The Ravens host the 2-11 Jacksonville Jaguars this Sunday, with a comfortable win expected by Baltimore fans. The Jaguars are built by head coach Gus Bradley to be a team that relies on a strong defenese, as Bradley had when he was the defensive coordinator of the Seattle Seahawks. While he’s brought across their Cover-3 based scheme, he has yet to find the same talent the Seahawks have in the secondary to make the system work as effectively as it does in Seattle.
(Discuss this post on the BSL forums here)
Dwayne Gratz is the starting left cornerback for the Jaguars. He’s been leaking big plays all season, which the Ravens should look to take advantage of.
Gratz, as the left corner, will spend most of the game dropping to a deep outside third of the field in the Cover-3 scheme. One of the typical Cover-3 beaters is four verticals. But the Eagles throw in a twist, using the tight end and receiver to run a scissor concept to confuse the defense.
Gratz follows the receiver up the field, but then spots the tight end running a wheel route, so peels outside to cover that route. However, his assignment is the deep third of the field. He has to stay deeper than the deepest. He should have stayed running with the receiver.
The receiver runs wide open down the field, but luckily for Gratz, Nick Foles misses him.
Gratz awareness as a deep zone defender is poor. The Eagles picked up on it way back in week one.
Like before, Gratz is assigned with covering the deep third of the field. The Eagles line up all three receivers away from his side of the field, with the tight end and running back a potential threat from his side of the field.
Gratz sticks with the tight end running down the field, but fails to spot the receiver crossing the middle of the field.
Gratz cheats on the tight end, leaving his deep zone open for the receiver crossing to run into.
Foles again misses the throw and gives Gratz a let off, but the Eagles showed the rest of the NFL how to attack the Jaguars defense going forward, and Gratz has failed to adjust.
This was the next week. The Redskins had back up quarterback Kirk Cousins in the game after Robert Griffin III dislocated his ankle, but Washington still had confidence in attacking Gratz. They line up Pierre Garcon in the slot and motion fullback Darrel Young outside. Both Garcon and Young run vertical routes.
Gratz cheats on the route again, but this time taking the inside route of Garcon and leaving Young wide open.
Cousins makes the easy throw and Young, a fullback, has a 20-yard touchdown to his name.
Gratz continued to get beat as the season went on.
This time, Gratz faces a deep route from Dolphins receiver Mike Wallace.
Gratz allows Wallace to easily eat up the cushion and is slow to turn his hips and run with Wallace down the sideline.
Wallace gets a yard on Gratz and makes the catch before falling out of bounds. With a slightly better throw, this could have been a touchdown. But it was still a good enough throw to pick up 50-yards on the play.
Even last week, Gratz was still getting fooled and picked on in coverage.
The Texans lined up DeAndre Hopkins in the slot and had him run a go route up the seam.
The quarterback pump-fakes to the quick hitch route on the outside, which Gratz bites on, give Hopkins a chance to get freely up the seam.
All Hopkins needs is that step and he’s open. The quarterback hits him in stride and all Gratz can do is chase down and make a tackle.
Big plays should be on offer for the Ravens on offense this week. The rest of the NFL has shown how Gratz and the Jaguars defense can be attacked. Torrey and Steve Smith should be in for big games this week if the Ravens use them correctly.
Mark is an NFL follower from across the pond. He began analyzing Redskins football for SBNation’s HogsHaven.com, before moving on to The Washington Post. He also helps with NFL Draft coverage on FanSpeak.com. Mark was born and still lives in England, often battling the time difference to watch every minute of football he can.