Jay, I have a question on those outside rushes that went for big yards. One in particular. It was to the Denver left and in it Ninkovitch is being blocked by the TE. Early it looked like he had him under control, tbut hen snuck a quick look inside as the runner approached. When the RB saw that he broke outside.
Now here's the question. The RB beats Ninko to the outside, but then not a single DB shows up in the picture until the RB is about 8 yds down field. What I'd like you to figure out (if you can) since you have replay, what kind of secondary coverage the Pats were in that would cause that result. There seemed to be no force by an inverted S, nor was a CB ever in sight. Man coverage would somewhat explain it, but IIRC, the down and distance would make that seem unlikely, especially since it seemed to me that the Pats were essentially in zone coverages most of the game.
That lack of run support from the secondry showed up several times early in the game, and IMHO was more the cause of the success Denver had running the ball outside, than Ninko getting sucked in.
I'll look forward to your reply
You nailed that one, Ken.
The play is a 1st and 10 on the DEN 18 with 7:18 in the 1st quarter.
Denver is lined up with two TE's to the left of the formation, and one back. The ball is on the far hash, with the strength to the field.
NE is in a balanced 34 with Nink aligned as the Sam, playing head-up on the line on the outermost TE. Deaderick is the playside end in a 5-technique. Arrington is the playside corner, aligned outside the numbers head up on the x. *The safeties are showing 2-deep 20 yards off the line*. The play is a handoff directed between the 5-technique and the sam.
The inside TE and the T doubleteam Deaderick, the outside TE posts Ninkovich. The playside guard rubs Love at the nose and seals Mayo.
The aiming point for the back is the seam between Nink and the doubleteamed Deaderick. There is a hole initially in the B gap, but Fletcher stays home and shuts that lane down, forcing the initial bounce. Ninkovich jars the TE post, and actually lifts his blocker off of his feet. He is square and controls the outside shoulder of the TE. As the play develops, Deaderick penetrates the doubleteam and turns the play outside. Simultaneously, Nink reads the play going inside of him and moves to shed to the inside to make a play. The back sees Deaderick split the doubleteam and this causes the bounce. Nink at this point is committed to the inside. Arrington is coming hard laterally, with the recever trailing him trying to make a block. As this is happening, Fletcher is scraping in pursuit of the play. As the back cuts it outside, it was a perfect storm of positioning. Nink and Deaderick are negated by the bounce out, and Arrington is now is poor position with the receiver now having an easy seal. Nink is still in position to make a play and does a nice job trying to recover. However, his blocker makes a nice hold on the v of his breastplate. Arrington is blocked into Fletcher, taking them both out of the play.
Slater is coming too hard to the C gap, and is now out of position for run support. McGahee is able to get the angle on him, defeats an arm tackle with a stiff arm, and now is in a race to the pylon along the numbers. Of all people, McCourty coming in pursuit is able to finally push McGahee out of bounds after a 28 yard gain.
So, yes DB play is absolutely to blame in this play. However, it was played well initially by the playside defenders. In my mind, it was just a nice play by McGahee and bad luck the way the play went down.
Hell of an observation in real time!
