Comments on: Smart Football Super Bowl Preview: Manning vs. Brees

By: Understanding the Indianapolis Colts’ Offense « Understanding The Trickeration

Sat, 25 Sep 2010 07:43:25 +0000

[...] Colts use two primary passing concepts in the play action passing game Three Verticals and some kind of Deep Cross. Both of these passing concepts are similar at their core. Both concepts seek to stretch the [...]

By: stan

stan — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:51:58 +0000

The Colts have the worst run blocking O-line in the NFL. Their run game is entirely dependent on defenses selling out to stop the pass. Is short yardage, obvious running situations, they are more likely to lose yardage than pick up the first down. Anyone watching the SB saw multiple examples. It’s been that way for years (go back to the way they got stuffed 3 times at the goal line by NE in the 2003 reg season game). Any Colt fan can give you dozens of examples.

By: OldSouth

OldSouth — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 18:02:01 +0000

I find it wildly implausible that Peyton only pursues “stats” for their “glory” to the detriment of his team. Glory comes from winning super bowls, which comes from playing for the team. It doesn’t come from upping one’s QB rating a miniscule amount.

By: gary jeff

gary jeff — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:55:21 +0000

I think Anthony Kuehn has a genuine dis-taste for the Indy Colts. Manning is a team player, and one of the Greatest Quarterbacks to ever play the game. Even Don Shula said he reads defenses and dissects them with a surgeons precision. He also has a great arm to go with that. Yes, he used poor judgment on the interception. The field was very open in that general area, and Manning should have put another 5 yards or so on the ball. Either way, the outcome of the game, did not show the reality of the better team. I applaud Coach Peyton’s gutsy call to open the second half. He’s a great coach, and if anything, I believe Indy WAS out coached.Yes, the run game was better than usual, but I have been saying for years, they need more running, which means, PAY and get a GREAT RUNNER! Don’t put all the blame on Manning. Remember, “Polian” took Buffalo to FOUR consecutive Super Bowls, without a win.

By: Barking Carnival — Blog — Spring Theory

Barking Carnival — Blog — Spring Theory — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 06:06:13 +0000

[...] I found a great write-up of the ways that two superbowl squads used the forward pass this season here from Chris Brown at [...]

By: 4.0 Point Stance

4.0 Point Stance — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 16:36:42 +0000

“Strangely enough he wasn’t in on thier fourth and one goal line run. That was an attempt to disguise the run call there, even though it failed that time, it allowed them to get Shockey one on one the next time they were in goal line.”
Great observation.

By: Anthony Kuehn

Anthony Kuehn — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 15:00:14 +0000

Brophy-
That’s why the Colts needed to run more, to get the Saints out of the 3-3-5. There are going to be occasional negative plays, but the Colts needed to at least try to keep the defense honest. Go back and watch the film, as soon as the run pass ratio got all out of whack, that’s when the Colts offense ground to a halt.

By: Brophy

Brophy — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 02:44:05 +0000

With respect to Mr.Kuehn, the Colts were able to run the ball due to a 3-man front, DC Willaims remedied this by returning to the usual 4-man front the Saints normally run. It should be noted that while the Colts AVERAGED a hefty run average, they also suffered a few negative yardage play (which is a cardinal sin in zone running). The Colts run game has not been particularly robust as it has been in the past (this wasn’t the Colts and Addai of 2006).

By: Mr.Murder

Mr.Murder — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:54:06 +0000

“Typically, Manning gets the ball snapped with under six seconds left on the play clock; he both wants to take his time surveying the defense and limit late shifts before the snap.”

Not on the Garcon TD. He was out early, at 16 seconds they were in formation, to my notice. At eleven seconds, they snapped, I was thinking a quick snap was needed there. It caught the Saints trying to disguise their cover and technique, and left a defensive back out of position to jam Garcon’s release.

It was my hope the Colts would use the same route(sluggo) in combo with Clark’s slant on the play Manning got intercepted. That way an outside or 3/4 shade would see the inside route and anticipate his own player’s release, thinking the double slants were coming. It would have basically been a time where they flipped the play that Garcon scored on and ran it with Wayne to the other side.

Tracy Porter credited film study to seeing that and acting quickly off Wayne’s outside release. My own assumption was that it was a bit of pattern reading, accelerated when he could see Clark’s hard inside commitment to the slant. Everything verified they were running dualies on the play.

It is imperative to run some adjustment or checkdown changes after play stoppages against aggressive teams. Interestingly, Wayne’s letting a defender cross his face was noted by NFL analyst Chris Carter, who thought Reggie’s prior knee injury was at play on that call to explain trouble coming out of his break.

By: Mr.Murder

Mr.Murder — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:42:10 +0000

The smash and levels concepts are huge Colts calls. Usually I’ve thought of levels as the ‘drive’ concept of Walsh terminology, whatever its name, it is simple and effective.

The “all go” play that is so good for the Saints, one of the main items in it is that they would usually put Meachem on the tightest wideout split to slot side. My belief was that you could cross read the two deep safeties on it to anticipate some of those plays, Bethea’s tackle of the reverse run was an example of that, it was my hope the Saints would have play passed on that specific call.

Credit Brees with staying on those short passes until the Colts made him do something different(they never really did outside of the first quarter).

The most interesting item were those Strief calls, he came in as a sixth lineman, to be their tight end. They used him to slow Freeney and the run front down from their “play the run on your way to the quarterback” style. Strangely enough he wasn’t in on thier fourth and one goal line run. That was an attempt to disguise the run call there, even though it failed that time, it allowed them to get Shockey one on one the next time they were in goal line. That because the Colts had to think run first, inside the five yard line, fromt he Saints’ go-for it attempts.