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Sounds like you are describing a different play but on one, the RB was outside of Jones and he dove out and ankle tackled him. Great play.
I'll defer to you on that ranking. I just think that's his weak spot. Maybe last season is still resonating with me and even then, it's not always his fault when the edge dissolves, particularly when Jones or Vellano is next to him on the inside, and they are getting blown off of the ball.
I'm still getting used to the concept of us having a good defense, so my reflex is to assume that when our defense succeeds, it's because the opposition is beyond terrible. I watched the game on the condensed NFL game rewind, so I didn't catch that it was Matt Kalil. Chandler wasn't just beating him 1v1 with a move either, he was constantly forcing him back, even when the Vikings were chipping him.
No that is not the case.
Ninkovichs side is the strong side.
I know exactly what play you were talking about, and I agree that it was fantastic.
BTW, I went back and reviewed, and it looks like my memory served me very poorly on the play in question, since I was wrong about almost every detail in question (wrong runner, wrong blocker, wrong loss of yards). I was actually referring to the second play from scrimmage, which I think is a perfect example of how dominant and versatile Jones is. He's not just a pure edge rusher. Check it out:
The Vikings initially come out in a standard I formation with Rhett Ellison (TE2) as the FB. Patriots have 3 DL - Ninkovich playing 7 technique as SDE, and Wilfork on the strong side with Siliga on the weak side (both 2 technique). Chandler Jones is standing up as a 7-technique OLB
The Vikings send Ellison up to the line as TE2 on the weak side. Jones responds by shifting to 9 technique on Ellison's outside shoulder, and briefly moving into a three point stance (he goes back to standing up before the snap).
At the moment that the ball is snapped, Jones is back in a two point stance, and Chung has moved up in run support on the strong side. Deonte Skinner is the WILB, Mayo is the SILB (basically the mike with Chandler down on the LOS), and Hightower is the SOLB.
The Vikings plan here seems pretty clear: Ellison was assigned to block Jones, enabling Matt Kalil to get to the second level and go after Deonte Skinner. Jarius Wright is at the top of the screen, with Revis matched up on him. Wright is in motion pre-snap, and Revis tails him across the formation. Wright is going to receive the handoff and try to run through the lane on the weak side that is opened up by Kalil blocking Skinner and Ellison blocking Jones. Chung has already been removed from the play by coming up to support the strong side (if he hadn't, I assume they would've run strong side at Ninkovich and Hightower, behind Loadholt and Rudolph). Meanwhile, the strong side defenders will be occupied by Asiata, as they'll fake a hand-off to him and he'll try to run to the strong side.
There's a few things going on here. Kalil is unable to get to Skinner, who is standing back and basically trying to limit the damage in the event that Wright gets past Jones. Instead, Kalil blocks Revis, who has followed Wright all the way across the formation and has put himself in position to make a tackle.
All in all, I'd say the Pats have handled this pretty well. In spite of all of the misdirection on the Vikings' part, they still have 3 guys (Revis, Skinner, Jones) on the weak side against 2 blockers.
Most crucially, though, notice that Jones has his arms fully extended, and as a result of his freakish length Ellison can't get his hands on him. Jones has already steered him 3 yards into the backfield, and he isn't done yet. You can already see that, if the original plan was for Wright to run a sweep (which it pretty clearly was, IMO) that play has been blown up by Jones forcing Ellison so far into the backfield.
I might need to post a few screenshots for this, just to show how thoroughly Chandler Jones is dominating Ellison here. It's crazy. Having already driven Ellison almost 5 yards into the backfield, Jones now disengages, throwing Ellison backward and completely eliminating the possibility of an outside run.
Wright runs directly into Ellison, who no longer has anything even vaguely resembling a block on Jones. Jones is able to tackle Wright easily for a five yard loss. But even if he hadn't been able to, by mandhandling the TE as he did, he would have at a bare minimum forced the run inside. This would've allowed Skinner and Revis a much better chance at making a play to limit the gain. Even Mayo has gotten off of his block and put himself in position to make a play in pursuit, because that's the kind of unnoticed thing that Mayo does pretty much every snap that he's on the field.
Ellison is forced to watch as a bystander while the guy that he was supposed to block tackles Wright 5-6 yards behind the line of scrimmage. Norv Turner is forced to consider that trying to block Jones with a tight end might have been a really, really bad call.
I know exactly what play you were talking about, and I agree that it was fantastic.
BTW, I went back and reviewed, and it looks like my memory served me very poorly on the play in question, since I was wrong about almost every (wrong runner, wrong blocker, wrong yardage). I was actually referring to the second play from scrimmage, which I think is a perfect example of how dominant and versatile Jones is. He's not just a pure edge rusher. Check it out:
The Vikings initially come out in a standard I formation with Rhett Ellison (TE2) as the FB. Patriots have 3 DL - Ninkovich playing 7 technique as SDE, and Wilfork on the strong side with Siliga on the weak side (both 2 technique). Chandler Jones is standing up as a 7-technique OLB
The Vikings send Ellison up to the line as TE2 on the weak side. Jones recognizes the threat of a run to the weak side, and responds by shifting to 9 technique to assume contain responsibility, and briefly moving into a three point stance (he goes back to standing up before the snap).
At the moment that the ball is snapped, Jones is back in a two point stance, and Chung has moved up in run support on the strong side. Deonte Skinner is the WILB, Mayo is the SILB (basically the mike with Chandler down on the LOS), and Hightower is the SOLB.
The Vikings plan here seems pretty clear: Ellison was assigned to block Jones, enabling Matt Kalil to get to the second level and go after Deonte Skinner. Jarius Wright is at the top of the screen, with Revis matched up on him. Wright is in motion pre-snap, and Revis tails him across the formation. Wright is going to receive the handoff and run a jet sweep either out wide or through the lane on the weak side that's opened up by Kalil blocking Skinner and Ellison blocking Jones. Chung has already been removed from the play by coming up to support the strong side (if he hadn't, I assume they would've run strong side at Ninkovich and Hightower, behind Loadholt and Rudolph). Meanwhile, the strong side defenders will be occupied by Asiata, as they'll fake a hand-off to him and he'll try to run to the strong side.
Side note: in week 1, the Vikings had Cordarrelle Patterson running jet sweeps instead of Wright. I'm wondering why they made the switch, and part of me wonders if it's because having Patterson run it would mean that they're running it at Revis. Revis is so strong in run support that I suspect Turner didn't have faith in Wright to make that block on him. Just another reason why he's so good, and might help explain why Revis wasn't put on patterson in the first place.
There's a few things going on here. Kalil is unable to get to Skinner, who is standing back and basically trying to limit the damage in the event that Wright gets past Jones. Instead, Kalil blocks Revis, who has followed Wright all the way across the formation and has put himself in position to make a tackle.
All in all, I'd say the Pats have handled this pretty well. In spite of all of the misdirection on the Vikings' part, they still have 3 guys (Revis, Skinner, Jones) on the weak side against 2 blockers.
Most crucially, though, notice that Jones has his arms fully extended, and as a result of his freakish length Ellison can't get his hands on him. Jones has already steered him 3 yards into the backfield, and he isn't done yet. You can already see that, if the original plan was for Wright to run a sweep (which it pretty clearly was, IMO) that play has been blown up by Jones forcing Ellison so far into the backfield.
I might need to post a few screenshots for this, just to show how thoroughly Chandler Jones is dominating Ellison here. It's crazy. Having already driven Ellison almost 5 yards into the backfield, Jones now disengages, throwing Ellison backward and completely eliminating the possibility of an outside run.
Wright runs directly into Ellison, who no longer has anything even vaguely resembling a block on Jones. Jones is able to tackle Wright easily for a five yard loss. But even if he hadn't been able to, by mandhandling the TE as he did, he would have at a bare minimum forced the run inside. This would've allowed Skinner and Revis a much better chance at making a play to limit the gain. Even Mayo has gotten off of his block and put himself in position to make a play in pursuit, because that's the kind of unnoticed thing that Mayo does pretty much every snap that he's on the field.
Ellison is forced to watch as a bystander while the guy that he was supposed to block tackles Wright 5-6 yards behind the line of scrimmage. Norv Turner is forced to consider that trying to block Jones with a tight end might have been a really, really bad call.
