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Preview: Redskins vs Giants
By Dillweed | September 1, 2008
I don’t want to draw too many conclusions from the Giants preseason match-up with the Jets because well…it’s preseason. But it’s the best preview we have of the Giants starters and some things they did in the game coincide with their in-depth review in Pro Football Prospectus (which is a book I highly recommended you buy last year, and this years issue is every bit as good.) So that being said, on with the preview:
Left Tackle, David Diehl: Pro Football Prospectus’ review of the Giants offensive line identified LT David Diehl as the question mark going into last year’s regular season. A former utility offensive lineman, Diehl was thrusted into the starting LT position and his regular season performance earned him this review by Prospectus: “Diehl allowed 11 sacks and had a team high eight penalties; his biggest problem was against bull rushers who would simply get underneath his pads and push him backwards into Manning.” Watching Diehl in the Giants vs Jets week 3 pre-season game, there was no question out of the entire offensive line, Diehl struggles the most with pass protection. The first frame shows Diehl unable to play at the proper pad level, he’s up high in his block…and that’s a good way to let a defensive end get underneath your pads:
In this case, Manning was able to get the ball out in time anyways, but in the next frame you see how Diehl struggles as he continues to play with lax technique. In this case he’s matched up against 264 lb OLB/DE Vernon Gholston who just bull rushes him into Manning like he’s a 285 lb defensive end:
I’m not sure if Andre Carter has the pass rushing moves that Gholston is equipped with, even something as simple as a bull rush, but I do know he loves to run around the outside of Offensive Tackles play after play after play…as fast as he can. Last year when we played the Giants at FedEx, Andre Carter was able to get a sack against Diehl by doing just that, as the chart will remind you:
| Yard Line | Down | Formation | Play Call | Coverage | Yards |
| Giants 25 | 1st and 10 | 4-3 (Under) | PA Pass | Sack | 0 |
| Carter blows right by David Diehl for the sack. Why is it every time I see Carter own a LT, they turn out being some kind of converted guard or rookie playing for the first time? Diehl is a converted Guard. Whatever, I’ll take it. (Sack-Carter) | |||||
Don’t get me started on Carter’s overrated 10.5 sack stat.
Calvin Pace used this same quick outside rush against Diehl and got to Manning for the sack:
Pace also got by Diehl with a spin move earlier on. I’ve seen Chris Wilson spin around like a top at times, maybe he’ll be able to pull a fast one on Diehl. Having even an 80% Jason Taylor would be huge for this game.
The Giants offensive line was fantastic at run blocking, per usual, with great lead blocks by the fullback and guards WAY downfield.
Left Guard Rich Seubert and the Fullback pull ahead:
and get a hat on a hat 10 yards downfield
There were a couple more instances of LG Rich Seubert pulling and blocking downfield and springing long gains. Interestingly, Prospectus calls Seubert the “weak link of the line” and said he ”struggles mightily when pulling to either side”…uh, looks like Seubert got coached up. Scary. Prospectus and my breakdown had no mention of fullback play last year, so not sure how often the Giants will deploy a fullback on Thursday, but their guards can pull with the best of them and the line as a whole is very physical.
Pass blocking from lineman not named Diehl was consistent except when exposed to a secondary blitz or a delay blitz by a LB. Because they were slow to pick up these specific types of blitzes…maybe expect Doughty and our LBs to get in a couple of sacks or at the very least pressure Manning. And pressures do wonders against Elijah…
Elijah: Pro Football Prospectus on Eli’s 2007 regular season (emphasis mine): “Eli Manning was hurried on a below-average percentage of pass plays, but when he was hurried-during the regular season, at least-he had the worst DVOA of any quarterback with at least 30 passes under pressure.” The DVOA rating system is explained here (good luck understanding it) but that quote just means that last year, in the regular season, Manning absolutely sucked under pressure. Based on the preseason game against the Jets he hasn’t improved much. I didn’t chart his stats under pressure because quite frankly I’d go insane if I had to chart other teams’ games, but it was quite obvious Manning could not make good decisions almost every time the Jets applied pressure. Last year against the Giants at FedEx, Elijah got pretty scurred against our blitz:
Blitzes
| Down | Blitzer(s) | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 1st and 10 | Marcus and Fletch | PA Pass for 0 yards |
| 1st and 10 | Rocky and Fletch | Pass for 0 yards |
| 1st and 10 | Marcus, Fletch and Rocky | Pressure: Daniels and Montgomery. Deflection - Montgomery |
| 1st and 15 | Marcus, Fletch and Rocky | INT. Pressure: Evans |
| 2nd and 5 | Landry | Throw Away. Pressure: Landry. |
| 2nd and 7 | Blades and Marcus | Pass for 0 yards. |
| 2nd and 7 | Rocky, Fletch, and Landry | Pass for 0 yards. Pressure: Rocky. |
| 2nd and 6 | Marcus | Pass for 24 yards |
| 2nd and 9 | Prioleau, Fletch and Blades | 33 yard TD (Rogers missed tackle) |
| 2nd and 9 | Marcus and Fletch | Sack: Golston and Fletch |
| 2nd and 10 | Landry and Fletch | Pass for 0 yards. |
| 2nd and 8 | Marcus | Deflection: Daniels. |
| 3rd and 5 | Rocky | Pass for 5 yards. |
With Landry playing centerfield this Thursday…the Redskins should blitz early and blitz often.
(Continued on page 2)
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Topics: NFL, Redskins | 10 Comments »
September 1st, 2008 at 3:13 pm
wow. amazing job.
This is Olympic Pole Vault and the bar was just set so high, I don’t even know if I want to pick up my pole to attempt this height….
September 1st, 2008 at 7:06 pm
great write up dillweed…..
I also think that if the Skins can get successful with the shorter passes, Portis will eventually run all over them (he has approx 93 ypg rushing in the last few games vs. NYG).
I also wonder if the Skins will use a screen or two to keep the Giants front four honest and not rush the passer on every play.
September 1st, 2008 at 7:30 pm
Ps.
Posted the link over on Extremeskins
September 1st, 2008 at 7:31 pm
good point…the Jets deployed the screen a couple of times to scatback Leon Washington with moderate success. I didn’t see any let up though with the pass rush.
That’s a good stat with CP…I just hope he doesn’t bounce it to the outside when Mathias Kiwanuka is on that end…that boy has crazy close-in speed
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Nice Work, very appreciated!
September 2nd, 2008 at 3:22 pm
hi
great comments as usual.. the game will revolve around one factor: the ability of the giants to run on the skins.. historically, when the giants have run well with tiki or with jacobs, they have handled the redskins easily. conversely, when eli had to win for them the results were far less favorable (think the second giant-redskin game last year. granted the weather conditions were atrocious, but the skins totally shut down jacobs)
what concerns me is the use of golston instead of mmontgomery. on the other hand, griffin is fresh.
one way or the other, stuff the run and the giant offense becomes unpredictable. let them have success converting third downs with the run or with short passes and we are in for a miserable evening
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Uh, it’s Elisha. Elijah is Plax’ infant son.
September 2nd, 2008 at 7:57 pm
ha…Elisha sounds like a girl’s name, how fitting.
Montgomery has the wider base and is a more natural fit in stopping the run. It would be interesting to see of the two, who is more successful in stopping the run. Perhaps I should start keeping track of Gholston vs Montgomery’s success rate at stopping the run…
September 2nd, 2008 at 8:13 pm
Dilweed,
big fan of your analysis…great job, as per usual.
I think the run success rate against our young DTs would be good to track. I also wonder how Blache tends to se them. Does Golston find more playing time at the beginning of games, to make sure Monty is fresh near crunch time? Does Montgomery seem to be n more when down/distance dictates a pass by the offense? Or, Does Blache really look at them at the 2 of them as interchangeable (as he seemed to indicate in his last interview)?
May be to much research to undertake, but it’s a curiosity I have.
September 3rd, 2008 at 12:59 am
Im pissed that I never knew this site existed… this analysis is the most in depth hands down that I have ever seen