Offseason Film analysis thread - Passing concepts

So, I had talked about it in a couple other threads that I've been working exhaustively through last seasons film analysis to identify which passing concepts are CK's strengths and weaknesses. I've also been trying to do a lot of study on his footwork - primarily in his timing, and mechanics. I've gotten through 11 of 16 games last year - I'm not planning on watching the last Ari game as I'm not sure there's a whole lot to glean from that. But, I've found out quite a few things.

Our passing game - in particular CK's ability to go through his concepts - was much better at the beginning of the season than at the end. But, there were some problems that you could see at the beginning of the season that just got exacerbated as the season progressed. I'll be highlighting more stuff from the Seattle games because those games make the weaknesses more glaring. He seems to struggle worse on the things he already struggles with against Seattle and it provides good examples of concepts that he struggles with overall.

I do ask that throughout this, let's not make this about how plain/vanilla/inept the O-staff was and that all the blame will land there - that's not the point of this thread. These are passing concepts used by just about every NFL team and most of them were created by Bill Walsh.

I did find a few "bread and butter" passing plays that we used more than others - I'll point those out as we get further along.

To the analysis:
concept struggles:
Smash concept. The smash concept, in theory is fairly simple. It provides a hi/lo stretch against a zone defender. It should work well against cover 3 zone because the inside receiver usually runs a corner route and the flat zone defender has to protect against the short out from that defender as well as the slot curl. This means - the read should be fairly simple against the corner - if the corner plays the WR curl aggressively the corner route will be open and if the corner protects against the corner route - you have the WR wide outside of the flat defender with an open throwing lane.
Out of the plays I counted I gave CK a positive rating on only 37.5% of smash concept plays. That positive rating was only based off the read of the play - not necessarily his footwork. He still missed a couple of the throws because the timing of his footwork was just a little off. So, for the "smash" concept, he successfully passed on 25% of our attempts. One of his problems off the smash is that he'll wait to long to redlight the corner route and go for the curl.

Levels concept: The levels concept is another passing concept that should work well for us since we primarily see zone coverages - and typically a cover 3 zone. Often times, the cover 3 zone will provide to shallow middle coverage players. Your levels concept is able to work an area of the underneath coverage and is a short/mid route combo. It's similar to the smash concept in that it creates a hi/lo stretch against an underneath defender. The key to working this play against the cover 3 zone is to look off the backside mid zone defender and quickly recognize if the playside defender is playing underneath or over the top coverage in this zone. Out of the plays that we ran a levels concept I gave CK a positive rating on 52% of these plays, negative rating on 32% and 16% were times where he made the correct read but his footwork and mechanics were off.

Flood concept: This is another one that should be a strong play for us. It floods an area of the field with deep, mid and short route to create a 3-2 stretch against the defense. However, we didn't run it a ton, but also did not have much success at all. I gave CK a positive rating on only 25% of flood plays. He was given a negative rating on 50% and moderate rating on 25% - again, due to poor footwork.

Verticals: This is another zone busting concept that we should excel at. Since we see a LOT of cover zone the idea is to send 2 vertical routes per side of the field. It can take the form of either 4 verticals 2 verticals on one side with another concept of the other. The idea is that, if the safety is looked off from a half field vertical, it creates a 2-1 horizontal and vertical stretch of the defense. If 4 verticals, the read is usually against the FS, whichever side the FS takes, or whichever way the QB looks the FS off towards, the throw is to the opposite vertical as it creates a 4-3 deep horizontal stretch against the defense. Of the verts we ran I gave CK a positive rating on only 43% of plays. With a negative rating on 36% an ok rating on 21%.

concept Ok's: These are the plays that he did Ok at, wouldn't say they are a strength or weakness.
Speedo concept: He did alright, there wasn't a high volume of plays to pick from, but, he did ok on most of them. He had 40% negative on these plays.

curl/flat concept: Another Ok concept for him. Had very few negative plays. Only 14%.

Spot concept: He didn't have a high positive rate, but didn't have many negative ratings. 14% negative, 43% positive and 43% ok.

Concept strengths:
Curls: A nice play for us as it creates a horizontal stretch of the defense and is a quick hitting play to get a receiver in space. 57% positive, 36% negative

Slide concept: A play that works well off play action to get the defense into a horizontal movement 1 direction while sending receiver in a flood type levels pattern the opposite direction. 75% positive and 25% negative.

I'll be highlighting film of these plays to show different things. Hopefully I'll be able to add more info as the offseason progresses. The games I've looked at took me quite a long time to do as this has been a project going on 10-11 weeks now. Basically, 1 game a week. This should give us a lot to talk about and somewhat of an idea what CK worked on in Arizona.

Here's an example of CK's struggles in in the "smash" concept.


This was late in the 1st Sea game, Sherman's 2nd INT - it was a gift from CK to seal the game. I really like the design of this play, it gives CK 2 concepts in 1 to work. He gets 2 curls along with the inside corner route to work a smash concept with a horizontal curls stretch added in. On these plays you should always be "alert" for the corner route against man-coverage. You see it's man coverage pre-snap based off of Dick's alignment. He's in press, squared up on the receiver, this means man coverage - along with the alignment of the LB's. They're going to "Spy" CK as well.


You see just after the snap how the corner route has an advantage. VD's working against Chancellor and Chancellor's in a tough spot having to defend both the mid-in and corner routes.


an aside - If Ck was deep in his film study, he would've seen what I've seen from Dick Sherman - that is, in man coverage, Sherman's COD isn't great. He's very susceptible to curls in man coverage. The one route you don't throw against Sherman in man coverage is the streak.... You see here how it held true, Johnson is able to get decent seperation on Sherman and is turned completely around, ready for a ball while Sherman is still face the other way....

anyhoo, you see how Ck has a nice pocket to step up in to. Staley did what he should, he took the speed rush upfield past the QB. Davis loses Chancellor with a nifty in/out move.


CK has a nice pocket and Davis has lost his man towards the corner, but, instead, he's fleeing the pocket. also, by now, Sherman's ready to drive on the curl route that CK is bailing out towards.


Davis beat Chancellor so bad that he fell down. VD probably goes in for a TD if CK stayed in the pocket and worked the play. Instead, he bails out to the opposite side with the "spy" waiting for him. I've omitted the last part of the play as it can be disturbing for some viewers. But, CK basically throws the ball straight at Sherman.

Here's an interesting flood design we dialed up against Sea that worked well, but, CK misses the receiver again.


We're going to run a deep hitch from the outside receiver and then run Boldin on a wheel route and send Miller into the flat off play action. This is a flood type of play but I like the wrinkle we throw in with the wheel route to create a horizontal stretch against the corner.


You see how the play action sucks up the LB's Now we have 3 receivers in a space of 2 defenders.


The mid level defender has his eyes on Boldin, this creates an opening between the numbers and the hash.



If Ck delivers the throw to Lloyd of a timing 5 plus hitch step - he only took 5 steps, not the hitch - as I'm sure the play called for, he'd have Lloyd wide open for a minimum of a 14 yard gain.


You see how wide open Lloyd was, but, instead, CK takes off running - why???


By the time he brings his eyes back up to look for Lloyd, Maxwell is in a position to drive on the ball.


So, he takes off for what's a 3 yard gain.

Good stuff, jonnydel. Be sure to check out all the Sucker and Spot concepts the 49ers ran last season. Those worked a number of times. I agree there were a crap load of Curls ran to get a horizontal stretch versus underneath zone defenders. Easily, the zone coverage that the 49ers saw the most was cover3.

edit: I see you did mention Spot in your OP.

Great info! Keep up the great work

Here's an example of what he can work on in his verticals concept.


Here, we're just gonna run 4 verticals. It creates a horizontal stretch of the defense as you have 4 receivers in a 3 defender zone. When AS took over for Shaun Hill, we ran this play a LOT and it had great success. This is when VD really emerged, because he was such a weapon up the seam against cover 3 zone.

the primary read is going to be on the FS as the key defender. Whichever side the safety helps to, the QB hits the opposite side seam.


On this play, we run play action to open up even more space to get the LB's out of the throwing lane.


You can see Earl Thomas opens up to VD's side as VD has the inside leverage on his side. This means the throw should go to McDonald.


This is at the moment of CK's windup. You can see the open area for McDonald and Maxwell has his head turned to Lloyd and you can see the back of Thomas' jersey. He should be throwing it to McDonald - easy. But, instead, he's throwing it to Lloyd. Why? I have no idea.


This is where McDonald would be about the time the ball arrived -if Ck threw the ball to him.


Instead, Lloyd has to make a tough adjustment to the ball with the defender right there - incomplete pass.

jonnydel, can you detail what constitutes a positive rating for your concept grades? In your OP, you mentioned that for Levels, "positive rating on 52% of these plays, negative rating on 32% and 16% were times where he made the correct read but his footwork and mechanics were off."

For example: Smash is run versus cover1 (similar to the play in post#2), but there is a man busting concept on the other side of the field. If Kap looks to the man buster, but the Smash (corner) becomes open, is he given a negative rating? In this situation, I might give a no grade because he properly looked to the man buster versus cover1.

Just trying to understand your criteria.

Money thread.

Thanks, JD.

Don't forget about the SPOT concept in the very 1st play of the game vs. the Raiders that he f**ked up.

Great work...it felt like slide was a great concept for kap. Gives him easy targets and a run/boot option.



The above play is a perfect example of slide. Of course for kap, this would be flipped because this play is designed for Steve from the 1994 offense. You can run this from any formation you want and the results are usually positive. This needs to be a core play going forward.

Originally posted by defenderDX:

Don't forget about the SPOT concept in the very 1st play of the game vs. the Raiders that he f**ked up.

Yea that was butchered....that was kap pressing the weight of all the Harbs BS kilked this team.

Originally posted by thl408:
jonnydel, can you detail what constitutes a positive rating for your concept grades? In your OP, you mentioned that for Levels, "positive rating on 52% of these plays, negative rating on 32% and 16% were times where he made the correct read but his footwork and mechanics were off."

For example: Smash is run versus cover1 (similar to the play in post#2), but there is a man busting concept on the other side of the field. If Kap looks to the man buster, but the Smash (corner) becomes open, is he given a negative rating? In this situation, I might give a no grade because he properly looked to the man buster versus cover1.

Just trying to understand your criteria.

good point, thanks for bringing that to my attention. Here's how I grade him.

What I did was look at what concept was being employed, look at the defense he was facing and where/if he threw the ball. So, for example, if he was given a "smash" concept on one side and it was a zone play, if he made the right read and completed the pass - I gave him a positive grading. If he made the right read but missed the throw - it was an "ok" grade. If he made the wrong read - I gave him a negative grade. If he ignored the concept side and completed the pass - it was an ok grade. If he ignored the concept side and the concept side was open and the pass was incomplete, it was a negative grade. If he moved on from the concept side because the pre-snap read showed the concept was defeated and completed the pass, it was a positive grade.

For plays where he had multiple concepts working - like you stated above, one concept on one side and another on the other(which didn't happen as much as I thought it would, maybe 15% of the time). Then I graded him on similar criteria for each of the concepts involved.

Originally posted by Niners816:
Great work...it felt like slide was a great concept for kap. Gives him easy targets and a run/boot option.



The above play is a perfect example of slide. Of course for kap, this would be flipped because this play is designed for Steve from the 1994 offense. You can run this from any formation you want and the results are usually positive. This needs to be a core play going forward.

I still have 5 1/2 games to work through, but, so far, I haven't seen a ton of side concept stuff. Sometimes though, there's a penalty on the play and I don't grade those plays - which it's not too uncommon to get penalties on different players on slide concepts because of all the movement. I did briefly mention the slide in my OP though. I just didn't have a high enough volume of plays in the games I watched to actually come to any sort of conclusion. There were only 5 slide concepts I counted in the games I watched - that didn't have any penalties involved.

Originally posted by defenderDX:
Don't forget about the SPOT concept in the very 1st play of the game vs. the Raiders that he f**ked up.

I still need to analyze the Raiders, Giants, Redskins, 2nd Ari game, and 2nd Sea game and half of one of the Rams games. So, his numbers may actually go down on the gradings because, as I remember, our offensive production was pretty low in all those games.

Originally posted by jonnydel:

Originally posted by thl408:
jonnydel, can you detail what constitutes a positive rating for your concept grades? In your OP, you mentioned that for Levels, "positive rating on 52% of these plays, negative rating on 32% and 16% were times where he made the correct read but his footwork and mechanics were off."

For example: Smash is run versus cover1 (similar to the play in post#2), but there is a man busting concept on the other side of the field. If Kap looks to the man buster, but the Smash (corner) becomes open, is he given a negative rating? In this situation, I might give a no grade because he properly looked to the man buster versus cover1.

Just trying to understand your criteria.

good point, thanks for bringing that to my attention. Here's how I grade him.

What I did was look at what concept was being employed, look at the defense he was facing and where/if he threw the ball. So, for example, if he was given a "smash" concept on one side and it was a zone play, if he made the right read and completed the pass - I gave him a positive grading. If he made the right read but missed the throw - it was an "ok" grade. If he made the wrong read - I gave him a negative grade. If he ignored the concept side and completed the pass - it was an ok grade. If he ignored the concept side and the concept side was open and the pass was incomplete, it was a negative grade. If he moved on from the concept side because the pre-snap read showed the concept was defeated and completed the pass, it was a positive grade.

For plays where he had multiple concepts working - like you stated above, one concept on one side and another on the other(which didn't happen as much as I thought it would, maybe 15% of the time). Then I graded him on similar criteria for each of the concepts involved.

Understood. And you are right about the 15% of the time. The 49ers ran 3x1 with a lone WR on the backside, about 85% of the time - not exactly a concept in terms of route combination on the backside.