week 13 Coaches film pre-game thread

Gonna start this here cause I'm hoping to get a video together by tomorrow of a preview of this week's matchup.

I've watched through the Rams game vs the Ravens and here's some takeaways and what we need to do to slow down and stop the seeming unstoppable offense of the Ravens. Also, opening up the conversation for game strategy.

The Ravens love to condense the set and attack the edge. By condensing the set, they force more players in the middle 30 yards wide of the field. By stressing the edge they get players moving horizontally while coming down with power-man blocks. This helps set up running lanes. This is a much different offense than what Roman ran when he was with us. The offense then was zone-read added to a lot of west coast passing concepts. This offense is much more like a college double wing style.
It sounds crazy, but the offense my high school ran was closer to this than this offense is to what we ran under harbaugh. They treat Jackson as a RB that can throw. They also major in out-flanking the other team, so pre-snap alignment is key. Quite often they run only 1 WR personnel packages. They use some difficult formations. One, for example, is a double wing out of the pistol. So, they'll have 2 TE's in the game, with a standard strong set with one TE, then put a TE and FB to either side of Jackson with Ingram behind him in the pistol. This gives them attack angles to bring a 4 or 5 man phase to either side and can also run Ingram up the middle.

On any given play they can attack the edge or up the middle. However, they're biggest gains are going to come off the edge.

KEYS TO STOPPING THEM:
OVERALL force the game to be played inside the numbers.
1. Contain the edge.
While it sounds elementary, the edges MUST be contained first. That's where their chunk plays come from and how they open up the passing game. By getting interior defenders to be scared of the edge it'll open up the middle of the field for Jackson in the passing game. He struggles throwing with accuracy outside the hash marks, so taking away the middle of the field is paramount. To do that, the edges must be contained in the run game first. That's where Bosa/Armstead/Thomas will be key in our W9. They have the ability to set a hard edge from their DE position and force the Ravens to run up the middle the whole game.
2. The interior DT's MUST eat up double teams or get penetration early.
If the interior can eat up double teams each or defeat their 1v1's we have a chance to limit the Ravens offense. By containing the edge and with condensed sets, the Ravens match up better against us than teams that will generally look spread us out and attack run lanes that way. D.J. Jones, Buckner, J. Taylor and the rest will be a huge factor in this game. If Fred Warner and Greenlaw are tasked with taking on pulling guards all game long it's going to be a rough day. But, if we can force the Ravens to run inside and allow our LB's to be clean, those huge, gaping running lanes will be limited and Jackson will be forced to throw the ball.
3. Take away passes inside the numbers. Jackson loves throws over the middle and Roman is scheming things that allow him to keep his head down the middle of the field and not have to make full field reads. When the middle of the field is taken away, he doesn't know where to go with the ball.
4. Create pressure and then be disciplined in the rush.
Once Jackson feels pressure, he takes his eyes off the receivers and turns into a RB. This is where the rest of the defense has to be ready and the rush has to be disciplined. If he doesn't have any lanes, he's susceptible to negative plays.

The Ravens aren't undstoppable, we just have to play a lot more disciplined than the Rams. I was shocked at how poorly the Rams played considering how widely regarded Wade Phillips is. But it was awful. They had players running themselves out of plays, getting out of their run fits and the Ravens are tough enough when you get a hat on a hat, but they had multiple plays with 1, 2 or 3 defender unblocked, running themselves out of plays.

Great post JD! Excited for some 49ers football

Fantastic as usual Jonny. Best poster on the zone hands down.

Jonnydel for MVP

Thanks JD, as i was just about to PM you and ask if there was a way to stop what up til now has been unstoppable.

So get Bosa, Arik, Solomon to contain edges, then have DTs, win their 1 v1s, and then hope both Fred and Dre beat their guys and then close the bag...is that about it? But if i understood this right, who takes on the 4 or 5 blockers (TEs and RBs)that goes with Lamar?

It's like Belichick said, there's a formula to beat every team, just gotta figure it out and execute.

Damn, how do we forward this to the defensive coordinator's office. There are some good points in this eval.

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:

Thanks JD, as i was just about to PM you and ask if there was a way to stop what up til now has been unstoppable.

So get Bosa, Arik, Solomon to contain edges, then have DTs, win their 1 v1s, and then hope both Fred and Dre beat their guys and then close the bag...is that about it? But if i understood this right, who takes on the 4 or 5 blockers (TEs and RBs)that goes with Lamar?

That's easy! Tartt.

Nice work man. I feel like this pretty much what the Patriots did.

Originally posted by SFTifoso:

It's like Belichick said, there's a formula to beat every team, just gotta figure it out and execute.

Which makes what Bill Walsh did with the WCO so impressive. It took practically 2 decades to crack until the Cover 2 D finally slowed it down. Even still its so effective when executed correctly that its been the most common scheme used in football since.

You're the man JD!