Category: Texans

Ravens, 49ers have the advantage of defenses that can do anything… and everything

The Ravens and 49ers are the one-seeds in the playoffs, and they both have defenses without specific tendencies. That’s not a coincidence.

It’s probably not a coincidence that the Baltimore Ravens and the San Francisco 49ers — the two one-seeds in the 2023 NFL playoffs — have defenses without a specific coverage type. In today’s NFL, with more formational and schematic concepts on offense, if you go out on the field without some things to mess up the opposing quarterback with different things, you’re left with an execution-based defense, and there’s very little margin for error if that’s the case.

The Cleveland Browns discovered that in their wild-card loss to the Houston Texans. In that 45-14 Houston win, the Browns stuck with their usual plan, to their direct detriment. C.J. Stroud had demolished single-high coverage all season long, and the Browns had run a higher rate of single-high in the regular season than any other defense. Cleveland decided to stay there in this game, and Stroud completed 12 of 16 passes for both of his touchdowns. On none of those 16 attempts did the Browns throw any kind of late movement at Stroud. It was line ’em up, and let’s go.

Browns’ refusal to adapt on defense cost them dearly against C.J. Stroud

When the Texans face the Baltimore Ravens on Saturday in the divisional round, Stroud will be tested in ways he certainly wasn’t last week. The Ravens do not have a specific coverage type. This season, they’ve run single-high coverage on 46.4% of their snaps, and two-high on 53.3% of their snaps. It’s been Cover-3, Cover-4, Cover-1, and Cover-6 in that order. You don’t know what you’re going to get from snap to snap, they do all of it well, and they’re very adept with coverage switches. 

The Ravens have made it very clear that the Stroud they’re dealing with now is a much more evolved than the Stroud that tried to navigate it all in his regular-season debut. The best way to counter that evolution is to make Stroud work through different coverage concepts. Mike Macdonald’s defense has no problem with that.

The Ravens know they’re dealing with a different C.J. Stroud this time around

On this deep incompletion against the Ravens in Week 1, Stroud had to manage a couple of things. First, Baltimore threw a six-man blitz at him with defensive back Kyle Hamilton off the edge, edge defender Odafe Oweh dropping into coverage, and linebacker Roquan Smith coming from the second level. And pre-snap, the Ravens showed a defined single-high look before moving to Cover-2. Brandon Stephens joined safety Marcus Williams as the second two-high defender. The combination of pressure and coverage must have made Stroud feel as if he had 13 or 14 defenders arrayed against him, and a near-interception was the result.

The 49ers, who play the Green Bay Packers on Sunday, are another amorphous coverage defense.They’ve played 50% single-high this season, and two-high 50% of the time. It’s Cover-3, Cover-4, Cover-1, and Cover-2 in that order. The 49ers flip to a bit more single-high on third down, but as is the case with the Ravens, they play what works for them and they don’t change a lot from a systemic point in a situational sense. 

Packers quarterback Jordan Love has been as good as anybody playing his position in the second half of the season, but even the best quarterbacks can be made uncomfortable when faced with the right concepts in concert. In Week 2 against the Los Angeles Rams and Matthew Stafford, the 49ers got an interception by disguising their intentions. Stafford is a 15-year NFL veteran with as developed a sense of what defenses will do as any quarterback you’ll ever meet, but here, Steve Wilks’ defense won the day.

Stafford would have 2-Man coverage to deal with post-snap, but that wasn’t the look pre-snap. With a single-high safety, and linebacker Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw close to the line of scrimmage, Stafford probably thought he’d have something easy over the middle of the field. This was a four-man rush in which the 49ers plastered Stafford’s receivers all over the field, and cornerback Deommodore Lenoir jumped Stafford’s backside slant for the pick.

No matter the quarterback you’re facing, you have a better chance of beating him if your defense is creative enough to throw as many different looks at him as possible, with the discipline to have everyone together on their assignments. The Ravens and 49ers each have this on lock, and again, it’s probably not a coincidence that the two best overall teams in the Final Eight can say that about themselves.

In this week’s “Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” the guys get into both defenses, and how they’re able to switch things up at such a high level.

You can watch this week’s episode of “The Xs and Os,” featuring all the most important matchups of the divisional round, right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to “The Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

One (potentially) fatal flaw for each remaining playoff team

Each team in the divisional round is good enough to get there, but they all have potentially fatal flaws… and here they are.

Divisional round weekend is often regarded as the best weekend in football. The best eight teams are in action to determine who will play for the respective conference championships, and usually promises four really quality football games.

Every team is in this spot for a reason, but they all have an achilles heel that, if exploited, could turn their next mistake into the final act of their season.

The Xs and Os with Greg Cosell: Previewing the divisional round of the playoffs

In this week’s “Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” the guys preview all the big matchups in the NFL’s divisional round.

And then, there were eight! It’s time for the divisional round of the NFL playoffs. and Greg Cosell of NFL Films and ESPN’s NFL Matchup, and Doug Farrar of Touchdown Wire and the USA Today Sports Media Group, are here to get you ready for the most interesting matchups that could decide who advances to the conference championships.

Houston Texans at Baltimore Ravens: The Week 1 game between these two teams doesn’t mean a lot, because the Ravens were dealing with C.J. Stroud in his rookie debut, and Stroud is an alien at this point. The Ravens are aware, and here’s how they can counter the Texans’ outstanding defense. Also, both of these teams have a ton of great, underrated talent on defense.

Green Bay Packers at San Francisco 49ers: The Packers have seen desperately-needed defensive improvement over the last three weeks, but is that enough to stop Kyle Shanahan’s offense? And how will Jordan Love do against a San Francisco defense that doesn’t really have one type of staple coverage?

Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Detroit Lions: When these teams played in Week 6, Baker Mayfield had his worst game of the season. But this is a different Buccaneers team than it was then, and there are ways for Mayfield to engineer a different result. The problem for the Bucs is that Jared Goff has proven that he’s ready for whatever Todd Bowles throws at him.

Kansas City Chiefs at Buffalo Bills: The Bills have far too many injuries on defense, and Patrick Mahomes is finding winning concepts with at least one receiver, so this will have to be a Josh Allen game if the Bills are to advance.

You can watch this week’s episode of “The Xs and Os,” featuring all the most important matchups of the divisional round, right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to “The Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

4-Down Territory: Tua Tagovailoa, Mike McCarthy, Nick Sirianni, Worst of the Week

In this week’s “4-Down Territory,” the guys get into Tua Tagovailoa, Mike McCarthy, Nick Sirianni, and the Worst of the Week for the wild-card round.

Now that the wild-card round of the playoffs is over, it’s time once again for Doug Farrar of Touchdown Wire, and Kyle Madson of Niners Wire, to come to the table with their own unique brand of analysis in “4-Down Territory.”

This week, the guys have some serious questions to answer:

  1. What should the Miami Dolphins do with Tua Tagovailoa?
  2. Should this be the end for Mike McCarthy in Dallas?
  3. Has Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni become more an liability than an asset?
  4. What was our Worst of the Week?

You can watch this week’s “4-Down Territory” right here:

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You can also listen and subscribe to the “4-Down Territory” podcast on Spotify…

…and on Apple Podcasts.

NFL divisional round power rankings: Ravens, 49ers up top, with challengers everywhere

Divisional round power rankings! It’s time to rank the remaining eight teams ahead of divisional round weekend.

It is the best weekend in football. The eight best teams in the NFL duking it out for a chance to make it to their respective conference championship games. As the field gets thinner, so too does the margin for error for the remaining playoff teams. Here is how they stack up heading into divisional round weekend.

Browns’ refusal to adapt on defense cost them dearly against C.J. Stroud

The Browns lost their wild-card game against the Texans because Jim Schwartz, their usually brilliant DC, refused to adapt to C.J. Stroud.

If you were to point to one factor that ended the Cleveland Browns’ 2023 season with their 45-14 loss to the Houston Texans in the wild-card round, you might say that Joe Flacco’s pick-sixes on consecutive drives. That obviously wasn’t beneficial, but it’s important to note that the Texans already had a 24-14 lead before Flacco’s first pick-six with 6:05 left in the third quarter, and Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud had completed 11 of 16 passes for 236 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 151.0 in the first half alone.

As great as Stroud has been throughout his rookie season, this was a bit of a surprise. Jim Schwartz’s Browns defense came into this game ranked second in Defensive DVOA and second in Pass Defense DVOA, behind only the Baltimore Ravens in both instances. But Schwartz refused to bend to the one reality he had right in front of him — that Stroud was set up well to take advantage of the Browns’ primary coverage concept.

In the regular season, the Browns played single-high coverage — either Cover-1 or Cover-3 on 64% of their snaps, the NFL’s highest rate.

But C.J. Stroud against Cover-1 and Cover-3 in the regular season? Try 141 of 228 for 2,054 yards, 1,335 air yards, 11 touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 105.4. Only Dak Prescott and Lamar Jackson had higher passer ratings against middle-of-the-field closed coverage in the regular season.

How that played out in this game was in no way beneficial to Schwartz and his players. Stroud faced single-high coverage on 16 of his 21 passing attempts in the game, and at no time did Stroud have to deal with any kind of wrinkle pre-snap to post-snap to muddy the picture and delay his reads and throws.

The worst part may have been that this was the plan going in.

“I think playoffs come down to who can be themselves the best, if that makes sense,” Schwartz said last Wednesday. “Can we be the best version of ourselves versus the Texans being the best version of themselves? I think that’s when it’s all said and done. You’ve got 17 games under your belt. There’s not a whole lot you’re going to pull out that another team hasn’t seen. And really at this point of the year, people are going with what they do best. I think that has a lot to do with it. I really can’t worry about him and how he’ll treat the game.”

Sure, but assuming that a rookie quarterback (no matter how advanced) has already seen everything you might throw at him, so you’re just going to do your thing, no matter how good he might be against it? That’s a bit of a stretch, and in the end, that cost the Browns the game more than anything else.

Edge-rusher Myles Garrett confirmed this after the game.

“[Schwartz] said from the beginning he’s going to ride with what got us here, and he’s not going to change up. There’s not going to be any magic call that’s going to get us out of anything or get us through anything. I guess they were just doing things a little bit different that kept us off balance, and I think just the tempo which they were doing it, whether it was running the ball a little bit differently than we had expected, getting the ball out on time, trying to just delay us enough up front to get the ball to their skill players and make plays. We have to be able to make plays all across the field, not just up front or not just on the back end. It’s all together.”

And that’s the problem — you never want to be behind the schematic eight-ball when you don’t need to be. The play shown above is Stroud’s 27-yard completion to receiver John Metchie with 1:34 left in the first quarter; it was not the first or last time that Texans offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik’s single-high beaters foiled Cleveland’s attempts to stop them.

This 21-yard pass to receiver Nico Collins with 11:51 left in the first quarter — the Texans’ second offensive play of the game — had Collins running the deep over out of 21 personnel — two backs, one tight end, and two receivers. Noah Brown’s vertical route from the left side cleared safety Juan Thornhill, who had to watch Brown and Collins at the same time, and afforded Stroud an easy read and throw underneath, with cornerback Denzel Ward a step behind Collins.

Stroud’s 76-yard touchdown pass to tight end Brevin Jordan with 12:13 left in the first half was a simple leak to the flat out of 22 personnel — two tight end and two backs — but as Greg Cosell and I detailed in our game preview, the Browns will tend to gear up for the run against heavy personnel (hat tip to Robert Mays and Nate Tice of The Athletic Football Show for the actual numbers) no matter the down and distance. Slowik had to know this, and he had to know that if Schwartz didn’t flip the script, his young quarterback could feast. That’s what happened here.

This is not to malign Jim Schwartz as a defensive coordinator — he’s as responsible as anybody for the Browns’ turnaround this season. But Schwartz may spend some time this offseason wondering why he didn’t tailor his game plan more to Houston’s extraordinary young quarterback — and the offensive genius behind that quarterback’s most meaningful plays.

Desmond King II of Texans with helicopter tackle of Joe Flacco

Desmond King II went for a spin on top of Joe Flacco while tackling the Browns QB

It should have been Joe Flacco who was dizzy after the way the Houston Texans treated the veteran quarterback on Saturday.

Early in the romp by the AFC South champs’ win over the Cleveland Browns, Flacco took off on a short run.

He headed to the turf and was met by Desmond King II of the Texans.

Flacco was down and King was on top of him, spinning ’round and ’round.

The spin was reminiscent of another post season helicopter journey.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssrkObXkGbM

 

Joe Flacco makes the wrong kind of history with back-to-back pick-sixes

Joe Flacco’s consecutive pick-sixes put a pin in the Flacco renaissance, made postseason history, and advanced the Texans to the divisional round.

Well, the Joe Flacco renaissance was nice while it lasted.

The Cleveland Browns are on their way to being forcibly eliminated from the playoffs by the Houston Texans, and if Houston quarterback C.J. Stroud’s brilliance wasn’t enough to make that happen, Flacco threw pick-sixes on back-to-back drives.

There was this Steven Nelson 82-yard return touchdown with 6:05 left in the third quarter, predicated by pressure from Derek Barnett:

And then, this 36-yarder from linebacker Christian Harris on a throw Flacco telegraphed like Samuel Morse.

Flacco is the fifth quarterback in the Super Bowl era to throw two pick-sixes in a postseason game…

…and he may be the only quarterback to do so on back-to-back plays.

Houston Texans with back-to-back pick-sixes of Joe Flacco

Joe Flacco threw a pick-six and the Browns were in a deep hole against the Texans

The magic of Joe Flacco has faded. Big time.

The Cleveland Browns quarterback committed major gaffes in the third quarter of their playoff game on Saturday with the Houston Texans.

The veteran was under pressure when he threw a pass that wound up in the hands of Houston’s Steven Nelson.

The Texans’ DB was off and running, going 82 yards for the score. After the PAT it was 31-14 for the Texans past the midway point of the third quarter.

It was the ninth pick thrown by Flacco since he was signed by the Browns and had the team rolling.

The next time the Browns had the football they faced a fourth-and-2 and Flacco connected with Christian Harris.

The problem is he plays for the Texans.

Harris returned it 36 yards for a score and after the PAT the Texans were romping, 38-14.

The pick-sixes came 1:59 apart in the third quarter.

C.J. Stroud has been killing single-high coverage all season, and the Browns didn’t get it

C.J. Stroud and the Texans chopped up the Browns’ usually stingy defense in the first half, and here’s how they did it.

Before Saturday’s wild-card game between the Houston Texans and the Cleveland Browns got started, it was clear that one key factor was going to be how often the Browns play single-high coverage vs. how Texans rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud demolishes one-deep stuff.

The Browns played single-high on 64% of their defensive snaps in the regular season, the NFL’s highest rate. But Stroud against Cover-1 and Cover-3 in the regular season? He completed 141 of 228 for 2,054 yards, 1,335 air yards, 11 touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 105.4 – only Dak Prescott and Lamar Jackson have higher passer ratings against Middle-of-the-field closed coverage this season.

It took little time for Stroud to show his mastery of single-high stuff in this game. With 11 seconds left in the first quarter, Stroud hit receiver Nico Collins on this fake-toss/Tunnel screen for a 15-yard touchdown.

The Browns had Juan Thornhill as their only deep safety.

Then, with 12:00 left in the first half, Stroud completed this 76-yard touchdown to tight end Brevin Jordan.

This time, Ronnie Hickman was the only deep safety on the bootleg pass.

Not that Schwartz moving to two-high helped much. Stroud’s third touchdown pass of the first half — a 37-yarder to tight end Dalton Schultz — saw the Browns with two deep safeties, and some miscommunication issues. Meanwhile, Stroud was once again showing outstanding deep touch when required.

At the half, Stroud was already setting rookie postseason records against one of the NFL’s stingiest defenses. And offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik is putting together quite a head coach resume.