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Bengals offense vs. Rams defense
Bengals offense
The Bengals offense finished the regular season tied for fifth in the NFL with 5.9 yards per play, which is heavily influenced by averaging the third-most net yards per dropback (7.2), despite allowing the third-most sacks (55) at the same time, since they only averaged 4.0 yards per carry (26th).
They’ve been dead-average in third-down conversion percentage (39.6 percent) and in the red-zone (59.6 percent), but converted 13 of 20 fourth downs on the year (65 percent).
Despite his 14 interceptions, Joe Burrow was second only to Aaron Rodgers in final passer rating and No. 1 from an accuracy perspective (completion percentage and on-target percentage).
Burrow arguably has the most complete trio of receivers at his disposal, with a stud alpha in rookie Ja’Marr Chase, who can consistently beat man-coverage isolated on the backside; a big-bodied flanker in Tee Higgins, who has that gliding speed and large catch radius where he can extend for the ball and hold on to it with those strong hands; and an excellent weapon in Tyler Boyd, who doesn’t shy away from contact and has great feel for finding open space against zone coverage. Plus, Joe Mixon gives them a checkdown option, who can win in those one-on-one tackling situations and drive forward for some key yards. Over their last five games, he has hauled in 26 of 29 targets for 216 yards.
Fundamentally, Cincinnati has made the transition from more of the Shanahan/McVay-oriented offense, where they would run the ball more out of 12 personnel and then run bootlegs off it early in the season, to putting their star quarterback more in the shotgun, spreading things out and attacking opponents through the air.
When you look at the game splits, they’ve thrown the ball on 64 percent of offensive snaps over their last five games with Burrow at the helm (he sat out during Week 18), compared to just 58 percent over the rest of the year. And while he has been sacked more than any other singular quarterback in the league this season – and some of it has been on him not getting rid of the ball, along with major issues in protection and play-designs not providing throwaway options – this guy is slippery like butter and tougher than a two dollar steak.
Against Kansas City in particular, he was pressured on just over 40 percent of dropbacks, barely seeing extra rushers being brought in. But he only took one sack. He was picking up crucial yards with his legs, at times having to get himself out of nearly impossible situations, just like slipping out of a couple of tackling attempts by Chris Jones.
From a schematic perspective, more directly, they run a lot of wide zone out of two-tight end sets, along with the threat of jet sweeps with a receiver in a condensed split and the edge defender left unblocked, where that extra burst Ja’Marr Chase packs, when he’s put in that spot, leads to positive plays despite that flat defender having it leveraged correctly.
The other play we’ve seen them run a lot of – particularly against 3-4 base teams, such as Tennessee in the Divisional Round – is the crack toss, often times motioning the tight-end inside, even when he’s the No. 2 on a trips side, or having Tyler Boyd in that near-wing alignment pinning the end-man inside and somebody coming underneath the formation to get a running block on whoever is designated to replace the “edge-setter”.
Another tendency of theirs is calling draw plays against defensive lines that bring out their NASCAR packages, where they really widen those alignments, but also present large gaps on the inside and can use the upfield approach against those guys.
And finally, in terms of run schemes when they operate more from the gun and 11 personnel, having their tight-end at that H or wing spot, allows them to utilize him as an insert blocker to give them a slightly different look on sort of power plays, which also opens up the opportunity to hit in-breakers off those run-fakes, when they can pull the linebackers upfield.
As already mentioned, the Bengals still base their offense on a lot of West Coast patterns, but they do it a lot more out of spread formations, where they can create clearer pictures for Burrow and attack voids in zone coverage, while obviously having the weapons to punish you if you try to send extra bodies and put their secondary in man-coverage.
Joe Burrow was Pro Football Focus’ No. 1 graded quarterback versus the blitz last season, where Chase has become basically unguardable one-on-one. He has registered a perfect passer-rating when targeted mid-way through the regular season, which hasn’t fallen off much, considering he broke the rookie single-game record with 266 yards against the Chiefs in the regular season, who dared the Bengals to beat press-man coverage all day long.
In terms of easy yardage that they try to pick up through the air, double slants from a two-by-two set with the tight end the other way into the boundary gives them an easy read on the slot defender, and out of empty sets, Burrow often hits his TE C.J. Uzomah on a little hook route as the No. 2 two on the short side.
If Cincinnati out-leverages their opponents to one side, they will religiously hit their skill-guys on screens and force tough open-field tackles. They use a lot of receiver stacks and bunches, where one of their favorite ways to attack defenses is creating vertical releases and clearing out space over the middle, in front of the deep zones, for example, by occupying the seams with Boyd and then having Tee Higgins release outside as the tip-man and breaking back inside about 15 yards downfield.
Rams defense
Transitioning over to the Rams defense, when you look at total and some of the categories, they haven’t been nearly impressive as they were in 2020. But only the Steelers and Vikings have recorded more than their 50 sacks this season. They’re fifth with 85 tackles for loss, they have the eighth-best red-zone percentage, and with 17 passing touchdowns compared to 19 interceptions, they are one of only four teams (along with the Bills, Patriots and Cowboys) to have a “negative” TD-to-INT ratio as a defensive unit.
While many people can remember the 49ers gashing them on the ground in their first meeting, they’ve really stiffened up in that department in this postseason, just not limiting San Francisco to their second-lowest rushing total of the season at a mere 50 yards, with 162 overall in those contests. And if you take the fourth quarter and 12 extra seconds of the Bucs game out of the equation, the Rams have surrendered just 34 points over the eleven remaining quarters throughout these playoffs.
When you see Raheem Morris’ scheme, they run a lot of five-man fronts, not only to avoid easy opportunities for combo-blocks, but also to create those one-on-ones for their D-line in passing situations. While those gap-scheme oriented attacks have had some success earlier in the year against them, their quickness up front has also led to a lot of issues for their opponents, especially when trying to work laterally with a zone-oriented approach. And only the Titans gave up fewer runs of 20 or more yards (four) throughout the year.
While they do have those three defensive linemen occupying that tackle-to-tackle area, they can get more flexible with their outside linebackers and pull them out really wide, at times in nine(-plus) alignments, where they create issues for offensive tackles wanting to set vertically and become vulnerable to speed-to-power maneuvers, because those players on the outside have the runway to build up momentum.
Along with that, they run a lot of T-E twists, where the three- or 4i-technique really attacks the inside shoulder of the tackle and because Von Miller and Leonard Floyd are such bendy athletes, they can tilt on a tight curve. They also like to completely overload one side, where they have four potential rushers from the A-gap outwards, with just one wide-nine on the opposite edge. And of course, having a three-time Defensive Player of the Year in Aaron Donald on the interior messes with your protection rules altogether, because he can wreck games quickly if left single-blocked.
More importantly, however, with those fronts, it allows them to affect protection rules without having to surrender resources in coverage, as both the OLBs have the fluid movement skills to be dropped out in zone coverage. It doesn’t force them to give away how they might rotate before the snap. They do ultimately run a lot of two-high shells, but spacing becomes an issue for offenses when they don’t, if there may be somebody in the throwing window, after initially having a wide gap between the nickel and the next-closest linebacker, for example.
Their most important asset on the back-end of course is Jalen Ramsey, who they put in the slot a lot more often over the first half of the season, to get him closer to the action and utilize him in different ways. But he’s been almost exclusively on the boundary again, where he can be in true or quasi-man coverage as well as how he excels in cover-two because of his physicality out in the flats along with the length and make-up speed to take away those “easy” pre-snap honeyhole shots that would present themselves otherwise out at the sideline.
Because of the structure of their defense and the fact they’ve been without both their starting safeties for stretches, only the Chiefs surrendered more yards after the catch this season (2,614). But bringing in recently retired Eric Weddle, who can add as an extra defender in the box, and the range of third-year man Nick Scott have helped them excel during this run.
How they match up
From the things discussed already, the biggest issue the Bengals will have to overcome is their disadvantage up front, because they can’t leave Donald in true one-on-ones on too many occasions, especially against the right guards Cincy has played this season, ranking 67th and 81st respectively out of 82 qualified players at the position, according to PFF’s grading system.
Yet at the same time they need to help out their right tackle Isaiah Prince against Miller and/or Floyd, since he’s been a liability for the most part (77th among OTs), while Von in particular has really beaten up on those fringe starters/backups at that spot (13 combined pressures vs. Seattle’s Jake Curhan, Baltimore’s Patrick Mekari, Tampa Bay’s Josh Wells, and San Francisco’s Tom Compton).
While some don’t mind Cincinnati being committed to running the ball in general, their tendency of handing it off on first downs and do so on the majority of snaps in 12 personnel recently will be used against them by L.A.’s defensive coordinator. If not now, when else would be the perfect time to break those tendencies? We saw those Rams safeties trigger down in a hurry and fill the C-gap a lot of times against the 49ers in the NFC title game. You have to take advantage of that, if they follow a similar approach and attack that are behind them. Burrow was 29th in pass attempts off play-action this season.
One of the biggest matchup advantages for the Bengals will be Joe Mixon against Troy Reeder on option routes. Eli Mitchell caught all three of his targets for 50 yards in the NFC title game. It also showed up on regular season tape a lot, where Reeder’s lined up at WILL and has outside leverage, but then he has to trigger down on a simple hook route over the middle, the back spins that way, and now Reeder has to redirect and try to chase the guy down.
Imagining the difference between him and Fred Warner trying to chase down Ja’Marr Chase on a jet sweep is also something one could see leading to a big play eventually. At this point it's not clear why he’s out there, other than against 12 personnel and/or outside of base downs. A more balanced matchup with Chase should be going up against Jalen Ramsey, which the Bengals will shy away from, but we could again see more looks for Tee Higgins, due to his size advantage against other cornerbacks – Darious Williams and Donte Deayon are both only 5’9”.
Another way the running back could be an asset in the passing is in three-by-one sets with a nasty (reduced) split from the single receiver, because the corner has heavy outside leverage, which presents that window inside for slants or slant-stop routes. Along with that, the outside backer often has to peel off with the back on any swing routes.
As good as those players for L.A. are in their roles, if you take them on a wheel, Burrow can still take a shot at some point, along with the fact that it just opens up room underneath and you don’t allow that edge defender to rush against your right tackle a few times.
And finally, as already mentioned, how good Burrow has been against the blitz. So while just throwing out six-man rushes and exposing yourself to big run-after-catch plays by those receivers wouldn’t be smart and though we’ll not see that from the Rams, there are a few spots where you can get home that way, before Burrow can identify them.
San Francisco for example got K’Waun Williams as a free rusher up the B-gap against an empty set once, because they knew Cincinnati would primarily run a half-line slide out of that set, meaning big-on-big on the field-side and slide away from it, where by stunting the three-technique inside, that left nobody to pick up the blitzer.
The Rams want to get home with their front, but when you look at the numbers, they blitz at the league’s fifth-highest rate (33.8 percent) when the game is within one score. So they won’t completely be scared out of doing so.
