Tuesday, October 26, 2004
OFF-TOPIC: SHUTDOWN
Great job by the Broncos' "shutdown corner," Champ Bailey, last night. He held the Bengals' Chad Johnson to a mere seven receptions for 149 yards. Actually, to be accurate, Johnson did catch one short pass against a zone coverage on third-and-long (Bailey made the tackle, but it was not a man-on-man match-up, nor a bad play by the Denver defense), and got away with one blatant offensive pass interference on another play; so Bailey was legitimately beat five times for 119 yards.
There were three incompletes thrown Chad Johnson's way, but Bailey only knocked down one of those. He did make an interception, but he beat Carson Palmer on that, not Johnson.
Basically, Champ Bailey got worked. Carson Palmer was 12 of 21 for 198 yards. To receivers not named Chad Johnson, Palmer was 6 of 11 for 49 yards.
Also exposed by the Broncos' pathetic effort was the fraudulence of their offense. ABC showed a graphic early in the game that indicated Jake Plummer has a mid-90s passer rating off of play-action, but is in the high-70s on dropback passes. A high percentage of Snake's play-action passes come on roll-outs. Cincinatti prepared for this, and their linebackers were always waiting for Jake at the other end of the roll-outs, thereby taking the play away. Deprived of their bread-and-butter passing plays, the Bronco passing offense struggled, averaging a miniscule 5.5 yards per pass -- and with Jake being sacked three times, doubling his total for the season.
During the Carolina game, right after Plummer had thrown an interception that Julian Peppers returned 3,209 yards without scoring, NFL Films caught one Panther defender on the sideline telling another "Jake Plummer ain't got no damn sense." Jake went out of his way to prove that last night, registering one dumb intentional grounding and two stupid interceptions. He had a few other passes that could have been intercepted, as well.
Part of the problem was the pass protection. The Bronco O-Line seemed confused having to block for a drop-back game (with the roll-out removed), and the blocking schemes never seemed a match for the Bengal pass-rush, especially in the critical fourth quarter.
Mike Shanahan essentially got schooled. At no point were the Broncos playing the type of game that they would have wanted. Reuben Droughns played well, but the running game was not a big factor for Denver as they were constantly trailing. It was just a bad, stupid game all-around. Yeah, Any GivenSundayMonday and all that, but what Cincinatti did to them is easily replicable, so Denver has to devise a response.
(On a side note: the dumbest play of the game was by -- guess who? -- Quentin Griffin, picking up a kick-off inches before it went out of bounds at the 22, thereby depriving the Broncos of 18 yards. Dumb, just dumb ... field position was a thorn for the Broncos all game, and this stupid pranks didn't improve matters.)
Great job by the Broncos' "shutdown corner," Champ Bailey, last night. He held the Bengals' Chad Johnson to a mere seven receptions for 149 yards. Actually, to be accurate, Johnson did catch one short pass against a zone coverage on third-and-long (Bailey made the tackle, but it was not a man-on-man match-up, nor a bad play by the Denver defense), and got away with one blatant offensive pass interference on another play; so Bailey was legitimately beat five times for 119 yards.
There were three incompletes thrown Chad Johnson's way, but Bailey only knocked down one of those. He did make an interception, but he beat Carson Palmer on that, not Johnson.
Basically, Champ Bailey got worked. Carson Palmer was 12 of 21 for 198 yards. To receivers not named Chad Johnson, Palmer was 6 of 11 for 49 yards.
Also exposed by the Broncos' pathetic effort was the fraudulence of their offense. ABC showed a graphic early in the game that indicated Jake Plummer has a mid-90s passer rating off of play-action, but is in the high-70s on dropback passes. A high percentage of Snake's play-action passes come on roll-outs. Cincinatti prepared for this, and their linebackers were always waiting for Jake at the other end of the roll-outs, thereby taking the play away. Deprived of their bread-and-butter passing plays, the Bronco passing offense struggled, averaging a miniscule 5.5 yards per pass -- and with Jake being sacked three times, doubling his total for the season.
During the Carolina game, right after Plummer had thrown an interception that Julian Peppers returned 3,209 yards without scoring, NFL Films caught one Panther defender on the sideline telling another "Jake Plummer ain't got no damn sense." Jake went out of his way to prove that last night, registering one dumb intentional grounding and two stupid interceptions. He had a few other passes that could have been intercepted, as well.
Part of the problem was the pass protection. The Bronco O-Line seemed confused having to block for a drop-back game (with the roll-out removed), and the blocking schemes never seemed a match for the Bengal pass-rush, especially in the critical fourth quarter.
Mike Shanahan essentially got schooled. At no point were the Broncos playing the type of game that they would have wanted. Reuben Droughns played well, but the running game was not a big factor for Denver as they were constantly trailing. It was just a bad, stupid game all-around. Yeah, Any Given
(On a side note: the dumbest play of the game was by -- guess who? -- Quentin Griffin, picking up a kick-off inches before it went out of bounds at the 22, thereby depriving the Broncos of 18 yards. Dumb, just dumb ... field position was a thorn for the Broncos all game, and this stupid pranks didn't improve matters.)
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