Tale of the Tape: Week 1 - Sam Bradford

[jrry32]

I am just going to tell you guys now, our QB was STELLAR in Week 1. I reviewed this game on Coach's film expecting to find the normal few instances where Sam missed open WRs down the field or was slow through his progressions or something of that nature. There were very few examples of it in this game. And that's a very good thing.

He was getting the ball out on time, he was getting through his reads quickly and he was finding the open receiver. There are a few things I want to highlight because I think they merit further explanation/evaluation.

Play #1: Interception TD
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This was a painful play to watch and a poor play call in my opinion. However, Jared Cook made a pretty big error on this play. He's sent in motion and is supposed to block but slips at the snap as shown in the final picture. Due to him slipping, he gets out of position and doesn't touch the DE. At minimum, he was supposed to chip that DE. I think he was responsible for blocking him but that's guess-work. Regardless, due to him slipping, the DE was untouched and was able to run right to Sam. Sam was not outside the pocket yet so he could not throw it away. He did about the only thing he could do, he tried to throw it over and around the DE. The DE made a nice play in getting his left hand up and batting the ball.

I'm not a fan of running a bootleg on the goal-line but had Cook been in position, this play likely results in positive yardage.

Play #2: Incomplete Deep Ball to Jared Cook
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Here we have the deep ball to the end-zone to Cook that appeared forced. In fact, it was the proper read. Before the snap, the safety is shaded to the strong-side of the formation leaving a single CB matched up on Cook with no help. They drop into a zone with the LB underneath and the CB over the top at the snap. Cook is running a post corner route which is a double move where he fakes the post and then makes an abrupt cut to the corner route to try and get the CB out of position. It works well enough. Issue is that Cook makes a bone-headed decision after his break. He should have stayed on the CB's outside hip and ran towards the front pylon while running under the ball. However, he tries to cut behind the CB and ends up losing momentum in the process and getting too far inside on a ball that was being thrown to the red strike zone in the corner of the end-zone.

We'll never know if Cook would have gotten to the ball but the mistake on this play was on Cook, not the QB. He needs to know that he has to keep outside leverage on the CB and fade to the corner. He is a tad inconsistent but he makes up for it with that amazing athleticism.

Play #3: Incomplete Short Pass to Quick on 3rd Down
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Here's a route combination that's been around for awhile. It's a Quick and Cook running drags from the opposite side of the field on 3rd and short. Cook's job is to pick Quick's defender in an innocent manner or force Quick's defender to slow down and dodge him. Why didn't the play work?

Simple. Quick slowed down and side-stepped in the 2nd picture because he thought he was going to run into Cook. Maybe he was right but I think he was wrong. Regardless, either Quick got too much depth initially or Cook didn't get enough. And the issue was that Quick side-stepping him alerted the CB that Cook was coming at him which allowed the CB to side-step him. Side-stepping him also did two things, it caused Quick to lose depth on his route which made the route be run short of the first down marker and it caused him to lose speed which allowed the CB to stick with him.

Had Quick run this route properly, he would have caught the ball at the marker and lost the CB covering him in traffic because of Cook. The play-call was right. It was just poorly executed by the receivers. And the issue was that nobody else was open so Sam had to take a shot at trying to zip it in to Quick.

Play #4: Incomplete Pass to Jared Cook Over the Middle
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Here's one of the few plays that was Sam's fault. On game day, this was also a throw that I felt he forced to Cook and I was on wrong that as well. We ran a play-action on this play and it was sold well. Karlos Dansby bought it hook, line and sinker. Issue is that Sam was far too late on the throw. The second photo shows Cook coming out of his break. Sam should have thrown it right as he went into it. He had a wide open window down the seam. We're talking fractions of a second but they matter. Because he was late, Karlos Dansby recovered and hauled butt down the seam to get into position to knock the ball away and nearly intercept it.

I'm sure Sam will be kicking himself when he sees this one in the film room as he had the throw, he saw the receiver clearly but he just took one too many hitch steps and was late.

Ok guys, that's it for today on plays that I wanted to breakdown. There are a few other good ones to look at but trust me, our QB had a very strong day against Arizona. VERY few plays that he left on the field and it's hard to nitpick what he did.

I also want to give credit to our OL who had a good day. Not a great day but a good day. While the stat sheet says they gave up 0 sacks, here are a few examples of how much Sam was able to help them on Sunday:
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Abraham stunts inside and Bradford side-steps him then slips his tackle on what would have been a sack but ends up fumbling while scrambling past the LOS
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Cardinals blitz and Bradford has to escape two guys but is able to and then makes a first down throw to Givens
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Defender penetrates the A gap off the snap and takes out Bradford's lower leg but he gets the ball out right before he's hit...our season could have ended on this play. Funny how the "Brady" rule went uncalled when Bradford was clearly cut down right below the knee.
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The defenders stunt and Saffold's guy gets inside of him and forces Sam out of the pocket...it's really too bad because if Sam had been able to stand in, Austin would have cleared Dansby into an open window and likely had a TD.
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Defender comes through almost entirely unblocked on a blitz and Bradford just throws it over Pettis's head to the sidelines as a throwaway...very savvy move...no intentional grounding on a clear throwaway.

This wasn't meant to take a shot at the OL either. The Cards brought a lot of heavy, exotic blitzes at us and we did a relatively good job of picking them up. I just wanted to highlight Bradford because it shows just how much his pocket awareness, presence and movement/elusiveness have come from his first 2 years where he was often a statue in the pocket.

If this were rookie Bradford, he's likely sacked 4 or 5 times in this game.

All in all, good performance by the offense for Week 1. Hopefully they expand on it. Bradford, though, looked very comfortable and he made very few errors. This was one of his strongest games as a pro and the Cardinals didn't give it up easily. They threw a lot of looks and blitzes at him. He got hit a decent amount in this game.

EDIT: Pictures are too big for forum...sorry you have to click the links. Don't have enough energy to resize them all tonight.

 

[bluecoconuts]

Awesome breakdown, when you look at it this way Bradford looks even better. As the receivers get time under their belt in the system a lot of these little errors should fix themselves as well, so it's pretty encouraging.

 

[Tron]

Wow, tremendous work man. Great post.

 

[albefree69]

No doubt about it, awesome post man! Thanks a bunch for all your work.

 

[Sgt. Ram]

Great breakdown, thanks for your hard work brother.

 

[max]

Really nice job, jrry

Guess you disagree with Sando who questions if Bradford is even an above average QB.

Of course Sando is shamelessly promoting the ESPN QBR rating system. So he has basically turned into a ESPN whore.

Any system that rates Andy Dalton higher than Peyton Manning in week one is filled with holes. But you won't hear that from Sando. Can't blame the guy for trying to make a living, but he has lost a ton of credibility with me.

 

[-X-]

Highlighting that one mistake? Why do you hate Bradford so much? :sly:

Awesome job on the breakdown, Mr. Seinfeld. I'll see what I can do about getting your images to post without you having to resize them, and without me having to allow 1024W pictures to bust the layout. I'm sure there's a simple script I can install that will do it automatically. Just gotta look for it. If not, I'll just resize them for you so that it's one seamless post.

 

[bwdenverram]

Great freaking post man. What stands out to me from all your pics is that while a lot of people were dissapointed with the "dink and dunk" play you can see from Arizona's D that they really tried to take away the deep play. Sam took what was available and when you see pics like that it makes it look like even less was there. Eventually, teams will try and take away the short passes and that's when our speed can take advantage of it. The ONLY thing I can say about Sam is that he still locks onto one guy sometimes when others are open but I think it's not nearly as bad as it was in the past. He really is going through his reads much better. I personally think Sam is only going to get better and better the longer he is in the same system with the same guys around him.

 

[Zaphod]

Wow, thanks for posting that!

Very cool breakdown.

 

[Rambitious1]

Great analysis.

Pretty insightful.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk - now Free

 

[nighttrain]

Awesome breakdown, when you look at it this way Bradford looks even better. As the receivers get time under their belt in the system a lot of these little errors should fix themselves as well, so it's pretty encouraging.

just gonna chip in here and say i add to awesome with totally. Watching the game in real time it was impossible to pick up what you broke down.
Gracias amigo, love your work
train

 

[fearsomefour]

Fantastic work. Thanks for putting in the time I know that took.
On the third play I really like a little quick hitter to Austin on that play also. He cuts out on the snap an easy pass and catch to get Austin in space basically one on one.
This does sort of touch on some of Cooks' short comings as a receiver also. But, for the real game with his new QB....Id say it went well.
It will be interesting to see if doubles start rolling to Cook how that opens things up.
When Im watching a game and you get a shot wide enough to see where the safties are I will pause it and see if I can guess where the ball is going. Fun little game that gives you another way to watch the game.
One other thing these pictures do is make you realize how fast the game is happening. A guy looks wide open in one still and is pretty much covered up in the next still of the same play. Cook over the middle is a good example. Sam held the ball too long for sure, that amounted to probably about a second or less.
Anyway, thanks again for the great work.

 

[RamsSince1969]

Bravo! Bravo! How the hell does it get any better than ROD with posts like this? Amazing breakdown. Thanks so much.

 

[fearsomefour]

Bravo! Bravo! How the hell does it get any better than ROD with posts like this? Amazing breakdown. Thanks so much.

Exactly. It doesnt get better.

 

[Stranger]

I love love love Jared Cook, but in an interview earlier this week Gil Brandt talked about the knock on Cook, if there was any, is that he sometimes takes plays off. I wonder, just wonder, if we're not seeing some evidence of this here, in these two examples.

This was a painful play to watch and a poor play call in my opinion. However, Jared Cook made a pretty big error on this play. He's sent in motion and is supposed to block but slips at the snap as shown in the final picture. Due to him slipping, he gets out of position and doesn't touch the DE. At minimum, he was supposed to chip that DE. I think he was responsible for blocking him but that's guess-work. Regardless, due to him slipping, the DE was untouched and was able to run right to Sam.

Here we have the deep ball to the end-zone to Cook that appeared forced. In fact, it was the proper read. Before the snap, the safety is shaded to the strong-side of the formation leaving a single CB matched up on Cook with no help. They drop into a zone with the LB underneath and the CB over the top at the snap. Cook is running a post corner route which is a double move where he fakes the post and then makes an abrupt cut to the corner route to try and get the CB out of position. It works well enough. Issue is that Cook makes a bone-headed decision after his break. He should have stayed on the CB's outside hip and ran towards the front pylon while running under the ball. However, he tries to cut behind the CB and ends up losing momentum in the process and getting too far inside on a ball that was being thrown to the red strike zone in the corner of the end-zone.

And thank you for this fantastic analysis. I'm learning a lot at this forum, and it's great. Perhaps we should formalize this thread weekly, in a regular Tale of the Tape series.

 

[RamFan503]

Nice work Jerry... or whatever your name is... :what:

Really love these kinds of break downs. I watched the game twice and came away with the impression that Sam really had it going on. I saw him make slight moves or sidesteps etc. to avoid the sack on multiple occassions. I agree that if this is rookie Sam, the AZ D gets to him often.

Really encouraging to watch the game. Even more so with your excellent analysis. Thanks man.

 

[jrry32]

I love love love Jared Cook, but in an interview earlier this week Gil Brandt talked about the knock on Cook, if there was any, is that he sometimes takes plays off. I wonder, just wonder, if we're not seeing some evidence of this here, in these two examples.

This was a painful play to watch and a poor play call in my opinion. However, Jared Cook made a pretty big error on this play. He's sent in motion and is supposed to block but slips at the snap as shown in the final picture. Due to him slipping, he gets out of position and doesn't touch the DE. At minimum, he was supposed to chip that DE. I think he was responsible for blocking him but that's guess-work. Regardless, due to him slipping, the DE was untouched and was able to run right to Sam.

Here we have the deep ball to the end-zone to Cook that appeared forced. In fact, it was the proper read. Before the snap, the safety is shaded to the strong-side of the formation leaving a single CB matched up on Cook with no help. They drop into a zone with the LB underneath and the CB over the top at the snap. Cook is running a post corner route which is a double move where he fakes the post and then makes an abrupt cut to the corner route to try and get the CB out of position. It works well enough. Issue is that Cook makes a bone-headed decision after his break. He should have stayed on the CB's outside hip and ran towards the front pylon while running under the ball. However, he tries to cut behind the CB and ends up losing momentum in the process and getting too far inside on a ball that was being thrown to the red strike zone in the corner of the end-zone.

And thank you for this fantastic analysis. I'm learning a lot at this forum, and it's great. Perhaps we should formalize this thread weekly, in a regular Tale of the Tape series.

I'm definitely going to try and do one a week. I'm not sure if all will be aimed at Bradford or not. But there might be some weeks where it will be difficult to put one out due to time constraints.

Fantastic work. Thanks for putting in the time I know that took.
On the third play I really like a little quick hitter to Austin on that play also. He cuts out on the snap an easy pass and catch to get Austin in space basically one on one.
This does sort of touch on some of Cooks' short comings as a receiver also. But, for the real game with his new QB....Id say it went well.
It will be interesting to see if doubles start rolling to Cook how that opens things up.
When Im watching a game and you get a shot wide enough to see where the safties are I will pause it and see if I can guess where the ball is going. Fun little game that gives you another way to watch the game.
One other thing these pictures do is make you realize how fast the game is happening. A guy looks wide open in one still and is pretty much covered up in the next still of the same play. Cook over the middle is a good example. Sam held the ball too long for sure, that amounted to probably about a second or less.
Anyway, thanks again for the great work.

Interestingly enough, Arizona was actually throwing some double coverage at Cook in that game. Saw at least 3 instances of them doubling him in man coverage with two defenders. But when they blitzed, it wasn't possible.

And yea, I hear you on that. I enjoy trying to guess what play we'll run and who we'll go to. As crazy as it sounds, I actually called the QB Draw on the 2 point conversion inadvertently. I said when we lined up, "With them so spread out, I'd love to see Sam run a draw here or just take off immediately." Then it ended up being the play-call. Was impressed with the balls Schotty had on that one.

Highlighting that one mistake? Why do you hate Bradford so much? :sly:

Awesome job on the breakdown, Mr. Seinfeld. I'll see what I can do about getting your images to post without you having to resize them, and without me having to allow 1024W pictures to bust the layout. I'm sure there's a simple script I can install that will do it automatically. Just gotta look for it. If not, I'll just resize them for you so that it's one seamless post.

Why do I hate him? Isn't it obvious? His hair. :ww:

I wouldn't put too much effort into it. It's not a big deal on the pictures.

Really nice job, jrry

Guess you disagree with Sando who questions if Bradford is even an above average QB.

Of course Sando is shamelessly promoting the ESPN QBR rating system. So he has basically turned into a ESPN whore.

Any system that rates Andy Dalton higher than Peyton Manning in week one is filled with holes. But you won't hear that from Sando. Can't blame the guy for trying to make a living, but he has lost a ton of credibility with me.

Definitely disagree. I am not a big stats guy but ESPN's QBR stat is one that I definitely don't like. I agree with you that having Manning anywhere but #1 after that performance is an egregious error.

It just seems like their stat is trying too hard to be different.

And thanks, to everyone that posted, for all the gratitude. It is appreciated. :cheese:

 

[Rabid Ram]

I love love love Jared Cook, but in an interview earlier this week Gil Brandt talked about the knock on Cook, if there was any, is that he sometimes takes plays off. I wonder, just wonder, if we're not seeing some evidence of this here, in these two examples.

This was a painful play to watch and a poor play call in my opinion. However, Jared Cook made a pretty big error on this play. He's sent in motion and is supposed to block but slips at the snap as shown in the final picture. Due to him slipping, he gets out of position and doesn't touch the DE. At minimum, he was supposed to chip that DE. I think he was responsible for blocking him but that's guess-work. Regardless, due to him slipping, the DE was untouched and was able to run right to Sam.

Here we have the deep ball to the end-zone to Cook that appeared forced. In fact, it was the proper read. Before the snap, the safety is shaded to the strong-side of the formation leaving a single CB matched up on Cook with no help. They drop into a zone with the LB underneath and the CB over the top at the snap. Cook is running a post corner route which is a double move where he fakes the post and then makes an abrupt cut to the corner route to try and get the CB out of position. It works well enough. Issue is that Cook makes a bone-headed decision after his break. He should have stayed on the CB's outside hip and ran towards the front pylon while running under the ball. However, he tries to cut behind the CB and ends up losing momentum in the process and getting too far inside on a ball that was being thrown to the red strike zone in the corner of the end-zone.

And thank you for this fantastic analysis. I'm learning a lot at this forum, and it's great. Perhaps we should formalize this thread weekly, in a regular Tale of the Tape series.

I dont think it is in any case a representation of cook taking plays off. I believe it is more in tune with his use becoming WAY more expensive then he has ever seen and learning more folds of his position.

 

[DR RAM]

Really great job, Jrry. I too thought that this was a great game from Sam, and that he should have gotten more credit for making his line look good, and not the other way around.

One thing that I picked up on last year, that I want to throw out for discussion. Does anyone else think that Sam has a fundamental problem throwing the ball in the left flat, or left out?