Football is a game defined by adjustments. Adjustments need to be made before, during, and after games for teams to succeed tactically. The NFL is a giant chess match and you’re only as good as your next move.
In the case of offensive coordinator Gary Kubiak, he made the adjustments to put his offense in a checkmate position all night.
The biggest turnaround arguably came in third-and-long situations. Instead of trying to convert by having his primary receivers get past the sticks, all of the big conversions came by gaining yards after the catch.
Flacco did a great job of attacking the open voids Pittsburgh left vacated when they played softer coverage. He hit his receivers in stride and they were able to pick up the extra yards needed to keep the chains moving.
Daniels and Torrey Smith were the biggest third-and-long busters off of slant and crossing patterns.
One of the other major third-down adjustments came through the improved protection scheme. The interior blitzes Pittsburgh ran were picked up pretty consistently, with Justin Forsett acting as Flacco’s personal bodyguard to buy him some extra time…
Speaking of Daniels, his veteran savvy was on full display Saturday night. Depending on how the Steelers decided to rush, Daniels would read the defense and change his route. There were a couple of plays in which the veteran sat down in zone coverage to make himself available to Flacco over the middle.
Getting back to the last game, the inability of Flacco to connect with Daniels on longer developing crossing routes was a big issue. Flacco simply wasn’t able to get the ball out on time, and was hit as he tried to get the ball in Daniels’ hands.
Flacco and Daniels had much better hot-route synergy in Pittsburgh, keeping the offense on track all night long.
It’ll be interesting to see how Daniels fares against the Patriots’ Jamie Collins. Collins has been a tight end eraser all season. This will be one of many outstanding matchups to watch out for the divisional game at Foxboro…
As I tweeted out on Saturday night, so much was made of the Ravens’ leaky secondary. And granted, that was a legitimate concern going into a matchup against Big Ben and the Steelers’ prolific passing attack.
However, I can’t remember the talking heads mentioning the vulnerable Pittsburgh pass D — which, by the way, ranked four spots lower than the Ravens this season.
The talk going into this game was about the #Ravens pass D. But the #Steelers actually had a worse season and their CBs are losing outside.
— Dev Panchwagh (@devpanchwagh) January 4, 2015
Kubiak attacked the Pittsburgh corners all night without hesitation, specifically attacking outside of the numbers. Flacco threw the ball on first down 13 times, including the bootleg completion to Crockett Gilmore that practically sealed the victory.
The Ravens will need to stay just as aggressive against the Patriots, even though the challenge will be much different on the outside against Darrell Revis and Brandon Browner…
A couple of other wrinkles and trends I noticed last night:
- Courtney Upshaw dropped in coverage a few times to buzz under in the flat area. At one point, he was responsible for covering Antonio Brown 1-on-1. He also lined up right over Brown a few times to jam him at the line. When I was at training camp, Upshaw was used in this short-area coverage role quite often.
- The Ravens did a nice job of mixing in more three-wide looks on early downs.
- Will Hill primarily stayed in deep coverage and he was terrific converging on the ball sideline-to-sideline. His ability to bring stability to the back end has been an under-the-radar reason for the improved secondary play. I think the team needs to strongly consider re-signing him to a new contract in the offseason.
