02-20-2022, 05:34 PM
We have to live with these SB nightmares; Mixon not running the ball in short yardage and not ONE screen play vs the worst team in the league in defending screen plays (SF beat them 2 out of 3 with screens and had an 80 yd TD in the loss)
That said the predictability needs to lessen and the creativity needs to increase. Taylor was hired directly from McVay’s staff, but he is not educated from the Shanahan/McVay tree. Instead, the Bengals run a modern version of the West Coast offense. All the schematic bells and whistles that are associated with the McVay/Shanahan offense are not found in this offense. For example, their motion/shift rate and bunch/stack receiver rate are below the league average, two places where the Rams and San Francisco 49ers, are at the top.
To start, the marriage between run and pass looks is almost nonexistent. When the Bengals go in shotgun, they throw the ball. When they go under center, they run the football. When they bring heavy personnel on the field, they exclusively run the football. When they bring lighter personnel on the field, they throw the football. This from PFF.
![[Image: 1e89e73b7a7c62567b2b8a4e56047c17.jpg]](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/1e/89/e7/1e89e73b7a7c62567b2b8a4e56047c17.jpg)
This creates a silo effect on the offense where defenses can get a beat on whether a run or a pass is coming based on simple tendency tells. The link between runs and passes — play-action passes — is also nonexistent. The Bengals called a play-action pass on just 19.7% of their pass plays, the fourth-lowest rate in the league.
Getting granular within their play-action pass menu, they have a hard time creating easy throws for their quarterback with their called concepts. The team struggled to control the space directly behind linebackers between the numbers. At face value, it would seem calling play-action concepts that attack the position group with conflicting interests in defending the run and pass would be a team's goal. Even with the downhill nature of the run scheme that the offense showed defenses before pulling the ball on the fake — 50% of their play actions were vertical, 50% horizontal — they still didn’t attack the space enough.
The dropback passing game also lacked a diversity of concepts and the marriage between two different route concepts. The team finished at the bottom in the regular season in volume of pass plays with a double move even though they led the league in yards on those plays. It’s a somewhat reductive way of looking at this aspect of dropback passing but it does illuminate the Bengals issues to an extent. Oline plays a huge aspect in this as well.
I hope Zac improves and unlike many others I want him to still call plays with Callahan's assistance because as long as we are successful we will lose multiple OC's, the continuity between Zac and Joe will remain (assuming it improves).
That said the predictability needs to lessen and the creativity needs to increase. Taylor was hired directly from McVay’s staff, but he is not educated from the Shanahan/McVay tree. Instead, the Bengals run a modern version of the West Coast offense. All the schematic bells and whistles that are associated with the McVay/Shanahan offense are not found in this offense. For example, their motion/shift rate and bunch/stack receiver rate are below the league average, two places where the Rams and San Francisco 49ers, are at the top.
To start, the marriage between run and pass looks is almost nonexistent. When the Bengals go in shotgun, they throw the ball. When they go under center, they run the football. When they bring heavy personnel on the field, they exclusively run the football. When they bring lighter personnel on the field, they throw the football. This from PFF.
This creates a silo effect on the offense where defenses can get a beat on whether a run or a pass is coming based on simple tendency tells. The link between runs and passes — play-action passes — is also nonexistent. The Bengals called a play-action pass on just 19.7% of their pass plays, the fourth-lowest rate in the league.
Getting granular within their play-action pass menu, they have a hard time creating easy throws for their quarterback with their called concepts. The team struggled to control the space directly behind linebackers between the numbers. At face value, it would seem calling play-action concepts that attack the position group with conflicting interests in defending the run and pass would be a team's goal. Even with the downhill nature of the run scheme that the offense showed defenses before pulling the ball on the fake — 50% of their play actions were vertical, 50% horizontal — they still didn’t attack the space enough.
The dropback passing game also lacked a diversity of concepts and the marriage between two different route concepts. The team finished at the bottom in the regular season in volume of pass plays with a double move even though they led the league in yards on those plays. It’s a somewhat reductive way of looking at this aspect of dropback passing but it does illuminate the Bengals issues to an extent. Oline plays a huge aspect in this as well.
I hope Zac improves and unlike many others I want him to still call plays with Callahan's assistance because as long as we are successful we will lose multiple OC's, the continuity between Zac and Joe will remain (assuming it improves).
