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Titans week - AFC Divisional Round


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Thoughts on this.  From The Ringer.  At the time I tended to agree.  Mixon got the ball too often for how little he was producing and how LV couldn't stop the short passing game.

 

Zac Taylor is the biggest threat to the Bengals offense.

Wild-card weekend’s first game ended up being its best. A Raiders team that couldn’t get out of its own way—and had no answer for Joe Burrow and Ja’Marr Chase—managed to stick around just long enough to give itself a chance to force overtime. I’m still not quite sure how the Bengals needed a red zone stop to escape with a victory. But it probably has something to do with Zac Taylor’s insistence on running a bad imitation of Sean McVay’s offense.

Recently, Taylor has done a better job of turning things over to Burrow and the passing game on early downs. Over the first half of the season, Cincinnati ranked 20th in early-down pass rate, according to RBSDM.com. That led to a lot of obvious passing situations on third down and put pressure on Burrow to beat complex coverages and hold steady behind a struggling offensive line. From Week 9 on, though, the Bengals jumped up to 12th in early-down pass rate and the offense took off.

On Saturday, Taylor reverted to his old ways, calling runs on 21 of 47 first and second downs. Those run plays lost the Bengals a total of 4.83 expected points and only 19 percent of them produced a positive EPA, according to RBSDM.com. Fortunately, Burrow was able to bail Taylor out on third down—Cincinnati converted five of 12 attempts—just enough to avoid a first-round loss. But things won’t be so easy as the Bengals advance through the playoffs.

Next week, Cincinnati will get a Titans defense that finished second in success rate allowed on third down, thanks in large part to a dominant interior pass rush and some clever coverage concepts. Taylor can’t afford to throw away those early downs against Tennessee. If he does, the Bengals will need more than another superhuman effort from Burrow to advance.

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30 minutes ago, tibor75 said:

Thoughts on this.  From The Ringer.  At the time I tended to agree.  Mixon got the ball too often for how little he was producing and how LV couldn't stop the short passing game.

 

maybe the runs kept them up close so the short passing game continued to work .  or  maybe Burrow was checking into some of the runs  i am not a ZT fans of any kind, but he calls the intial play and Burrow has the ability to check or change once they are the line.  I feel at times they pass too much .  lol then again if the play works it was the right call , 

 

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59 minutes ago, tibor75 said:

Thoughts on this.  From The Ringer.  At the time I tended to agree.  Mixon got the ball too often for how little he was producing and how LV couldn't stop the short passing game.

 

Zac Taylor is the biggest threat to the Bengals offense.

Wild-card weekend’s first game ended up being its best. A Raiders team that couldn’t get out of its own way—and had no answer for Joe Burrow and Ja’Marr Chase—managed to stick around just long enough to give itself a chance to force overtime. I’m still not quite sure how the Bengals needed a red zone stop to escape with a victory. But it probably has something to do with Zac Taylor’s insistence on running a bad imitation of Sean McVay’s offense.

Recently, Taylor has done a better job of turning things over to Burrow and the passing game on early downs. Over the first half of the season, Cincinnati ranked 20th in early-down pass rate, according to RBSDM.com. That led to a lot of obvious passing situations on third down and put pressure on Burrow to beat complex coverages and hold steady behind a struggling offensive line. From Week 9 on, though, the Bengals jumped up to 12th in early-down pass rate and the offense took off.

On Saturday, Taylor reverted to his old ways, calling runs on 21 of 47 first and second downs. Those run plays lost the Bengals a total of 4.83 expected points and only 19 percent of them produced a positive EPA, according to RBSDM.com. Fortunately, Burrow was able to bail Taylor out on third down—Cincinnati converted five of 12 attempts—just enough to avoid a first-round loss. But things won’t be so easy as the Bengals advance through the playoffs.

Next week, Cincinnati will get a Titans defense that finished second in success rate allowed on third down, thanks in large part to a dominant interior pass rush and some clever coverage concepts. Taylor can’t afford to throw away those early downs against Tennessee. If he does, the Bengals will need more than another superhuman effort from Burrow to advance.

 

You can't just throw the ball all the time. Burrow would have got killed. You have to mix in the running game to keep the defense off balance and set up the play action pass. I had no issue with this. Some people think you can just drop back and pass every down. That's not how it works, even when the run isn't overly effective. As the poster above suggests, we really don't know how many runs were called or checked into by Burrow. 

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19 minutes ago, BengalFanInTO said:

 

You can't just throw the ball all the time. Burrow would have got killed. You have to mix in the running game to keep the defense off balance and set up the play action pass. I had no issue with this. Some people think you can just drop back and pass every down. That's not how it works, even when the run isn't overly effective. As the poster above suggests, we really don't know how many runs were called or checked into by Burrow. 


This is 100% truth.
Well said. 

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I am concerned with Taylor’s play calls in crunch time.  Late in the game he took the ball out of Burrow’s hands on second and third down.  He ran his cutesy plays he hoped would fool the defense.  They didn’t work.  Taking the ball out of Burrow’s hands is going to blow up in his face at some point. 

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39 minutes ago, spicoli said:


took too long for ya, did it?

lol seriously till this year he showed how inexperienced he was  and by his own admission he still makes critical mistakes at bad times, BUT i will give him props he does seem to learn from them and i do not know who does the halftime adjustments but they do a very good job of them.     

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52 minutes ago, stryker57 said:

lol seriously till this year he showed how inexperienced he was  and by his own admission he still makes critical mistakes at bad times, BUT i will give him props he does seem to learn from them and i do not know who does the halftime adjustments but they do a very good job of them.     

 

🍻

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2 hours ago, BengalFanInTO said:

 

You can't just throw the ball all the time. Burrow would have got killed. You have to mix in the running game to keep the defense off balance and set up the play action pass. I had no issue with this. Some people think you can just drop back and pass every down. That's not how it works, even when the run isn't overly effective. As the poster above suggests, we really don't know how many runs were called or checked into by Burrow. 

 

 

Not to mention we had guys on the defensive line that were playing every single snap in the 2nd half so we needed to do some ball control to give them some rest.

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5 hours ago, tibor75 said:

Thoughts on this.  From The Ringer.  At the time I tended to agree.  Mixon got the ball too often for how little he was producing and how LV couldn't stop the short passing game.

 

Zac Taylor is the biggest threat to the Bengals offense.

Wild-card weekend’s first game ended up being its best. A Raiders team that couldn’t get out of its own way—and had no answer for Joe Burrow and Ja’Marr Chase—managed to stick around just long enough to give itself a chance to force overtime. I’m still not quite sure how the Bengals needed a red zone stop to escape with a victory. But it probably has something to do with Zac Taylor’s insistence on running a bad imitation of Sean McVay’s offense.

Recently, Taylor has done a better job of turning things over to Burrow and the passing game on early downs. Over the first half of the season, Cincinnati ranked 20th in early-down pass rate, according to RBSDM.com. That led to a lot of obvious passing situations on third down and put pressure on Burrow to beat complex coverages and hold steady behind a struggling offensive line. From Week 9 on, though, the Bengals jumped up to 12th in early-down pass rate and the offense took off.

On Saturday, Taylor reverted to his old ways, calling runs on 21 of 47 first and second downs. Those run plays lost the Bengals a total of 4.83 expected points and only 19 percent of them produced a positive EPA, according to RBSDM.com. Fortunately, Burrow was able to bail Taylor out on third down—Cincinnati converted five of 12 attempts—just enough to avoid a first-round loss. But things won’t be so easy as the Bengals advance through the playoffs.

Next week, Cincinnati will get a Titans defense that finished second in success rate allowed on third down, thanks in large part to a dominant interior pass rush and some clever coverage concepts. Taylor can’t afford to throw away those early downs against Tennessee. If he does, the Bengals will need more than another superhuman effort from Burrow to advance.

My thought is the author of this article is a stat nerd that doesn't understand the game of football, using analytics without context is just stupid. 

 

The Raiders run defense was their weakness and you have to try to get a big play in the run game by running the ball with your Pro Bowl RB. Also, it helps the offensive line to fire off the ball and wear down the opposing side by running the ball. 

 

Running the ball is important because it allows the offensive line to impose their will on their opponents and you can't abandon it, especially when you have the lead..which the Bengals did for the entire game.

 

Ultimately Zac did something no other coach has done in 4 decades, win a playoff game...so yeah I think he did a good job.

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I was looking at the game notes and saw that Taylor coached Tannehill in college from 2008-2011 and his first 3 years (2012-2015) in the NFL, so he knows him extremely well..this is a huge advantage as he knows Tannehill's tendencies, strengths, and weaknesses. 

 

Hopefully this familiarity helps the Bengals win the game. 

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8 hours ago, LostInDaJungle said:

From a strategic standpoint, the biggest thing you accomplish with a steady diet of run is punishing stunts and overloads on the defensive line. D-Linemen need to stay in their run gaps, and stunts don't really work well against O-Linemen who are firing out to run block. Our guys may not be able to beat the Raiders in one on one matchups, but at least they got one on one matchups.

Success running the ball to the left side kept their guys in lane most of the game. Made Crosby leery of playing wider and made Prince's job easier. Kept Burrow from playing for the green team.

I see where the Titans are another run-resistant side. Keep similar schemes against it? 

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33 minutes ago, spicoli said:


No Way Wtf GIF by Harlem

Think of it this way - curse began with the Raiders. Just beat them. Last playoff win was vs the oilers. Then we play the Bills in the National AFCC, then the Niners in the SB.

 

Where's the DeLorean with the Flux Capacitor?

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