Are we worried about our offense?

[mr. tegu]

Being only marginally better than last season? Worthy likely has a higher ceiling and more potential than Hardman but he is unlikely, at least for now, to be a 6-8 target a game guy as an option on the majority of passing plays. Rice is better than Rice last season so that's good. Kelce is probably worst though.

But mostly what I’m fearful about is that losing Brown is going to be a major impediment to the offense being noticeably better than last season. He was likely big in our schemes and philosophy. I know we typically struggle vs the Bengals but as of right now I'm not sure what would make me confident we dramatically improve over last season.

What does everyone think? How can we ensure the significant improvement over last season that it seems we might need?

[RunKC]

Originally Posted by Mecca

The NFL is running a hybrid spread, how often do we see any QB's get under center right now?

Not about whether the QB is under center. If the QB has to actually hold the ball for a play to develop the tackles aren’t very good technique wise bc they didn’t do it a ton in college. Oregon’s offense was 70% quick passes. How is an OL gonna learn to use technique when they don’t have to block more than 1 second each snap?

Then they come to the NFL and have to pass protect for 2.5-3 seconds and get owned bc vet DL are killing them with technique and hand placement/leverage.

Spread offense is killing OL and QB development in college and high school.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by O.city

With the LB"s dropping as deep as Cinci had them doing, I'm not sure that's gonna work out as well.

Make an option route out of it then.

And it's an easy one to decipher. If you get your depth and start your route and the LBs are behind you, you put on the brakes at the hash and get your easy 8 yards.

And honestly, you could flatten that route, come in under them and STILL get out the back side of it clean and with speed.

That's why you run it with Worthy rather than Rice. You're looking to make a footrace to the sideline out of it. And you're pressuring the hell out of that LB even if they've taken a deep drop because if they don't get their pursuit angle right, they're just dusted.

It's very possibly moot - it may just take too long to run it. And to do it, you'd have to leave the OTs on an island (because you'll need the TE opposite Worthy running a little leak route to potentially get that CB to sink and open up that hole behind him). You're probably having the wide WR on the other side run his own slant to create some confusion over the middle and for the safeties.

[Mecca]

Originally Posted by RunKC

Not about whether the QB is under center. If the QB has to actually hold the ball for a play to develop the tackles aren’t very good technique wise bc they didn’t do it a ton in college. Oregon’s offense was 70% quick passes. How is an OL gonna learn to use technique when they don’t have to block more than 1 second each snap?

Then they come to the NFL and have to pass protect for 2.5-3 seconds and get owned bc vet DL are killing them with technique and hand placement/leverage.

Spread offense is killing OL and QB development in college and high school.

Yea, that's true but of course you'll get someone saying well then the NFL needs to quick throw too!

[O.city]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Make an option route out of it then.

And it's an easy one to decipher. If you get your depth and start your route and the LBs are behind you, you put on the brakes at the hash and get your easy 8 yards.

And honestly, you could flatten that route, come in under them and STILL get out the back side of it clean and with speed.

That's why you run it with Worthy rather than Rice. You're looking to make a footrace to the sideline out of it. And you're pressuring the hell out of that LB even if they've taken a deep drop because if they don't get their pursuit angle right, they're just dusted.

It's very possibly moot - it may just take too long to run it. And to do it, you'd have to leave the OTs on an island (because you'll need the TE opposite Worthy running a little leak route to potentially get that CB to sink and open up that hole behind him). You're probably having the wide WR on the other side run his own slant to create some confusion over the middle and for the safeties.

Do it from the slot. Easier and quicker to get there, but running thru a zone is a quick way to get decapitated if it doesn't work out as planned.

There's ways to beat it. It's not hard.

But you've gotta be able to hold up, up front.

[O.city]

Teams aren't sitting in it presnap either. They're rolling into it post snap.

Which is very tough .

[DJ's left nut]

I'm thinking something as simple as this:



Only instead of having the Y on the strong side, that Y receiver is Kelce inline running a simple leak. On that diagram, Rice is the Z, Worthy the H and Watson is the X. They're likely going to run Cover 4 on the left side of the formation and Cover 2 on the right. So you maybe flatten that slant from Worthy down a bit, get him all the way to the other side of the formation where he's not in the Cover 2 side and that CB may well have come down on Kelce.

So now you've got the safety and maybe a LB who you're probably leaving in your wake.

And if the backers crash down to cut that off, there's a pretty good chance you have Rice over top of them now.

It's not something that CAN'T be stopped. You couldn't just spam it over and over again. But it's something you can pull out a time or two and potentially bust a big play out of it.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by O.city

Do it from the slot. Easier and quicker to get there, but running thru a zone is a quick way to get decapitated if it doesn't work out as planned.

There's ways to beat it. It's not hard.

But you've gotta be able to hold up, up front.

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

...
I'd love to get Worthy in the slot on a shallow crosser where he comes poking out the other side with ahead of steam towards the sideline. You flip that ball up there to let him run under it and then he's got the far side safety to beat up the sideline. It's a massive catch and run YAC opportunity. Especially if the far side corner gets sucked up and screws up his depth...

[O.city]

Sorry

[Red Dawg]

The Reaper

[O.city]

His size is gonna make it tougher for him to play in the slot like that though. A Lb'er will be able to reroute him to Peculiar pretty quickly.

[O.city]

The problem is that teams aren’t running 2 deep to take away the routes Mel laments missing. They’re trying to take away digs and crossers.

You can still throw gos and posts! They’re there! The problem is that teams don’t think it’s optimal to throw gos and posts all day. https://t.co/Xfi65Cq9IR

— Benjamin Solak (@BenjaminSolak) September 19, 2024

[O.city]

Bengals have two-deep safeties, w/ man backside.

989 is the concept. Safety hangs a little low worried about the 8, the bender. Mahomes beats him over the top. pic.twitter.com/LW7OSEQea0

— Benjamin Solak (@BenjaminSolak) September 19, 2024

There's how you beat it.

[RunKC]

Yeah I’m really pissed off that Andy used Worthy like MVS running deep. He needs to be utilized in the middle of the field.

His speed needs to be utilized fully not just deep

[O.city]

Nah, you need his speed outside. It's better used out there.

[O.city]

Get Wiley down the seam. Seems like he was basically designed for that.