The Philadelphia Eagles can’t stop J.J. Watt—they can only hope to contain him, to borrow an old saying. And even that will take some doing.
The NFL is still seeking an answer for the Houston Texans defensive end, who at the age of 25 has already earned practically every individual accolade in existence.
Watt has been to two Pro Bowls, been named first-team All-Pro twice, led the league in sacks and was Defensive Player of the Year in 2012, all in his first three professional seasons. I’ve been saying it for a long time now, but in 2014, Watt has even garnered mentions as a legitimate MVP candidate.
Watt rarely gets shut out on the stat sheet, having recorded either a sack or an interception in six of the Texans’ eight games this season. His impact is felt across the entire Houston defense, a unit that ranks second in the NFL with 17 turnovers.
This truly is a special player and a rare talent. If the Eagles don’t find a way to neutralize Watt on Sunday, it could be a long day for Nick Foles, LeSean McCoy and the Philadelphia offense.
It can be done, though. A healthy dose of triple-teams is certainly one way to go about it.
The Dallas Cowboys are one of the few teams that have successfully limited Watt this season, holding him to a quiet four tackles in the box score during a 20-17 victory in Week 5. Anything the Cowboys can do, the Eagles better be able to do better—as long as they intend to reclaim first place in the NFC East, anyway—so copying from the division rival’s blueprint seems like a good place to start.
And, no, the Cowboys didn’t just throw triple-teams at Watt for 60 minutes. They ran away from him, too.
Watt is also a rare breed in that he’ll line up all over the place, but regardless of which side of the field he’s on, a common method to slow down any defender is to create traffic. Here, the offense starts with the tight end next to the left tackle and then brings a wide receiver in motion into the backfield. They aren’t all there to gang up on one man.
The only person who’s dealing with Watt is the tight end, and he sets up as wide as possible. The receiver’s route goes straight ahead, splitting the gap between the tight end and left tackle, which also forces the defensive end to the outside.
By the time Watt loops around the block, the running back is already taking the handoff in the opposite direction—and with the tackle left to his own devices, the offense has five hats on five hats.
If the Eagles can get this type of look with Watt to the left, it should play nicely to their own strengths. Philadelphia has had some success running to that side since right tackle Lane Johnson returned from a four-game suspension. Judging from the size of the hole above, the daylight is there.
That game will be there some of the time, but eventually Watt is going to test the interior of the offensive line, which happens to be at less-than-full strength right now. Matt Tobin continues to fill in for injured All-Pro Evan Mathis at left guard, while Jeff McLane for The Philadelphia Inquirer reports right guard Todd Herremans will attempt to play with a torn biceps.
Let’s stay on the left and discuss Tobin’s development first. An undrafted second-year player out of Iowa, Tobin got his first NFL start in Week 4 against defensive end Justin Smith and the San Francisco 49ers, and let’s just say there were some issues with continuity.
Smith is a beast in his own right, but Tobin and left tackle Jason Peters experienced very apparent communication issues in help situations. On a handful of plays, the defender basically just ran right by them, untouched.
Tobin has improved with experience, and lately breakdowns like this have been few and far between, but once again he and Peters will be battling a heavyweight. There will be situations that rely on the two of them to work in concert to keep Watt at bay, like the one above. Notice how Pro Bowl left tackle Tyron Smith appears to be the man who will engage him at the point of attack.
Smith merely bumps Watt instead, but it’s enough to get the attacker spun around, which makes life a little easier for impressive rookie guard Zack Martin, while the left tackle moves up to the second level. It’s not a huge gain, but it’s a positive play—exactly the type Philly must execute to get McCoy and the ground game going.
Continuity likely has everything to do with why the Eagles are hoping that Herremans is a go on Sunday as well. To help free up Watt, who is constantly the focus of the offense, the Texans like to send him on stunts that are meant to confuse linemen in pass protection.
Before the snap, Watt was positioned as if he was coming on a classic edge rush, but No. 99 is about to take a detour. The interior lineman is working his way off the right guard and to the outside, a switch that’s designed give Watt a direct path to the quarterback.
The tackle gets fooled by the move, but the right guard scopes it out and actually picked up Watt. Now in his 10th NFL season, Herremans has seen it all, and even with one arm, he might be better equipped to catch Houston’s tricks than backup Dennis Kelly.
Of course, we could draw up what the offensive line is facing all week. The fact of the matter is Watt is going to make things happen over the course of 60 minutes.
In the end, Foles and McCoy are probably going to have to bail out the boys up front from time to time.
One of the Cowboys’ biggest plays actually came when Watt flat-out beat Smith off the left side. The quarterback looks dead in the water here, doesn’t he?
That’s Tony Romo, though, and while we’ve seen him make his share of bonehead plays, he makes plenty of spectacular ones, too. He somehow manages to spin away from Watt's grasp and then connects with wide receiver Terrance Williams for a 43-yard touchdown pass.
And even when the offensive line has everything seemingly blocked up in the running game, the group will be counting on McCoy to make his man miss. DeMarco Murray found some success to the right earlier, but this time Watt is over there.
Watt basically collapses the entire line of scrimmage to the inside, seemingly giving Murray a ton of space to run, except the safety was filling in on run support the entire time. If the back can make the defender miss, however—McCoy’s specialty—this is a huge gain. Murray gets tripped up in the backfield for a loss instead.
We’ve seen Foles hit big throws under pressure before. We’ve seen McCoy make would-be tacklers look silly plenty of times. We haven’t seen either of those happen in bunches this season, though, a big reason why the offense has been so erratic. With Watt wreaking havoc in every phase from every possible angle of the field, the Eagles are going to need their backfield to step up and make things happen.
//from Bleacher Report http://ift.tt/1tgYW9m
via IFTTT October 29, 2014 at 01:07AM
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