honyock
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Here are some observations on the OL and the offense in general after watching the replay.
Detroit had a very different defensive approach than both Washington and Philly the past two weeks. Those two blitzed repeatedly. The Lions mostly just rushed four, with some occasional blitzes, and held seven men back in coverage. If you do that, and your front four can supply consistent pressure, it makes for a long day for your QB. Under constant pressure, little time to make decisions, with plenty of defenders back in coverage. And it worked really well.
Tony could have gotten killed that first half. I counted four really hard hits on him in the first half and another in the third quarter, and I mean Tony fully extended taking shots to the ribs from some very big men moving very fast. Fairley could have knocked him out of the game on his first pass, on our first possession. When he wasn't getting hit, he was throwing off his back foot or flushed and throwing on the run. There was pretty consistent pressure up the middle, with both Suh and Fairley in disruptive mode.
After the game Tony compared the game to the Vikings playoff game in 2009, and after rewatching the game, I agree. Like many here, I thought Tony was off during the game. On the rewatch, I'm giving him a better grade - he just had no chance too much of the time. As the game went on, he started looking rushed even when the protection was okay.
Fairley did a lot of the damage on Leary, who had a really shaky game. He let Fairley shoot by him for Romo-hits twice, and he and Smith miscommunicated on a stunt once to cause another hit (it looked to me like this one was on Smith - he was slow to recognize the stunt. The Lions pulled the same stunt in the third quarter and Smith handled it well that time). Waters and Free had the same problems with a stunt that led to a Suh hit on Romo.
Frederick came in for a couple of plays in the first half when Waters hyper-extended his knee, then again early i the third when Waters went out with the arm injury. Bern didn't let Suh blow by him, but he was getting pushed back into the pocket several times the second half.
When Free and Smith weren't dealing with stunts, they were mostly pretty solid. The problem was, whenever their men created a little outside pressure, the middle was getting pushed back and Tony ended up throwing quickly or throwing off his back foot.
In the run game, we actually ran the ball pretty decently on first down through most of the first three quarters. On first down runs, we gained 5, 7, 8, 4, 5, 1 (the end around to Dez), -1, 5, 5, 0, 6 yards. Three neutral to negative plays and eight solid gains, average 4.1 per carry. Nothing flashy, but we were putting ourselves in good second down position pretty consistently.
But then came second down. Our second down runs through the same stretch: -3, 0, -3, 6 (we started learning our lesson here and ran outside for a first down) and 4. Average 0.8 per carry. Coupled with the third down pressure, those were drive killers. It looked like Detroit was anticipating those second down runs and selling out to stop them, and our blocking got overwhelmed by numbers. But they were playing us straight up on first down then playing the run very aggressively on all those second and short plays.
Against Philly, the line cleaned up their blitz protection in the second half and cut out the free runs on Romo. Against Detroit, we got better as well against the four man rush in the second half, not perfect but only one hard hit on Romo. The result was that the offense put up 20 points in the second half. The problem is, we're wasting a half of football on offense too often.
Here's my thoughts on our second to the last possession of the game, the one that has come under so much criticism for the conservative play calling and for Romo throwing it away on third down. After rewatching, I disagree with almost all of the criticism of that series. Here's how it went:
Play 1, 1st down, we come out throwing, PI on Dez' man, automatic first down.
Play 2, 1st down, Detroit is showing only six men in the box, we run. I have no problems with a run here, the defense they show fits a run and we've run pretty well on first down for most of the game. The problem was, Bern pulled left, and the middle linebacker immediately read it and shot through the vacant hole and drilled Randle behind the line.
Play 3, 2nd and 13. This is the play that you could argue was too conservative. Detroit is again showing six in the box, but we run again and the overwhelm our blocking, gain of one.
Play 4, 3rd and 12. Detroit rushes four, and three men break free towards Romo. Line of scrimmage was the 23, and Tony is facing an almost certain sack at probably the five yard line. He's got nowhere to go. The play was over with 2:33 on the clock and Detroit has two time outs. So if Tony takes the sack (and he had the two ends coming at him from the outside and one from the middle and absolutely nowhere to go), then we're punting from our endzone with Detroit likely to get the ball at the 50 yard line or closer with no need to even rush things on offense.
And to argue that we need him to just take the sack at the five yard line means he had to anticipate that the Lions would get the ball TWICE in the last two minutes. The sack runs the clock down to the two minute warning (or the Lions call time out) and they are set up in great field position and a ton of time and at least one time out. Even if the clock runs down to the two minute warning, time isn't an issue for the Lions, given the field position we'd be giving them with the sack. Saying that Romo should have seen how the game might play out with two more possessions for the Lions, is pure hindsight. As a player, you don't have foresight to see all the permutations of how a game might play out. Romo was absolutely right to throw that ball away in that situation.
Detroit had a very different defensive approach than both Washington and Philly the past two weeks. Those two blitzed repeatedly. The Lions mostly just rushed four, with some occasional blitzes, and held seven men back in coverage. If you do that, and your front four can supply consistent pressure, it makes for a long day for your QB. Under constant pressure, little time to make decisions, with plenty of defenders back in coverage. And it worked really well.
Tony could have gotten killed that first half. I counted four really hard hits on him in the first half and another in the third quarter, and I mean Tony fully extended taking shots to the ribs from some very big men moving very fast. Fairley could have knocked him out of the game on his first pass, on our first possession. When he wasn't getting hit, he was throwing off his back foot or flushed and throwing on the run. There was pretty consistent pressure up the middle, with both Suh and Fairley in disruptive mode.
After the game Tony compared the game to the Vikings playoff game in 2009, and after rewatching the game, I agree. Like many here, I thought Tony was off during the game. On the rewatch, I'm giving him a better grade - he just had no chance too much of the time. As the game went on, he started looking rushed even when the protection was okay.
Fairley did a lot of the damage on Leary, who had a really shaky game. He let Fairley shoot by him for Romo-hits twice, and he and Smith miscommunicated on a stunt once to cause another hit (it looked to me like this one was on Smith - he was slow to recognize the stunt. The Lions pulled the same stunt in the third quarter and Smith handled it well that time). Waters and Free had the same problems with a stunt that led to a Suh hit on Romo.
Frederick came in for a couple of plays in the first half when Waters hyper-extended his knee, then again early i the third when Waters went out with the arm injury. Bern didn't let Suh blow by him, but he was getting pushed back into the pocket several times the second half.
When Free and Smith weren't dealing with stunts, they were mostly pretty solid. The problem was, whenever their men created a little outside pressure, the middle was getting pushed back and Tony ended up throwing quickly or throwing off his back foot.
In the run game, we actually ran the ball pretty decently on first down through most of the first three quarters. On first down runs, we gained 5, 7, 8, 4, 5, 1 (the end around to Dez), -1, 5, 5, 0, 6 yards. Three neutral to negative plays and eight solid gains, average 4.1 per carry. Nothing flashy, but we were putting ourselves in good second down position pretty consistently.
But then came second down. Our second down runs through the same stretch: -3, 0, -3, 6 (we started learning our lesson here and ran outside for a first down) and 4. Average 0.8 per carry. Coupled with the third down pressure, those were drive killers. It looked like Detroit was anticipating those second down runs and selling out to stop them, and our blocking got overwhelmed by numbers. But they were playing us straight up on first down then playing the run very aggressively on all those second and short plays.
Against Philly, the line cleaned up their blitz protection in the second half and cut out the free runs on Romo. Against Detroit, we got better as well against the four man rush in the second half, not perfect but only one hard hit on Romo. The result was that the offense put up 20 points in the second half. The problem is, we're wasting a half of football on offense too often.
Here's my thoughts on our second to the last possession of the game, the one that has come under so much criticism for the conservative play calling and for Romo throwing it away on third down. After rewatching, I disagree with almost all of the criticism of that series. Here's how it went:
Play 1, 1st down, we come out throwing, PI on Dez' man, automatic first down.
Play 2, 1st down, Detroit is showing only six men in the box, we run. I have no problems with a run here, the defense they show fits a run and we've run pretty well on first down for most of the game. The problem was, Bern pulled left, and the middle linebacker immediately read it and shot through the vacant hole and drilled Randle behind the line.
Play 3, 2nd and 13. This is the play that you could argue was too conservative. Detroit is again showing six in the box, but we run again and the overwhelm our blocking, gain of one.
Play 4, 3rd and 12. Detroit rushes four, and three men break free towards Romo. Line of scrimmage was the 23, and Tony is facing an almost certain sack at probably the five yard line. He's got nowhere to go. The play was over with 2:33 on the clock and Detroit has two time outs. So if Tony takes the sack (and he had the two ends coming at him from the outside and one from the middle and absolutely nowhere to go), then we're punting from our endzone with Detroit likely to get the ball at the 50 yard line or closer with no need to even rush things on offense.
And to argue that we need him to just take the sack at the five yard line means he had to anticipate that the Lions would get the ball TWICE in the last two minutes. The sack runs the clock down to the two minute warning (or the Lions call time out) and they are set up in great field position and a ton of time and at least one time out. Even if the clock runs down to the two minute warning, time isn't an issue for the Lions, given the field position we'd be giving them with the sack. Saying that Romo should have seen how the game might play out with two more possessions for the Lions, is pure hindsight. As a player, you don't have foresight to see all the permutations of how a game might play out. Romo was absolutely right to throw that ball away in that situation.
