From October on, the Ravens were the best team in football. They were the best team in football by a wide margin. They had the best player, Lamar Jackson, who will win the NFL’s MVP award in a few weeks. They had the best passing offense. They had one of the best running games in the history of the league. Over the second half of the season, their defense was among the best in the NFL.
The Ravens were a heavy favorite to win the Super Bowl, and rightfully so.
If Baltimore was going to suffer defeat in the playoffs, it was going to be at the hands of a worthy adversary, like Kansas City and its juggernaut offense or San Francisco and its world-devouring defense. It certainly wasn’t going to be the Titans, who snuck into the playoffs in Week 17, that knocked off the AFC’s No. 1 seed. Not a chance.
Sure, Tennessee’s offense had broken out over the second half of the season and Derrick Henry was steam-rolling every defense put in front of him. But the Titans defense was no match for the NFL’s best offense, and that, ultimately, would do them in.
Well, you know what happened next. The Ravens are out. One and done after a 28-12 loss at home.
That league-leading offense? It was held to its lowest scoring output of the season. Outside of a few big plays by Jackson, the running game never really got going. And Jackson turned the ball over three times. Tennessee’s defense didn’t just play well. It dominated the NFL’s best offense in its own stadium.
So how did a Titans defense that ranked 16th in DVOA pull it off? It wasn’t through X’s and O’s magic, as one might have suspected. Tennessee was able to expose Baltimore’s (few) offensive weaknesses and make the Ravens play a game they hadn’t played all season.
The Titans’ defensive gameplan
Last week, I wrote a piece about how the Titans could confuse Jackson with their disguised coverages. If you were looking at the box score, you might think I got that one right. But, after further review, I can say that I didn’t. For one, Jackson did an excellent job of reading the defense when he dropped back to pass. And, two, Titans defensive coordinator Dean Pees kept things relatively simple all game.
Tennessee didn’t vary its coverages often, especially on key downs. Pees did throw the occasional simulated pressure at the Ravens but he mostly played man coverage in obvious passing situations. Star FS Kevin Byard would play the deep middle while emerging LB Rashaan Evans lurked as an additional coverage player underneath.
Evans was also tasked with spying Jackson in case he left the pocket. But first, he’d look to cut off receivers running those crossing routes the Ravens have been killing teams with all season. Once he disrupted those routes, he’d lock his eyes on Jackson in the pocket.
Evans did a fantastic job as a spy. There was really only one bad play, where the second-year linebacker got a little too aggressive and let Jackson break the pocket for a big gain.
That was Tennessee’s go-to coverage on passing downs. On early downs, the Titans mostly stayed in a “quarters” look with the safeties playing about 10 yards off the line, where they were able to crash down into the box against the run or help out on slot receivers against the pass.
The Titans played zone coverage almost exclusively on early downs. They would change up their front based on the personnel on the field, though. When the Ravens had four pass-catchers (WRs or TEs) on the field, the Titans would play nickel (5 DBs), and play with four defenders on the line — two tackles with their hands in the dirt and two stand-up edge rushers.
When the Ravens added an extra running back (or blocking tight end Nick Boyle), Pees would match them with base personnel and call a three-man front. On most of those snaps, the Titans would line up their ends on the inside shoulder of the offensive tackles and play the interior lineman head up on the center. In the college game, this is referred to as the Tite front (I wrote over the summer that it might emerge in the NFL).
The Titans would defend the Ravens’ dangerous option run game differently based on the front they were playing. When they had the four-man line, the Titans would use a “scrape exchange,” where the end crashes down toward the back — forcing the QB to pull the ball — and a linebacker (or sometimes a box safety) goes outside where he’d, in theory, be in position to tackle the quarterback.
That wasn’t very effective as Jackson was able to beat Tennessee’s defenders to the edge on a few runs.
But Tennesse’s other front — that gap-clogging three-down look — was effective. There were no open gaps inside and the Titans had enough bodies on the perimeter to discourage runs out there.
And … that about covers the entire defensive gameplan. It wasn’t a terribly complicated plan; instead, it was one that put the onus on the Titans players to out-execute the Ravens players.
Well, they did. And it started up front…
Tennessee’s defensive line dominated
If there was one major weakness for the Ravens offense coming into the playoffs, it was the interior line. The center and left guard position, to be more specific. Obviously, RG Marshall Yanda is an all-pro and future hall of famer, but LG Bradley Bozeman and C Patrick Mekari looked like liabilities on paper and it played out like that on the field.
Tennessee’s defensive linemen had their way with Baltimore’s line. They consistently help up Ravens blockers and prevented them from getting to the second level. That kept Titans linebackers clean all game. Evans, Wesley Woodyard and rookie David Long Jr. rarely had to defeat blocks to get to ball carriers. The Titans seemed to have at least two free hitters on every run play.
Even Baltimore’s stellar tackle pair struggled at times. RT Orlando Brown got beat inside for a sack, and LT Ronnie Stanley gave up the strip-sack that pretty much put the game out of reach.
But it was the failure of the interior line that really set the Ravens back. They could not handle Tennessee’s odd front, which forced Baltimore out of its comfort zone. Knowing that the Ravens couldn’t run against the Titans’ base personnel, Greg Roman was forced to play the most three-receiver sets he played all season. The Ravens were in 11 personnel (1 RB, 1 TE, 3 WR) on just over 75% of their snaps on Saturday. Over the second half of the season, they were in 11 personnel on just 37% of their snaps, the lowest rate in the playoff field, per Sports Info Solutions.
With fewer running backs and tight ends on the field, the Ravens couldn’t really get to their expansive play-action package and had to rely on more quick dropback passes. That’s not really the strength of the offense. Jackson did well on those plays, but he could only do so much against the Titans’ man coverage.
The Ravens receivers couldn’t get open
When a defense plays man coverage, it forces the opposing receivers to win. Outside of scrambling, there’s not much a quarterback can do if his receivers are not getting separation. Well, that was the case on Saturday night. The Titans were able to play man coverage whenever they wanted and Baltimore’s limited receiving corps — which had been buoyed by play-action fakes all season — was exposed. Jackson was routinely forced to throw into tight windows and when it came down to who could make a play — the Ravens receiver or Titans defensive back — it was almost always the latter.
Tennessee tallied eight pass breakups, which is on the high side. Throw in the untimely drops and it’s easy to see why Jackson’s stat line wasn’t all that impressive. But outside of a few wayward throws and the strip-sack, the second-year quarterback mostly played well. The rest of his supporting cast did not, but he still managed to put up nearly 500 yards of offense. The only other Ravens who played a good game was rookie receiver Marquis Brown, who came up with a number of big plays, including this ridiculous one-handed grab that set up Baltimore’s first points.
The rest of the Ravens skill players picked the wrong time to not show up. It wasn’t just in the passing game, either. The receivers and tight ends did not block well, which limited the explosive running plays that had powered Baltimore’s offense all season.
Several Titans defenders showed up big
While several Ravens skill players picked a terrible time to play their worst games, the opposite was true for several Titans defenders. The entire unit played well, but three players stood out to me. The first was Evans, who did a good job of chasing Jackson all over the field, both as a spy and a contain player in the run game…
Kamalei Correa also did a tremendous job of tracking Jackson in the run game. The former Raven might be one of the best athletes at the edge position. His agility served him well on several plays. He was able to change direction and take down Jackson for a handful of stops.
The safeties, Kevin Byard and Kenny Vaccaro, came up with the two interceptions, but Adoree Jackson may have been the star of the secondary. He made THREE impressive pass breakups that prevented big plays.
His coverage on the speedy Brown allowed Pees to stick in those single-high man coverages that afforded his corners no help on the outside, which allowed the Titans to have an extra run defender in the box.
****
The Ravens were clearly the better of the two teams throughout the season, but matchups matter and this was obviously a bad one for the favorites. The Titans have a dominant interior line that could expose the one big flaw on Baltimore’s offense. Their corners were good enough to hold up in man coverage against a fast but underwhelming receiving corps. And Pees’ smart (but not groundbreaking) gameplan forced the Ravens into a Plan B.
The answer to that question everyone was asking Saturday night — How did the Titans defense pull this off? — is not some indictment on Lamar Jackson’s passing ability or the way the Ravens run their organization. The answer is actually kind of a letdown: Tennessee simply out-played Baltimore.
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