Building a Playbook to Beat the Cardinals: Streaking Behind a Wall of Blockers

by John Morgan on Nov 12, 2009 4:34 PM PST

To wrap up today's look at winning plays, I illustrate a play I've never seen Seattle run. It's a little radical, but Greg Knapp seems willing to mix it up. This is a screen pass to the receiver. There's no read or progression, only execution. It is a passing play with the heart of a run, and like a run can help Seattle draw in cover and open things down field.

This is not a very popular play in the pros, but a personal favorite of mine and a chance to involve Deion Branch's quickness. The Patriots run something like this with Wes Welker. The key to it working is the interior line pulling forward without getting tied up. The I-backs rush forward to retard the freed pass rushers and the tackles and tight end John Carlson slow the edge rush.

Deion Branch starts by running a loose "out". That gives the linemen a chance to disengage. Then Branch streaks back underneath. Matt Hasselbeck is retreating from imminent contact and waiting for his receiver to slice underneath. The second Branch begins approaching the right guard, Hasselbeck zips it towards the center and allows Branch to run into the pass.

From there it's all about a split-second read, react and run. Branch can turn up field behind his blockers, but more likely, Branch continues his path left and attempts to race towards the left flat. It's a big play disguised as a little play. Branch has running room. The blockers won't last, but their purpose is to give Branch a floating pocket to attack the second level from. Let's hope that pterodactyl tendon holds.

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The cards have had our number...

The last three contests. I have a hard time seeing this go differently. I think the thing people tend to forget about the cards recent run of success is their incredible injury luck..

In the last season and a half the cardinals have had a 38 year old QB play in all 24 games, and this is a guy who was quite injury prone at a younger age!

On top of that the cardinals have not had a lineman on either side of the ball miss a single start in any of those 24 games..

In their secondary, the Cards have had all four starters start every game this year. Rolle, DRC, and Wilson combined to miss all of one start last year. McFadden was acquired in the offseason.

Boldin’s perpetual injuries show up in the little news ticker on the bottom of the screen a lot but he is their #2 wideout and they have known about his being injury prone for years and been able to address it (Doucet, Breaston, etc.). Otherwise the Cards haven’t missed too many skill position players.. Their linebackers have missed only a handful of starts total in both seasons.

You could cover all the games cards starters have missed the last year and a half on a post-it note, the hawks list would fill volumes. Hass, Jones, Locklear, Sims, Burleson, Branch, Spencer, Trufant, WIlson, Tatupu, Hill, Wahle, Kerney, Bryant..

The effect of these injuries is not just the games missed, our guys are spending their weeks rehabbing and we can’t keep the same units on the field together so they can increase their level of play from week to week. In theory we are pretty healthy this week. The only projected starters from the preseason that we don’t have are Jones and Tatupu. Tatupu’s backup has looked good (we knew we had good LB depth) and their was ample reason to doubt Jones’s return anyways. Still, the Locklear/Sims/Spencer/Unger/Willis line (assuming Lock goes) has never started a game together and has probably worked together very few times in practice also. Nobody ‘shuts down’ the Arizona offense so we are relying on these guys to just magically crawl out of a hospital bed and create running lanes and buy time for Hasselbeck… probably not gonna happen. I see a lot of Seahawks lineman bumbling around and laying out very soon.

Please let us win.

by michaelfox99 on Nov 13, 2009 6:21 AM PST reply actions