BDL 2020 Week 9 - Rome Eternals @ Cuba Smugglers

[rackcs]

BDL 2020 Week 9

Match: Rome Eternals @ Cuba Smugglers

Away Owner: @bcb1213

Home Owner: @MD4L

 

Vote for who you think would win the game.

Rules:
One vote per person, duplicate accounts will be banned and action taken against those attempting to rig the results.

One vote per team involved in the match. Co-owners may vote in every match up except their own.

For members, who have been following along, and wish to vote.  Please join the conversation and maybe give a reason you voted as you did. This will alleviate any suspicions of unusual voting and will promote discussion.

Note: Players that have a (D) next to their name indicate that they are doubtful or unlikely to play. Players with (Q) are game-time decisions.

Good luck to you both

[rackcs]

Rome Eternals

QB Justin Herbert 
RB Phillip Lindsey  Q
WR Juju Smith Schuster 
WR Amari Cooper 
WR Will Fuller 
WR Jamison Crowder- Q 
LT Andrew Whitworth 
LG Michael Onwenu 
C Brandon Linder 
RG Chris Lindstrom 
RT Ryan Ramczyk

WR Hunter Renfrow
RB DeAndre Swift 
TE/FB Anthony Firkser 
WR Scotty Miller 
TE Tyler Eifert 
OT Braden Smith 
RB Boston Scott 
OL Ted Karras 

DE Marcus Davenport 
DT Dalvin Tomlinson 
NT Malcolm Brown 
DE Carlos Dunlap 
LB Alex Anzalone 
LB Jordan Hicks 
Julio 1  Noah Iginobhene 
CB Jamel Dean 
CB William Jackson 
S Duron Harmon 
Julio 2  Tre Boston 

Edge Jaylon Ferguso
Edge Leonard Floyd
INT Michael Brockers 
INT Ross Blacklock
LB Leighton Vander Esch 
LB Devondre Campbell
CB Nickell Robley Coleman 
CB Buster Skrine

Cuba Smugglers

QB: DeShaun Watson
RB: Dalvin Cook
WR: Julio Jones
WR: DJ Chark
WR: Justin Jefferson
TE: Mo Alie-Cox
LT: Anthony Castonzo
LG: Elgton Jenkins 
C - Ryan Jensen
RG: David DeCastro
RT: Mekhi Becton 

RB: Le’Veon Bell
FB: Kyle Juszczyk 
WR: Marvin Jones
TE: Adam Shaheen
RB: Darwin Thompson
WR: Denzel Mims 
WR: Miles Boykin
OL: Trent Brown

Edge: Jerry Hughes 
DT: Arik Armstead 
NT: DaQuan Jones
Edge: Cam Jordan
WLB: Cory Littleton 
MLB: Eric Kendricks 
RCB: Kenny Moore
NCB: Isaiah Oliver
FS: Tyrann Mathieu 
SS: Eric Rowe
LCB: Jenoris Jenkins

Edge: Matt Judon
DT: Derrick Nnadi
DL:Mario Edwards Jr.
DE: Denico Autry
SLB: Vince Williams
NCB: Jimmie Ward 
S: Khari Willis 
CB: Ugo Amadi

[rackcs]

Rome Eternals

Offense 

This week is must win for us here with Cuba battling us for the final playoff spot.  We know Cuba is undermanned at the corner position and we expect to see a bunch of zone blitz, and regular zone and will practice heavily against it as we expect Cuba will try to confuse the youngster with multiple zone blitz concepts as they simply don’t have the talent to play man against our WR.  I hope people realize that Herbert has put up basically the same numbers as Watson, despite playing one less game.  We are going to havve a higher pass percentage than most weeks attacking the Cuba back seven

4 wr 1 RB (40%)

This is where the majority of pur passing game will come from.  Juju  and Crowder  come from the slots with Fuller and Amari outside.  We will use motion to determine man or zone and Herbert now has the experience to audible as he sees fit.    This secondary has some major depth issues and if in man we are going to target our slot WR like crazy as Jimmie Ward and Isaih Oliver are simply on the struggle bus in coverage this season.  We also will target mini Kenny Moore on the outside if we get Cooper on him and just toss up some jump balls.   The four wide also lightens the box for us and allows Swift and Lindsey to run behind BDL premier offensive line and get to the second level.  We will have one member of the trio of WR run into the flats if no one comes with them as any zone blitz is going to leave that spot open.  We also will be flooding the wide side of the field to give us the most space with outs seams, gos and other zone options.  The screen game to our WR will be an extension of the run game here.  If we see majority zone expect some quick snaps with jet sweep action to Juju and Crowder or Miller on the motion.  The four wide will lighten the box for draws and inside zones .  In man, we are going to use a lot of rub routes to get the underneath game going with slants and drags.  When the defense moves up we try to hit a double move on Janoris Jenkins who has consistently been beaten by such routes throughout his career

2 wr, 2 te, 1 RB (10-15%)

While the Cuba secondary leaves a lot to be desired, the front fout is stout so we aren’t going to run too much base offense this week.  This will be more running the clock late in the game if we have a large lead/  Firkser comes in at RB and we rotate in fresh backs between Scott, Swift, and Lindsay.  Our passing game from this formation will come from play action and roll outs.  We will have more edge rushing  from this formation with sweeps and off tackles to try to get our elusive backs in space.  Eifert plays TE while Firkser takes his FB/TE role from real life

2 RB, 3 WR    25% 

The triple read option is going to play a heavy part from this formation.  Mainly from the pistol formation, the first read is the edge crashing down to stop the inside run, if he does then we run the speed option to the side of the field with two WR to serve as lead blockers to the speed option.  The linebacker on this side will have to determine to go after Herbery or the RB.  QB will read the LB and keep or pitch.  Expect some screen passes to RB against zone from this formation

5 wide (10%)

This will be reserved for long down and distance.   Cuba will likely be playing zone when we break this out so we will flood one side of the field with our zone breaker routes.  We also will break this out on rare occasion on first down if we see zone is the answer to this formation and will hit a quick WR screen to Miller with Cooper and Renfrow as the lead blockers

Other 15 percent will be a mix of things working about and jumbo goal line sets as needed. 

I know I said this before, but up front we feel we have the best line in the BDL and we are counting on them to open holes for the running game and give Herbert all the time he needs   A running back  will be on blitz alert before starting his route

Tl/dr: 

Spread them out and take advantage of sub par CB depth.  Run up the score early and make this game a shootout

Defense 

This week we play a well balanced offense.  Stopping Cuba completely is tough, but we plan on making them take long drives as we don’t think they can outscore us and our defense gets much tougher to beat as we get closer to the goal line.  Bend but don’t brea.  Watson has shown that he doesn’t have a great deal of patience for long drives and will make mistakes when pressing the action.

The first order of business is Julio Jones, with Marlon Humphrey out we are going back to what we normally do against Cuba and double team Julio every play.  Now, some might question this strategy but no matter what teams do to Julio, Cuba always says they are going to target him around 8-10 times.  We are planning on taking him out of the box score as much as possible.  Noah I is a physical freak and has inside leverage with Boston helping over the top every single play.  One man generally can’t stop Julio, but two should do the trick.

With Julio on lock down we can use our two best corners ont he other Cuba weapons.  Jackson gets Chark while Dean gets Jefferson.  The will be fun matchups to watch.  Anzalone draws the difficult task of Dalvin Cook out of the backfield while Hicks gets Ian Thomas who generally gets ignored in the Cuba lineups.  For four wide, Buster Skrine takes the fourth WR and in five wide, NRC gets the assignment

The other big part of the Cuba offense is obviously the running game with Dalvin Cook. Luckily we have one of the best pure run stopping fron fours in the BDL and the Cuba offensive line has struggled mightily in run blocking this season.  Castanzo has especially been awful in this regard and DeCastro hasn’t been his normal studly self dealing with injuries all season.  We are going to continue to play edge contain and turn everything inside to our big time run stuffers and linebacking core.  This also keeps Watson in the pocket and away from rolling out where he can make big plays happen.  We will rotate in iBrockers more heavily this week to keep the big boys fresh while Ferguson will come on only when an edge needs a break.  Anzalone and Hicks are both athletic liinebackers and solid tacklers to keep Cook from busting big gains.  Harmon is playing centerfield today but will occasionally creep up.  

We will continue to sporadically use our  2-4 5 defense vs three wide with Dunlap and Tomlinson inside and all four of our LB on the field.  From this formation we are able to overload a side with just four rushers while still keeping two LB in coverage.  This is going to force Watson to see where the pressure is coming from and gives us an extra second to get home.   We will run this formation on a third of the three wide looks on second and third and loongs.  Campbell and Vander Esch are the outside (edge) backers in this formation with Hicks and Anzalone inside

We aren't gonna go crazy with blitzes this week as giving a guy like Watson  more openings to run is a recipe for disaster.  We per usual will mix in cover two, three and cover four zones.  When we do blitz, it will come from a zone look as we don’t want Watson scrambling for big yardage against a defense that may all have their original assignments to worry about.

Tl/dr. 

Eliminate Julio from the plan.  Keep Cook bottled up inside and don’t let him bounce it out.  Trust other corners in a shootout

Cuba Smugglers

Intro

Against a former rival but with Rome now being out of conference we still have an important game today considering our standings for the playoffs. We just defeated an excellent team and Rome also did with a victory against Berlin. 

Offense

It’s a good week to play Rome considering Marlon Humphrey will not play. We felt comfortable going after his matchup but without him on the field, the offense feels like there are areas we can find success across the board. If Rome decides to play a base defense with their meat wall lineup Watson should have time in the pocket to connect with Julio frequently. Every team has their own utilization of two DBs covering Julio and we’ll move him to the slot to create isolation opportunities for DJ Chark and Justin Jefferson. Jamel Dean has been targeted more by teams recently and we want to follow this idea. Julio’s target share will be based on more vertical routes in this game, and the back shoulder fades are also a staple to go after isolation opportunities. We are excited to use Jefferson and Chark more frequently and make them part of our intermediate targets to get yards. Both players have big play ability we want to take advantage of but will make them more prominent options with Rome having to put more responsibility on their #1 CB than usual.

We envision this game being high scoring and there may be a time when we have to control the ball. Thankfully, Dalvin Cook has been electric lately and he will be the person who finishes with the most touches. Our utilization will feature counters and inside zones behind the right side of our offensive line. DeCastro and Becton should help create allies for Dalvin Cook and as he has shown it does not take much to spring him open. We also want to make him a weapon on some screen passes, particularly on 3rd down to counter act Rome’s  NASCAR looks and make them pay if they decide to focus solely on rushing upfield to get Watson. 

Defense

It is a great thing any time you don’t have to play Drew Brees. Nonetheless, Herbert has proven to be more than capable and a dual threat that makes it unwise to strictly focus on one area for stopping this team. The weapons feature Amari Cooper and a plethora of quality contributors ranging from three viable RBs to an explosive deep threat in Will Fuller. There is no one specific areas we are aiming to takeaway but the main focus is stopping the team in crucial situations. Herbert has shown he can carve up defenses and has some elusive speed so our best coverage schemes are going to be creative coverages on 3rd downs. We are going to rotate a handful of our versatile options as Nickel and dime CBs to let them blitz the passer. We are going to play a basic zone defense with occasional switches from cover 3 and cover one with the safety coming down to box focused on the run and Herbert more than any assignment.

Rome does feature a strong offensive line but we hold up strong in the trenches. We have a good rotation of 7 guys that can handle playing against an uptempo scheme. The versatility helps on these situations account for moving guys across the board based on the situations. If there is one area we are excited to test it is putting Armstead against Onwenu and letting Cam Jordan play next to Jerry Hughes on passing downs to exploit possible pressures we can generate on Herbert.

The coverage matchups are relatively simple in zone but for man coverage responsibility Kenny Moore will be on Amari Cooper so Janoris Jenkins can account for Will Fuller. This responsibility switches occasionally as Moore is also one of the best blitz options on our defense. Jenkins would then go for Cooper and the safety playing deep has the help for Will Fuller with Isaiah Oliver playing Fuller underneath. Eric Rowe is the man responsible for help against the run on early downs. He will play deep when Mathieu moves to the slot and if Oliver gets excessively targeted will become our nickel CB to cover JuJu Smith-Schuster. Mathieu will be the deep man for the most part. The few times we use his versatility will be to blitz and account for Herbert’s versatility. Ultimately, we think this is a hard offense to account for and expect to give up some plays. However, we think the creativity and wrinkles to get stops on 3rd downs can aleo translate into our redzone defense which can translate into a late stop if necessary. The name of today’s game is getting enough stops to give our offense the ball. 

[MD4L]

11 minutes ago, rackcs said:

Anzalone draws the difficult task of Dalvin Cook

That one probably won’t work.

[MD4L]

16 minutes ago, rackcs said:

Noah I is a physical freak and has inside leverage with Boston helping over the top every single play.  One man generally can’t stop Julio, but two should do the trick.

Probably won’t work either.

EDIT: 30 snaps played in the past 3 weeks for Noah Igbinoghene.

Edited November 9, 2020 by MD4L

[bcb1213]

14 minutes ago, MD4L said:

Probably won’t work either.

EDIT: 30 snaps played in the past 3 weeks for Noah Igbinoghene.

Yes I'm shocked he's not seeing more snaps than Byron Jones and xavien Howard really.... 

[MD4L]

Just now, bcb1213 said:

Yes I'm shocked he's not seeing more snaps than Byron Jones and xavien Howard really.... 

So he’s not good enough to get snaps as the nickel CB (traditional base in modern football) but is good enough to erase Julio Jones?

[bcb1213]

18 minutes ago, MD4L said:

That one probably won’t work.

Well good thing your use of him in the pass game is screen pass and screen pass then 

[bcb1213]

Just now, MD4L said:

So he’s not good enough to get snaps as the nickel CB (traditional base in modern football) but is good enough to erase Julio Jones?

Two dudes are on Julio. This is not a difficult concept   one plays inside, one plays over the top outside.  I'm not asking him to do this by himself lol 

[MD4L]

1 minute ago, bcb1213 said:

Well good thing your use of him in the pass game is screen pass and screen pass then 

Yeah he should do his damage as a runner. We like his chances behind DeCastro and Becton. Our offensive line is not far from your team.

[MD4L]

Just now, bcb1213 said:

Two dudes are on Julio. This is not a difficult concept   one plays inside, one plays over the top outside.  I'm not asking him to do this by himself lol 

That bracket coverage probably still won’t work is my point.

[bcb1213]

1 minute ago, MD4L said:

That bracket coverage probably still won’t work is my point.

Shrug. If you say so.  Pretty much what the Broncos did to him today and shut him down with what do u know, mostly fill in guys for injured starters 

[MD4L]

Just now, bcb1213 said:

Shrug. If you say so.  Pretty much what the Broncos did to him today and shut him down with what do u know, mostly fill in guys for injured starters 

Matt Ryan finished the game with a healthy 8.1 YPA and 3 TDs. Julio finished with 5/54/1 in a 31 point performance. It sounds like the Broncos game plan did not work.

[bcb1213]

7 minutes ago, MD4L said:

Yeah he should do his damage as a runner. We like his chances behind DeCastro and Becton. Our offensive line is not far from your team.

Yes I would imagine my defensive line would line up close to your offensive line cause this is football? 

[MD4L]

And I like Cook to spring one when he gets beyond the LOS. Becton and DeCastro lead the way.