Week 2 Pittsburg Steelers coaches film analysis

Originally posted by defenderDX:
I don't think his footwork looks that great here. he delivered a great ball but his front foot should be more out in front of him as he throws should it not? (being nit-picky, but just wanted your opinion)

twisted ankle waiting to happen. he steps right into the defender right in his face.

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:

Originally posted by jreff22:

Then why keep doing it? Throwing a 6th round rookie against a pro bowler...you should figure out the outcome by the end of the first quarter.

Brown has gone for 150+ yards against some of the best CB's in football. I don't think it matters much who they put on him when they had no pass rush to speak of. When you have an elite QB like Big Ben and an elite WR like Brown, it doesn't matter much who you have in your secondary if you can't force the QB off his spot and make him less comfortable.

Why use man then? I'm not saying you're wrong, what I'm asking is why even flirt with the idea. These guys are on a short week with a tall order. Having the safety's play close against WR's faster than what we have seems more reckless than ballsy.

The lack of a pass rush really hurt us. There wasn't much we could do since they called max protect and just sent 3 guys out that basically just tried to out run our secondary. Not many teams can do this. Rushing four against max protect is a fool's errand.

Ben was making practice throws. He had too much time to pick his WR and what kind of throw to make.

Originally posted by jreff22:
Why use man then? I'm not saying you're wrong, what I'm asking is why even flirt with the idea. These guys are on a short week with a tall order. Having the safety's play close against WR's faster than what we have seems more reckless than ballsy.

Mangini wanted to see what he had. Better week 2 than week 12.

More good stuff from our new X WR. As we've discussed, the X WR is often lined up by himself on the backside. He operates without the benefit of route combinations. This puts an emphasis on being able to win athletically, and/or with precision route running. Last season, BLloyd, SJohnson, Patton, all took turns as X and did not do well. This is something they rarely saw - the CB playing with a cushion. Torrey (orange) changes that.
Backside skinny Post. Can't tell what coverage this is.


The CB is not going to get beat deep here so he gives a huge cushion at the snap and backpeddles after the snap.


+18 yards. The next play is the Kap/Hyde fumble.

Originally posted by BleedsRedNGold:
The lack of a pass rush really hurt us. There wasn't much we could do since they called max protect and just sent 3 guys out that basically just tried to out run our secondary. Not many teams can do this. Rushing four against max protect is a fool's errand.

Ben was making practice throws. He had too much time to pick his WR and what kind of throw to make.

Yup. Steelers max protect putting 7 guys in to block (5 OL, 1 TE, 1 RB) against 4 pass rushers. Football is really simple sometimes, greater numbers win, especially 7 on 4.

As you said, not many teams can pull that off, only 3 guys running routes and getting whatever they want on the field. Elite QB + Elite WR got the job done, much of the damage against a corner making his 2nd career start on a short week to prepare. Just a perfect storm this game. He'll bounce back.

As far as Mangini, the only major gripe I have is having the safeties so far up by the LOS and expecting them to recover in Cover 2 down the field. I'm sure it made all the sense in the world on the whiteboard, trying to guard the sticks on 3rd down, but you have to know what you're up against. Big Ben feasted off that defensive look. The coverage disguise didn't work, a more simpler scheme would have helped the players tremendously.

Originally posted by thl408:
This is the dropped pass by Boldin that could have extended the drive. Crap result, but I wanted to highlight it as we try to understand Geep's passing offense. There were so many flood concepts in the MIN game that I was sure there was more. I'll try to highlight some passing plays as we take a sneak peak into the 49er playbook.

The progression is shown (white numbers). This type of progression is easy on the QB's eyes. Notice how all the routes break in the same direction. Kap simply scans from right to left with the routes entering his line of sight.
Versus Cover1 blitz


Kap looks to his first read, VD. VD is covered. With the defender on VD playing outside leverage and being able to attack downhill, Kap red lights VD and will move to his next read.


Boldin enters Kap's line of sight.


I like the order of progression and how it works to help the QB. Before anyone says anything like, "oh they dumbed down the progression for Kap", I'll post a play from the SB where Brady has the same type of progression. Good designs aren't effective and complex, good designs are effective and simple.


Notice Kap's head as he moves from VD to Boldin. Dropped pass.

man that pass should have went left to Hayne he was in the clear

Originally posted by jonnydel:
Well my fello fans, I'm off to football practice, I have the first big chunk play of the 2nd half, will post it when I get back, about 6:30 PST. Don't have too much fun without me! :)

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.

Originally posted by SofaKing:
As far as Mangini, the only major gripe I have is having the safeties so far up by the LOS and expecting them to recover in Cover 2 down the field. I'm sure it made all the sense in the world on the whiteboard, trying to guard the sticks on 3rd down, but you have to know what you're up against. Big Ben feasted off that defensive look. The coverage disguise didn't work, a more simpler scheme would have helped the players tremendously.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Tomsula's Monday morning press conference specifically addressed this failure and the possibility of not doing it as much. I saw that as a positive sign that Mangini and Tomsula knew the scheme + execution combined for the major fails here, and I expect we'll see it far less, especially against offenses more in the Pittsburgh mold.

Originally posted by jreff22:

Originally posted by Phoenix49ers:

Originally posted by jreff22:
Then why keep doing it? Throwing a 6th round rookie against a pro bowler...you should figure out the outcome by the end of the first quarter.

Brown has gone for 150+ yards against some of the best CB's in football. I don't think it matters much who they put on him when they had no pass rush to speak of. When you have an elite QB like Big Ben and an elite WR like Brown, it doesn't matter much who you have in your secondary if you can't force the QB off his spot and make him less comfortable.

Why use man then? I'm not saying you're wrong, what I'm asking is why even flirt with the idea. These guys are on a short week with a tall order. Having the safety's play close against WR's faster than what we have seems more reckless than ballsy.

My guess is that Mangini had a feeling his 4 man pass rush was not going to get it done so he crowded the LoS to try and confuse PIT's pass protection. As jonnydel showed, the 49ers came with a 4 man rush even after all the exotic fronts that showed possible blitz pressure. He was trying to get a free rusher into Ben's face due to confusion in pass pro. PIT had their stuff together.

Originally posted by captveg:

Originally posted by SofaKing:
As far as Mangini, the only major gripe I have is having the safeties so far up by the LOS and expecting them to recover in Cover 2 down the field. I'm sure it made all the sense in the world on the whiteboard, trying to guard the sticks on 3rd down, but you have to know what you're up against. Big Ben feasted off that defensive look. The coverage disguise didn't work, a more simpler scheme would have helped the players tremendously.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Tomsula's Monday morning press conference specifically addressed this failure and the possibility of not doing it as much. I saw that as a positive sign that Mangini and Tomsula knew the scheme + execution combined for the major fails here, and I expect we'll see it far less, especially against offenses more in the Pittsburgh mold.

Yup, listening to that presser now and glad to hear him address this specifically.

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.

That is interesting. Mangini surely knows how to teach pattern matching, he was a DB coach and D-coordinator for NE all those years using pattern matching.

He's a guy that will alter things week to week. Maybe he just didn't want to employ it these first 2 weeks, for whatever reason. We'll soon find out.

Can you leave the GIF's in color, they are harder to see in black and white

Originally posted by SofaKing:

Originally posted by captveg:

Originally posted by SofaKing:
As far as Mangini, the only major gripe I have is having the safeties so far up by the LOS and expecting them to recover in Cover 2 down the field. I'm sure it made all the sense in the world on the whiteboard, trying to guard the sticks on 3rd down, but you have to know what you're up against. Big Ben feasted off that defensive look. The coverage disguise didn't work, a more simpler scheme would have helped the players tremendously.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Tomsula's Monday morning press conference specifically addressed this failure and the possibility of not doing it as much. I saw that as a positive sign that Mangini and Tomsula knew the scheme + execution combined for the major fails here, and I expect we'll see it far less, especially against offenses more in the Pittsburgh mold.

Yup, listening to that presser now and glad to hear him address this specifically.

i almost shed a tear listening to the coach admitting a mistake.
instead of acting like no mistakes were ever made.

I think Tomsulas no bull s**t personality will be a great thing. I just hope he has the same attitude with Trent if need be.