Week 2 Pittsburg Steelers coaches film analysis

Originally posted by thl408:

Originally posted by thl408:
Wanted to get your thoughts on the lack of pattern matching in Mangini's coverage scheme. I thought the lack of it in the MIN game was just because he didn't feel the need to do it since Teddy is a young QB and maybe it wasn't required to fool him. With the loss in talent for pass rushing, you mentioned during the offseason, and I agree, that the coverage would have to step up to buy time for the pass rushers to get home. Nothing gets the job done more than good pattern matching.

I know Mangini likes to get fancy pre-snap, then rotate and shift post snap, but the coverage scheme in this PIT game was for the most part simple. Just spot dropping zones or man coverage. This is everything that the previous defense was not. It seems like all that work by the previous coaching staff will be lost if Mangini moves away from pattern matching. I thought for sure it would continue because Mangini comes from Belichick's school of defense. The only players not versed is Acker, who was obviously in team meetings, but not on the field last season. The safeties excel at pattern matching. Brock did fine in 2013. Ward was exposed to it as well.

jonnydel, your thoughts?

Yes, I was just about to come back to that, was trying to catch up on all I missed, haha.

I'm not a huge fan of it, can't say the spot dropping doesn't work and doesn't have it's uses though - Seattle uses spot dropping cover 3 zone 90% of the time - Brady even mentioned it after the SB. "they play a lot of zone, about 90% of the time".

Spot dropping is best employed when you have a lot of length in a more condensed field with excellent lateral movement from your underneath defenders. Hence why Seattle runs the D they do and hold the crap out of anyone.

I was a big fan of the way Fangio ran it. Yeah, we gave up some easy completions some times, but, it was very complimentary of our offensive philosophy. By the way we played defense and offense, we were going to force a team to be efficient and take advantage of every single possession. So, if we got a turnover in a game, we had a good chance of winning.

We kept everything in front of the defense in a very "bend but don't break" philosophy. The offense was going to have to put together a 12 play drive to score, most of the time. They had to earn every yard. The pattern matching also allowed our DB's to keep their eyes on the QB and use their football IQ to decipher what was in front of them. I liked it because, as we know from all the narratives about how KC won't do anything without a vertical passing game, most teams are in love with the idea of taking shots. So, our defense just sat and waited for them to do it. We had a lot of INT's over the years from QB's forcing deep passes on us. If they weren't going to choose to take underneath stuff and be patient, we were going to make them pay.

This all played into how we played offense - slow and methodical(in theory.....). We wanted to use as much of the playclock as we could - to turn back to boxing, it was like George Foreman, we were the guy who would wait, not delivering a lot of punches, but trying to land hard, punishing punches that took the life out of the opponent. It didn't always work, but, by the defense and offenses philosophy mesh, we took away 3-4 possessions a game. That meant, some teams that were used to having 9-10 possessions to score 28 points, only had 6 or 7 to do the same thing against a team that wasn't going to give up anything deep.

I think the amount of turnovers created by our Defense is a big testament to the way the entire defense worked together. The great pass rush helped, but, still, last year we had, essentially, the same pass rushers. Yes, we had J. Smith, but he was 35 and A. Smith wasn't there for 9 games.

I'm not saying this defense can't be just as effective, I'm just not as a big of a fan of it. With spot dropping and no pattern matching man coverage, you're relying on your players being better athletes. With pattern-matching, you're relying on your players being smarter and quicker in their thinking. The thing about the latter is, you don't have to have the premier athletes, just smart, good football players. That's why our defense kept doing well even when we had injuries happen.

There is also the possibility that Mangini doesn't trust the young guys with this level of cerebral play, I don't know.

Originally posted by jonnydel:

For me, I'm not seeing MORE WCO, just different. Last year, nearly all of our plays were WCO concepts(I know, I know, the WCO incorporates just about every concept) but I'm meaning, I saw us use a lot of stuff I had seen in numerous WCO playbooks from Walsh-Holmgren-Shanahan-Gruden.

I agree with this..,,I think in my original answer I failed to see the word MORE. I was responding to seeing a lot of WCO stuff. Seems like we are doing some different WCO from the past couple of years...but now that vast majority is out of gun or pistol sets. For example, I'm pretty sure Miller caught a pass on either a Texas/HB angle route out of a strong pistol form. I'm not entirely sure if is was the Texas concept with the accompanying TE seam route or not. It was though an angle route.

I wonder if PIT saw that our safeties faking out the blitzes, and said "Antonio, you beat your CB and no way is that safety going to get back there in time to catch you" probably the same thing with DHB. Maybe the snap was based around when Reid was most vulnerable.

Long story short, this was a story of no pass rush. Big Ben had a clean pocket all day long. Our guys are getting stuffed with 1 OL, and not creating any havoc. IF this continues, we will need to look at picking up our offensive pace to keep up with all of the points our defense will allow.

I liked our offense, but we are not built to score a lot of points. And to be frank, I am sick of saying that for the last.... 12 years?

Originally posted by Niners816:

Originally posted by jonnydel:

For me, I'm not seeing MORE WCO, just different. Last year, nearly all of our plays were WCO concepts(I know, I know, the WCO incorporates just about every concept) but I'm meaning, I saw us use a lot of stuff I had seen in numerous WCO playbooks from Walsh-Holmgren-Shanahan-Gruden.

I agree with this..,,I think in my original answer I failed to see the word MORE. I was responding to seeing a lot of WCO stuff. Seems like we are doing some different WCO from the past couple of years...but now that vast majority is out of gun or pistol sets. For example, I'm pretty sure Miller caught a pass on either a Texas/HB angle route out of a strong pistol form. I'm not entirely sure if is was the Texas concept with the accompanying TE seam route or not. It was though an angle route.

I'm pretty sure the Miller Texas play was something like this:


Differences being, it was in a pistol form and the Z wasn't running a drive/drag route.

Originally posted by SJniner7:
I wonder if PIT saw that our safeties faking out the blitzes, and said "Antonio, you beat your CB and no way is that safety going to get back there in time to catch you" probably the same thing with DHB. Maybe the snap was based around when Reid was most vulnerable.

Long story short, this was a story of no pass rush. Big Ben had a clean pocket all day long. Our guys are getting stuffed with 1 OL, and not creating any havoc. IF this continues, we will need to look at picking up our offensive pace to keep up with all of the points our defense will allow.

I liked our offense, but we are not built to score a lot of points. And to be frank, I am sick of saying that for the last.... 12 years?

That is exactly what I was thinking as well. It seems like Mangini's scheme requires quite a bit out of the safeties. Also, this leaves the CBs on an island basically because there is no help over the top. So proper execution is crucial out of the CBs. If you are going to press, you better get a good jam on your WR or you're toast and that is exactly what happened.

Is there any chance someone could post a gif or stills of correct technique for press coverage in cover 2 man and cover 6? I saw the up close stills and gif of Acker's poor technique vs Brown. And the poor technique vs Heyward Bey. I would like to see up close how that situation is supposed to be played. Great work guys. Thanks a lot! This is my favorite thread to read every week.

Originally posted by jonnydel:

We kept everything in front of the defense in a very "bend but don't break" philosophy. The offense was going to have to put together a 12 play drive to score, most of the time. They had to earn every yard. The pattern matching also allowed our DB's to keep their eyes on the QB and use their football IQ to decipher what was in front of them. I liked it because, as we know from all the narratives about how KC won't do anything without a vertical passing game, most teams are in love with the idea of taking shots. So, our defense just sat and waited for them to do it. We had a lot of INT's over the years from QB's forcing deep passes on us. If they weren't going to choose to take underneath stuff and be patient, we were going to make them pay.

amen to this. a big part of a reason why our D has been able to do this was sure tackling and elite talent at linebacker, as well as dline+olbs could put pressure with 3/4 man rush

like you've said, that defense challenged the qbs to put together sustainable drives by doing short passes. a qb with high iq could pick this d apart, like peyton did last year. however with non-elite or average qbs, that D was really hard to play against because we'd drop 7-8 in coverage and also generate pass pressure. the inability of teams to run on us made most of them one-dimensional, and then ability to drop 7 or 8 in coverage made them one-dimensional by taking away big plays.

it was the definition of bend not break. sometimes teams would put together big drives only to waste a down on running the ball and another short pass on third down would be short, or a short pass would be sniffed out by good tackling cbs like rogers or our stud lbs and brought down before the sticks.

the thing is, I liked it, but I actually think it doesnt work without elite talent. a huge chunk of that D goes out of the window if run-stopping is mediocre. no longer can we drop a ton of players in coverage without paying for it. I like wilhoite, but hes no match for 2011 or even 2012 sideline to sideline willis.

fangio is a good D coordinator, but he kinda worked off having elite talent in the front 7 and focusing on fundamentals. I think this year mangini is a better fit simply because there will be more variety and our defense, while still talented, is nowhere near as talented than under fangio

this gameplan for sunday stunk though. playing soft zone with cbs who are supposed to press, without actually pressing...and disguising ourselves out of the game

hopefully we learn from our mistakes

Going back in time a bit to the early 2nd quarter. This is probably the closest the 49ers got to making it a close game. After driving down the field using 10 plays, the 49ers find themselves at 1st and 5 (the picture says 1st and Goal, that's wrong. The score is 8-0.

2Q 1st & 5
This is the second time I've seen them try to hit this type of route near the end zone. Versus MIN, it was Bush on a similar route in the same area of the field. That pass was overthrown into a very tight window.
Out of a bunch formation, the 49ers look to get a rub to free up Vance on the wheel route. PIT is in some sort of cover1. They may be pattern matching because watch what the CB lined up over Patton does.


The CB over Patton lets him go free across the formation. Defenders on the strongside of the formation man up. Kap gets the look he wants with a LB on Vance.


The pass is overthrown.


The 49ers will eventually convert a 3rd & 2 to get a new set of downs, then proceed to move backwards, starting with a Pears holding call. Then settle for a FG.

Originally posted by thl408:
Going back in time a bit to the early 2nd quarter. This is probably the closest the 49ers got to making it a close game. After driving down the field using 10 plays, the 49ers find themselves at 1st and 5 (the picture says 1st and Goal, that's wrong. The score is 8-0.

2Q 1st & 5
This is the second time I've seen them try to hit this type of route near the end zone. Versus MIN, it was Bush on a similar route in the same area of the field. That pass was overthrown into a very tight window.
Out of a bunch formation, the 49ers look to get a rub to free up Vance on the wheel route. PIT is in some sort of cover1. They may be pattern matching because watch what the CB lined up over Patton does.


The CB over Patton lets him go free across the formation. Defenders on the strongside of the formation man up. Kap gets the look he wants with a LB on Vance.


The pass is overthrown.


The 49ers will eventually convert a 3rd & 2 to get a new set of downs, then proceed to move backwards, starting with a Pears holding call. Then settle for a FG.

I feel that the throw to patton here is easy and should be done in this situation instead of a way more difficult throw going for it all to a guy who isnt that athletic.
its first and 5, we dont even need a TD to get a new set of downs. patton isnt covered, he should get at least 2 yards by simply making the catch and lunging forward
at absolute worst patton gets no gain. at best he picks up a first down with yac.

I remember we used to run crabtree in these drag routes

Originally posted by jonnydel:
Yes, I was just about to come back to that, was trying to catch up on all I missed, haha.

I'm not a huge fan of it, can't say the spot dropping doesn't work and doesn't have it's uses though - Seattle uses spot dropping cover 3 zone 90% of the time - Brady even mentioned it after the SB. "they play a lot of zone, about 90% of the time".

Spot dropping is best employed when you have a lot of length in a more condensed field with excellent lateral movement from your underneath defenders. Hence why Seattle runs the D they do and hold the crap out of anyone.

I was a big fan of the way Fangio ran it. Yeah, we gave up some easy completions some times, but, it was very complimentary of our offensive philosophy. By the way we played defense and offense, we were going to force a team to be efficient and take advantage of every single possession. So, if we got a turnover in a game, we had a good chance of winning.

We kept everything in front of the defense in a very "bend but don't break" philosophy. The offense was going to have to put together a 12 play drive to score, most of the time. They had to earn every yard. The pattern matching also allowed our DB's to keep their eyes on the QB and use their football IQ to decipher what was in front of them. I liked it because, as we know from all the narratives about how KC won't do anything without a vertical passing game, most teams are in love with the idea of taking shots. So, our defense just sat and waited for them to do it. We had a lot of INT's over the years from QB's forcing deep passes on us. If they weren't going to choose to take underneath stuff and be patient, we were going to make them pay.

This all played into how we played offense - slow and methodical(in theory.....). We wanted to use as much of the playclock as we could - to turn back to boxing, it was like George Foreman, we were the guy who would wait, not delivering a lot of punches, but trying to land hard, punishing punches that took the life out of the opponent. It didn't always work, but, by the defense and offenses philosophy mesh, we took away 3-4 possessions a game. That meant, some teams that were used to having 9-10 possessions to score 28 points, only had 6 or 7 to do the same thing against a team that wasn't going to give up anything deep.

I think the amount of turnovers created by our Defense is a big testament to the way the entire defense worked together. The great pass rush helped, but, still, last year we had, essentially, the same pass rushers. Yes, we had J. Smith, but he was 35 and A. Smith wasn't there for 9 games.

I'm not saying this defense can't be just as effective, I'm just not as a big of a fan of it. With spot dropping and no pattern matching man coverage, you're relying on your players being better athletes. With pattern-matching, you're relying on your players being smarter and quicker in their thinking. The thing about the latter is, you don't have to have the premier athletes, just smart, good football players. That's why our defense kept doing well even when we had injuries happen.

There is also the possibility that Mangini doesn't trust the young guys with this level of cerebral play, I don't know.

Agree with your assessment of Fangio's defense. I find it a mistake to have a good foundation of pattern match principles that have been taught by the previous staff to go to "waste" if Mangini doesn't continue it. About SEA, I think they do pattern match with their LBs out of a cover3 so it's not simply a spot dropping scheme. What makes their scheme work though is that their pass rush was so good and their safeties are so smart.

The reason why it seemed like any CB could play well with the 49ers was because they were taught so well in the pattern match scheme. Drop 7 and play coverage as a unit. It allowed so many CBs to look good as CBs benefited from LBs and safeties. If the pass rush with 4 is lacking this season, then pattern matching will tighten up windows for the QB to throw into.

Spot dropping gets exposed when the pass rush can't get home. A good example is on the long pass play where Wilhoite found himself deep downfield covering a WR. If the 49ers were pattern matching, there wouldn't be any defenders covering grass, being useless. Because the 49ers were in Tampa2, there were 3 defenders covering a lone WR on one side of the field while it was 3v3 on the other side. This never happens when pattern matching out of a Quarters or Cover7 look.

When Mangini was named DC, I thought for sure he would continue with pattern matching, and I have yet to see it.

Originally posted by the_dynasty:
I feel that the throw to patton here is easy and should be done in this situation instead of a way more difficult throw going for it all to a guy who isnt that athletic.
its first and 5, we dont even need a TD to get a new set of downs. patton isnt covered, he should get at least 2 yards by simply making the catch and lunging forward
at absolute worst patton gets no gain. at best he picks up a first down with yac.

I remember we used to run crabtree in these drag routes

Agreed and maybe just maybe Patton has a shot at a TD. On Kaps other overthrow to Bell down the seams, it really showed how slow Bell is compared to VD. Maybe the tougher throws shouldn't be going to these guys.

Originally posted by the_dynasty:

I feel that the throw to patton here is easy and should be done in this situation instead of a way more difficult throw going for it all to a guy who isnt that athletic.
its first and 5, we dont even need a TD to get a new set of downs. patton isnt covered, he should get at least 2 yards by simply making the catch and lunging forward
at absolute worst patton gets no gain. at best he picks up a first down with yac.

I remember we used to run crabtree in these drag routes

I agree.....I'm sure this is one where the coaches are gonna point out the drag busting free. I like the play design a lot though.

This play looks like something straight out of the 2014 playbook. Going too deep for a down and distance that doesn't require it.

2Q 3rd & 7
4 verticals (I think) vs cover1 blitz
When running 4 verticals, the WRs can be asked to curl their route if they feel the defense is playing with 'over the top' positioning where a GO route would be easily defeated. I think this is what is happening here as Boldin curls his route.
Versus Cover 1 blitz.


The pass protection brain farts as Devey and Martin allow a free rusher up the middle (blue).




Not a fan of 4 Verticals in a 3rd & 7 situation, but the pass protection is what really fails here.


Sacked for -17. After the punt. PIT scores on the bomb to DHB on the first play of the possession.

Originally posted by the_dynasty:
I feel that the throw to patton here is easy and should be done in this situation instead of a way more difficult throw going for it all to a guy who isnt that athletic.
its first and 5, we dont even need a TD to get a new set of downs. patton isnt covered, he should get at least 2 yards by simply making the catch and lunging forward
at absolute worst patton gets no gain. at best he picks up a first down with yac.

I remember we used to run crabtree in these drag routes

With Vance one on one with the LB, Kap was going to a TD. The underneath stuff is not his style. He goes for homerun plays. Considering our red zone offense, I don't blame him. He has a shot, he takes it.

Its ok with me as long as no int and the situation is different.

Originally posted by Niners816:

Originally posted by the_dynasty:
I feel that the throw to patton here is easy and should be done in this situation instead of a way more difficult throw going for it all to a guy who isnt that athletic.
its first and 5, we dont even need a TD to get a new set of downs. patton isnt covered, he should get at least 2 yards by simply making the catch and lunging forward
at absolute worst patton gets no gain. at best he picks up a first down with yac.

I remember we used to run crabtree in these drag routes

I agree.....I'm sure this is one where the coaches are gonna point out the drag busting free. I like the play design a lot though.

I think Kap was happy with the matchup he got - 1v1 with a LB on Vance. Once he saw that, he made up his mind that was the route he'd target. He never gave Patton's drag route a look. The LB gives Vance a nice jam at the LoS and stayed close. It was a tough throw to Vance, but I think a pinpoint throw gets it done.