. Now you're into second and three. You flip the script on the defense a bit. And what you've done is you've now kept the playbook wide open. You can run anything you want on second and three. Excuse me, I was doing that from memory. That play came against Arizona. Shows me I shouldn't be trying this from memory anymore.

I'm a man. I'm 41. Another example of that is also a play against Arizona. This time, Jacksonville puts three receivers to the right, tight end on the left, Bortles on the shotgun, running back standing to his left. And this is more your zone read type play. They leave the defender across from that tight end unblocked. The tight end, Julius Thomas, goes straight to the second level.

They leave that defender unblocked. Bortles meets the running back at the match point and decides what to do based on what that defender does. Given that this is the NFL, given that you're worried about stopping the run game and the running back, that defender slides down the line of scrimmage expecting the handoff. Bortles keeps it. And that little run action, what it's done,

you've essentially blocked that defender. Again, you've flipped the script a bit. And now Bortles has a lead blocker. Thomas gets to the second level, blocks that linebacker. Since you've run it away from trips, there's nobody else out there. It's a 28-yard gain for the running back. And so that's why that's question two for me. Will Bortles be an active participant in the run game? Because if he is, that sort of changes the calculus with question one. Because now, even if you have those numbers advantages pre-snap,

they can be neutralized by Bortles being an active participant in the run game. And so the issue there becomes if he is will the Patriots make the necessary adjustments or will they have fail safes in place for those plays you know for example this sort of zone read type play maybe the end guys on the line of scrimmage they don't slide down on those their job will be stay at home make them hand it off do your job and trust that the other guys do theirs and stop the handoff stop the run from the running back stay at home respect the fact that portals can do some things with his legs do your job and if

he hands it off and all you do is stand there and look silly on tape fine you've done your job trust everybody else to do theirs so that's question two will Bortles be an active participant and if so with the Patriots do the things necessary to take that part of the game away from him? Finally, we're going to talk about winning some one-on-one matchups. When I talked to our friends over at Locked On Jaguars, they talked about the interior of this Jacksonville offensive line. They talked about A.J.

Kant and how there were times where he let them down this year. I think if the Patriots win those one-on-one battles, they can also stop this run game. That's ahead with me, Mark Schofield, in Locked on Patriots. My friends, let's close out this show by porking out on the final question, which is this. Can the Patriots win those one-on-one matchups? And a lot of what the Jaguars like to do, they run a varied sort of offensive run game. They'll do stuff in the power game.

They'll do stuff in the zone game. They'll do counter things. But all of those can be sort of set off course with quick interior pressure up front. It's been a theme of a lot of these shows, both when the Patriots have the football and other teams have the football. Can the defensive tackles get that quick push up front to sort of set run plays off course, set the Jaguars plays off course? And if you look at some of the examples, some of which I've written about over at LockedOnPatriots.com, some of which I'll talk about here.

The ability of defenders to get inside, to get upfield quickly, to beat blockers to the spot has really sort of set Fournette in particular, as well as this Jaguars run game, set them off course. First example is a run play against the Cardinals. It's a second and 11. Once more, we're back to that split zone. The offensive linemen, they all flow to the left. Fournette's in the shotgun next to Bortles, who's in the gun.

He's standing at the right of the quarterback. He takes the handoff from Bortles and heads to the left side. Koyak, their tight end, comes across the formation, blocking from left to right. He's handling that backside defensive end. The matchup is A.J. Kan, the right guard, number 60. He just gets overwhelmed at the point of attack by defensive tackle Frosty Rucker. Rucker stands him up, wins at the point of attack, and stops this play before a minimal gain. It's quick initial contact, but what the defensive tackle does is

he sees this develop. So rather than just take him on and try to win, he instantly turns basically his backside towards the play and that gives him a leverage advantage he then fights off aj can the right guard and what it does is it forces fournet to sort of try to cut and bounce but he can't do that and he can't get past rucker so by that defensive tackle winning at the point of attack, winning that one-on-one matchup, he's able to stop that play. Another example against the Colts.

This is a simple outside stretch zone run and play. You have seven men across, seven-man face, five offensive linemen, tight end to each side everybody flows to the right the key block is can the right guard and right tackle Jeremy Parnell they need to get a double-team combo block on the defensive tackle who's aligned over the tackle once they get that guy contained one of them can scrape to the second level and take on the linebacker.

Well, on this play, what happens? They can't get that guy contained. That defensive tackle stands them both up. He sees the play flow into them, and what does he do? He sort of gets down. Almost gives himself up, but by doing that, he occupies both of them.

And the end result is that everybody else can flow to the play and make a tackle. By creating that traffic, creating that chaos, clogging that run lane, Fournette starts to run that way. He sees traffic. What does he try to do? He makes his bend read. Every sort of outside zone run and play, the running back has three potential

reads. He can make his bounce read where he tries to bounce it towards the outside more, towards the sideline. He can make what's called the bang read, which is you see the hole develop where your aim point is, usually the B gap between the guard and the tackle. And you just aim right for that and go.

And then there's a third one, which is your bend read, where you bend it, you cut it back to the backside. And on this play, because of all the traffic that's created, simply by that one defensive tackle, standing those two offensive linemen up, and then clogging that hole. Fournette tries to bend it back to the backside. Then the pursuit comes. They stop Fournette in the backfield, and they hold it to a loss.

So by winning those matchups, those one-on-one situations, they can stop run plays before they get going. Another example of this, there's a play against the Colts where the left guard on this play, who's not playing in this game, he was a backup, but the left guard gets overwhelmed on another outside zone run of play to his side of the formation. He gets overpowered at the point of attack. Again, like we just talked in the previous play

Fournette has to make a cut in the backfield because of that delay the cut in the backfield help arrives it's held to a minimal gain and on that play it gets us back to where we began which is this

Colts had a numbers advantage in the box priest now Bortles didn't get him out of it Stayed with the play they were running You have a loss at the point of attack by that guard Numbers advantage as well for the defense The extra defender is able to flow to the football After Fournette tries that cut in the backfield, and he makes the tackle.

So now we've come full circle. The three questions. Will Bortles audible? Will he be an active participant in the run game? And can the Patriots win those one-on-one battles? Those are the three critical questions. How those questions get answered will tell the tale, the ultimate tale, which is this.

Can the Patriots stop the run? If Bortles sticks with these plays when the Patriots have a numbers advantage, advantage Patriots. If the Patriots can sort of take away Bortles and his ability to be an active participant in the run game, advantage Patriots.

And if the Patriots can win those one-on-one matchups, particularly in the interior, advantage Patriots. That means they can stop the run, and then you can really say, in terms of the game as a whole, advantage Patriots. That's been your Thursday edition of Locked On Patriots. Tomorrow, your game day edition. I'm going to do two things.

Usual standard game day fare. My expectations for Sunday. What I'm expecting to see. What I'm watching. Also, we're going to be talking with my friend Mike K. He is a Jaguars beat reporter for First Coast News. Down in Jacksonville. He's also the host of the Black and Teal Report.

Nightly show covering the Jacksonville Jaguars. He's a good guy. Got to know him last year down at Mobile for the Senior Bowl. We'll be talking to him about his expectations for Sunday. Until then, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Scofield, and Locked on Patriots.