eMailbag: On The Pass Rush
TJB reader Eric Bieber has done some game charting and has sent in the rushing information, along with a Excel game chart of Bills passes. Here’s the short version of how the Jets blitzed on Sunday.
3 Rushers
3-7, 17 Yards, 1 INT
4 Rushers
16-23, 83 Yards,1TD, 2 INT
2 Scrambles, 16 Yards, 1 TD
2 Sacks
5 Rushers
5-5, 46 Yards
6 Rushers
1-2, 6 Yards
1 Sack, FF, Def TD
From the numbers above, Bieber then concludes:
The idea that the Jets almost lost this game because they didn’t blitz enough, is [crap]. You could argue the Jets don’t blitz well, but when they were in their regular defense, they were solid against the pass.
The one point I will concede is that Buffalo was 4-9 in converting 3rd down passes against the 4 man rush, however, none of the passes were thrown more than 10 yards, and it’s unclear if a blitz would have even mattered.
Yes, the Bills completed a lot of passes on the four man rush, but they couldn’t move the ball through the air at all — making their decision to pass late in the fourth quarter even more baffling.
… the Bills best success came against the five man blitz. Losman’s rushing TD did come against a four man blitz, but that was a pressure induced run, and hardly to be blamed by the Jets rush. The rushing defense was a debacle , but when [people] cry about the lack of Jets blitz … let them know the truth.
I guess, in game, when it’s an obvious passing situatios and the defense rushes three players allowing the quarterback to survey the field at length, it just seems counterintuitive, especially with a defense that’s struggling to defend the pass as much as this one is to let them play into your weakness.
The Jets are bringing pressure, but often front seven players are blitzed to keep exposure on secondary players to a minimum. The Jets seem to be using a fair mix, if you consider the base a four man rush (standard in any defense) and the three and five/six men rushes evened each other out against the Bills, with seven of both of those groupings.
I think that the three man rush plays just seem to stick out like sore thumbs to fans traditional expectations of how a defense should react on a passing down, no matter the actual results.
The real problem is that the Jets were able to skate this time … sort of … but the real story is that this defense just doesn’t look well enough right now to stop a solid rushing or passing team like the Broncos, Colts or Steelers should they make the postseason. They’ve got two weeks to sort things out if this team has any shot of making a postseason run.
22 Responses to eMailbag: On The Pass Rush
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Lou says:
if it didn’t take the whole defense to tackle buffalos running backs, they wouldn’t have gotten 3/4 the yards they did.
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subwayfare says:
I’ve said before the problem is more the quality of blitzes(they don’t seem to take great angles or hit gaps) and that I thought they should send at least 6 when they do apply pressure. Those numbers do seem to bear that out. The 5-man rush, often picked up by a RB or TE, is the real failure. No more pressure, less coverage. It’s sort of like trying to mitigate risk on what is by nature a high risk/reward play. Nothing ventured nothing gained.
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JesusRevis says:
eMailbag: on the pass rush? What pass rush?
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Najy says:
You are as good as your record says you are….
Period.
End of story….
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The Ed(itor) says:
I don’t see the D Line switching up their pass rushes. They seem to go straight ahead and try to beat the lineman ahead of them. They should taking different angles or routes and switching up how they rush. I think the term is looping. Also the D back always seems to be picked up other than on the Elam play. I would agree that the quality of the blitzes is lacking. Again this goes back to coaching.
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Brad says:
I dont know what this guy is saying! we blitzed 7X with a 5 or 6 man rush! that is 7x out of 37x= 19% of the time we blitzed. that is not blitzing enough in my eyes! Four man rush is the norm, so dont tell me he is considering that to be blitzing. The bottom line is we dont apply enough regular pressure on the QB making him feel the pressure and forcing errors. Five man rushes for weeks now havent been very effective. Rich cimini has been doing this breakdown for weeks now too, and has come up with the same thing, that other teams have been successful on converting their passes with our 5 man rushes. So we either have to disguise the 5 man rushes, or better off, when we decide to blitz, bring 6. I would like to see us bring 6 guys 20% of the time! next week, we arent facing a good QB if hasselbeck isnt playing, make wallace make quick decisions, causing TO’s.
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Liam says:
subwayfare hit the nail on the head, the issue isn’t whether or not they brought more than four defenders a certain percentage of the time, the issue is the lack pf pressure generated by our pass rush. If you watch, for example, a Steelers game, they do not bring more blitzers per game, they just do a much better job of getting pressure when they do commit to the blitz. I do not understand for the life of me, how we fail to get pressure on the qb with potential blitzers like BT, Pace, Harris, Rhodes, Elam and Revis – all of whom have shown a natural ability to get after the QB. I blame the game planning and scheming. So many of our blitzes are soft blitzes, or scheme blitzes lined up with an extra down lineman. One obvious tweak, would be to bring lots of more pressure up the middle. For instance, DH is an excellent blitzer. Big Jinx is a space eater. DH has struggled some this year in pass coverage. Might be worth using him (and here’s the key, in tandem with a second blitzer) as a blitzer up the middle forcing a lineman the decision of keeping his assignment on Jinx or single teaming and allowing the pocket to collapse. Also Kerry Rhodes has been completely under utilized as a blitzer. I understand there are concerns for the secondary and you want to keep your QB back there but guess what, KRhodes is one of our best blitzers, its one of the things that got him paid in the first place. Send him more.
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A blitz i saw the other day in the steelers game that i liked was when the steelers brought a MLB and he was follwed by a safety. MLB got picked up by the line, causing the safety to go free to the QB. Need more pressure up the middle. Sutton, please take notes on what the steelers defense does, how they blitz!
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Matt C. says:
Those INT vs completion numbers are deceptive.
The Bills threw 2 INT’s in 2 minutes when they fell behind.
It is the same reason the Jets pass D is ranked 31. They are not all THAT bad, but since the Jets have been ahead big in so many games, opposing teams had to abandon the run.
One thing is for sure, when Sutton mixes up corner and safety blitzes, the results seem to be better.
This guy has to be a bit more creative for us to have a chance in January -
Brad –
You nailed it, dude.
No one is better than the Steelers at mixing up blitz packages. Maybe Jim Johnson in Philly is a distant second…..maybe. -
Bent says: So, other than the Ellis TD, they went 6-6 when the Jets sent more than 5 guys. This is exactly my point. Saying “why don’t we blitz more?” doesn’t address the problem, that being that, for whatever reason, they aren’t successful when they do blitz. Scheme, execution or talent deficiency – that is the question. Maybe the coaches have decided they are better off not blitzing a lot of the time and, if anything, the numbers bear that out.
Luckily, when it counted, they picked the right time to send 6 and the execution on that play was perfect (well, except maybe some of the fumble recovering).
Yes, I want to see more and better pressure and hope they figure it out before it’s too late, but just sending two extra guys is not the answer…in fact that might be the worst thing they could do.
I’d be interested to see the numbers from some of the games when the QBs put up big numbers though. (@NE, Den, @SF, KC etc)
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The play Brad was referring to was when the ravens were on D. Ray Lewis and Ed Reed bltzed. Reed following Lewis; Lewis was picked up, but Reed go by without getting touched and sacked Rothelisburger.
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momshead says:
The Buffalo game was an anomaly. Other than the one late TD drive, Losman couldn’t move the team through the air – at one point in the 3rd quarter he had 49 yards passing. That said, I’d like to see the blitzing breakdown for the previous two games. I strongly suspect that our intuition that the defense is not blitzing enough will be born out with numbers for those games.
On a related note, it seems that the Jets have been most vulnerable to the quick underneath routes. It killed them for most of the day in SF. And, as far as I can see, there are two reasons for this: a) Ty Law is too slow, and can no longer be physical on the line – have you seen his presnap drops? They’re consistently five yards off. b) The hybrid outside LBs are not utilized properly. They are not fast enough to sit in expected coverage, nor big/strong enough to line up with hands down. Both of these liabilities would be fine if Sutton did one thing, though – CONCEAL THE FOURTH RUSHER! The success of the 3-4 is predicated on not letting on who the fourth rusher will be until the snap. Unfortunately, when the Jets rush four, either Thomas or Pace have their hand in the dirt. The O-line and backfield know exactly how they have to operate before the ball is ever snapped. And neither of these guys is strong enough to take on the tackles consistently, especially after playing in space on the previous play. That’s why the pressure has been so lame, why it always seems a bit too late. Sutton knows this, and used to do a better job of presnap deception. What happened?
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biebs says:
I’m the one who did this… and yes, I have way too much time on my hands.
But, The point about how the Jets are blitzing is important. Either Sutton is telegraphing the blitzes in when he calls them, or the players are telegraphing them on the field.
THe point isn’t that the Jets aren’t blitzing enough, it’s that they are obviously doing it wrong. As far as the Buffalo game goes, the blitzing wasn’t the issue.
It does speak volumes that Buffalo was 6-7 against a 5/6 man blitz (and the only INC was a fumbled snap that had nothing to do with the rush). Sutton needs to find a way to blitz better.
Often passes were coming out in under 2 seconds, in those cases I don’t think there’s a difference btwn a 4 man rush or a 6 man rush.
I do think teams have been neutrilizing the Jets rush by using lots of screens, quick slants, and other short passes. Similar to what the Jets did to the Titans just a few weeks ago.
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brian311 says:
i agree its completely quality over quantity. if you watch a steelers or ravens game, you get a headache just trying to keep up – not only with the number of players coming at the QB, but the different angles they take and the spaces they create.
rhodes and elam are great blitzers but it is difficult to not telegraph a blitz when they are typically aligned 20 yards off the line. either the OL knows its coming when they see them creeping, or they have to delay and sprint 25 yards to reach the QB. i have seen rhodes specifically do this and it just doenst work.
part of the reason why reed and polomaulo are so effective are the formations they blitz from. often, polomaulo lines up with the LBs or even right at the line. it is confusing to the QB and more importantly, the OL to tell if he is coming or not. the jets seemed to do this much better in 2006 – this is something sutton has not figured out
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right on biebs. Did you read my previous comment?
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Bent, we would indeed have to see more numbers, as you say, before these “numbers bear that out.” As it is, rushing 5, compared to 2,4, and 6, was the category of greatest consequence. In the other three, the numbers, at least, indicated a positive result. I do know we would all love to see better execution; timing, disguising, etc.
That said, I think there were some small improvements in the pass defense against the Bills. There were far less instances of receivers being ridiculously wide open than there were in the previous two losses. On many of the catches, the cover man was right there — just beaten as opposed to dusted. At the moment, I’ll take that small encouragement. -
jim says:
this is minutia guys….tackle…convert our own third downs…keep the d off the field with longer drives…this is how we beat ne and tenn
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Lou- thanks for correcting me- both great defenses, great at bringing the pressure! Here are the numbers of our pass rush from denver and 49ers
Of the 49ers’ 42 pass plays (39 passes, two sacks, one scramble), the Jets blitzed 15 times. However, the majority of those were conservative five-man rushes. Only twice did they send more than five rushers.
This is how it went down, with Shaun Hill’s stats:
• Three-man rushes – 9 (6-for-9, 74 yards, 1 INT)
• Four-man rushes – 18 (13-for-16, 116 yards, one sack, one 8-yard scramble)
• Five-man rushes – 12 (8-for-12, 92 yards, 2 TDs)
• Six-man rushes – 2 (1-for-1, 3 yards, one sack)According to my breakdown, the Jets blitzed QB Jay Cutler on 12 of 43 pass plays. On those plays, he completed seven balls for 90, including one TD (36 yards to Brandon Stokley) and one interception. Here’s a breakdown of the breakdown:
Three-man rushes: Cutler, 7-for-8, 132 yards, 1 TD
Four-man rushes (included two CB blitzes): Cutler, 13-for-22, 148 yards
Five-man rushes: Cutler, 6-for-9, 70 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT
Six-man rushes: Cutler, 0-for-1Well the numbers speak for themselves- bringing 5 isnt doing it, but bringing 6 is! If we want to blitz, we must bring 6!
In the last 3 games- we brought 6 men 5x- got 2 sacks- elam forced fumble on that last sack, one throw incomplete, the other 2 for a total of 9 yards. We arent getting burned on the 6 man blitz, sacked the QB 40% of the time (2 out of 5), and forced a TO 20% of the time (1 out of 5)! I will take those stats all day!
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I’ve mentioned this 6-man blitz theory on past threads but without the stat collecting effort you guys have put in to advance it. Well done.
My other blitz theory is that they should bring it early in the game and be sure to make the first one count. As it is, I feel the D is trying to make do with the base, or a 5-man rush, on early passing downs, allowing the QB to get into a rhythm and not feel pressured even when there is an extra rusher.
If the Thigpens, Hills and, hopefully, Seneca Wallaces, are knocked silly the first time they drop back, every rush is going to feel dangerous, whether it is or not.
In short, I’d do the reverse of what the Jets are doing now, sell-out blitz early, and then fake pressure, more coverage to intercept the rushed passes later.
Stopping the run was last week’s problem. Pass rush not really a factor, except when they let Losman run out of the pocket right up the middle for big yardage.