On Monday morning, I made an offer. The first person to chip in $100 for the Eagles Almanac kickstarter got to name his or her post here on the IgglesBlog. 

Twitter-er @Thunder_Lips -- who probably isn't actually Hulk Hogan -- is your winner. And since he's such a nice guy, despite not really knowing what he wanted me to write about and in the face of a number of truly ludicrous suggestions, he actually picked the headline you see there at the top.

Which is nice, because it's kind of something I've been thinking about anyway. To the post ...

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Let’s get this out of the way first – all coaches want players who are versatile. Why settle for tight ends who can only block or linebackers who can only plug gaps if the other option is 22 players who can do it all?

The answer, obviously, is that you’ll never have a perfect roster. Even good teams have holes. You just hope the greatness of Brian Dawkins can help cover up some of the limitations of Chris Gocong.

So when we say “Chip Kelly wants versatile players,” we’re not really saying anything about him that isn’t true for every other coach in the league.

Having said all that, I think there’s still something to this idea that Andy Reid and Chip Kelly come at versatility in different ways.

You could either describe Andy Reid by saying he liked having a wide range of weapons with which to attack a defense or you could criticize him by saying he wasted too many draft picks and roster spots on a bunch of one-dimensional cat toys. It’s pretty much the same thing.

At the individual level, the challenge with many of these guys is that they weren’t versatile. When MacJax get hurt, third-down specialist Jason Avant has been basically useless outside. Speedy little Ryan Moats combined Danny Watkin’s blitz awareness with DeSean’s physicality. Human sledgehammer Tony Hunt … ah, forget it.

You could even make the case that something similar happened on the other side of the ball. Asante was a ball-hawking machine, just don’t ask him to tackle anyone. Jason Babin rushed the passer secure in the knowledge that every apparent handoff was actually a well-disguised play action pass.

On the other hand, if we elevate the level of analysis from individual to team, this weird collection of misfit toys actually does start to look versatile. All these different players could – if put in the right positions – make plays. Fast guys did their jobs, big guys did theirs, and as long as our coaches stayed one step ahead of the other side’s, the results could look pretty good.

At the roster level, what we see here is a form of additive versatility. You have a base offense, onto which can be added new “fastballs” that provide additional capabilities and new types of plays.

So that’s Andy.

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This is the point where we have to paste in the boilerplate about how we don’t really know anything about what Chip’s going to do this year since we haven’t seen even a sliver of training camp, much less a game. However, the guy’s been an object of fascination among the smarter football commentariat for years, we have hours of Oregon game film to sift through online, and as much as he hates giving anything away during his sessions with the media, I still believe in the virtues of close textual analysis. So.

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Chip seems like he has a different approach to Andy’s. And it’s one that springs logically from everything else he does. So let’s talk about that first.

It goes too far to suggest Kelly’s approach to football is primal. He coaches violence, builds his offense around a power running attack, and recruits/drafts for size and physicality, but there’s also a mathematical elegance to what he tries to do. He needs the size and violence so that his six guys can beat the crap out of your six guys – but it’s the math that gets him to six on six rather than six on ohshityourbackjustgotcreamed.

What’s weird, too, is that on a surface level his schemes look gadget-y. You’ve got option football, running quarterbacks, wide receivers taking handoffs, and on and on. But all of those things are just window dressing. The basic, underlying plays are simple and straightforward.

And that starts to get into the differences between the old coach and the new one. Andy Reid wanted you to bring that safety down and heck, go ahead and blitz, because if you do that, you might get us once or twice, but otherwise we’re going to block up and light your ass up on the back end.

Chip Kelly would rather see those safeties stay back all day. Go ahead, take away the deep ball, because if you do that, he’s going to split out three receivers, make you play with six in the box, and repeatedly pound the ball at you.

Hey, that’s great that you took away the sideline route. Good job!

Here’s another inside run to chew on. Thunk.

When Reid’s offense didn’t work, it was usually for one of two reasons. Either the pressure was overwhelming his offensive line – giving the QB no time to hit those big plays – or the defense was playing sound, “contain-y” football and his guys just couldn’t execute the short/mid-range game consistently enough to sustain drives.

Chip will have his own challenges to solve – number one being that no one’s going to give him a six-man box to whale away at for more than a couple of plays before they change things up. (At the NFL level, every team has enough speed to do more than sit back and hope.)

It’s this realization, I believe, that’s driving Chip’s desire for versatility. He doesn’t need guys who can add “bonus plays” to his regular offense – he needs guys who can force the defense to let him run his regular offense, even when that’s the last thing the defense wants to do.

So that’s the beauty of a guy like (Rice alum) James Casey (who went to Rice). When you have someone who can play all over the field (as he did at Rice), you can put the defense in a bind. If they stay big – by keeping three or four linebackers on the field – spread ‘em out and run the quick passing / WR screen game. If they go small to take that away, just run over them.

Note also that what Chip really wants – as far as we can tell – is for the defense to go small and spread out. That’s why H-backs are better than tight ends and fullbacks are pointless. Don’t block the box!

Shifting gears, I also think this same philosophy helps to explain Chip’s preferences on defense, as well.

[Standard boilerplate again.]

What we do know, however, is that Chip’s expressed preference is for a 3-4. He said it had something to do with special teams performance – a point examined and debunked by Jimmy Kempski – but I think the truth is that he just prefers the versatility. When you present a balanced front, you’re not leaning one way when the defense wants to go the other. And exchanging that fourth bigger/slower guy for a fourth almost-as-big/faster guy makes it easier to counter any of the crazy stuff the offense might be planning.

The same ability on offense to make you commit and then do the opposite is exactly what he wants to avoid with his balanced, versatile defense. 

---

A few more quick topics, since I’m only 90 minutes into a five-hour flight and I no longer have to worry about saving some stuff for tomorrow.

Number one: The Eagles needed Lane Johnson and they need a great offensive line. This entire offense seems to be about having enough guys to block all their guys (Chip’s job) and then your guys actually blocking all their guys (their job). The offensive line has to be the best unit on the field if that’s going to work.

Furthermore, the Eagles last year were absolutely horrendous against the blitz. I don’t have the stats handy (airplane), but there were entire quarters if not games where the offense simply crumbled under all the pressure applied to Vick and Foles.

Things are not going to change on the defensive side this season. Our opponents can’t sit back and die a death of a thousand cuts, nor can they passively show us eight-man run fronts and watch as Vick goes bombs away over their heads.

They’re gonna come – a lot – and if our guys can’t stop them, it will be like last year all over again, just with different guys getting crushed in the backfield. Chip can take some pressure off everyone with a quick passing game that gets the ball outside before the rush arrives, but even there, it’s not like we have ideal, tackle-breaking receivers to pull that off.

Pray for good health for the big dudes.

Number two: Don’t sleep on DeSean. Assuming the line can stem the blitz tide, someone’s going to need to make everyone pay for overloading to stop the run.

If DeSean can be DeSean when everyone on the defense knows that job number one is taking him away and living with everything else, then I’m pretty much expecting him to be DESEAN once the imperative shifts to defending the run.

We also know that it’s going to be tough for the Eagles to use the QB to hold a defender out of the run game the way Chip so often did at Oregon. There will certainly be some forms or run/pass option trickery (imagine Foles starting the handoff, seeing the end crash down the line, and then yanking the ball back to chuck it outside), but by far the easiest way to deal with that extra defender in the box is to force him out of there before the play even begins.

DeSean is key.

Number three: We’re finally back to a coherent scheme. The last couple seasons the Eagles have been running Frankenstein-ian schemes on both sides of the ball. Two years ago they ditched Juan Castillo’s offensive line techniques to graft on Howard Mudd’s zone scheme (and boy are we glad they did given that we’re now implementing … Kelly’s zone scheme). On defense, they foisted the wide nine on a group of coaches who had never dealt with it before, then tried to bolt on some coverage competence in the form of Todd Bowles.

What we experienced with both those systems is that when they worked, they really worked. You can see why other people ran them elsewhere.

But when they didn’t work, our coaches were surprised, confused and struggled to catch up. In the red zone in particular we became exactly the kind of “play offense” Kelly warned against in one of his famous coaching clinics.

We may not know everything about Kelly’s system, but one thing we do know is that it’s going to fit together. He knows his moves, he knows your countermoves, and he knows the counters to your counters. He also knows exactly how to teach the techniques needed to run it.

It also helps that Kelly hasn’t been running the same thing for 13 straight years against the same opponents six to eight times a season. Have to figure just being goofy-footed is going to be worth at least one win this year.

Of our 10.

 

As we move into free agency and the draft, a lot of assumptions are being made about the kind of scheme the Eagles are going to run on defense next year.  Assumptions that aren't really supportable if we go back and look at Chip Kelly's introductory press conference:

That's one of the things about Billy's background is his versatility because he's coached in both. What direction we end up ultimately heading in, I like the 3-4 better...

One of the things that really attracted me to Billy was his versatility and being able to coach in both systems...  And that's what I wanted in a coordinator, is a coordinator with versatility. Then it's our job as coaches to figure out what is the best scheme for the guys we have in place.

Everybody has a wish list of how they want to do things and what they want to do. But everything we do offensively, defensively, and special teams wise will be driven by personnel.

...

We won't have a really good understanding of our guys until we get to that first camp in April ... So we've got time, and I think we've got versatility in our coaching staff, and I think we have some versatility in our roster.

...

What we're going to do is put our guys in the best position for them to make plays. I don't know if that's being a 3-4 team, a 4-3 team, a 5-2, a 6-1 team...

We're also not caught up in that. It's about making sure we play sound defense on first, second and third down. We could look drastically different on first and second downs than third downs. And that's going to be entirely personnel driven for us. Could it be a 4-3 under defense? Yeah, or it could be a 3-4 under defense.

I'm not caught up with labels...

The message here seems pretty clear:

• In the long run, Chip Kelly would prefer to run a 3-4 (for a number of reasons, including an interesting point about improved special teams from carrying more linebackers and fewer linemen).
• In the short run, he's going to structure the defense to fit the personnel, not the other way around.
• One of the reasons he hired Billy Davis is because he's comfortable coaching a mix of 3-4 / 4-3 / hybrid-whatever, so he can help carry everyone through this transition period.

I could make an argument that Chip Kelly's background as a college coach is driving his thought process here.  When you're in an environment where you're losing six to eight starters every year and aren't recruiting at an Alabama level, you're going to have to be flexible with adapting what you do to the players you have.

On the other hand, Bill Belichick never coached at the college level and this is also what he does.  There's more than one path.

So let's talk about Brandon Graham.

There's been a fair amount of Graham talk lately.  Does he fit as a 3-4 OLB? Would it make sense to move him for someone who might fit better?  Why do we even care about Graham anyway since he's a bust and we should have taken JPP?

All of these things are wrong.*  Let's work backwards.

On a per-snap basis, Brandon Graham was strikingly productive in 2012.  Pro Football Focus offers a "signature stat" it calls "pass-rushing productivity" that mashes together sacks, hits and hurries -- with a weighting factor for each piece -- and then controls for the number of attempts a player gets.^  I don't actually like the stat much, but it's hard to argue with it at least in directional terms.

Brandon Graham led the league in PFR in 2012.

Obviously there are ways to argue with that stat.  He was a part-time player who didn't become a starter until late in the year.  Maybe he was only effective because he got the bulk of his chances when he was fresh and everyone else was tired. 

Nope:

You can slice those stats by use periods (little early, some in the middle, lots late) or pre/post-departure of Babin.  The numbers are, allowing for small sample sizes, consistent.

You get similar results looking at his rush defense stats.  He had tackles on 12.7 percent of run plays as a backup and 12.5 percent as a starter (again, PFF stats).  Overall, Graham was in the top three in tackles, tackles+sacks, and stops per snap among all defensive ends.  

Let's flip sites as a sanity check and head to AdvancedNFLStats.  Trent Cole got 75 percent more snaps than Graham, but the two came out almost even in terms of EPA+, WPA+ and EPA+/game.  

Sort that table by EPA/game and look at the top of that table.  Then consider this per-pass rush comparison:

No, I'm not saying that.  But there's something going on here.

There are plenty of coaches -- even some good ones -- who would look at Brandon Graham and see a square peg that won't fit a round hole.

Chip Kelly's gonna re-cut that damn hole. 

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*Maybe not the part about how we should have taken JPP.  

^Actual formula is sacks + hits * 0.75 + pressures * 0.75.

To our lasting regret, no one ever wrote the book on Andy Reid.  

It's not that no one ever tried to write a book about the Andy Reid Eagles. I'm sure it was pitched dozens of times.  Clearly, no one ever got a yes.

We can only guess as to why, but I'll always blame it on the Super Bowl.* A book on Reid would have given a fuller picture of the man beneath the moustache, under the hat, behind the podium.  That would have been problematic for Reid, because at some point in the book, we'd have seen him happy.  And happy was one thing the fans never wanted to see Andy be.

Not without a Super Bowl.

From where we stand right now, it looks like the story of the Andy Reid Eagles just ended.  And I guess it did.  But we're starting to get some hints that maybe the new story:  a) didn't start with Chip Kelly and b) quietly began at least a couple seasons ago.

I confess that I don't quite know what to make of Howie Roseman.  Joe Banner was easy to figure out in comparison.  A strange and complex blend, for sure, but the components weren't too hard to suss out.

Howie's a little trickier, especially because the longest and most in-depth pieces we've read about him have been almost entirely based on anonymous third-party assessments from people who have a vested interest in making him look bad -- either in general terms or because the knife Howie used to stab them in the back is preserved in amber and hanging on a wall in an office near the lovely campus of Baldwin Wallace.  

That's a lot of noise to wade through in search of a signal.  But I keep getting this tingly sense that there's a lot more going on with Howie than we really understand.  

Today's tingle comes from the pair of stories about Tom Gamble's long road back to Philly (Inky version, DN version, and yay no more MFN games from the Eagles' FO).  Gamble was a big hire for the Eagles.  Not, you know, the biggest of 2013, but a really big deal nonetheless.  He fills a major hole in the organization and even if he doesn't bring any positive acquisitions to the table, he'll save us years of grief just by waving us off deadweight like Demetress Bell, Nnamdi Asomugha and OJ's Atogwe's opportunity cost.

The big news in the story is that Howie tried to hire Gamble a year ago.^ Think about that for a moment.  A year ago Howie wasn't in charge.  It was still Reid's team.  The owner put everyone on notice:  one more losing season and big changes are in store.

And yet Howie was out there recruiting a guy who -- on paper -- is much more qualified to be an NFL GM than he is.  

In practice, Gamble should be Howie's Mornhinweg.  A guy who's so good at his job his boss can go off and worry about everything else, knowing he's got that part covered.

In effect, though, it's a lot more like Head Coach Marty Mornhinweg hiring Offensive Coordinator Andy Reid.

I'm still skeptical about Howie in some ways.  I think he's gotten taken in some recent negotiations.  I have a hard time writing off the 2010-2011 drafts as Not His Fault At All.  And boy, has he made some enemies.  

But I think the new consigliere might just be one of the most interesting people in the NFL right now.

Sure would be nice if someone would write that book.

---

* We can add this to the list of things lost that night in Jacksonville, along with Donovan ever getting the career credit he deserves and maybe even Dawk's Canton chances.

^ Which explains a lot and should go a long way in assuaging fears about why the 49ers let him go right now.

This is a really fun time to be an Eagles fan, if only because after years of run-pass ratio, red zone performance and we're-really-hiring-whom? all the current arguments are New! and Fresh! and Exciting!

Official IgglesBlog beat writer (it's a lifetime award) Les Bowen gave his take on the Vick vs. Foles debate this morning.  Read it if you haven't, but suffice it to say, he's ready to move on.

In truth, I'm ready to move on, too.  I respect the hell out of Vick as a player -- he's one guy you'll never see give up on the football field, unlike so many of his recent teammates -- but he's old and busted and I'm ready for the new hotness.

The problem is that there's no obvious new hotness available.  And boy does that suck.  After years of a crumbling marriage that's finally -- finally! -- over, we're the still-plenty-good-looking woman who walks into a singles bar ready to take advantage of her newfound freedom only to run smack dab into a motley assortment of bitter old retreads or skeevy-looking cougar hunters.

And now we'll run as far away from that analogy as possible.

Chip Kelly and Howie Roseman are facing two different optimization problems.  The first is right in front of them:  How to win games in 2013.  Big issue.  But maybe not as big as the other problem, which is how to win lots of games in 2014-?? and hopefully maybe even a trophy.

There are places on the roster where these two areas aren't in conflict, mostly regarding talented youngsters like Cox, Kendricks, etc.  Snce they'll be around for awhile, we plug them into hopefully good roles and then just keep developing them.

But there are lots of other areas where that isn't the case.  Defensive scheme, for example.  What's our long-term plan?  Are we trying to move to a pure 3-4 -- but we have all these expensive DEs for now so we need to figure out how to get some value from them even as we start phasing them out -- or are we comfortable running some sort of hybrid over the long-term where a guy like Brandon Graham could mostly play like a DE most of the time even if we call him something else?

And then the big one.  Quarterback.  There are lots of different ways to run a hurry-up spread offense.  It can look like RGIII or it can look like Tom Brady. Would Kelly be fine running the a pass-heavy, immobile QB version for the long-term?  Or is he committed to his read option running attack that requires a quarterback who can, at the very least, keep defenses honest.

Which brings us back to the short-term vs. long-term deal.  If he's somewhat scheme-agnostic -- just give him a QB and he'll figure out how to use him -- there could be a place for Nick Foles.  We know he played in an offense in college that did a lot of the things Kelly says he likes to do (spread everyone out, get the ball out quickly, for the love of God don't take sacks). On the other hand, Foles will never be able to "keep defenses honest" with his legs.

So, if Kelly isn't scheme-agnostic ... if he really believes in the run-based version of his offense, then it's probably the wrong choice to go back to Foles this year even if you believe he gives this team a better chance to win games in 2013.  You'd be spending an entire season NOT practicing the things you care about and NOT getting the rest of the offense ready for the long-term simply because you can't do the things with Foles that you want to do going forward.

If this is what Kelly's thinking, then Vick is the right move, as much as people may not be happy to see it.  Vick can do the run-spread.  He's a veteran, professional quarterback who can hold things together during what will be a learning experience for everyone, then you swap him out at some future point when you finally have the guy you're ready to commit to over the long-term.

(Especially if you can re-jigger his contract to pay him less money and get him entirely off the books when he's gone a year from now.)

If the Eagles win a bunch of games next year, it's going to be by accident.

"I think to be really successful in this league, you've got to be able to have the freedom to make short-term plans, mid-term plans and long-term plans and if you feel like you're under the gun where you're going to be given two years ... you're not going to get the best coaching. So, when a coach comes to the Philadelphia Eagles ... he knows he's going to have the owner's support to both plan in the short run, plan in the midterm and have long-term strategy as well."

-- Jeff Lurie announcing Reid's departure

They're not bringing back Vick to see if his old legs can lead them on one more run.  They're not hiring Jon Gruden to wring very bit of talent out of this roster using all his quick fix tricks.  And they're not reaching for a guy like Geno Smith unless they're 100 percent certain he's their franchise quarterback.

They're starting over.

* * * 

I realize I'm going to sound like every ex-coach announcer ever when I say this, but too many of the Reid retrospectives I've read in the past few days have given short shrift to what he accomplished in the first half of his time here.

Andy Reid -- to his lasting dismay -- never won a Super Bowl.  But I would argue that what he accomplished was statistically indistinguishable from winning a Super Bowl.

The amount of enjoyment we got out of watching those teams was remarkable.  I've never been more crushed as a sports fan than I was after those games against Tampa Bay or Carolina, but I've also never been happier -- as a sports fan -- than I was during that era as a whole.

Reid has always had his detractors, but I think too many of his fans are hand-waving away the magic that was the run from 1999-2004, either out of defensiveness or bitterness regarding what we've seen since.

* * *

The alternate universe where Andy Reid took a year-long sabbatical after what happened at training camp and then the entire team "missed his leadership and strategic acumen so much that they crashed all the way to 4-12" is quite a thinker.

* * *

The historical revisionism surrounding Jim Johnson is getting annoying. Johnson was an incredible coach and won his share of games for this team, but so did Reid, McNabb, Dawkins, Westbrook, Trotter, Vincent/Taylor and all the rest.

Laying it all at the feet of Johnson repeats the same error Lurie talked about in his presser.  It takes an organization to raise a trophy.  You're never just one guy away.

Give Johnson his due, but he didn't carry Reid.  All those guys picked each other up.

Now, none of them do.

* * *

Speaking of all those old guys, this old depth chart is work a look.

How many 2012 Eagles are starting on that team?  I'll give you Mathis and Celek on offense, and Cole and Ryans (sorry, Trot) on defense.  Cox could have played, but Johnson hated starting rookies.

There's some work to do here.

* * *

It's weird how much expectations matter, even after the fact.  The Iverson/Brown Sixers are perhaps my second-favorite team/era, and I have no regrets about their long climb to the Finals that ended just short of a trophy.  They "shouldn't" have won one more game than they did.

* * *

This does nothing to discourage my pet theory that the Eagles are laying the groundwork to shift to a 3-4 going forward.

* * *

I have less angst about Roseman now that we understand he won't be Joe Banner.  In fact, there will never be another Joe Banner, because Jeff Lurie has become Joe Banner on all the things we care about -- long-term vision, sticking to a plan, facilitating inefficiency exploiting strategies -- and has carved off for other people all the other things we don't care about.

I'm also reading Lurie to be saying, look, it wasn't just the 2012 draft. Roseman really hated Watkins and was completely overruled.  He may even have been the lone voice arguing against Vick.  Or when Castillo happened he begged Lurie to stop it and he should have listened.

We'll never really know what's happened, but Howie's had plenty of opportunities to oppose terrible decisions the past few years.

* * *

On what gives him confidence that general manager Howie Roseman is the right fit at general manager moving forward: "A lot of the analysis of what we have here has taken place over the last 12 months. It's not been reported properly because the information hasn't been communicated properly ... The mistakes that were made in the 2011 draft have little or nothing to do with Howie's evaluations and I think it was important for me to own up to the mistakes that were made and understand where they were coming from and it was awfully clear. So, an effort was made to streamline the entire operation and, as it turned out and it was nothing I could easily communicate to all of you ..."

Look, I've made my share of jokes here, but at the end of the day, PR people are at the mercy of senior decision makers.  The problems the Eagles have with communications have nothing to do with a taciturn head coach or tactical choices regarding the wording of official statements.  They need a mindset shift.

The Banner Plan, which granted MFN status to one key beat writer in an attempt at message control, blew up spectacularly this year when Joe left town, but continued feeding self-serving scuttlebutt to his old contact.

In his presser, Lurie seemed spectacularly displeased about that craven display of disloyalty those stories represented -- and really, the outcome where your divorce is only the second most contentious split of the year is truly mind-boggling -- but the most important point here isn't "Joe Banner is self-evidently a jerk no matter how many poor kids he helps."

The Eagles have the opportunity to push the reset button in a lot of ways the next couple months.  How they communicate through a) the media and b) their own channels is something to work on.

I never thought you were a good choice for the job of defensive coordinator.  I came back here just to talk about all the things I hated about your defense, last year's version and especially this year's, once they gave us the all-22 and we could actually see everything that was happening.

I said many, many unkind things about the adjustments your opponents made and the ones you didn't.  Offline and among friends, I may even have been less circumspect in calling you, say, an unqualified dolt.

I still don't think you were a particularly good defensive coordinator.

But holy $#@! were you better than Todd Bowles.

Any prediction about the changes Todd Bowles might make to the Eagles' schemes needs to start with an honest assessment of the team's performance so far and some educated guesses about what Castillo had been trying to do.

As any number of people have pointed out, the Eagles' defense has actually been pretty good this year -- most of the time and in most situations. Looking back over the entirety of Juan's tenure, a non-exhaustive list of specific concerns would include:

1.  Missed assignments.  We haven't talked much about it this year, but this was a problem in 2011, both up front (gaps) and in the secondary (blown and freelanced coverages).  I'm including it here because it pertains to the later discussion.

2.  Nnamdi's vanishing wheels.  This town blows awfully hot and cold on Nnamdi these days.  He gives up a couple big completions and he's a bum; then he does a great job on Megatron (with lots and lots of help) and hey look, "he's figured it out again."  He is, in both cases, the same guy -- an exceptionally skilled cornerback without much catch-up speed left.

3.  Two rookies in prominent roles.  Boykin and Kendricks have boatloads of talent, but they're both inexperienced.  This has shown up most often when they're challenged in zone.

4.  Sub-par play from the WIL spot.  Not to pick on just one guy, but on an individual level there aren't too many weak links.

5.  Castillo's inexperience as a playcaller.  It's been reported a couple different places this week that Bowles has already had some involvement in the playcalling this year.  My standing theory since the first game has been that he's called the coverages while Castillo was making the calls up front. Such a system comes with inherent compromises.

Watching the Lions game one last time, I was struck by the contrast between their wide nine and our wide nine.  The base defenses are awfully similar up front, but Detroit showed far more variety and aggressiveness over the course of the game.

In fact, my initial plan for this post was to highlight some similar formations/plays from the two offenses, then to show how much more creative Detroit was in attacking them up front.  But as I was working on that, I got a pretty healthy reminder of the power of recency bias.  Looking back at games earlier in the season, Castillo actually had been more creative up front.  Unfortunately, some of that stuff didn't work and I think we can best understand the current (pre-Bowles) state of the defense as a reaction to that.

After the jump, less jabbering, more pictures.

One of the small, but intriguing, differences between the two wide nines starts with pre-snap alignment.  It's generally pretty easy to figure out gap responsibilities in our defense, since before the snap, just about everyone stands in a gap:

Contrast that with Detroit's alignment against the same look (1TE 1RB):

Not much difference in the front fours, but you can see that their linebackers are "stacked" behind hte DTs.  Teams stack their linebackers for a range of reasons (often to protect them from blockers), but for our purposes it's interesting to speculate on why we don't -- and I think it at least partially goes back to point #1 at the top.

After all, it's pretty had to forget what gap you're supposed to be in when you begin the play by standing in it.  

Moving to the second point, we shouldn't forget how much trouble Nnamdi had earlier this year playing outside without help.  Baltimore got him when we brought the house:

Against Pittsburgh, Antonio Brown is going to run right past him, but drop the ball in the end zone (with the safety in no position to help on the other side):

And we all remember the Giants game.

This is likely an area where Bowles and Castillo disagreed.  My guess is that Bowles would tell you he can work around that by mixing up the coverages and giving different looks.  Castillo's answer was more along the lines of: "If in doubt, keep two safeties back."

This does a few things.  First, it's harder to run against this:

Or this:

Than against this:

Or this:

More importantly, in the modern NFL, you're also making big plays possible against you in the passing game.  And that's where trying to keep two guys always deep can really hurt you.  

If you tell a safety "you've got a gap AND deep coverage responsibilities," you're going to see play action into that gap and the tight end running up the seam:

Or play action into that gap to attack your quarters coverage:

Arizona version:

Giants version:

For as much crap as Kurt Coleman gets, I sure wouldn't want his job.  And what they're asking him to do is just fundamentally unsound, especially as a regular feature of the defense and not just something we mix in, but don't let people count on it being there.  

Buttressing the interior of the defense at the second level also allows the ends to stay in the wide nine, because you're less worried about getting gashed:

The Eagles didn't show the same look every time, but one of the issues they had in terms of pass rush was that the Lions could get an auto-double on the outsides whenever they went with two tight ends:

-----

Quick aside, while we're on the subject of two tight ends.  Jordan has contain responsibility on this play.  He doesn't keep it, but DeMeco and DRC shut things down for him, in large part because the WR ignores DRC and heads to the safety:

What I find fascinating though is to compare these two frames just before and just after the snap:

A lot of linebacker play happens at an extraordinarily reptilian level.  

-----

Three more points before I wrap this up.  

First, I think we'll see more variety in the defense now at least partly because we're back to a single playcaller.  For the old plan of "you vary the coverages and I'll get everything else in," Bowles needed to know before he made his call how many guys he had to work with and who would be on the field.  Blitzes had to be called as packages, because there wouldn't time for Castillo to say, "I'm bringing five, what do you want to do."  With one guy calling everything, that should all be easier.

Second, Bowles' new focus on the entire defense should help fix some of the issues we've seen in coverage over the middle.  The Cruz touchdown against the Giants is probably the best example.  It looks at first like he's running a slant/post right into the safety:

But then Allen walks up and shows blitz:

Which puts DeMeco on the tight end and leaves man outside and a gaping void in the middle:

At the snap, however, Allen locks up the tight end and DeMeco races to undercut Cruz's route:

He just doesn't do it all that well, sort of bumbling out there rather than really committing to it:

For which Boykin didn't particularly care:

I'd like to think some of that Bowles cut-up and coverage magic can rub off on the other groups.  We'll see.

Lastly, it sounds from the interviews since he's taken over that Bowles has identified the pass rush issue as being related to two things:

1. Teams are getting the ball out quickly.
2. Teams are max protecting on the handful of plays where they want to take shots.

The pass rush itself isn't the problem.  So what he needs to figure out how to do is beat max protect with scheme up front and take away the easy, quick throws in the back.  I'm looking forward to seeing what he has in store on both counts.

Todd Bowles in his first press conference as Eagles defensive coordinator:

On how he thinks CB Nnamdi Asomugha can best be utilized: "He’s a corner. He’s best utilized mixing man and zone coverages, as we have been doing. There aren’t too many things as a corner that you can or can’t do. You can’t go into a game and say, ‘We are going to lock him down the whole game.’ If you play 75 snaps of man coverage you’re going to get beat three. If you play all zone coverage, you’re going to get beat. We have to continue to mix it up and make sure that the game plan is conducive, not only for him, but also the other 10 guys."

Nnamdi Asomugha after the Eagles blew a fourth-quarter lead to the Lions:

"The fourth quarter was a lot of blitzing," Asomugha said. "So, the fourth quarter, they were able to find the matchups they wanted amidst the blitzing. You could say, 'You should blitz more,' but we did that and it didn't help us in the end..."

"We kind of just mixed it up," he said. "I was on him most of the game. I think when we got to the fourth quarter, there was a lot more trying to give him a different look. We talked about, 'Let's give him something else,' so that he doesn't get comfortable with the one guy or however it is. So we just wanted to give him a different look. So there were some times that Dominique, especially in the fourth quarter, would go to him. But it wasn't something in particular."

Nnamdi Asomugha an anonymous source talking to Bob Grotz after the Castillo firing:

Interim Eagles defensive coordinator Todd Bowles has been heavily involved in game plans and almost certainly was calling the coverages during games an NFL source said. 

The fourth quarter change in the Eagles' coverage of Lions receiver Calvin Johnson had someone else's fingerprints on it per the source.

The Eagles were doubling Johnson with cornerback Nnamdi Asomugha and a safety until varying the coverage with other defenders. While Asomugha was puzzled by the shift in tactics, head coach Andy Reid denied the coverage changed significantly.

Let's look at every passing play in the Lions game and see why those statements carry so much meaning.

First pass, and you'll note those are helpfully numbered:

Nnamdi on CJ at the bottom of the screen.  We immediately do the one thing I thought we wouldn't see all day, rotating to a cover three away from Nnamdi, meaning he's running deep with CJ without safety help.

It's worth looking at the play itself, although we'll get back to the coverages soon.  As you can see, it's a screen that's missing it's running back:

So what happened?  Well, they ran play action, at Jason Babin, right before he executed a spin move:

So as his back is turned, he thinks the running back has the ball:

Which means he comes out of the spin and "tackles" him:

Anyway, back to the coverages.  Pass #2:

Again to cover three, this time rotating over Nnamdi with DRC running deep.  That allows Nnamdi to undercut the in-breaking route without fear and knock the ball away.  Great play.  

Next drive:

Our first man look on a pass play, with a free safety.  Some of my blogging brethren are going to argue that Stafford had a bad day, and they'll point to this play, because he "misses" the open Scheffler running up the seam:

The problem is that once Scheffler got past the safety, he made the very human mistake of slowing down his route and turning his body to face the quarterback as he ran.  The ball was already out, with the QB assuming he'd keep going down the field, the way an NFL receiver should.  The resulting very slight overthrow was on Scheffler, not his QB.

Next play, we're doubling the inside receivers and manning up everyone else:

Note how aggressively Nnamdi can work his jam, knowing he has help:

Good coverage on the other side as wel:

Next play.  I swear all our worst outcomes this year start with Kurt Coleman worrying about that backside run.  We're in man free here.  Tight end on the other side will block down for a beat, faking out the linebacker, then release with his rolling QB:

Linebacker (Kendricks) sucked way too far inside to get back out.

Next, something a little different.  We're going to quarters coverage (four deep): 

It should be a fantastic call for the route that gets run (CJ is putting himself into double coverage), but we don't execute very well and he is rather tall.

Next, we're going to start to see how they handle bunch routes these days.  CJ motions inside:

We audible to a box, 4-on-3 coverage:

Works perfectly against the route package:

And notice how much ground Nnamdi makes up driving on the ball to get there as it arrives.  I was very impressed with Nnamdi in this game:

Next, we're in man free again, but we're going to blitz two guys:

Which means 11 minus 6 rushers minus 1 safety = 4 people covering 5 receivers:

Stafford took the PI up top instead, but oops.

Next, looks like man free at the start.  There aren't as many coverages you can run (successfully) this close to the end zone:

But then CJ motions inside, which is going to freak out everyone.  It's hard to see in these photos, but the safety who had been inside in the previous picture flips with the corner and gets up tight into jam position:

You can see they do a good job getting vertical separation, so when those receivers cross, our guys don't run into each other and he can get outside:

How it looks from end zone:

Cover two man on the next one:

Teams are starting to do a good job teeing off on the one guy covering the running back with screen passes when we run man, and here's good execution on this one:

Next, and there's a lot going on with this one:

Note first that we're doubling CJ out of the slot.  Then we have three guys in man (red lines).  But then something weird is happening with that double yellow arrow.  I had to see a few of these plays a couple times before I was able to figure out what we're doing.

When that WR comes in tight to the formation, we're evidently very concerned about crossing routes, so what happens is that the CB and S switch to an inside/outside coverage.  If the route comes outside, DRC stays with him.  If he breaks across, the safety will pick him up.  

Remember that for later.

Also, the coverage was really friggin' good the first three quarters of this game.  Look at Kendricks on the TE coming up the seam.  Stafford tried to fit something in here:

No chance.  Next drive:

For this one I drew the routes and the paths are defenders took.  I honestly have no idea what happened at the end of this play.  Early, it made sense:

That's great coverage.  But then as Stafford scrambled around:

Maybe our guys just aren't used to covering that long?  Definitely strange.  

Anyway, next play is the Nnamdi end zone interception, and again it's quarters coverage:

Except we played it much better this time:

---------------------------------------

Let's pause here for a moment and revisit a very similar play from the Cardinals game.  You remember which one.  Guess how it started?

That's right, Kurt Coleman staring into the backfield, worrying about his run assignment.  We were supposed to be in quarters here too, but it broke down after he charged forward.

Interesting sidenote, we talk about a one-gap defense, but when there's a fullback, you need a second guy in that gap.  That was Coleman:

---------------------------------------

Back to the Lions, but unfortunately we're still talking about Kurt Coleman staring into the backfield.  He's on the tight end here.  That guy is going to block down and then release on the bootleg.  Sound familiar?

It even looks like he's got this under control:

Whoops, ran past him towards "the ball carrier":

Bootlegs killed us all day.  The first time I watched, I just noticed the way the ends were constantly crashing down the line and losing contain.  True enough, but they also got Kendricks and Coleman, as we've seen, and put Colt into an impossible situation, as we'll see later.

But no, coaching hasn't been the problem.

Next play, still puzzled by Kurt Coleman:

Is he supposed to be under the route, over the route, near the route?

Who knows.  Screen on the other side, though, and you can see it's well blocked again:

Next play, man free with a double on CJ:

And really, Nnamdi was just in his kitchen all day:

Next, we drop to what looks like cover four (quarters):

Textbook:

But then watch what happens when the top receiver runs a deep dig:

The top safety stays with him on the cross, while the other three guys continue deep:

DRC got his feet tangled, so it almost ended up being completed, but when you can show a coverage that looks EXACTLY like another coverage but then magically morphs into triple coverage on the guy they're trying to throw to and tight man against the "checkdown," you're doing something right.

Next, more trips bunch:

Then cover two man:

Then a double on CJ (very helpful for post-game diagnosis when Nnamdi points at the safety to communicate the plan):

Then more cover two man on the last pass of the half:

---------------------------------------

Second half.  We start with man and a double on CJ.  Notice a couple things, though.  First they're going to try to get outside DeMeco with a little swing route:  

And based on his positioning, that's going to be tough for him to be even with, since he's well inside the RB and has some trash to get through on his way outside:

On the other side, note that we're doubling CJ, but look a) with whom and b) what else he's looking at:

Glad we didn't see that tested with a little play action / bomb.

Next, they're in man again, and on this play Coleman is going to alertly see the cross and come down to help on it, although his "help" will mostly involve decking Nnamdi:

Next, two WRs = auto-double on CJ.  This was the play where we forgot to put an LDE on the field:

Not the coaching, though.

Interesting coverage on the next one.  We're going to inside/outside another guy:

As the TE runs up the seam, our CB and LB are going to decide who's covering the slot based on where he goes.  Everyone else in man with one safety deep:

Next play, back to quarters, but look how far inside Allen is:

This time, CJ runs up the sideline, not the seam, and Allen can't get there in time to help.  Nnamdi's coverage is good, but he gets back shouldered. Especially with the TEs staying in to block, Allen's gotta be quicker outside here:

That puts us in the red zone, and we see five across:

And then after the CJ OPI, man with a double:

Now, remember earlier when I talked about how the CB and S were in/out-ing the tight receiver?  That's what happened on the catch and run by CJ that ended with him getting shoved out at the one yard line.  The look pre-snap:

And then the TE is going to come off the ball and set an obvious but legal pick:

No chance for Allen:

I talked about the TD here on twitter, but in case you missed it, the bootleg killed us again.  Pre-snap, we're in an "anyone but CJ" defense:

But see what's going to happen.  Trent will rush inside and when Stafford boots, Colt either has to run with him or cover his man, the tight end. Damned if you do / don't:

Next series, after the Vick INT.  I think this might have been the play that spooked Castillo into fully abandoning the game plan:

I have no idea what coverage this is.  I could describe it by saying "Kurt and Colt run right past the guys they're presumably supposed to be covering":

But I don't know how catchy that is.  Bad, bad miss by Stafford on this one.

At any rate, up to this point, you've seen the mix of coverages we used and how effective they had been.  This is also where I'm going to stop showing you every single play, because you don't need me to keep pasting images of us sitting in cover two man.

How about a summary chart, before and after the point in the game we're at right now:

This is what Nnamdi was talking about.

Everyone got so hung up on the blitz part of what he said, that they ignored the bigger picture.  They had a game plan, it was working, then one guy got hurt and they threw it out the window.  Rather than a mix of coverages, with a healthy, healthy dose of Nnamdi and a safety doubling CJ, we saw this:

And this:

And this:

Over and over and over.

And once the Lions knew what was coming every play, they started making us pay.  On the third and two, they know DeMeco will be on the running back and they know where he'll be lining up based on their formation:

They know they can clear out the middle of the field and run pitch and catch over the middle:

Although one of our guys is really damn fast:

Our big innovation was going from 2-man to 1-man with a blitz.  Which just emptied things out even more.  The LB will blitz, CJ will easily beat DRC's jam, and then he'll blow across the formation:

I mean, there's no chance here:

And remember how the Lions started chewing us up on the ground during the tying field goal drive?  That's because our damn safeties:

Were so far back:

That we ended up in a six-on-six situation in the box:

Even Stafford could get yards out of this on a QB draw, expecially once they run the back out wide, yanking DeMeco outside the formation:

The holding penalty in overtime that looked like it might save us?  That came on this play:

We blitzed Coleman outside and ... 

Yeah, there's no one in that gap.  Colt is 17 yards off the LoS.  It's a tremendous credit to the linemen over there that this didn't end the game on its own:

But since it worked so well last play, why don't we blitz Coleman again and leave DRC alone on CJ in the slot:

Ball game.

---------------------------------------

Let's return to a few of the points quoted at the top:

"We kind of just mixed it up," Nnamdi said. "I was on him most of the game. I think when we got to the fourth quarter, there was a lot more trying to give him a different look. We talked about, 'Let's give him something else,' so that he doesn't get comfortable with the one guy or however it is."

Subtext:  Because Juan stopped varying our coverages and we were just playing solo man on him every single play, we decided on the sidelines that we'd at least not give him the same person each time.

"He’s a corner. He’s best utilized mixing man and zone coverages, as we have been doing ... If you play 75 snaps of man coverage you’re going to get beat three. If you play all zone coverage, you’re going to get beat. We have to continue to mix it up ..."

Subtext:  Yep.

In the first half of last Sunday's game, the Steelers ran a wide open, shotgun-based passing attack.  In the second half, that changed dramatically:

The change of philosophy was evident on the very first series in the third quarter, when the Steelers came out in power, tight formations.  Here's the first play:

You can see that we're heavily shaded to the strong side of the formation with our linebackers.  And while we're keeping both safeties back, that gap through which the RB is coming is Kurt Coleman's responsibility.

We should pause here for a moment to talk about that, because it's interesting in its own right.  Remember when we played the Giants and there were those two big completions off play action that Nnamdi and the safeties gave up?  Here was the after-the-fact explanation:

On the first play, Asomugha tried to bump Ramses Barden at the line, but the receiver got behind him. Ideally, Asomugha would have had safety help there, but Kurt Coleman bit on a play fake and was late to recover.

Coleman said his priority on that play was a "run-first read." So while it was preferable for Coleman not to bite, it was still Asomugha's ultimate responsibility to defend Barden, who pulled in a 31-yard pass down the sideline.

"For him, he sees a pass play because a wide receiver is running deep," Coleman said. "But if I'm reading something different, I don't always see it as fast as him because I'm looking at something else."

-- Jeff McLane, Inquirer

At the time, this didn't make much sense to me.  Why do you ask a safety to read run first if he's got deep coverage responsibilities?  Then the Steelers game happened -- and trust me, you're going to be as sick of reading about weakside gap assignments by the end of this as I was watching them -- and it started to make more sense.

As a refresher, here's that Giants play:

Coleman is in a deep safety position, with a "run-first read" and also deep help responsibilities.  But notice something else as we flip the camera angle:

Just as in the Steelers formation above, there's no one in that gap behind which Coleman is standing.  And because "as everyone knows" we play a one-gap scheme, that means that must be his gap assignment.  

So this explains a lot of things:

• What a run-first read means (there's no one else to play that gap);
• Why Coleman is the free safety in the Castillo scheme (because the weak side safety has to be the better run support player than the strong side safety given our alignments -- see above);
• What they really think of Nnamdi Asomugha (since, well, we'll get to that).

Back to the Steelers, here's that play as it unfolds:

And how it looks from Coleman's perspective:

On the next play, the Steelers have a slightly different formation, but they're going to attack the same gap:

With the backs in the I, we're not overshifted as much, and Jamar Chaney should be able to shut down that gap:

But the counter action draws him inside:

Opening up the backdoor escape route (even more so because that receiver is again cracking down on Coleman):

On that one, blame Chaney for getting out of his gap, but take a look at the photo before the last one and notice that if he hadn't, the play would have worked just as well.  If he stays outside the tackle, the run goes inside. We're screwed either way, and it's because we don't have enough numbers in the box to take on all the blockers.

Surely if we saw the exact same thing three times in a row, by then Castillo would have made some sort of adjustment, right?  

Ha, right:

Two safeties back, gap unfilled.  Our guys do a better job with rush, crush, close on this one (since they've seen the same damn thing three times in a row) and the run doesn't go as far, but the hole's there:

The Steelers are going to throw a couple of passes, then it's right back to the same look:

The run goes right this time, for a short gain, and I honestly think Haley just did that to keep us in this stupid defensive alignment.  "See guys, worked that time!  You're too tough for us!"

Next play is another run, this time a draw.  We're still keeping two deep:

On third and two, we finally get aggressive:

I liked this call.  It's man across with one free safety and Ryans standing in the middle, half-zoning and half-keeping an eye on Roethlisberger.  It's a call that plays to our strengths and provides some insurance against the rumbling scrambler.

Unfortunately, the Steelers go max protection, and we end up wasting both Allen and Kendricks in coverage as their men just block and they never move:

We were lucky on this play that Ben just overthrew Wallace, who had gotten behind DRC on a crossing route.  They punt.

------

Series two, we finally adjust:

We walked down Allen late, the Steelers don't account for him, and he makes a tackle after a short gain.  Steelers went pass-pass-punt after that.

-----

Series three, we're back to playing it safe.  Two safeties back, here comes the lead and pulling guard:

We had seven-on-seven, but the pull gives them a numbers advantage and it works:

Now, you may have detected a certain tone so far, and it's intentional, but the next play is bullshit for reasons having nothing to do with our defensive calls.  Castillo actually dials up a run blitz right into the gap the Steelers are headed towards.  Safety crashes down too:

The problem is that the right tackle has Cox wrapped up at the point of attack:

And the right guard is holding Kendricks so badly that the rookie ends up trying to make a play with his back:

Lots of pad shifting around after this play once they'd been yanked all over the place.  Yeah, running the ball is pretty damn easy when you can just tackle the defenders.

Anyway, next play, looks like we've finally figured out that we need to have someone in that weakside gap:

So good, it took almost a quarter, but we're there, we're adjusted, and we're all set.  Unless, of course, the offense does something mean like adjust again.

Next play, Coleman's in a good spot, Chaney just screws everything up:

  

In that last photo, you can see Chaney POINTING at the gap Coleman is supposed to take.  Surely that means Chaney has the inside covered, right?

Cautiously optimistic ...

Kaboom.  Backwards and out of the hole.

While we were all watching that, though, Todd Haley noticed something else.  Take a look at the pre-snap rotation again:

As Coleman came down, we move to a three-deep look, and while DRC can turn and burn to get deep, Nnamdi no longer can.  He's fading back before the snap.

So, next play, same formation, same rotation:

Bam, screen pass:

Nnamdi's so far off the ball it's an easy 10 yards.  And the tight end out blocking actually does something cool, in that he starts towards Kendricks, then either [ realizes he can / is coached to ] let him go, figuring the WR can outrun him.  He heads for Nnamdi instead.  

It's just not fair when they other guy won't stand still.

The next play, we finally say Enough Is Enough and bring everyone to the line:

And then on the following play, when we get the same killer formation that's been blasting us all second half, note the difference:

Our linebackers are no longer overshifted -- putting a big body in that $#@ing hole finally -- we have a safety providing an extra body on the strong side, and Nnamdi is back up tight again.

It's even interesting to watch Matthews in that position:

He's got his gap responsibility, but unlike Coleman, when the ball doesn't come to him, he actually does something about it:

Nice play.  Have to think he's going to get a look at some point on the weak side this year.  Chaney's certainly not keeping the job.

-----

Before we wrap this up, I want to talk about one play on the last drive.  Not the third-and-12.  I'm sure other people will show the photos for that one.  I mean the third-and-four that came when the Steelers were just on the edge of field goal range at the Eagles' 38.

When Reid after the game talked puzzlingly about being in 2-man on the big third down conversion, everyone assumed he meant the first one.  As he cleared up in his Monday press conference, it was the second one, and you can see why it would have stuck in his craw a bit.  

Here's the pre-snap alignment:

We're showing a two-deep safety look.  Right away this is strange, because they only need four yards.  If they want to throw a 20-yard pass instead, let them.  There's no reason to have our safeties back there.

Now look at the routes:

The top and outside receivers in the triplet are going to push off and run in and out breaking routes.  The bottom guy is going to follow the tight end and use him as a moving screen.  If he can isolate Boykin on one side, then he simply breaks to the other and there's literally no way the rookie can cover him.

You can see the trouble off the snap:

There's almost nothing Boykin can do there against any route.  He might be able to break hard on a slant, but that's an iffy proposition at best.  And if the receiver runs outside, he's completely blocked.

The receiver sets him up:

And then breaks out.  The ball is already in the air:

They needed to get a four on three situation over there.  Let Nnamdi play short outside and use the safety to cover outside deep.  I've given a lot of credit to Bowles so far this year.  Not on that play.

Today was Thursday aka coordinator press conference day aka defend last week's gameplan day.  To mark the occasion, let's talk more about playcalling.

And yes, there will be pictures.  But some blah blah first.

One of the things that drives me nuts is post facto analysis that doesn't consider what the coaches might have been thinking before their meticulously crafted game plan blew up all over their faces.  It's just X didn't work, so clearly NotX was the better choice.

There's a place for this sort of thing during the game -- RUN THE %$#@ING BALL ANDY -- but after we've had a couple days to sort through everything and take a more dispassionate look, it's time to dig a bit deeper.

Starting with the offense, one of the ways in which Marty and his critics* disagree is the definition of the word "work."  When we say, "Dude, whatever you were trying to do last game, that stuff didn't work at all," we mean "You scored six points."

That's not Marty's definition.  Marty watches the film and sees plays where receivers were open but didn't get the ball, either because Vick didn't see them or was running for his life.  Or plays where the receiver would have been open if he'd run the right route.  Or screen passes that would have worked if his running back would just forget about the right joystick for once.

My issue with this line of thinking is that execution is not an exogenous variable.  Vick missed guys because he was under pressure all day.  The line struggled picking up seven rushers who had zero concern about the run game.  Rookie receivers always make more mistakes the more chances you give them.

And no, we don't really "hope they blitz."

But enough about the offense, let's talk about Todd Bowles and Juan Castillo, two guys who have been much maligned for their choice of coverages against Larry Fitzgerald, even though he ended up being about the only guy who did anything.  And they only gave up 17 points, playing with an offense that thinks ball security has something to do with a kevlar athletic supporter.

After watching the all-22 a couple times and from what we've seen so far this season, I think Bowles and Castillo had three issues coming into this game, two of which they knew about, one they didn't.

The first known problem was Brandon Boykin.  He's too good.  

Remember all the way back in August we were still talking about "Nickel Nnamdi":

That project is apparently on the fast-track, as Juan Castillo seems to be full-steam ahead with his plan to use Asomugha in a variety of ways. That means Marsh – or whoever wins the job — gets thrust into an important role.

“That’s our plan right now – we put [Marsh] in a lot of different packages just so we can try to take advantage of matchups,” said Asomugha. “The more he progresses, the more we’ll be able to do.”

The Eagles still see value in putting him in the interior. There’s even a name for the package – the “Nickel Nnam” – where Asomugha slides inside and Marsh gets the call on the outside.

“I approach it as being a starter because I have to come in and play with the first team in certain situations, so I have to be just as prepared as somebody that’s out there all the time,” said Marsh.

-- Tim McManus, Birds 24/7

So much for that.  Boykin was so good so early that the coaches seem to have decided they're going to run with him as the #3 cornerback no matter what.  Having said that, they don't seem all that fired up about letting him play outside.  

Some evidence for that viewpoint in a Castillo non-answer from today's presser:

On whether there is still an option for an alignment with Asomugha on the inside and CB Curtis Marsh on the outside: “Well, again, it depends on the down, whether it’s first or second down. Sometimes in base, when you’re going against their two backs, two receivers and tight end, if the two receivers are on the same side, you may see the two corners and you may see (CB) Dominique (Rodgers-Cromartie) inside, or Dominique outside and Nnamdi inside. Same thing as when they play two tight ends and one back and two receivers; usually, our corners go over and match up with their wide receivers.”

Evidently the coaches think the dropoff from Boykin to Marsh is so big that it's not worth playing the situational game where one guy is Mr. Inside and one is Mr. Outside.  That was issue #1.

The second challenge had to do with the type of team we are and the type of quarterback Kevin Kolb is.  When we've looked our best this year on defense, it's been playing a man underneath look with two deep safeties watching everyone's backs.  Unfortunately, when you're game planning for the Cardinals, that's almost the last thing you want to do.  

The shortest distance between two points is generally pretty wide open, which means against Captain Checkdown, there's not much point in just sitting those two safeties back there.  They're kind of wasted, and by the way, wouldn't it be nice to use at least one extra man on Larry Fitzgerald?  

The Cardinals also run a lot of short, crossing crap, so really you want to flood the short zones and make Kolb look for something downfield, all with your pass rush bearing down on him.

So, issue #1, we want to play Boykin and we need to keep him inside. Issue #2, we like to play 2-man, but that's a bad fit for Arizona and ideally we'd rather not just let them tee off on Boykin inside all day once they figure out what we're doing. 

Which brings us to the game plan we actually used -- lots of zone and combo coverages -- and then issue #3 ... which is that it turns out some of these guys kinda struggle with zone and combo coverages.

As Bobby April might say, here's how we paid our tuition on that one.

Last week I showed a good play by DeMeco, pushing his man to the safety and them coming off to take away the crossing route.  

This week, we saw Kendricks facing almost the exact same situation (he's inside, Boykin actually circled, sorry for confusion):

He's inside, his receiver is running up the hash marks, and the outside receiver is going to hook it up short.  Last week's DeMeco play, very similar situation at this point:

But check out the difference.  Here's Kendricks as the play continues:

Note that he's run another five yards, and is no longer in position to help with the short receiver.  Contrast with Ryans, who had already come off his man and was giving help:

And in fact, the pass has already been completed before Kendricks ever comes off his man:

Sticking with Kendricks for a minute, the Cardinals also attacked him when he was in man.  They love their pick plays.  Here's one he doesn't see coming:

Trapped:

And here's another one where they're actually trying to pick Ryans (Kendricks circled, DeMeco next to him):

The pick:

Annnd, oops, the rookie forgot he was in man, not zone, so the picker actually ends up running free across the middle while Kendricks double covers what looks to be the super dangerous Beanie Wells:

Boykin had even more difficulty in zone than Kendricks did.  This play is a pretty straightforward four-covering-three situation.  Boykin should know he has outside/short, so his responsibility coming out of this bunch should be obvious pretty early:

A beat after the snap, it's clear he's having trouble identifying what's coming at him:

Which makes him late:

The ball's in the air and he's barely moved.  Now, having said that, Kolb put the throw in a bad spot and Boykin is so fast that that mistake was all he needed to close it down and help ensure Doucet didn't make the catch.  But that's not good zone defense.

Here's another one where we have to guess a bit, but I think we have enough info to do so.  Boykin in the slot at the snap:

Allen is going to move to the middle as the play progresses and Nnamdi is going to run deep as fast as he can (more on that in a moment), so I believe Boykin had the short outside.  As opposed to, literally, the middle of nowhere:

Maybe he was supposed to be short, maybe he was supposed to be deep ... we know for sure he wasn't supposed to be in the middle not covering anyone.

Now, take one more look at that play as it continues:

That's not Larry Fitzgerald.  We need to be really careful asking Nnamdi to play deep thirds out of press.

More Boykin.  Here's a blitz that would make Sean McDermott happy.  CB coming from the bottom (off Fitz), we rotate a double team into his spot, and Trent Cole's dropping up top:

The routes (that's Boykin in the slot):

How it plays out:

Criticize the coaches all you want for dropping Cole into coverage -- at least he's covering someone.  Easy pitch and catch as neither Kendricks nor Boykin is close to the receiver.

I think you could even argue that the slant Fitz almost turned into a first down on fourth third and a million was another example of Boykin not showing great zone awareness.  Routes:

Nnamdi says, "By all means, please go inside":

Boykin stays focused on the man in front of him, rather than his area of the field:

That one's a bit more arguable, but I still think he could be a couple steps further outside and further back.  

Now, contrast his zone work with what we see when he's locked up on someone.  Fitz is still going to beat him here:

But it takes an absolutely evil route and he's not beating him by much:

We also shouldn't leave the impression that only the rookies struggled in zone.  No need to re-hash the Coleman touchdown here, but how about this one from Nnamdi:

It's cover three and he's five yards deeper than the other safeties, even as the man in front of him is sitting down and the ball's coming his way.

Brian talked a couple days ago about the way it sometimes looks that Nnamdi is more interested in appearing that he wasn't beaten than he is sticking his nose in to help make a bad play a little less so.  I have the same observation, but a different take.  I think Nnamdi is scared to death of guys running past him these days, so we see him overreacting to moves and -- as in the above -- leaving cushions that are a bit too big to be effective.

Here's another mess-up, this time from DeMeco.  Sitting in zones with crossing routes and a man coming right at him:

He's going to react to something -- I think a little move by Kolb shifting in the pocket -- and take himself towards the top of the screen, also know as "out of position" for this throw:

I think we might go back to playing a lot more man this week.

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