Our “Getting Home” series takes a deeper look a the strategies behind blitzing in the NFL. This is Part 4, which explains why simulated creeper pressures are gaining popularity. Part 1 explained why pressure is so important. Part 2 covers protection basics and how defenses manipulate them. Part 3 is a look at Bill Belichick’s vaunted “Cover 0 blitzes.” Part 5 examines how NFL blitz packages might evolve.
Around this time last year, the Cleveland Browns were being hyped as possible Super Bowl contenders. It didn’t last long. About three hours into the start of the season the wheels had already fallen off the bandwagon after a 43-13 loss at the hands of the Titans.
It wasn’t so much that the Browns had lost to Tennessee; one loss generally does not kill the sort of hype Cleveland had going into the year. It was how the Browns lost. And how an unheralded Titans defense made Baker Mayfield, who had been billed as the next great young quarterback during the offseason, look so uncomfortable throughout the 30-point drubbing.
In Part 3 of this series, we covered Sam Darnold’s “seeing ghosts” game. We may not have audio of Baker saying he was seeing ghosts, but, at times, it appeared he was dealing with supernatural entities. How else do you explain a quarterback throwing off his back foot in a clean pocket against a three-man rush?
It wasn’t ghosts — or even an onslaught of actual pass rushers, like Darnold faced against the Patriots — that had Mayfield panicking against phantom pressure, though. It was Tennessee’s package of simulated pressures, or “creepers,” that had his head spinning.
I wrote about creeper pressures last offseason, suggesting they could help NFL teams strike the perfect balance between pass rush and coverage, but there was one glaring omission in my coverage: A mention of recently retired Titans defensive coordinator Dean Pees, the NFL’s foremost creeper enthusiast. I swear that’s a compliment.
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No NFL team ran more creepers than the Titans did in 2019. And, more importantly, they worked! Tennessee allowed 0.08 Expected Points per dropback on all plays last season. Against creepers, Titans opponents averaged -0.29 EPA per dropback. Opposing quarterbacks averaged only 3.7 Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt. For the season, the Titans defensive ANY/A was 6.2. So Tennessee’s pass defense was nearly two times better when it was throwing a creeper pressure at an offense.
Pees’ defense was not unique in that regard. It was true for the league as a whole. Defenses allowed -0.05 EPA per drop back on these simulated pressures. Compare that to the overall league average of 0.06. The Dolphins are probably the best example of how useful creepers can be for a defense that lacks pass-rushing talent. Miami was near the top of the league in usage and finished with an EPA of -0.31 on those plays. On all dropbacks, the Dolphins allowed 0.24 EPA per play, worst in the NFL.
If you haven’t read my piece from last offseason, you’re probably wondering, OK, what the hell is a creeper? Good question. Here’s how Ron Roberts, Baylor’s new defensive coordinator and college football’s godfather of simulated pressures, defines them:
“It’s bringing somebody that’s not accounted for in the traditional three-down or four-down [front],” Roberts told Chris Vasseur on his Make Defense Great Again podcast. “Bringing somebody else and not sacrificing coverage. Not having to sacrifice and play fire zone or man coverage and still get to the point attack and get the pressure you’re looking for.”
In other words, the defense is sending a standard four-man rush but dropping at least one traditional pass rusher — it can be a defensive lineman or stand-up edge rusher — into coverage and sending a second- or third-level defender, like a linebacker or defensive back, after the quarterback.
Let’s draw one up. Here’s a creeper the Titans used against the Browns in that Week 1 game:
If it seems like there’s a lot going on there, imagine being a quarterback trying to sort it all out in real-time. Tennessee is sending a corner blitz and rotating to a standard Tampa 2 coverage behind it. Here’s how it plays out on the field.
In Part 2 of this series, we looked at how defenses try to overload protections using blitzes. Well, these creepers allow the defense to accomplish the same goal without actually taking a player out of coverage to do it. An added benefit is that the quarterback doesn’t immediately realize what’s going on. He sees traditional pass rushers dropping and second-level defenders rushing — which is generally a tell for the much-used fire zone blitz (more on that in Part 5) — and the “BLITZ!” alarm goes off in his mind, sending him into panic mode — and when he tries to throw quickly, he’s actually throwing into full coverage.
“The guy who is supposed to be the read for the quarterback, all of a sudden I’m firing him and dropping something into that same spot, it can create a lot of problems for the kid pulling the trigger,” says Roberts. “It’s post-snap, my ability to put the ball in the quarterback’s hands and not have to make a call against the offensive coordinator.”
On that balmy Sunday in Cleveland, Mayfield vs. Pees was a total mismatch. The Titans called seven creepers during the game. Mayfield was sacked on three of those plays and threw interceptions on two others. The seven plays (here’s a playlist of them all) resulted in -10.77 Expected Points or -1.54 EPA per play.
It’s hard to fault a second-year quarterback for struggling to figure out what the crafty veteran play-caller was throwing at him. Mayfield’s eyes weren’t necessarily going to the wrong spots based on what he was seeing. For an example, let’s look at the third sack he took during the game.
The Browns are running a four verticals concept with a six-man, half-slide protection. If you read Part 2 of this series, you should have a good idea of what that means. If not, it just means that part of the line is sliding one way and sorting out pass rushers using a zone approach, and the remaining linemen are blocking specific pass rushers with the running back scanning for a sixth rusher.
Using Mike Tice’s “basketball rules,” also covered in Part 2, let’s figure out which players could give the protection trouble if they rush. To the strongside, Tennessee appears to be a man short. That would typically mean that the edge rusher isn’t coming. If he does, there’s nobody to cover the tight end. The Browns should be good on that side and sliding to the opposite side is a safe bet.
The ball is snapped and something funny happens. Only one rusher is coming on that weak side and the Browns are wasting three offensive linemen on one dude. Oops.
Meanwhile, on the other side, the Titans are sending three with only two blockers to pick them up and the running back scrambling to get over there to pick up the extra guy.
Mayfield does the right thing, in theory, and looks to throw hot but …
Crap. His hot receiver is covered (by a linebacker who’d been lined up over the center, showing blitz), and he has no choice but to take a sack.
So, the Titans were able to overload that side of the protection AND get all the receivers. That’s not supposed to happen! I wouldn’t have blamed Mayfield for thinking there were 12 Titans on the field for that play. That’s the beauty of these pressures.
Another benefit is that they force the offense to keep the back in to block, which doesn’t happen a whole lot against a standard four-man rush. Modern offenses want to get all five eligible receivers out into the route because it makes it easier to stretch the defense’s coverages. With no back running out to the flats, second-level zone defenders aren’t in conflict, and the quarterback loses an emergency outlet if the pass rush gets home quickly.
While defenses typically reserve blitzes for obvious passing downs — when offenses are forced to push the ball downfield and therefore don’t take advantage of the vacated areas underneath — Roberts says that creepers are useful in any down and distance. The only thing changing based on down-and-distance, he says, is the coverage behind the pressure pattern. Pees seems to agree, as the Titans’ usage of creepers was fairly evenly split across downs.
Now, I’m not suggesting a defense makes the whole plane out of creepers, but it’s a tool that should be in every team’s toolbox. That’s especially true for the teams that don’t have elite-level pass rushers on the edge, which is a majority of the NFL. If you’re the 49ers and have a billion first-round picks on the line, then, by all means, send a traditional four-man rush every down. If not, it’s time to start earning that paycheck…
“Sometimes if you have an elite pass rusher on the edge, you’re gonna kinda leave him to do what he does,” Pees told Midday 180 shortly after the 2019 season. “You kind of take the scheme out of it and you kind of keep him out of it and maybe scheme with other people. When you don’t have that, you scheme everybody. So it’s kind of fun as a coach to have to do that.
“I’ll refer back to the 2012 Baltimore team. People don’t realize we were without Ray Lewis for 10 games that year. We didn’t have Suggs for eight. And we did a lot of scheming with guys you’ve never heard of and yet it got us to a Super Bowl.”
Pees retired after the Titans’ loss to the Chiefs in the AFC title game, so Tennessee will be relying on … well, some combination of coaches to try to replicate his success. Titans coach Mike Vrabel did not name a defensive coordinator to replace Pees, though veteran coach Jim Haslett did join the staff to coach inside linebackers.
Creepers, or simulated pressures, are by no means a new concept. Roberts says Memphis coach Joe Lee Dunn was running them back in 1990. But they have grown in popularity at the college level over the past few seasons. Last summer I predicted they would migrate more to the pro ranks. And based on the success NFL defenses had with them in 2019, I expect that trend to continue.
In the final part of this series, we’ll look at some other trends that could gain traction in the NFL and what the evolution of pressure could mean for the future of the league.
