Experience Points—Defensive Notes vs. Texans 1/15/12

[blah3]

While the Ravens may have played a make Yates beat us defense, that does not excuse the poor play from the DLine, IMO. Very little pressure, and Foster had a very good day. Their play needs to improve in NE.

[festivus]

Thanks, FS.

I was troubled by what I saw as the failure of our pass rush, thanks for explaining what I was watching. I expect it will be very different against NE.

[Carey]

Film, great job as always. Got a question, if you were calling the Pats game how would you attack their offense?

[Tucker: M&T Sec 527]

Should you be worried about pressure unable to get home? Not more than a little. The Texans’ offensive line is excellent and the Ravens didn’t bring a complex pressure scheme.

Foster scored the Texans’ only TD on 3rd and goal from the 1 with 4:48 remaining in the first half. Thereafter, the Texans went 0 for 7 on 3rd and 4th down.

I was hoping you'd conclude that our pass rush didn't suck as much as their OL just blocked well. We need to confuse the Pats w/ some organized chaos from both the usual (Suggs, Ray, Ngata) and unusual ( McPhee Kruger, McClain.blitzing DBs, etc.) suspects.

3 and out defense for 35 minutes!! That might could slow down some Brady.

[Filmstudy]

Film, great job as always. Got a question, if you were calling the Pats game how would you attack their offense?

Lots of coverage variation (some, but not all press) with some jamming on the TEs, Webb on Welker, fewer numbers in the pass rush, but lots of different pressure schemes (stunts, delays, zone blitzes, linemen dropping to spy/cover etc.).

For the Ravens to defense the TEs effectively, some corner is going to have to have a great game in man coverage on the outside.

[TimTheEnchanter]

They forced Yates to throw into 7-man coverage for most of the day. I scored the Ravens with just 3 deceptive blitzes and one of them was with 3 men. They dropped 18 men to cover from the LoS which is something the Ravens have often done regularly to inexperienced QBs in the past.

I hope they let us do that against the Patriots.

[Filmstudy]

I hope they let us do that against the Patriots.

I see I didn't write the following clearly:

They forced Yates to throw into 7-man coverage for most of the day. I scored the Ravens with just 3 deceptive blitzes and one of them was with 3 men. They dropped 18 men to cover from the LoS which is something the Ravens have often done regularly to inexperienced QBs in the past.

What I was trying to say was that the Ravens have often tried to confuse young QBs with pre-snap movements and zone blitzes where a lot of men drop from the LoS into coverage. 18 is just a moderate number for the Ravens for 35 pass plays.

Versus jittery or inexperienced QBs they have often used many more. For example, in last year's WC game at KC, they dropped 18 on just 21 pass plays vs. Cassel.

[TimTheEnchanter]

Ah. Since you had just mentioned a deceptive blitz with only 3 rushers I figured it was a typo that was meant to be 8 in coverage. I understand now.

Do you think that was a sign of respect for Yates (that they didn't think they would be able to confuse him like other inexperienced QBs) or a sign of disrespect (we think you'll be confused just with a standard defense - no sense dressing it up)

[Filmstudy]

Ah. Since you had just mentioned a deceptive blitz with only 3 rushers I figured it was a typo that was meant to be 8 in coverage. I understand now.

Do you think that was a sign of respect for Yates (that they didn't think they would be able to confuse him like other inexperienced QBs) or a sign of disrespect (we think you'll be confused just with a standard defense - no sense dressing it up)

That's a really good question, but if I were Yates, I would not feel respected.

The Ravens essentially said:

"We're going to contain you in the pocket and if we can get pressure, great, but if not, you're going to make plenty of mistakes for us to win."

Were this Peyton Manning circa the mid 2000's, the same exact strategy would correctly be interpreted as:

"We can't rush more than 4 regularly because you'll read the blitz and beat us, but we think we can get some pressure with 4 and get you off the field enough to give us a chance."

[Ravenswintitle]

great stuff FS

[Teavo]

For the Ravens to defense the TEs effectively, some corner is going to have to have a great game in man coverage on the outside.

I think this is not only possible but likely.

As you and others suggested, Webb on Welker is probably a good idea. Their only other WR of note is Deion Branch who is a decent player but I think Cary Williams could handle him.

That leaves the safeties, maybe LBs, and perhaps Jimmy Smith to handle the TEs. There is no matchup in this league that would make me feel like Beastkowski is ever neutralized, but short of that I feel reasonably good about the prospect of, say, Smith or a LB bracketing Gronk underneath while Pollard brackets deep and readies some hits.

I hope we play only just enough zone to be unpredictable and no more. Brady and Welker eat zones for breakfast.

[mjones73]

I go through quite a few DVRs, since I don't have a way to archive HD (please PM me if you have a way).

There isn't anything about the amount of equipment we have that helps with the analysis directly, but we've been very fortunate (as has DirecTV) to be able to organize our house around watching the NFL.

If you have basic cable or you're close enough to Baltimore for over the air reception and you have a Win7 pc, you can set up Media Center to record the games, it saves every recording as a separate file, you do need to play them back on a Win7 machine (or via Xbox as an extender) though.

[myfavoriteboxer]

Were this Peyton Manning circa the mid 2000's, the same exact strategy would correctly be interpreted as:

"We can't rush more than 4 regularly because you'll read the blitz and beat us, but we think we can get some pressure with 4 and get you off the field enough to give us a chance."

I thought this was the case for other top QBs, such as Brady. You need to pressure them, but if you try to blitz you just get burned, so to have a chance you need to be able to get pressure with 4.

So if that's what we need to do Sunday I'd be worried based off the results v. Houston. But maybe their o-line is weaker enough that we should have more success.