As we all adjust to a new life while the planet deals with the COVID-19 virus, we are getting used to living without live sports. To help fill the gap, the NFL has made their GamePass product available for free until the end of May. Some of you might be taking the plunge into GamePass, and the “All-22” for the first time. As someone who has been using the product for years, here are some tips on how you can grind the tape like a pro.
Getting Started
At first glance, the NFL GamePass system might be a bit overwhelming. But here are some pointers on how to get started.
When you enter the system, you will see a screen that looks almost identical to this one:
In the top blue bar you see, working from left to right, the following: “Games,” “NFL Originals,” “Film Session,” “Search,” and “Teams.” This is the place to begin. If you click on “Games,” as the above screen indicates, you will then be able to navigate through each week of the season. The default setting is the most recent week, and as you see the Super Bowl is the only game listed.
“NFL Originals” brings you to an incredible library of everything the NFL has produced, from the “America’s Game” series to “Hard Knocks” to “All or Nothing” and everything else you can imagine. “Film Session” is the film series with Brian Baldinger and Ron Jaworski breaking down game film with players like Cameron Jordan, Thomas Davis and Adam Thielen, plus coaches like Doug Pederson. “Search” is a topic on its own, and finally the “Teams” section will allow you to pick a single team, and pull up its entire season:
That’s what you see first when you click on “Teams,” and then when you click on the Baltimore Ravens. All of their 2019 games in reverse chronological order, plus you can also find original content featuring the Ravens such as “Sound FX: Ray Lewis” or “America’s Game: 2000 Baltimore Ravens.”
So now, let’s watch a game. To get started, say with the Super Bowl, you drag your cursor over the game, and you will see the following:
These are the four different ways of watching a game. The “Full Replay” is just the replay of the broadcast version, complete with the replays. As we will see in a moment, that also allows you to skip throughout the game by selecting a particular play. The “Condensed” version is an edited, shortened version of the broadcast version, usually somewhere between 30 to 40 minutes. Replays are stripped out, and you cannot skip around between plays. “Listen” allows you to hear the radio calls from both the home and the away teams. Then finally, the “Coaches Film” brings you to the All-22 goodness.
So let’s click on that and get started:
The player immediately brings you to the opening kickoff of the game. Now there are a few things to note before we start talking about the film itself. In the upper right corner you see the bar graph. Clicking on that allows you to view stats for the game. In the bottom left you’ll see the “-10” and “+10” options. That allows you to rewind or fast forward each play by ten seconds. That and the “Play/Pause” button are going to get a workout.
You’ll also see what looks to be a three item list, next to the stats option in the upper right. Click on that and the film window will shrink, but it will pull up a very handy feature for you:
That brings up the play-by-play list for the entire game. So if you wanted to work through the game focusing on all running plays, all passing plays, or you know a play in particular you wanted to watch, say, a huge third down conversion in the fourth quarter, you can click to that play and within seconds, there it is:
Look away San Francisco 49ers fans…
So now we know the basic mechanics. Now the fun begins. Let’s talk about what to watch for on the All-22.