detailed breakdown of Rams from Eagles perspectives (with pictures!!) (!)

Eagle Eye: Rams Boast Playmakers On ‘D’

By Fran Duffy

http://www.philadelphiaeagles.com/news/article-1/Eagle-Eye-Rams-Boast-Playmakers-On-D/c715bba4-c6c1-4ae7-8b59-2729d8dd9162

Coming off the bye week, this is going to be a very tough St. Louis Rams team that takes the field on Sunday afternoon at Lincoln Financial Field. Though just 1-2, they’ve got a very talented defense to go along with a tough running game and talented weapons on the perimeter that can score at any time. Austin Davis, named the starter earlier this week by head coach Jeff Fisher, plays within the offense and gets the ball out quickly and in rhythm. When it’s all said and done, though, this is a running team led by second-year back Zac Stacy. Let’s look at one of their favorite plays to run with Stacy in the backfield, the split zone run.

The split zone is a play the Eagles ran a lot a year ago, especially down the stretch. Your offensive line is going to have the same rules as you would on any inside zone run, with double teams at the point of attack and linemen sifting to the second level to erase the linebackers, creating creases for the back to run through. What makes it a split zone, however, is the act of a fullback or in this case a tight end coming across the formation to block the backside defensive end.

Watch Stacy above as he takes this split zone run for a long gain and a first down against Dallas. Split zone isn’t the only play they like to run with Stacy, though, because you can count on seeing “power” as well.

We’ve covered this before, so you know what you’ve got here with the pulling guard from the backside and the frontside linemen blocking down the line of scrimmage. This is power all the way.

Not so fast!

While the Rams do like to run power, they love to get their receivers the ball on reverses. On this play, it’s 2013 first-round pick Tavon Austin, but he’s not the only one they’ll give the ball to on these plays. Chris Givens, Kenny Britt and even tight end Jared Cook have been known to get the ball in the run game for the Rams, as they try their best to get playmakers the ball in space.

In the passing game, the Rams are a big “high-low” team. What that means is they like to give the quarterback a read of the high receiver or the low receiver on any given combination. Often that comes in the form of crossing routes from opposite sides of the field.

You can see what I mean here, where you have a post route at the top of the screen with a shallow cross coming from the bottom. The hope is to get some of the underneath defenders to run with the shallow cross to open up throwing lanes for the post. No matter what the Rams are running, there’s often some kind of a high-low element to their passing game, and they’ll pair those high-low reads with vertical routes.

With the high-low read in the middle of the field, you have two vertical routes on the outside. On this play, Davis likes his chances on the perimeter with one of his weapons at wide receiver.

Davis makes a great read on this play, sees the Vikings are in Tampa-2. He makes a great throw into the “turkey hole” (the soft spot in the zone above the corner and beneath the safety towards the sideline), completing this pass to Austin.

Here you see another very similar play, with another high-low read inside and vertical routes on the outside. The Cowboys are in man coverage and Davis throws a great pass to Brian Quick. The former second-round pick out of Appalachian State beats Morris Claiborne down the sideline for a long touchdown. Quick is a big, physical receiver who moves well for a guy his size, and is a tough cover at this stage in his career.

Enough with the vertical routes though. Let’s see how the high-low reads work.

The Rams are running double post here otherwise known as “Topper.” Double posts work in a very similar way to double slants (“Tosser”), in that the main target here is that outside No. 1 receiver. With the No. 2 receiver inside running a post to the left, and the shallow cross from the tight end to the right, there should be a nice gap to throw the ball to No. 1 for a first down.

This play works beautifully, just the way you draw it up. The shallow cross takes two underneath defenders out of the way expanding the coverage to the right. The post route from No. 2 expands it to the left, leaving a nice lane for Davis to deliver the football, and he throws a strike for a first down. Great design and great execution from the Rams’ offense.

Another concept the Rams will use to get playmakers, specifically Cook, the ball in space is a play we covered last week, the post-wheel.

Cook is another tough cover on this Rams offense. With the athleticism to run away from linebackers and the size to outmuscle safeties, his abilities in the open field make him a dangerous threat in this offense and on this concept he can be especially effective because of his ability to go up and win at the catch point.

Defensively, this unit is led by Gregg Williams, who runs a pressure scheme that plays a lot of man coverage on the back end. This team is chock full of athletic physical specimens on this side of the ball, featuring a lot of high draft picks and highly touted prospects. Robert Quinn is the cornerstone, obviously, as the leading sacker in the NFC a year ago (19 sacks). His ability to “run the hoop” and accelerate off the edge is a rarity, and despite the fact that he doesn’t have a sack yet in 2014 he is one of the most dangerous pass rushers in the league.

Michael Brockers, much like his 2012 draft class peer Fletcher Cox, is a big man who can move really well and is one of the more athletic nose tackles in football. Aaron Donald, one of their two first-round picks this year, is a quick, explosive 3-technique who lives in opposing backfields. While he is coming off the bench, Donald has five tackles for loss so far this season in three games and has looked very impressive.

At linebacker, James Laurinaitis is as steady as they come, but athletically there may be nobody in the league as physically gifted at that position as Alec Ogletree. The former Georgia Bulldog, at close to 250 pounds, is unbelievably fluid in the open field, and his closing speed is tough to find. Safety T.J. McDonald was another one of those physical marvels coming out of USC a couple of years ago, and moves the way you want a safety to move on the back end with long arms and the ability to play at the line of scrimmage, in the slot, or in the deep middle. He has come a long way since his days as a Trojan. Janoris Jenkins is one of the best off-man cornerbacks in the game, and his ball skills and route recognition make him a top-flight cover corner. Again though, this is a pressure scheme, and with all of these athletes they love to mix up different looks to bring heat on opposing quarterbacks.

Here you can see the pre-snap look from the Rams. The Vikings have no idea where the blitz is coming from. Ogletree and Laurinitis drop out before the snap, and a hit on quarterback Matt Cassel leads to an incomplete pass.

The Rams don’t always need to bring extra men to get into opposing backfields though. Remember that explosiveness I mentioned from Aaron Donald? That’s him above knifing into the backfield to take down running back Adrian Peterson.

On the back end, this is mostly a man coverage team, but when they do play zone, you can count on seeing a good amount of Tampa-2 coverage.

We’ve covered Tampa-2 in the past. What you’re basically seeing here is two high safeties splitting the field in half, with two outside corners in the flat, two outside linebackers dropping to the numbers and a middle linebacker dropping down the seam, opening his hips up to the passing strength of the formation and carrying any vertical routes down the middle of the field.

This is one of the benefits of playing Cover 2. The play started and look at all of the defenders’ eyes. All eyes are in front, focusing on the quarterback. The ball is thrown, and the entire unit rallies to the ball to make the spot short of the first down. There’s another wrinkle of this coverage that the Rams will roll out from time to time, and I couldn’t help but share it with you.

That’s 326 pounds of beef dropping and running down the seam with Jason Witten by the way. The Rams are known to drop one of their defensive tackles from time to time in underneath coverage in Cover 2, with two deep safeties and six underneath defenders stretching across the field. This is the scary type of athleticism you can see from players like Brockers on this defense.

I’ve alluded to it since the beginning of this piece, but the Rams are a man coverage team because of the athletes they have on the back end of the defense. Janoris Jenkins is their top corner and you can see why on this play.

Here you can see Jenkins’ short-area burst and ability to read routes as he jumps this curl route by Dez Bryant, taking Tony Romo’s pass to the house.