Thread: The schematic problems on the defense

I’m frustrated with the defensive scheme. It’s vanilla. It sucks. Why I tortured myself doing this, I don’t know. But before you is me venting my nerdy ass frustrations.

The Broncos base defense is going to be a 2–4-5 nickel or a 2-3-6 dime. That’s pretty common now, especially against teams like the Bears (and later the Chiefs) who are in primarily shotgun formation with 11 or 12 personnel.

The problem pass rush wise is Denver’s outside linebackers are getting chipped, double teamed and pushed wide. That still leaves three blockers on two inside and Wolfe and Harris are just frankly not good enough to get pressure in that situation. The problem is, they’re just not making many adjustments with the two key players, Miller and Chubb.

The problem coverage wise is pretty easy. Corners are just way out of the play, unless it’s a medium to deep pass.

For example:





Easy throw and catch for a quarterback who isn’t particularly accurate (in NFL terms).

Interestingly enough, the Broncos went to essentially a 3-3-5 that is basically a 5-1-5 on the second drive for about half the plays. It’s an interesting concept and basically takes away the running game. It also helps with contain and the outside quick throws Trubisky was hitting early.



Obviously, in third and long they move away from it, but the problem as I see it is that they don’t show anything exotic on third and long. They go straight to the base nickel against 11 and 21 personnel, which the Bears use almost exclusively anyway.

On the key play of that long second drive when the Broncos got into third and long and Yiadom missed the tackle that was basically the difference between a field goal and a punt, the Broncos rushed just three and Miller’s job was to shadow Cohen out of the backfield. The Bears flooded that zone, with the corners still playing 10 yards off. That forces a natural pass rusher to make a coverage decision. He, probably correctly, chooses Cohen, and not the tight end. The tight end, with no one in the flat gets Yiadom not in tight coverage one on one for the first down. There are just too many problems with this. It’s just way too passive.

The one time the Broncos brought any semblance of pressure in the first two drives was a second and long around the 35 yard line. The Bears had an inside screen on and the pressure was beat quite quickly.





Inexplicably, though, it’s a zone blitz with Chubb dropping into coverage. At least he’s in a place to not allow that inside screen to get a first down, and ultimately a good run stop on third down forces a field goal. But, that’s the first time, we’ve gone an entire quarter and a few minutes, and that’s the first pass rushing adjustment they’ve made. Why? Roughly 10-15 pass plays, no outside pass rush to speak of, and that’s after a week where Denver’s two really good (Von is great) pass rushers were just rendered useless.

Off to watch the rest of the half and the second, surely, they’ll make some adjustments, right?

Circled in blue is Bradley Chubb.



You think that’s a zone?

First play of the fourth drive.



No formational adjustments.



It’s a screen.

Andy Reid is going to eat this alive. My goodness.

Second half. Surely they’ve made some adjustments.

Nope.



Five man front, Miller in coverage, Chubb way too wide to make a play, no push up front, corners playing off. Cool.

OMG, a stunt! Only took two quarters.

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So it wasn’t the direct game plan correlation I thought, but the big play in the game was the Cordarrelle Patterson sweep. I think playing the corners off contributed to this.

In the first half they run a jet sweep and only Miller is in the flat. They don’t execute perfectly, but it shows that sweep is there.



Corners playing off, space in the flat and they get the numbers to block for the big play later in the game.

Originally Posted by MOtorboat

OMG, a stunt! Only took two quarters.

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Pretty sure this is the only stunt they ran the entire game. I’m not even sure it was called from the sideline. Just vanilla nothing defense. It’s just bad.

Move Von and Chubb around, vary up fronts. Run some stunts. Shit, do what the Chargers do and line up Chubb and Miller on the same tackle and make that tackle shit himself.

Defensively, these two games have been very frustrating. The offense clearly blows, so they better start doing something interesting defensively, or it’s going to be a really long season, not just a long one.

Next up. I torture myself and watch every Garrett Bolles play! (Just kidding, probably not)

I like this thread thanks for the work.

I felt the Defense was called like a preseason game.

Not enough pressure and not nearly enough blitzes to be effective.

This is my main issue and I hope its just a matter of Vic being a first time HC, with Donatell as the DC and they are working the kinks out. It drives me nuts to watch such a vanilla defense, then when we do pressure its not with von and chubb consistently until the last few plays of the game. I feel like were still doing pre-season offense and defense play calling, they Prob should have gotten this worked out then not in weeks 1 and 2.

Good work MO!

The biggest surprise for me with this defense is that he's leaving our slow, muddling ILBers on the field on passing downs. This is where the adjustment needs to start IMO. Josey Jewell is watching backs and TEs run past him without a prayer of catching up. He played every defensive snap in the first game. When the Broncos didn't bring in ILBer help, I assumed that Fangio would make adjustments to cover up that Achilles heel. It hasn't happened. Now you have Wolfe whining and crying about how fast the ball is getting out of the QBs hands. It's because the middle of the field is wide open!

Bring an extra safety in and play them in the box. Go with 6 dbs. Blitz the ILBers and make the QB uncomfortable in the pocket. Do something!

I'm not by any means giving up on Fangio and this defense, but adjustments need to be made or the Broncos are going to be picking top 5 in the draft again.

This bend-but-don't-break, passive, hope-the-offense-makes-a-mistake, Bob Slowick-style defense is miserable to watch. Absolutely miserable. It's the equivalent of John Fox ball on defense - uber conservative.

Between that and our bottom-5 scoring offense - apathy has set in much earlier than I expected.

Watching Fangio walk around in his frumpy sweathshirt and fanny pack with zero emotion - while watching totally stale and boring football on both sides of the ball -- is already 100x worse than I imagined this season being. It's killed all the excitement I had for this team and this season.

At least the Cardinals can get excited about something with a young coach, a young QB and a dynamic system -- we're moving in the wrong direction everywhere.

Originally Posted by Buff

This bend-but-don't-break, passive, hope-the-offense-makes-a-mistake, Bob Slowick-style defense is miserable to watch. Absolutely miserable. It's the equivalent of John Fox ball on defense - uber conservative.

Between that and our bottom-5 scoring offense - apathy has set in much earlier than I expected.

Watching Fangio walk around in his frumpy sweathshirt and fanny pack with zero emotion - while watching totally stale and boring football on both sides of the ball -- is already 100x worse than I imagined this season being. It's killed all the excitement I had for this team and this season.

At least the Cardinals can get excited about something with a young coach, a young QB and a dynamic system -- we're moving in the wrong direction everywhere.

Agreed. I was prepared for a poor product on the offensive side of the ball. But Fangio was advertised as a defensive mastermind that disguises coverages brilliantly and gets the most out of his talent.

What we’ve seen thusfar is not only terrible it’s terribly boring.

From Von after the game: “I feel like if I could do my job and get him on the ground, it wouldn’t have even been there,” Von Miller said. “It’s a double loss for me. Tough day.”

Above from https://www.denverbroncos.com/news/e...-second-defeat

Very interesting in Von saying I feel like IF I could do my job. We all know what Von is capable of doing, so was Von saying that he can not do his job because of the defensive scheme?

Fangio might be overwhelmed with first time coaching duties and play calling duties.

Originally Posted by King87

Fangio might be overwhelmed with first time coaching duties and play calling duties.

I feel like him and Scags both are overwhelmed right now. They have the IQ and knowledge to turn it around. Lets hope for the best. I am angry but being objective I know this is new for both if them and it may just take some time. If Harris is right and the mindset is better after these losses then last year maybe there is hope. We started 2-0 last year, look where that got us.....I have always said week 4 is the best indicator of where your headed. But even then teams can surprise in the middle and down the stretch run....