For several years, people have been talking about Eli's mechanics and his inconsistent passing. When Eli first came into the league, his mechanics were in fact not good. Gilbride was his QB coach and he did not fix things. The current QB coach, Palmer has done a good job addressing the problem and Eli is now a very accurate thrower. In the past, people talked about him throwing off his back foot, but in fact, this was not the flaw in his throwing motion. Every QB throws off his back foot from time to time, you can't help it when you have a defender in your face. The problem with Eli's motion was with his shoulder positioning. He did several things incorrectly: (1) he turned his front shoulder to the left as he threw, twisting away from the target instead of striding right through his throw. (2) he would drop his front shoulder at the beginning of the throw, instead of raising it up and gradually dropping it only after he released the ball and his right shoulder came forward. Both of these flaws took the forward momentum of his body out of his throw and put all the stress for the power and pace of the throw onto his right shoulder. When the shoulder, the elbow and the wrist are straining to put pace on the ball, they can not guide the ball effectively and accuracy suffers. Furthermore, if the shoulder is dropping too early, the nose of the ball drops down and the ball comes up short. If you try to compensate by putting more arc on the ball, it sails on you. It seems to me that Eli has fallen into some of these bad habits on occasion in the last 3 games and it also is possible that it is related to his bad foot. If the QB can't put all his weight on that back plant foot and get his body moving forward, the momentum of his body can not propel the throw forward. It's not only the INT's that he's thrown in the last 3 games - some of the blame for those INTs can be shared with the WRs. There was a tipped ball that resulted in an INT; there was a good deep ball that Hixon did not make a play on in the Cardinals game and there was a pass that Beckum didn't make a good enough play on in the Eagles game. But, there are several throws that should have been easy TDs that Eli missed on. There was a pass to Steve Smith in the Saints game that Eli overthrew by about 1 yard where Smith was wide open for what should have been a 35 yard TD. There was another throw against the Eagles where Hakeem Nicks was running down the seam on a double move. Perhaps you remember, it was the 1st half and the S Mikkel cut over from his spot in the zone, got his hands on the ball and nearly made an INT. This throw was badly underthrown. Nicks was behind the CB and the S was even with him, also biting on the first move by Nicks. The ball could have been thrown 5-7 yards deeper, giving Nicks a chance to run under it for an easy TD.
The reason I am highlighting these two particular passes is that they have a common element. They were deep balls that did not have enough air under them; they were thrown too flat. The throw to Smith was long and to Nicks was short, but both were thrown with not enough arc for deep balls. In both cases, if the ball had been thrown a little higher, the WRs would have been able to run under them and catch a TD. As I described above, this could come from not getting his weight down on his plant foot, bending his knees and exploding into the throw. His weight is only half back, the throwing shoulder doesn't come down enough, the nose of the ball stays just a little down and you don't get enough elevation on the throw. We'll see.
The other factor could be the OL, which has been just a little off this year. They're not terrible, but they're definitely not affording Eli the time he had to throw in the past. They are better run blockers than they are pass blockers, but this year, it seems like both have declined just a little. It could be that the OL is slowing down just a bit or it could be that the entire league has caught up to the Giants play calls and their protection schemes. Either way, Eli has been under more pressure this year than in the past. If the Giants miss too many of these deep pass opportunities, the league will not respect the deep ball, will blitz more and be willing to gamble on keeping single coverage on the outside relying on the fact that the long balls will not hurt them. Eli has to hit on the long pass plays to make this work.
The offense is not as badly broken as the coaching is on the defensive side of the ball, where there are hosts of blown assignments, players are not lining up properly and they don't get the play call early enough to know what their assignments are on a particular play. This is stuff that can be rectified. I just don't have confidence in the DC to do it.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Giants: Team makeup
Years ago, the league was a weight and power league. If you lined up bigger and more powerful players than the other guys, especially in the DL and OL, you simply dominated the other team and carried the day. Running the ball was the primary, safest way to advance the ball and the passing game was secondary in importance. In the past several years, the rules have changed and the league has become a passing league. Speed became the byword, not only on the outside, at the skill positions, but even in the trenches. There certainly are some large and wide bodies combating each other at the line of scrimmage, but even there, athleticism and speed has become more important. Take a look at the Giants DEs: Tuck, Ueminyora, Kiwanuka, Tollefson and looking back a few years, Strahan, were all speed guys, not power rushers. Furthermore, the LBs have become somewhat marginalized in importance in the league. A better way to say it is that the LBs were once the center of the defense. They had to be stout against the run and be quick enough to take decent drops against the pass, but TEs were not deep threats and they did not have to cover as often on pass plays. Now, most teams have speedy, pass catching TEs; teams throw passes often off of quick 3-step drops which calls for more quickness and speed from the defense, especially the LBs; and offenses using 4 and even 5 WR personnel groupings require defenses to use 5 and 6 DBs often, calling for LBs to be off the field. Complex blitz packages also require speedy LBs who can get to the QB quickly. My point is that in the previous era, weight and power were the things, now speed is the main determinant for winning.
Giants definitely bought into the speed thing. As I said above, the DEs are all quick and athletic; last year's starting S, James Butler was switched out for Phillips largely because of speed; last year's starting LB, Blackburn was supposed to lose his starting job to speedy FA LB Boley; Canty was supposed to replace an aging and slowing Robbins at DT and Rocky Bernard was supposed to help in the middle as a speedy and stout DT. These key additions to the defense all of whom were supposed to add speed have all been out virtually the entire year. Regardless of that fact that the Giants defense has some good players, they are missing the speed upgrade they thought they were getting and needed from the roster changes. Add to this the fact that Clark and Pierce at LB seem to be a step slower and the Giants have been transformed into a defense that is both smallish AND slow, a definite recipe for disaster. Add to that the troubles of the first year DC and the predictability and transparency of the schemes; the "communications problems", the missed assignments and the poor tackling (all coaching problems, BTW) and you can see why the Giants defense has been so poor against quality offensive teams.
Giants went for small and quick as the makeup of their defense. With the 2 fastest guys in two key units on defense (LB Boley and S Phillips) missing and the absence of Canty requiring too many snaps for the slowing Robbins, the Giants went from being smallish and quick to smallish and slow. The new DC Sheridan seems to favor a simple 2-deep zone, which puts more pressure on fast guys in the DB-field to cover the center. It's not working.
Having brought all this gloom and doom, let me bring one positive glimmer to the table. I watched the Eagles game again and the big plays given up by the defense were more blown assignments than they were physical domination by the Eagles. On the pass to DeSean Jackson right before the half, C.C. Brown was out of position. Corey Webster made some hand motion right before the play, banging his fists together, no doubt changing the defense and requiring Brown to cover deep on the right side of the defense. Brown did not get the message because he was in the middle of the field, a few yards away from where the other S, Michael Johnson was, who was patrolling the left deep zone. The result of the blown coverage was that jackson was embarrassingly wide open.
On the TD run by the rookie McCoy, it looked to me like the Giants DL lined up wrong; they were unbalanced with 5 or 6 guys on the left side of the defense and 2 on the right side. That's exactly where McCoy ran and he was nearly untouched for the score.
My point is that coaching mistakes and communications problems are at least theoretically fixable. Having bad players is not fixable. Maybe the Giants can get their act together and play better. We still need to see something from our coaches, that give us confidence that this can happen, however.
Giants definitely bought into the speed thing. As I said above, the DEs are all quick and athletic; last year's starting S, James Butler was switched out for Phillips largely because of speed; last year's starting LB, Blackburn was supposed to lose his starting job to speedy FA LB Boley; Canty was supposed to replace an aging and slowing Robbins at DT and Rocky Bernard was supposed to help in the middle as a speedy and stout DT. These key additions to the defense all of whom were supposed to add speed have all been out virtually the entire year. Regardless of that fact that the Giants defense has some good players, they are missing the speed upgrade they thought they were getting and needed from the roster changes. Add to this the fact that Clark and Pierce at LB seem to be a step slower and the Giants have been transformed into a defense that is both smallish AND slow, a definite recipe for disaster. Add to that the troubles of the first year DC and the predictability and transparency of the schemes; the "communications problems", the missed assignments and the poor tackling (all coaching problems, BTW) and you can see why the Giants defense has been so poor against quality offensive teams.
Giants went for small and quick as the makeup of their defense. With the 2 fastest guys in two key units on defense (LB Boley and S Phillips) missing and the absence of Canty requiring too many snaps for the slowing Robbins, the Giants went from being smallish and quick to smallish and slow. The new DC Sheridan seems to favor a simple 2-deep zone, which puts more pressure on fast guys in the DB-field to cover the center. It's not working.
Having brought all this gloom and doom, let me bring one positive glimmer to the table. I watched the Eagles game again and the big plays given up by the defense were more blown assignments than they were physical domination by the Eagles. On the pass to DeSean Jackson right before the half, C.C. Brown was out of position. Corey Webster made some hand motion right before the play, banging his fists together, no doubt changing the defense and requiring Brown to cover deep on the right side of the defense. Brown did not get the message because he was in the middle of the field, a few yards away from where the other S, Michael Johnson was, who was patrolling the left deep zone. The result of the blown coverage was that jackson was embarrassingly wide open.
On the TD run by the rookie McCoy, it looked to me like the Giants DL lined up wrong; they were unbalanced with 5 or 6 guys on the left side of the defense and 2 on the right side. That's exactly where McCoy ran and he was nearly untouched for the score.
My point is that coaching mistakes and communications problems are at least theoretically fixable. Having bad players is not fixable. Maybe the Giants can get their act together and play better. We still need to see something from our coaches, that give us confidence that this can happen, however.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Giants: Eagles game review (ugh)
Giants are in a free fall now. They need to right the ship, but it's not clear that they can. When things are going well, the team has the confidence that it will make every play and find a way to win. When things are going badly and the swagger is knocked out of a team that thought it was good, they walk with their tail between their legs, their shoulders slumped and are just waiting to be beaten. One thing goes wrong, everyone gets tense and tight and then three more things go wrong. Case in point is what transpired at the end of the half in the Eagles game. Giants were down 13-0 in the blink of an eye, giving away a 40+ yard running play to a FB who had never had a run of more than 20 yards in the NFL and who had not scored a TD in about 4 years. Then Eli threw an INT in which he stared down the target, rookie Travis Beckum so that everyone in the stadium knew where he was going with the ball, including CB Assante Samuel. The rookie Beckum didn't help because he did not charge to the ball and try to make a play on it, he slowed down, cut off his route and allowed Samuel the easy INT. 13-0 before you knew it. Then, the Giants somehow stabilized the game. They actually put some pressure on McNabb, and even though the offense was not very good, the game was not a runaway. Finally, Eli moved the offense down the field and with less than two minutes left in the half, pushed the Giants into the end zone and the 16-7 deficit going into the second half looked at least manageable. Then, the roof caved in. McNabb hits a 57 yard TD to DeSean jackson who was so open that it looked like a preseason play. Eli threw another INT on a terrible pass, the Eagles ran two plays and were in the end zone again. 30-7. Train on runaway again. Giants closed the score to 16-7 and inside of 5 plays from scrimmage: 1 for the Eagles, 2 for the Giants and then 2 more for the Eagles, the Giants were trailing by 30-17. Rout on.
The dispiriting thing about the first TD pass to Jackson was that it was almost the same thing that happened 2 weeks ago against the Saints and last week against the Cardinals. Eagles through a simple formation were able to get exactly the match up they wanted, were able to pick on C.C. Brown in a deep zone and had a WR open, about 20 yards away from any defender. This is exactly what the Saints did and exactly what the Cardinals did. No exotic, trick plays - simple schemes to get the exact match ups they wanted. This is for several reasons: the Giants defensive schemes are predictable and transparent. The Giants don't shift in and out of formations, show one things and do another, except for an occasional blitz fake. The opposing team knows how to read the Giants coverage and is never fooled. On top of that, the Giants have a huge hole in the secondary at S and combine that with occasional missed assignments and the Giants have big trouble.
In addition, it sure looks like the Giants LBs are slow. Clark and Pierce have both lost a step and Blackburn never really had a step to lose. Robbins is slowing down at DT and the absence of Canty and Alford makes him take more snaps than he should to remain an effective player. Add to this the fact that Tuck's shoulder is hurting and therefore he is a less capable backup at DT and you can see some real decline in what was thought to be a powerful front 7. Every team has injuries, so this is not a good excuse. But when you have injuries at two positions that you knew needed strengthening (DT and LB) and you signed FAs there. it indicates you needed the help. And you have another injury at S, another position that you knew had lack of depth, you can see why the defense might be struggling. Giants may get Canty and Boley back this week and perhaps will get Ross back after the bye. Maybe they will play better then. The worrying thing is that there is still no help at S and the DC still sends his defense out on the field advertising clearly what defense the Giants will be playing.
On offense, Eli has played poorly the past few weeks, but as with the defense, the offense is so completely predictable. There are just too few plays where Giants are out running free, having fooled the defense. There are, conversely, too many plays where the defense masses to the ball knowing exactly what play is coming.
The dispiriting thing about the first TD pass to Jackson was that it was almost the same thing that happened 2 weeks ago against the Saints and last week against the Cardinals. Eagles through a simple formation were able to get exactly the match up they wanted, were able to pick on C.C. Brown in a deep zone and had a WR open, about 20 yards away from any defender. This is exactly what the Saints did and exactly what the Cardinals did. No exotic, trick plays - simple schemes to get the exact match ups they wanted. This is for several reasons: the Giants defensive schemes are predictable and transparent. The Giants don't shift in and out of formations, show one things and do another, except for an occasional blitz fake. The opposing team knows how to read the Giants coverage and is never fooled. On top of that, the Giants have a huge hole in the secondary at S and combine that with occasional missed assignments and the Giants have big trouble.
In addition, it sure looks like the Giants LBs are slow. Clark and Pierce have both lost a step and Blackburn never really had a step to lose. Robbins is slowing down at DT and the absence of Canty and Alford makes him take more snaps than he should to remain an effective player. Add to this the fact that Tuck's shoulder is hurting and therefore he is a less capable backup at DT and you can see some real decline in what was thought to be a powerful front 7. Every team has injuries, so this is not a good excuse. But when you have injuries at two positions that you knew needed strengthening (DT and LB) and you signed FAs there. it indicates you needed the help. And you have another injury at S, another position that you knew had lack of depth, you can see why the defense might be struggling. Giants may get Canty and Boley back this week and perhaps will get Ross back after the bye. Maybe they will play better then. The worrying thing is that there is still no help at S and the DC still sends his defense out on the field advertising clearly what defense the Giants will be playing.
On offense, Eli has played poorly the past few weeks, but as with the defense, the offense is so completely predictable. There are just too few plays where Giants are out running free, having fooled the defense. There are, conversely, too many plays where the defense masses to the ball knowing exactly what play is coming.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Giants: Coaching questions
There are some indications that the Giants are getting out-coached by their opponents. As much as the last two games may have exposed some weaknesses in the personnel, I think the coaches are at least partly to blame for not putting the players in the best position to succeed.
Cardinals came in with a novel plan against the Giants. They had 9 guys at the line of scrimmage to stop the run and would blitz often. This is not that new, lots of teams try to stop the Giants running game. The thing that the Cardinals did that was a little different was they showed one defense pre-snap and changed the safety's positioning after Eli adjusted the blocking schemes and/or the play call. Lots of defenses do this - show one defense to the QB on his pre-snap read and then change the defense at the last minute. The difference here is that the protection schemes that the Giants change to and the audibles that they make in response to the defense are so transparent and take so long for Eli to call out that when the defense re-adjusts, the Giants offensive play has no chance. This was particularly effective last week because the Cardinals S is very quick and very smart. For example, Cardinals would show 2-safeties back and near the snap, would walk one S up and shift to single safety high. It was too late for Eli to audible to a pass play, but he could change the direction of the running play to the opposite side of the field. To handle this, the S, instead of coming straight ahead, would run diagonally across the field and stop the running play. The play calls are too obvious, the changes that Giants make are too predictable and the Giants made an average Cardinals defense look like world beaters last week.
The announcers of the game seem to have discovered something about the Giants snap count. I don't know if they're exactly right, but it sure seemed like the Cardinals were getting a great jump on each play. This is something the coaches and Eli need to fix because it can make any offense look terrible. In 2000 when the Giants shutout the high powered Vikings offense 41-0 in the NFC championship game, the Giants discovered something on film about the Vikings snap count when they were in shotgun formation. Specifically, regardless of what the actual snap count was from the time that the OL got set, whether it was 1 beat or 5 beats, the C would drop his head and exactly 1 second later would snap the ball. This tipped the Giants when to rush. I can remember one play where Giants MLB Michael Barrow sped around the Vikings RT on a blitz and he was past him so fast that the RT did not have a chance to get out of his 3 point stance and even attempt a block. This is important. I don't think the Eagles are quite as exotic with their defense as the Cardinals were last week, they just like to dial up a lot of blitzes. But they will put extra guys in the box to stop the run and will blitz on running downs and passing downs. Giants have to be willing to take shots down the field and have to be a little deceptive on their formations and play calls.
Another indicator of being out-coached is the failure to make adjustments in-game to what the opposing team is doing. There are a few specific examples of this from the Cardinals game. In the first half, the Giants did a good job keeping Fitzgerald contained. They knew where he was lining up and they managed to get Webster or Thomas on him most of the time. In the 2nd half, the Cardinals lined up Fitzgerald at different spots - in the slot, even in the backfield once and managed to get him away from Webster. They got the matchups they wanted, with Fitzgerald in the middle of the field against a S and made a few big plays.
On the other side of the ball, the Giants had 14 points in the first half, though the offense did have some help in generating these points. One was good field position after a fumble recovery and one was on the lucky tipped ball by Nicks. Nevertheless, they did move the ball during the first half and at least had some plays for these scores. In the 2nd half, the Cardinals adjusted their defensive scheme, as noted above and the Giants did not get a first down on the first 3 possessions of the 2nd half. When the other team adjusts to what you're doing and stops you cold, that's 100% coaching.
Great coaches may have different game plans for the first half and second half. Or they may have a game plan assuming the opponents play to their tendencies and another game plan if the opponents do something different. I don't get the feeling that the Giants coaches go in with that level of planning. Against the Saints, the Giants players said that they expected the Saints to try to run the ball. I guess the Saints have run the ball 60% of the time in the 2nd half of games. (This is probably misleading, because a team tends to run a lot more when they have a big lead, but that's a different question.) Nevertheless, the coaches plan for a running attack by the Saints may not have been unreasonable. However when they saw the Saints throwing the ball all over the yard they should have changed their plan and made some adjustments.
Maybe this is just growing pains for the new DC and an OC that, although he's not new and has been around, needs to get used to new WRs and see what they can do. Certainly, I'd rather see this happening at the beginning of the year than at the end of the year, but the coaches have to show us that they can adjust the game plans before we give them high marks.
Cardinals came in with a novel plan against the Giants. They had 9 guys at the line of scrimmage to stop the run and would blitz often. This is not that new, lots of teams try to stop the Giants running game. The thing that the Cardinals did that was a little different was they showed one defense pre-snap and changed the safety's positioning after Eli adjusted the blocking schemes and/or the play call. Lots of defenses do this - show one defense to the QB on his pre-snap read and then change the defense at the last minute. The difference here is that the protection schemes that the Giants change to and the audibles that they make in response to the defense are so transparent and take so long for Eli to call out that when the defense re-adjusts, the Giants offensive play has no chance. This was particularly effective last week because the Cardinals S is very quick and very smart. For example, Cardinals would show 2-safeties back and near the snap, would walk one S up and shift to single safety high. It was too late for Eli to audible to a pass play, but he could change the direction of the running play to the opposite side of the field. To handle this, the S, instead of coming straight ahead, would run diagonally across the field and stop the running play. The play calls are too obvious, the changes that Giants make are too predictable and the Giants made an average Cardinals defense look like world beaters last week.
The announcers of the game seem to have discovered something about the Giants snap count. I don't know if they're exactly right, but it sure seemed like the Cardinals were getting a great jump on each play. This is something the coaches and Eli need to fix because it can make any offense look terrible. In 2000 when the Giants shutout the high powered Vikings offense 41-0 in the NFC championship game, the Giants discovered something on film about the Vikings snap count when they were in shotgun formation. Specifically, regardless of what the actual snap count was from the time that the OL got set, whether it was 1 beat or 5 beats, the C would drop his head and exactly 1 second later would snap the ball. This tipped the Giants when to rush. I can remember one play where Giants MLB Michael Barrow sped around the Vikings RT on a blitz and he was past him so fast that the RT did not have a chance to get out of his 3 point stance and even attempt a block. This is important. I don't think the Eagles are quite as exotic with their defense as the Cardinals were last week, they just like to dial up a lot of blitzes. But they will put extra guys in the box to stop the run and will blitz on running downs and passing downs. Giants have to be willing to take shots down the field and have to be a little deceptive on their formations and play calls.
Another indicator of being out-coached is the failure to make adjustments in-game to what the opposing team is doing. There are a few specific examples of this from the Cardinals game. In the first half, the Giants did a good job keeping Fitzgerald contained. They knew where he was lining up and they managed to get Webster or Thomas on him most of the time. In the 2nd half, the Cardinals lined up Fitzgerald at different spots - in the slot, even in the backfield once and managed to get him away from Webster. They got the matchups they wanted, with Fitzgerald in the middle of the field against a S and made a few big plays.
On the other side of the ball, the Giants had 14 points in the first half, though the offense did have some help in generating these points. One was good field position after a fumble recovery and one was on the lucky tipped ball by Nicks. Nevertheless, they did move the ball during the first half and at least had some plays for these scores. In the 2nd half, the Cardinals adjusted their defensive scheme, as noted above and the Giants did not get a first down on the first 3 possessions of the 2nd half. When the other team adjusts to what you're doing and stops you cold, that's 100% coaching.
Great coaches may have different game plans for the first half and second half. Or they may have a game plan assuming the opponents play to their tendencies and another game plan if the opponents do something different. I don't get the feeling that the Giants coaches go in with that level of planning. Against the Saints, the Giants players said that they expected the Saints to try to run the ball. I guess the Saints have run the ball 60% of the time in the 2nd half of games. (This is probably misleading, because a team tends to run a lot more when they have a big lead, but that's a different question.) Nevertheless, the coaches plan for a running attack by the Saints may not have been unreasonable. However when they saw the Saints throwing the ball all over the yard they should have changed their plan and made some adjustments.
Maybe this is just growing pains for the new DC and an OC that, although he's not new and has been around, needs to get used to new WRs and see what they can do. Certainly, I'd rather see this happening at the beginning of the year than at the end of the year, but the coaches have to show us that they can adjust the game plans before we give them high marks.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Giants: Eagles game preview
It's not time to give up on the season because of the current two game losing streak, though there are some worrying signs contained in these losses. For one thing, these are 2 of only 3 teams that the Giants have played with winning records so far this year. The other team Giants have played with a winning record is the Cowboys and that was before they got their Miles-Austin-generated mojo back, which they seem to have last week against Atlanta. Overall, Giants are 1-2 against teams with winning records and their 4 other wins came against teams with a cumulative record of 5-23. Are the Giants good enough to clean up against the weak teams and not good enough to beat the good teams? As the season unfolds, we will get a much better view of this question.
The Eagles game this weekend looks interesting, because the Eagles are a tough team to figure out. On the one hand, they have big weapons on offense and DeSean Jackson seems to be stepping forward as one of the best big play WRs in football. On the other hand, their OL is somewhat questionable and they had that awful loss against the Raiders two weeks ago. It is true that their OL was banged up against the Raiders; they had some OL-men come back healthy against the Redskins and won fairly easily 27-17. But if you look under the covers of that victory, it was an unusual offensive performance. They got two big plays out of Jackson, a 67 yard end around and a 57 yard pass play. Those two plays account for 124 yards, essentially half of the 260 yards of total offense that they gained. The rest of the offense was only 138 yards on the other 51 plays that they ran for a ridiculously meager average of 2.7 yards per play. Sometimes, if the opposing defense is pressing, blitzing and gambling you have to be patient and wait for the big play, so statistics can be somewhat deceiving. But that wasn't the case here - Redskins have a good defense and except for those two big plays, they completely shut down the Eagles offense. The other 13 points were a direct result of Redskins turnovers; one an INT returned for a TD and two fumble recoveries that the Eagles turned into FGs. The rest of the night the offense was rather unproductive and some of McNabb's passes looked like a throw from a baseball outfielder to nab a runner at home plate - intentionally bouncing about5-10 feet in front of the intended target. McNabb should be called out by PETA, like his teammate Michael Vick was, because McNabb killed a lot of worms on the Lincoln Financial Field turf. Put it this way: if Eli had been throwing passes like that, the media would be up in arms about what a bad, inconsistent passer he is. My point: the way to beat the Eagles (or at least contain their offense) is to try to take away big plays for DeSean Jackson, keep McNabb in the pocket and make him try to beat you with many short passes. Giants do have to watch out for Celek in the middle of the field, he is a good pass-catching TE. Eagles WRs are fast, but they are not physically imposing; not as big as Colston on New Orleans or Boldin and Fitzgerald on Arizona, so the mismatch against Giants safeties may not be as worrisome.
On defense, the Eagles are good against the run and there is no reason to think that they won't use the same strategy that they used to beat the Giants last year; and that the Cardinals and Saints used the last two weeks. Load up to stop the run in the early downs and blitz Eli like crazy in passing downs. Giants WRs are talented and will have some good games this year, but they are young and they will also have some bad games. The Cardinals counted on Giants WRs dropping the ball if they got open and it worked for them; Eagles will do the same because that's what they always do. There's not Dawkins back there at S and the Giants may have to hit some big plays on the Eagles to balance things out. As bad as the Giants offense looked against the Cardinals, if Manningham had caught that perfect pass from Eli at the 2 yard line and if Bradshaw had not fumbled with 3 minutes left in the game, the Giants may have actually pulled the game out and we might not be as worried about the offense this week.
The Eagles game this weekend looks interesting, because the Eagles are a tough team to figure out. On the one hand, they have big weapons on offense and DeSean Jackson seems to be stepping forward as one of the best big play WRs in football. On the other hand, their OL is somewhat questionable and they had that awful loss against the Raiders two weeks ago. It is true that their OL was banged up against the Raiders; they had some OL-men come back healthy against the Redskins and won fairly easily 27-17. But if you look under the covers of that victory, it was an unusual offensive performance. They got two big plays out of Jackson, a 67 yard end around and a 57 yard pass play. Those two plays account for 124 yards, essentially half of the 260 yards of total offense that they gained. The rest of the offense was only 138 yards on the other 51 plays that they ran for a ridiculously meager average of 2.7 yards per play. Sometimes, if the opposing defense is pressing, blitzing and gambling you have to be patient and wait for the big play, so statistics can be somewhat deceiving. But that wasn't the case here - Redskins have a good defense and except for those two big plays, they completely shut down the Eagles offense. The other 13 points were a direct result of Redskins turnovers; one an INT returned for a TD and two fumble recoveries that the Eagles turned into FGs. The rest of the night the offense was rather unproductive and some of McNabb's passes looked like a throw from a baseball outfielder to nab a runner at home plate - intentionally bouncing about5-10 feet in front of the intended target. McNabb should be called out by PETA, like his teammate Michael Vick was, because McNabb killed a lot of worms on the Lincoln Financial Field turf. Put it this way: if Eli had been throwing passes like that, the media would be up in arms about what a bad, inconsistent passer he is. My point: the way to beat the Eagles (or at least contain their offense) is to try to take away big plays for DeSean Jackson, keep McNabb in the pocket and make him try to beat you with many short passes. Giants do have to watch out for Celek in the middle of the field, he is a good pass-catching TE. Eagles WRs are fast, but they are not physically imposing; not as big as Colston on New Orleans or Boldin and Fitzgerald on Arizona, so the mismatch against Giants safeties may not be as worrisome.
On defense, the Eagles are good against the run and there is no reason to think that they won't use the same strategy that they used to beat the Giants last year; and that the Cardinals and Saints used the last two weeks. Load up to stop the run in the early downs and blitz Eli like crazy in passing downs. Giants WRs are talented and will have some good games this year, but they are young and they will also have some bad games. The Cardinals counted on Giants WRs dropping the ball if they got open and it worked for them; Eagles will do the same because that's what they always do. There's not Dawkins back there at S and the Giants may have to hit some big plays on the Eagles to balance things out. As bad as the Giants offense looked against the Cardinals, if Manningham had caught that perfect pass from Eli at the 2 yard line and if Bradshaw had not fumbled with 3 minutes left in the game, the Giants may have actually pulled the game out and we might not be as worried about the offense this week.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Giants: Cardinals game review
Somehow I think the Cardinals game this past Sunday was even more disappointing and worrying than the Saints game last week. It's true that the game was closer on the scoreboard and the defense played a little better, with more enthusiasm and with more of an aggressive, attacking style than they did against the Saints. Furthermore, statistically at least, the Giants defense did well enough, allowing less than 300 yards of offense to the potent Cardinals attack. The 24 points that the defense gave up was not a great number, but they didn't allow much in the way of long drives. The Cardinals scored two TDs with a short field, one provided by lack of movement by the Giants offense and poor punting by Feagles which set them up with good field position at around midfield. The other was provided by the INT on the tipped ball which gave the Cardinals the ball at around the Giants 20. The Giants defense did get some pressure on Warner and did get off the field a few times when they had to. These are all the good signs. The worrying things to me are perhaps more about coaching than the players. For one thing, the Giants defense continued their poor performance inside the 20. The Giants are the worst team in the league at defending inside the 20. They have given up the highest percentages of TDs of any team in the league and the Cardinals scored 3 out of 4 trips inside the 20. Do Giants players get claustrophobic in cramped space when they have the goal line up at their backs?
The other worrying thing about the defense was the number of blown assignments and the holes and weaknesses that they have, despite the fact that they have some very good players at some positions. Giants have a weakness in speed at the LB position, especially OLB, which exposes them to the short zones in the passing game. They have a weakness at S in C.C. Brown in defending the middle depth zone in the middle of the field. They have weakness in the nickel and dime packages with Dockery who has played unevenly this year and with Bruce Johnson, who despite the second-week INT against Dallas has made some rookie mistakes in coverage. Offenses the last two weeks seem to be able to find these particular weaknesses and take advantage of them. Saints did it in week 6 and Cardinals did it a little bit in week 7. How do these stop?
This week, against the Cardinals, while the defense was a little better despite the exposures noted above, the offense was very uneven and unproductive. Four turnovers, including three INTs by Eli can undercut any production. But from the big picture, the Giants offense only manufactured 3 points. They scored one TD after a fumble recovery, when they were set up on the Cardinals 30 yard line. They scored another on the lucky tipped ball with a 60 yard catch and run by Nicks, so they manufactured legitimately, on their own, all of one FG. Here too, the one FG was a short one, where the Giants were stopped on 3rd down inside the 5 yard line and settled for 3 points. The Giants offense is among the worst in the league at scoring TDs inside the 20; they are 27th in the league in percentage of TDs. The discouraging thing about the offense was the lack of ability to move the ball coming out in the 2nd half. They failed to pick up a first down on their first three possessions of the 2nd half, with the third ending up with the INT that set up a Cardinals score. Lack of production inside the 20 and coming out in the second half, when they needed to take control of the game shows a lack of the offense to get it done when it matters. There are certain times when the game is critical and the outcome turns on a few possessions. That's not to say that a TD in the first quarter is worth fewer points than a TD in the 4th quarter. And if you need to go 80 yards for a score, 5 yards gained on your own 20 don't advance you to the goal line any less than 5 yards on the other team's 20. But lots of teams give up (or gain, if you're talking offense) yardage between the 20s. It's inside the 20 that the yards are tough, the defense stiffens, the play needs to be sharper in order to turn those yards into points. The old expression about yards inside the 20 is: "between the 20's is for show, inside the 20 is for dough". It definitely has some truth to it. If the Giants offense failed to produce in just this one game, we could let it go, but it has been a season-long problem. In fact, Giants were not too good at it last year either, so there is definitely an issue here.
There are two problems with the lack of offensive production inside the 20. One is personnel related and one is coaching related. On the personnel side, you have to be able to run the ball inside the 20 and it is much more difficult to do so because the DB-field is closer to the line of scrimmage and doesn't have to worry about being beaten deep by a speedy WR. They don't give a cushion to the WR and it's harder to throw in close for the same reason. The running style, therefore may have to be more pure power running. Despite the fact that the Giants have the biggest RB in the NFL in 265 lb. Brandon Jacobs, their OL is not a big, powerful road-grading group. Certainly they are not tiny, but they are more quick, athletic, smart and balanced than they are powerful straight ahead bruising blockers. Furthermore, last year the Giants had Michael Matthews, a strong blocking TE to help and this year have kept Darcy Johnson and Travis Beckum instead. To make matters worse, Hedgecock does not seem to be having as good a year as he had last year leading for Jacobs and I am not sure why. This may explain why the Giants are less than automatic on 3rd and short and why they don't run the ball effectively inside the 20. Giants are best when they spread the offense a little bit and use the athleticism and speed of the OL to make holes for the running game. It may also explain why Bradshaw seems just as effective as Jacobs in short yardage, maybe moreso. Giants run different plays out of different alignments for Bradshaw that better match the style of the OL with the style of the RB. Last week against the Cardinals, I thought Will Beatty played well and showed real promise on his future and why he deserved to be taken in the first round. But right now he is smaller than McKenzie and this may have hurt the short yardage a little bit. (A project for the future is to bulk Beatty up a lite bit.)
The other side of the offensive flaws against the Cardinals comes back to coaching. I am planning another post for tomorrow that analyzes some of the coaching weaknesses that I think the Giants are showing, but for now, in the context of red zone productivity, one big factor is play calling. If your offense can move the ball between the 20's and has all of the tools it needs to be a productive offense, your teams should be productive inside the 20 as well. Perhaps there is a style difference as noted above with the power running game and it is a little harder to score than it is to move the ball in the middle of the field. That means, your offense may not be at the top of the charts in percentage of TD's scored. But if you are among the worst, there is clearly a problem with the play calling and the schemes used. The Giants use little deception in the running game or the passing game at the goal line. They line up tight with two TEs way too often and the defense knows exactly what is coming. The Giants WRs are smallish so fade patterns are not attractive, but Boss could be used more and Nicks is a physical WR also that can catch in a crowd. When Jacobs was stopped on 3rd and 3 at the 2 yard line in the 4 quarter of the Cardinals game, I was 90% sure when they lined up that they would run that draw play. Speaking to my son after the game, he said the exact same thing. If we can figure it out, I think the Cardinals can also. If you were running on that down, it should have been two down territory and they should have gone for it on 4th down, but that is another discussion. (BTW - it was a bad spot from the ref; Jacobs may have made the first down or was at least much closer than 1 full yard away which is where the ball was spotted... could have influenced Coughlin's decision to go on 4th down.)
Executive summary: offensive and defensive problems are both a combination of personnel flaws and coaching weakness. I'll take a more detailed look at the coaching in another post, scheduled for tomorrow. Stay tuned.
The other worrying thing about the defense was the number of blown assignments and the holes and weaknesses that they have, despite the fact that they have some very good players at some positions. Giants have a weakness in speed at the LB position, especially OLB, which exposes them to the short zones in the passing game. They have a weakness at S in C.C. Brown in defending the middle depth zone in the middle of the field. They have weakness in the nickel and dime packages with Dockery who has played unevenly this year and with Bruce Johnson, who despite the second-week INT against Dallas has made some rookie mistakes in coverage. Offenses the last two weeks seem to be able to find these particular weaknesses and take advantage of them. Saints did it in week 6 and Cardinals did it a little bit in week 7. How do these stop?
This week, against the Cardinals, while the defense was a little better despite the exposures noted above, the offense was very uneven and unproductive. Four turnovers, including three INTs by Eli can undercut any production. But from the big picture, the Giants offense only manufactured 3 points. They scored one TD after a fumble recovery, when they were set up on the Cardinals 30 yard line. They scored another on the lucky tipped ball with a 60 yard catch and run by Nicks, so they manufactured legitimately, on their own, all of one FG. Here too, the one FG was a short one, where the Giants were stopped on 3rd down inside the 5 yard line and settled for 3 points. The Giants offense is among the worst in the league at scoring TDs inside the 20; they are 27th in the league in percentage of TDs. The discouraging thing about the offense was the lack of ability to move the ball coming out in the 2nd half. They failed to pick up a first down on their first three possessions of the 2nd half, with the third ending up with the INT that set up a Cardinals score. Lack of production inside the 20 and coming out in the second half, when they needed to take control of the game shows a lack of the offense to get it done when it matters. There are certain times when the game is critical and the outcome turns on a few possessions. That's not to say that a TD in the first quarter is worth fewer points than a TD in the 4th quarter. And if you need to go 80 yards for a score, 5 yards gained on your own 20 don't advance you to the goal line any less than 5 yards on the other team's 20. But lots of teams give up (or gain, if you're talking offense) yardage between the 20s. It's inside the 20 that the yards are tough, the defense stiffens, the play needs to be sharper in order to turn those yards into points. The old expression about yards inside the 20 is: "between the 20's is for show, inside the 20 is for dough". It definitely has some truth to it. If the Giants offense failed to produce in just this one game, we could let it go, but it has been a season-long problem. In fact, Giants were not too good at it last year either, so there is definitely an issue here.
There are two problems with the lack of offensive production inside the 20. One is personnel related and one is coaching related. On the personnel side, you have to be able to run the ball inside the 20 and it is much more difficult to do so because the DB-field is closer to the line of scrimmage and doesn't have to worry about being beaten deep by a speedy WR. They don't give a cushion to the WR and it's harder to throw in close for the same reason. The running style, therefore may have to be more pure power running. Despite the fact that the Giants have the biggest RB in the NFL in 265 lb. Brandon Jacobs, their OL is not a big, powerful road-grading group. Certainly they are not tiny, but they are more quick, athletic, smart and balanced than they are powerful straight ahead bruising blockers. Furthermore, last year the Giants had Michael Matthews, a strong blocking TE to help and this year have kept Darcy Johnson and Travis Beckum instead. To make matters worse, Hedgecock does not seem to be having as good a year as he had last year leading for Jacobs and I am not sure why. This may explain why the Giants are less than automatic on 3rd and short and why they don't run the ball effectively inside the 20. Giants are best when they spread the offense a little bit and use the athleticism and speed of the OL to make holes for the running game. It may also explain why Bradshaw seems just as effective as Jacobs in short yardage, maybe moreso. Giants run different plays out of different alignments for Bradshaw that better match the style of the OL with the style of the RB. Last week against the Cardinals, I thought Will Beatty played well and showed real promise on his future and why he deserved to be taken in the first round. But right now he is smaller than McKenzie and this may have hurt the short yardage a little bit. (A project for the future is to bulk Beatty up a lite bit.)
The other side of the offensive flaws against the Cardinals comes back to coaching. I am planning another post for tomorrow that analyzes some of the coaching weaknesses that I think the Giants are showing, but for now, in the context of red zone productivity, one big factor is play calling. If your offense can move the ball between the 20's and has all of the tools it needs to be a productive offense, your teams should be productive inside the 20 as well. Perhaps there is a style difference as noted above with the power running game and it is a little harder to score than it is to move the ball in the middle of the field. That means, your offense may not be at the top of the charts in percentage of TD's scored. But if you are among the worst, there is clearly a problem with the play calling and the schemes used. The Giants use little deception in the running game or the passing game at the goal line. They line up tight with two TEs way too often and the defense knows exactly what is coming. The Giants WRs are smallish so fade patterns are not attractive, but Boss could be used more and Nicks is a physical WR also that can catch in a crowd. When Jacobs was stopped on 3rd and 3 at the 2 yard line in the 4 quarter of the Cardinals game, I was 90% sure when they lined up that they would run that draw play. Speaking to my son after the game, he said the exact same thing. If we can figure it out, I think the Cardinals can also. If you were running on that down, it should have been two down territory and they should have gone for it on 4th down, but that is another discussion. (BTW - it was a bad spot from the ref; Jacobs may have made the first down or was at least much closer than 1 full yard away which is where the ball was spotted... could have influenced Coughlin's decision to go on 4th down.)
Executive summary: offensive and defensive problems are both a combination of personnel flaws and coaching weakness. I'll take a more detailed look at the coaching in another post, scheduled for tomorrow. Stay tuned.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Giants: Look ahead to Cardinals
DC Sheridan is a newbie
The players seem to give new DC Sheridan high marks for knowing his football, for being very detail oriented and for coaching well. They say that he has a different personality than Spagnuolo, who was fiery and emotional compared to Sheridan's somewhat more understated demeanor. The emotion part on its own may not be an issue: players can get pumped up in other means. But Sheridan's ice water personality, coming as it does after the fiery Spagnuolo might be a problem. Regardless of the way the players approach the game and the fact that they are professionals and need to play at a high level all of the time, the fact is that they simply don't. Players occasionally need a coach to get them riled up and with Spags and Starahan both gone, that absence may be a real detriment to the team.
More important to me, however is the in-game adjustments. Players themselves might not even necessarily even see those adjustments. The most time they spend with the coaches is during the week and their impression of preparation is what happens during practice from Wednesday until game time. If they have a good game plan that they can buy into, they think of the coach as having done a good job. There is so much confusion on the sideline and chaos on the field during the game that even if a play doesn't work, the players will not immediately know why it failed. For nearly every play that doesn't work, there may be a coach that didn't coach right and a player that didn't play right. For example, in last Sunday's game, would the DL say that the coach didn't call enough blitzes and relied on the DL for pass rush, or would they blame themselves and say, regardless of the defenses that was called, we, the DL should have beaten our man 1-on-1 and created the pass rush.
All of which leads me to my next point. Last week, Brees dropped backed to pass 34 times and the way I counted it when I reviewd the game, the Giants sent a blitzer, usually just 1 extra LB, 8 times or a bit less than 25% of the time. I guess that is not such a low percentage, but in retrospect, with the lack of pressure that the Giants were generating, he should have sent more blitzes and sent more people when he did, overloading a side and giving an advantage to the defense. All of that is water under the bridge, but you certainly hope the DC will learn from that and be aware of what is happening in the game and be able to adjust the plan on the fly.
Here's what really concerns me. When some newspaper reporters asked Sheridan if he should have blitzed more last week against the Saints, he sort of admitted guilt and said that in retrospect that might have been a good move. Then, to cover his a$$ a bit, he waffled and said something like "would've, should've, could've" as if to say this is purely hindsight and a second guess. He was asked further if he thought the pass happy Cardinals were licking their chops and were anxious to go after the Giants suddenly-discredited secondary like the Saints did last week. Sheridan said: "I'm sure they are". Then (here's the part that really has me burned) when Sheridan was asked if he would blitz more this week, he said that he would. Why would he say that? Just shut up. If a reporter asks you what the game plan is, you don't let anything out. Not a hint. The response should be something vanilla like: "our game plan always has a mixture of pressure packages included". Why would you give the opponents anything to hang their hat on, anything to analyze anything useful to assist their preparation. I am not sold on Sheridan yet as a DC. He has to prove himself before we accept him as a good hire.
Last week's beating by New Orleans could be a good thing for the Giants, coming early in the season, if they realize that they have to go into a game with healthy respect for their opponents. It could also be a good learning tool for Sheridan who should realize that he has to vary the attack on defense. Even if you are better than the guys lining up across scrimmage from you, there are always schemes to minimize your strengths and let the opponents accentuate their own strength. Even if you don't belive in blitzes and zone blitzes and would rather beat opponents 1-on-1, adding variations or adding unusual blitzes makes the OL uncertain about where you're coming from and gives you an advantage even on a play when you don't blitz.
Cardinals Game Plan
If I were the Cardinals, my game plan would be to use a fair amount of max protection schemes, keeping in a TE and/or RB to protect the QB, and running a bunch of 2 or 3 WR pass routes. With that, you can still run 2 WRs in patterns on one side of the field, and get a match up of Larry Fitzgerald on C. C. Brown. The Giants need to anticipate that the Cardinals will do this, which really should not be that difficult, because the Cardinals are all pass and don't run the ball effectively. Let's see what Sheridan comes up with to combat this. Play a lot of nickel, double team Fitzgerald and have an automatic blitz from the opposite side of the field when there are 2 WR pass routes so Warner does not have time to go deep to Fitzgerald.
Giants Offense
Jacobs and Bradshaw were both running well last week and Jacobs particularly looked more in step with his blockers. The Giants WRs are really developing into an excellent unit on the team. The emergence of 3 WRs ahead of Dixon allowed the Giants to get Hixon back as a kick returner, where he excels and where he had a great game last week. This will pay dividends for the Giants down the road. Thinking back to last year's game against the Cardinals in Arizona, I recall that Hixon had a huge game and several long returns that set up some Giants scores.
The players seem to give new DC Sheridan high marks for knowing his football, for being very detail oriented and for coaching well. They say that he has a different personality than Spagnuolo, who was fiery and emotional compared to Sheridan's somewhat more understated demeanor. The emotion part on its own may not be an issue: players can get pumped up in other means. But Sheridan's ice water personality, coming as it does after the fiery Spagnuolo might be a problem. Regardless of the way the players approach the game and the fact that they are professionals and need to play at a high level all of the time, the fact is that they simply don't. Players occasionally need a coach to get them riled up and with Spags and Starahan both gone, that absence may be a real detriment to the team.
More important to me, however is the in-game adjustments. Players themselves might not even necessarily even see those adjustments. The most time they spend with the coaches is during the week and their impression of preparation is what happens during practice from Wednesday until game time. If they have a good game plan that they can buy into, they think of the coach as having done a good job. There is so much confusion on the sideline and chaos on the field during the game that even if a play doesn't work, the players will not immediately know why it failed. For nearly every play that doesn't work, there may be a coach that didn't coach right and a player that didn't play right. For example, in last Sunday's game, would the DL say that the coach didn't call enough blitzes and relied on the DL for pass rush, or would they blame themselves and say, regardless of the defenses that was called, we, the DL should have beaten our man 1-on-1 and created the pass rush.
All of which leads me to my next point. Last week, Brees dropped backed to pass 34 times and the way I counted it when I reviewd the game, the Giants sent a blitzer, usually just 1 extra LB, 8 times or a bit less than 25% of the time. I guess that is not such a low percentage, but in retrospect, with the lack of pressure that the Giants were generating, he should have sent more blitzes and sent more people when he did, overloading a side and giving an advantage to the defense. All of that is water under the bridge, but you certainly hope the DC will learn from that and be aware of what is happening in the game and be able to adjust the plan on the fly.
Here's what really concerns me. When some newspaper reporters asked Sheridan if he should have blitzed more last week against the Saints, he sort of admitted guilt and said that in retrospect that might have been a good move. Then, to cover his a$$ a bit, he waffled and said something like "would've, should've, could've" as if to say this is purely hindsight and a second guess. He was asked further if he thought the pass happy Cardinals were licking their chops and were anxious to go after the Giants suddenly-discredited secondary like the Saints did last week. Sheridan said: "I'm sure they are". Then (here's the part that really has me burned) when Sheridan was asked if he would blitz more this week, he said that he would. Why would he say that? Just shut up. If a reporter asks you what the game plan is, you don't let anything out. Not a hint. The response should be something vanilla like: "our game plan always has a mixture of pressure packages included". Why would you give the opponents anything to hang their hat on, anything to analyze anything useful to assist their preparation. I am not sold on Sheridan yet as a DC. He has to prove himself before we accept him as a good hire.
Last week's beating by New Orleans could be a good thing for the Giants, coming early in the season, if they realize that they have to go into a game with healthy respect for their opponents. It could also be a good learning tool for Sheridan who should realize that he has to vary the attack on defense. Even if you are better than the guys lining up across scrimmage from you, there are always schemes to minimize your strengths and let the opponents accentuate their own strength. Even if you don't belive in blitzes and zone blitzes and would rather beat opponents 1-on-1, adding variations or adding unusual blitzes makes the OL uncertain about where you're coming from and gives you an advantage even on a play when you don't blitz.
Cardinals Game Plan
If I were the Cardinals, my game plan would be to use a fair amount of max protection schemes, keeping in a TE and/or RB to protect the QB, and running a bunch of 2 or 3 WR pass routes. With that, you can still run 2 WRs in patterns on one side of the field, and get a match up of Larry Fitzgerald on C. C. Brown. The Giants need to anticipate that the Cardinals will do this, which really should not be that difficult, because the Cardinals are all pass and don't run the ball effectively. Let's see what Sheridan comes up with to combat this. Play a lot of nickel, double team Fitzgerald and have an automatic blitz from the opposite side of the field when there are 2 WR pass routes so Warner does not have time to go deep to Fitzgerald.
Giants Offense
Jacobs and Bradshaw were both running well last week and Jacobs particularly looked more in step with his blockers. The Giants WRs are really developing into an excellent unit on the team. The emergence of 3 WRs ahead of Dixon allowed the Giants to get Hixon back as a kick returner, where he excels and where he had a great game last week. This will pay dividends for the Giants down the road. Thinking back to last year's game against the Cardinals in Arizona, I recall that Hixon had a huge game and several long returns that set up some Giants scores.
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