Analysis from Seahawks Game coaches film

The 49ers attacked the underneath zone of SEA with the 'all-curls' concept designed to horizontally stretch the field. It puts stress on the underneath zone defenders and tries to create an out numbered situation on the LBs playing zone.

Below:
2Q 2:13 2nd&7
49ers: 21 personnel (Crabs on top, Boldin in slot)
SEA: cover 3, zone under

The 49ers call an all-curl play where every WR (and TE) runs curl routes. The thought process is that SEA will be in zone coverage underneath (LBs playing zone). SEA comes with a 5 man rush which removes a route runner due to Miller and Gore having blitz pickup responsibilities. The concept still stays true here.


Below: As the play develops, it is the perfect call against this coverage scheme. Notice the stretching action that the curl routes create. It puts all the WRs at the same depth downfield. The 3 deep zone defenders are rendered useless (X'ed) as they cover grass. It creates a 1 on 1 scenario horizontally across the field. The WRs sit down in their routes and find the soft spots in their respective area of the field. Kap fires a pass to Boldin (slot) for a 10 yard gain.


The play in full: Notice one of the ILBs seems to overlap another ILB's zone. This should not have happened if they played their zones correctly. Regardless, there is plenty of separation and Kap can choose any curl target he wants. 10 yard gain to Boldin.




Below:
3Q 6:27 1st&10
49ers: 21 personnel - (Crabs on top, Boldin in slot)
SEA: cover1, man

Below: The 49ers use the same formation to run the same play. This time SEA is in a different coverage call, man coverage. The all curls concept is designed to beat zone coverage, not man coverage. And we will see the play call fail here.


Below: Notice that there is very little separation. Nothing for Kap to throw to as he completes his dropback. He is pressured and has to scramble, but there isn't much separation from any of the WRs (Boldin, Crabs, Ham). Kap will end up scrambling to his right and get an ad-lib 4 yard catch by Crabs.


The play in full: Wrong call against man coverage. Kap does an excellent job making something of nothing.



These are examples of the same concept being ran against different coverages and how the results will be different. There are basically three ways to beat zone coverage - horizontal stretch, vertical stretch, and flooding. I hope to show some detailed examples of vertical stretching. We've seen the smash concept already (vertical stretch).

Originally posted by thl408:
The 49ers attacked the underneath zone of SEA with the 'all-curls' concept designed to horizontally stretch the field. It puts stress on the underneath zone defenders and tries to create an out numbered situation on the LBs playing zone.

Below:
2Q 2:13 2nd&7
49ers: 21 personnel (Crabs on top, Boldin in slot)
SEA: cover 3, zone under

The 49ers call an all-curl play where every WR (and TE) runs curl routes. The thought process is that SEA will be in zone coverage underneath (LBs playing zone). SEA comes with a 5 man rush which removes a route runner due to Miller and Gore having blitz pickup responsibilities. The concept still stays true here.


Below: As the play develops, it is the perfect call against this coverage scheme. Notice the stretching action that the curl routes create. It puts all the WRs at the same depth downfield. The 3 deep zone defenders are rendered useless (X'ed) as they cover grass. It creates a 1 on 1 scenario horizontally across the field. The WRs sit down in their routes and find the soft spots in their respective area of the field. Kap fires a pass to Boldin (slot) for a 10 yard gain.


The play in full: Notice one of the ILBs seems to overlap another ILB's zone. This should not have happened if they played their zones correctly. Regardless, there is plenty of separation and Kap can choose any curl target he wants. 10 yard gain to Boldin.




Below:
3Q 6:27 1st&10
49ers: 21 personnel - (Crabs on top, Boldin in slot)
SEA: cover1, man

Below: The 49ers use the same formation to run the same play. This time SEA is in a different coverage call, man coverage. The all curls concept is designed to beat zone coverage, not man coverage. And we will see the play call fail here.


Below: Notice that there is very little separation. Nothing for Kap to throw to as he completes his dropback. He is pressured and has to scramble, but there isn't much separation from any of the WRs (Boldin, Crabs, Ham). Kap will end up scrambling to his right and get an ad-lib 4 yard catch by Crabs.


The play in full: Wrong call against man coverage. Kap does an excellent job making something of nothing.



These are examples of the same concept being ran against different coverages and how the results will be different. There are basically three ways to beat zone coverage - horizontal stretch, vertical stretch, and flooding. I hope to show some detailed examples of vertical stretching. We've seen the smash concept already (vertical stretch).

the 2nd play is the one I first highlighted at the beginning of this thread. Davis does have the inside leverage, Kaep just misses the read to man.

Excellent job of showing the horizontal concept. Also shows how much the game is a, "ok you do that, I'll do this" kind of chess match.

Originally posted by jonnydel:
the 2nd play is the one I first highlighted at the beginning of this thread. Davis does have the inside leverage, Kaep just misses the read to man.

Excellent job of showing the horizontal concept. Also shows how much the game is a, "ok you do that, I'll do this" kind of chess match.

Ah yes. I forgot to mention that. Post #3 breaks down the all-curl failed attempt. As you mentioned in that post, VD has inside leverage and Kap could have hit him. I mostly wanted to emphasize the concept being defeated by the coverage call. The QB reading leverage can make up for the 'bad' playcall.

Originally posted by thl408:
Ah yes. I forgot to mention that. Post #3 breaks down the all-curl failed attempt. As you mentioned in that post, VD has inside leverage and Kap could have hit him. I mostly wanted to emphasize the concept being defeated by the coverage call. The QB reading leverage can make up for the 'bad' playcall.

exactly, you have to give to Seattle though(man I hate to say that, I can't stand that team...) they had ran cover 3 zone most of the game and picked the right time to call man.

Originally posted by jonnydel:
There's a lot of examples from the Seattle game, I'll show some others from the Colts game as well.



Here we show a 2 deep safety read with press on the receivers. The outside corner on the 2 receiver side doesn't press cause you never want 2 defenders on the same level out there, sets up pick plays too easily... When we give this look we usually run cover 2 zone, we use the press to redirect routes not as a man coverage technique.



You see Asomgha get a great jam on the receiver at the bottom(I was impressed with his jam he literally pushed the receiver back a foot and a half, it was really violent and the receiver barely ran his route, on the flip side I also watched him whiff a couple jams later...) Bowman sees the RB stay in pass pro and drops into coverage, he and Willis work really well together to hand off the receiver in coverage as the play develops.



The inside receiver Holds Whitner in the middle of the field but Rogers keeps good technique with outside leverage on the slot receiver knowing he has help inside. Willis passes the defender off to Bowman and Reid sees the RB coming out of the backfield and starts to jump the route from his 2 deep zone coverage.



The D has held long enough for the pass rush to get there. Justin Smith clobbers Luck as he throws the ball, trying to hit the corner route but by the good coverage and the pressure from the pass rush it falls incomplete. This is a good example of team defense, the coverage helps the rush and the rush helps the coverage. I think Luck was expecting a cover 2 zone from the pre- snap read cause it looks like he is looking for the corner route with the curl underneath, which beats the cover 2 zone.

^^ Love this breakdown here and how Bow and Willis work together to seamlessly pass off coverage duty on a route runner. If there is one thing that is evident from your defensive coverage analysis, it's that the 49ers are very much about coverage disguise. Playing with a cushion can drive some of us crazy at times, but it supports that claim that the 49ers love to disguise coverage and not reveal their hand so early after the snap.

My thinking is that as the coverage is being disguised, and the QB is waiting...waiting...for some sort of indicator as to what the coverage is, the pass rush will make its presence known.

Originally posted by thl408:

Wow, look how OPEN (again) those delayed-flared out RB's are. Roman could literally make them AR's alone or teach CK that if his read isn't there, check down instantly instead of taking off and trying to buy time with his feet If we get Huner or even Gore out in space like this, they are going to make magic happen!

Thanks t!

PS: In the 2nd gif you can also see CK running out of the pocket for no reason other than trying to find his AR. Stay in the pocket, look to your check down.

Originally posted by thl408:
^^ Love this breakdown here and how Bow and Willis work together to seamlessly pass off coverage duty on a route runner. If there is one thing that is evident from your defensive coverage analysis, it's that the 49ers are very much about coverage disguise. Playing with a cushion can drive some of us crazy at times, but it supports that claim that the 49ers love to disguise coverage and not reveal their hand so early after the snap.

My thinking is that as the coverage is being disguised, and the QB is waiting...waiting...for some sort of indicator as to what the coverage is, the pass rush will make its presence known.

It just confirms your initial theory if nothing else. That said, it's still simple pitch-and-catch outside often and I've even seen QB's audible to quick outs b/c of these cushions. Is there a design where we can start out off the LOS but just before snap. creep up to the LOS? Or use a technique like Dick is using, literally, closer to the LOS, turned sideways to keep his eyes in the backfield and staying in position while he runs with the WR (using the sideline to his advantage)? He also ran a blitz off this same look.

And what the heck happened with our under-cutting CB reads? Rogers made a billion dollar contract on just doing that his first year here.

Bump! Great stuff! Giedi

I'm expecting this at least once a week now Jonnydel, keep it up.

Originally posted by NCommand:
It just confirms your initial theory if nothing else. That said, it's still simple pitch-and-catch outside often and I've even seen QB's audible to quick outs b/c of these cushions. Is there a design where we can start out off the LOS but just before snap. creep up to the LOS? Or use a technique like Dick is using, literally, closer to the LOS, turned sideways to keep his eyes in the backfield and staying in position while he runs with the WR (using the sideline to his advantage)? He also ran a blitz off this same look.

And what the heck happened with our under-cutting CB reads? Rogers made a billion dollar contract on just doing that his first year here.

that's part of why Aldon's sack numbers went up in his second year, cause Qb's started being more careful. We do have those trap defense plays around the LOS like you said, think of Brock's pick six against Houston. Like I said though, it's also philosophy. Fangio says, if you're going to beat us you're going to have to dink and dunk and run the ball. It's playing to the strengths of our defense, they play great against the run and tackle very well. So, you keep everything in front of you and make the offense earn every yard. They can't run short outs all day. They can go ahead and complete 9 of those if the 10th one gets picked.

Originally posted by Team49ers:
I'm expecting this at least once a week now Jonnydel, keep it up.

right now I'm going to try and do one of these for each game. Starting out it's kind of hard to zero in on anything before the Seattle game cause there is SO much film to look through. I actually appreciate the questions people have cause it helps me go back and look for something specific.

Originally posted by jonnydel:
I think it comes down to how to best attack a defense based on how they are attacking you. Very much a chess philosophy. Part of why we don't run screens is because, when teams blitz, they don't blitz the middle(with the exception of a few plays from NO) they tend to run an overload blitz. If you call a screen the wrong way into an overload blitz you can get you QB killed. We do run a quite a few quick slants actually, part of it is timing between QB and receiver and some of it is that the defense tries to take away the middle of the field a lot so to get an effective slant we usually have to run Vernon up the middle to clear out the middle of the field. Our run game does have pitches in it, but they aren't the most effective. Our run game is predicated on power running. Traps, powers, wham, sweep type of plays. Everything is based out of that. Gore's best strengths are not running east - west it's north-south. pitch plays are not Frank's strength(how many times have we seen the guy slip and fall down on pitch or far stretch plays, I love the guy to death but it's not his strength). It's also not the strength of our football team. What we do, which is essentially a pitch play, usually with Hunter, is run a counter-sweep. This is where Hunter fakes one way and then they run a sweep the opposite way. They try and get the defense moving laterally one way and come back the other. This are sometimes effective. Other times, teams are able to get penetration and blow up the play. There was one play against Seattle in particular where we ran a counter-sweep and it was actually really close to breaking out for a TD but McDonald and Anthony Davis had a miscue on who was going to block the DE, they both blocked him and then both released him and slowed Hunter down enough for the rest of the D to get there.

Most Defenses aren't looking to penetrate up the middle of the field they're actually trying to move laterally across the LOS to beat all the trap and power plays. Also part of why those plays aren't working too well.

Hope that answers your question a little. If I can help any further just let me know.

If you have a chance to watch last weeks browns-pats game, I would really be interested in hearing what you think of the first half play calling and execution by the browns, before they turned on the Josh gordon show in the second half. It seemed to have a very wco rhythm, even though it has been discussed that norv is really not a WCO guy.

Originally posted by jonnydel:

Originally posted by Team49ers:
I'm expecting this at least once a week now Jonnydel, keep it up.

right now I'm going to try and do one of these for each game. Starting out it's kind of hard to zero in on anything before the Seattle game cause there is SO much film to look through. I actually appreciate the questions people have cause it helps me go back and look for something specific.

I know you've had loads of requests, i think I just have one - I'm hoping, and would be very grateful, if you could have a look at the pass protection of our Oline in the Carolina game and compare it against the Seahawks one.

One of my peeves this season is that I think the pass protection has been very bad in stretches, the Carolina game stands out as does the NO game. It would be great to see if we are changing our scheme or improving - of particular concern to me is Goodwin's performance, I'm not sure if he's holding up in pass protection as I would hope.

Originally posted by Buchy:
I know you've had loads of requests, i think I just have one - I'm hoping, and would be very grateful, if you could have a look at the pass protection of our Oline in the Carolina game and compare it against the Seahawks one.

One of my peeves this season is that I think the pass protection has been very bad in stretches, the Carolina game stands out as does the NO game. It would be great to see if we are changing our scheme or improving - of particular concern to me is Goodwin's performance, I'm not sure if he's holding up in pass protection as I would hope.

I just reviewed the entire game film from the Carolina game. That was a frustrating game to watch. We were really close on a lot of plays. Everyone on offense had a hand in this loss. This was definitely not one of Kaep's better game. Goody actually played a pretty good game, he did have a couple plays where he got whooped but it wasn't a lot in pass pro. Staley had an unusually poor performance as well as Iupati. Iupati had a tough time diagnosing some stunts that Carolina did up front.

Let me preface this with, after reviewing the film, the reason Carolina has such a good defense is because of they're D-line, the play at a really high level and they free up the LB's to look as good as they do. Keuchly, IMO, gets overrated because of his D-line does such a good job.

There were plays where receivers were not sharp on their routes, or where the timing was just off, or Kaep missed an open receiver. Also, everyone on the O-line gave up pressures at some point. There were moments where the line played outstanding and times where they either missed an assignment or whiffed on a block.

The two best performers on the O-line from that game were probably Goodwin and Boone. Frustrating game though.

Here's an example of how the O-line was just a little out of sync in this game.



Carolina runs a 4-3 under formation here, in a 4-3 under it's similar to a 3-4 look giving 5 men at the LOS. They end up sending an overload blitz to the strong side and dropping the DE on the weakside. It appears, from Goodwin's and Boone's first step after the snap that he had called for the line to the strong side.



You see here how we drop. Anthony Davis takes the DE on his side where Boone moves over to block the same guy, Goodwin steps to the side expecting help inside but Iupati takes the DT who slants across leaving no one for Staley to block. 2 Defenders come off the edge unblocked and Goodwin gets beat without the help he was expecting. The blitzing OLB gets the sack.

This kind of stuff happened all game.