Week 13 had some great things to offer: The Minnesota Vikings win in Atlanta, while the Saints beat Carolina. The Seahawks’ victory over the Eagles has left the playoff race open once and for all in the superbly manned NFC, with Seattle aggressively showing its perhaps best game plan of the season. However, the SPOX-NFL column starts this week with the chaos at the New York Giants.
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One thing should be clear to everyone in the wake of Ben McAdoo’s dismissal: putting Manning on the bench was by no means McAdoo’s decision. It may have been his idea, but it would be very naive to think that a coach sitting more than just on a shaky chair would simply saw off the franchise quarterback and double Super Bowl champion with such standing on and off the field in the final phase of a lost season.
With this thought in mind, the past few days in New York become a spectacular farce.
It is so painfully obvious that the team bosses now accuse McAdoo of eating the lion to dismantle Manning as a pawn sacrifice. My opinion on Mannings Benching I had already explained in detail, in the short version: Everybody knows what geno can do and especially what he can’t do. Webb was miles away from an NFL quarterback in college – the Giants themselves made it clear that he was not ready when they chose Geno.
The fruitlessness of the decision to place Manning on the bench was one of the reasons for the outcry of the fans and several ex-players, who had probably already planned protest actions for Manning at the next game. The Giants have put themselves in a desolate situation by dismantling their biggest active legend without a plan. The timing of the McAdoo dismissal clearly shows that he is now the pawn’s victim – and this is reaffirmed by the fact that team owners have publicly placed the quarterback decision in the hands of interim coach Steve Spagnuolo for the games to come. A farce.
All this is in no way intended to protect McAdoo or managing director Jerry Reese. Both of them earned the discharge for various reasons. But how all this has happened, one of the league’s normally most stable organizations, which actually doesn’t let this kind of thing happen, shows up in a very bad light.
It suggests that the angry mob with the pitchforks pressed the finger on the trigger at that time. Those responsible can only hope that with Manning’s now unquestionably imminent return, the waves will soon be smoothed out and the eyes turned to Draft and Free Agency. Then at least this plan would have worked.
On paper, everything seemed clear: the duel between Seattle’s offensive line and the Philadelphia Eagles’ defensive front was perhaps the most obvious one of the week, and it was hard to imagine that the Seahawks would score too much on the offensive. It is well known that things were quite different, and this was not only (but also) due to the sensational abilities of Russell Wilson. Rather, the Seahawks had concrete measures against the pass rush of the Eagles ready.
Specifically, this plan did not contain any groundbreaking innovations, but the mix was decisive in this case:
Defensively, two things were particularly conspicuous: The Seahawks regularly used stunts on the line of scrimmage (two players swap positions after the snap, for example, the player who was facing the guard before the snap, the tackle and vice versa) and hurt Philadelphia’s line mainly with the speed rush. In combination with good timing in lightning play calling and costly mistakes by the Eagles (Wentz’ Fumble, some inaccuracies in the passing game and the missed challenge in Wilson’s supposed cross pass) the Eagles Offense experienced a damper.
First of all, the big problem on Sunday was the Chiefs-Defense, which didn’t get along at all with the extremely exciting offense designs of the jets (more on page 2). The pass rush is barely there, the run defensive defenses are punctured and in the secondary one sees communication errors.
Meanwhile, Alex Smith had 217 yards on long passes, having collected a total of 146 deep-passing yards in the past four games. That was a positive exclamation point, but the question will be: can he implement it consistently? If this doesn’t work, the team is not only defensively vulnerable but also completely transparent. And then Andy Reid should consider a quarterback swap before the division’s gone.
Commenting on the statement:”Compared to last week, my fundamental opinion has not changed: I still do not believe that Patrick Mahomes is able to implement a full NFL offense. But the point about Kansas City is that he doesn’t have to.
What made the Chiefs so strong in the first few weeks? The interplay of very good run game, various misdirection and fake elements and aggressive downfield passes. The misdirections and fakes made the run game easier, the run game helped with the downfield shots, and the defenses made them more susceptible to Underneath passes and forced a lighter box.
And what has happened in the last few weeks? The run-blocking has subsided, which is a problem. The bigger problem for this offense, however, is the mixture of the other two elements: Because Smith has lost a lot of ground in terms of downfield passports – apart from the jet game – defenses can afford to play a lot out of cover 2 and cover 3. Relatively simple, but effective: Smith can no longer consistently attack the Seam-Routes, i. e. the areas between the deep coverage zones.
From the Zone Coverage it is much easier for Defenses to expose the misdirection elements of the Chiefs: Since the defenders are assigned to a room and not to any player, all the deceptions become much less dangerous. And that in turn has an effect on the run game. Against the jets, it was clear that this had to be an internal topic – suddenly Smith was more aggressive again. Partly with success, partly with a lot of success. And this is where Mahomes comes in.
In the end, all statements about his NFL-suitability are speculation at the moment, but one thing is clear: The rookie has no problems with a downfield passing game. The play-concepts of Andy Reid make it much easier for a quarterback to read the Defense, Mahomes could find himself in a situation similar to that of Deshaun Watson in Houston: Simple Reads, Plays, taking the pressure from the quarterback and at the same time an offense that fully accentuates the qualities of the young QB.
Kansas City has been in a downward trend for weeks and has finally lost the upper hand in the division. Of course, this is also due to the extremely pitted defense – but my conclusion to the chiefs is that the offense with Smith won’t keep coming to the level of the first few weeks. A game in which the Jets Tyreek Hill couldn’t cope doesn’t change that. And in that case, KC doesn’t stand a chance in January if they play at all.
The Vikings have a real chance to force the NFC playoffs to the Super Bowl in Minnesota through Minnesota – or to put it another way: they have a real chance to get the number 1 seed. This is largely due to the outstanding Defense, which plays even more consistently than in the pre-season and offers tremendous quality on all three levels. But it’s also due to the offense in which Case Keenum plays the season of his life – carried by the probably best receiver duo of this season and great play designs and play calling.
The decisive touchdown to Kyle Rudolph in the final quarter was a perfect example of how Minnesota can attack a zone defense in the tightest of spaces. The whole concept only attacks the right side of the defense: The running back pulls out the middle defender. Diggs runs a route inwards from the outside, so that the left of the three defenders take over.
The Outside Cornerback on the right side has to take Kyle Rudolph – who has the complete middle of the field free for himself after a Corner-Post-Route. A play call from and for the textbook (App-User: Here you can find the whole thing in picture form!
These things can be seen from Minnesota’s open week after week. Creative designs alternate with good situational play-calling, right at the first turn the Vikigns showed a play-action move in Atlanta on Sunday, where the receiver not only plays a completely unhindered release, but also has a tight end in front of it with the ball in his hand as a blocker. Especially in the Red Zone you can see an enormously efficient play-action-game of the Vikes every week.
If Minnesota wants to survive in the playoffs, it needs an offense that can manage more than just the game – the competition in the NFC this year is too big for that. Offensive Coordinator Pat Shurmur gives the Vikings a real chance.
Page 1: A gigantic farce, the Seahawks-Offense, the Chiefs and Minnesota
Page 2: Rodgers, the Seahawks, Winston, Denver, the Jets – your questions