I wanted to take a look at the bigger plays for Cinci and what happened, particularly in the first half. And if there was a chance Houston could take advantage of those looks. I noticed a few things that I wanted to highlight here.
The Ravens were bad setting the edge. The running plays that were successful on the inside were during non-obvious passing downs. The Ravens just showed a lot of looks that were designed to fail. This one is a good example. The Ravens are way overloaded, which works in a split shotgun formation but against a single back, this is an easy audible and an easy gain.
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This play is also due to a lack of gap control. Wormley just lets his man run right by him, he’s the guy on the 33, Wormley has to engage him, the other guy is cutting Pierce, and Wormley gets washed and really has no shot at this play. The Ravens have a shot here if Judon keeps contain but he tries to inside the tackle instead of outside the tackle and gets burned.
This play is also due to a lack of gap control. Wormley just lets his man run right by him, he’s the guy on the 33, Wormley has to engage him, the other guy is cutting Pierce, and Wormley gets washed and really has no shot at this play. The Ravens have a shot here if Judon keeps contain but he tries to inside the tackle instead of outside the tackle and gets burned.
If I just showed you this screen shot you’d think it’s a loss. But Judon loses the weakside contain. That’s a recurring problem.
Same thing happens here with Ferguson on the end around. Ferguson, Peanut, and Bynes all take awful routes to the ball here. They angle in, but they should all just be getting the sideline. Mixon runs by Judon and between Peters for a 9 yard gain here.
This is a run on 2nd and 10. Ravens are showing Cover 2 presnap and Cinci runs it. Ferguson is out way wide, can’t do anything to slow down the LT who just dives at peanut and it’s an easy seven yards.
I have no idea what Peanut is doing on this play. He’s the free man and just kind of stands around and then engages the TE on the weakside. That’s Ferguson inside of him.
Before it was just a total blowout and the starters were out, there was also an issue with Judon and Bowser dropping in coverage. It’s just a stunt that doesn’t get home. But Bowser is caught in no man’s land. Judon held up because he had a guy in his space but we’re not at an advantage when you’re dropping those guys. Also, if that’s a spy on the 42, great but that guy needs to get some more depth to his drop as well.
What I mostly saw on film was our edge guys losing integrity and our inside guys just having a really bad game. Bynes over played. Peanut literally looked lost. Fort didn’t get on the field a lot. And the Bengals ran a lot with 3 WR, in long down and distance situations. I’ll chalk up the bad LB play at the edges and the gap control on the weak side. But if I’m the Texans, I’m looking to exploit the Ravens LBers in similar looks.
Ravens Analyst
Jordan Kough is a graduate of University of Maryland, Baltimore County. He’s a long standing Ravens and Orioles fan of many years. He grew up just north of Baltimore and likes the statistical analysis of games as much as watching games themselves.