BDL 2023 Week 1 - Cancun Kaiju @ Raleigh Firebirds

[SirA1]

BDL 2023 Week 1

Match:  Cancun Kaiju @ Raleigh Firebirds

 Away Owner:  @Blue 

Home Owner:  @EaglesPeteC

 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

[SirA1]

Cancun Kaiju

QB Patrick Mahomes
RB Rhamondre Stevenson
X WR Mike Williams
Z WR Chris Olave
Y WR/TE Mike Gesicki
TE Foster Moreau
LT Laremy Tunsil
LG Cordell Volson
C Ryan Kelly
RG Zion Johnson
RT David Bakhtiari

RB Aaron Jones
RB Devin Singletary
H-Back Kyle Jusczyzk
WR Elijah Moore
TE3 Michael Mayer
OT Yosh Nijman
OT Calvin Anderson
IOL Nick Gates

 

DE Greg Rousseau
DT Jonathan Allen
DT Travis Jones
DE Cameron Jordan
LB Pete Werner
LB Ernest Jones
CB Tre’davious White
CB Cam Sutton
Apex Jalen Pitre
FS Marcus Williams
SS Kevin Byard

Edge/LB Kayvon Thibodeaux
Edge Dorance Armstrong
DT Justin Jones
DT Shy Tuttle
LB Zaire Franklin
CB Steven Nelson
CB Carrington Valentine
S Darnell Savage

 

Raleigh Firebirds

Offense

QB- Daniel Jones

RB- Christian McCaffrey 

XWR- Courtland Sutton

ZWR- Michael Thomas

SWR- Dionte Johnson

TE- Noah Fant

LT- Jordan Mailata

LG- Landon Dickerson

C- Connor Williams

RG- Issac Seumalo 

RT- Jack Conklin

RB- Ty Chandler

RB- Chuba Hubbard

WR- Hunter Renfrow

WR- Quinten Johnston

WR- Darius Slayton

TE- Robert Tonyan

Swing T- Andre Dillard

Swing Interior OL- Patrick Mekari

 

Defense

EDGE/Rush LB- Danielle Hunter

DT- Jalen Carter

DT- BJ Hill

EDGE- Josh Sweat

LB- Jerome Baker

LB- Shaq Leonard

CB- Darius Slay

CB- Kristian Fulton

SCB- Avonte Maddox

FS- Justin Reid

SS- Budda Baker

 

EDGE/Rush DT-Brandon Graham

EDGE- Jermaine Johnson

NT- Alim McNeill 

LB- Quincy Williams

CB- Sean Murphy Bunting

CB- Marcus Jones

S- Jayron Kearse

S- Reed Blankenship 

 

 

[SirA1]

Cancun Kaiju

Offense:

12 personnel is going to be our primary formation in this game, with a bit of 3 WR and occasional 21 personnel. While Stevenson draws our start, we want to get him and Aaron Jones roughly equal touches in the run game, about 10-12 carries each. We want to run a bit more power with Stevenson and a bit more off-tackle with Jones, but there won’t be a big difference in play-calling with either in the game.

Where we intend to win this game is in the trenches. We have two of the top 3-4 pass blocking tackles in the NFL, and we feel very comfortable leaving both of them on islands against the Raleigh pass rush. On the interior, the center’s job is to help out whichever of our guards is lined up on Jalen Carter, double-teaming Carter on every play he’s in for. We’ve brought in special advisor Michael Vick this week to coach up the offensive line; we know Carter has that dawg in him, and if anybody knows something about how to put a dog in its place, it’s Mike Vick. We will make sure the weak interior rush of Raleigh never gets going and force them to start rotating guys in early.

Our passing game will open with a heavy dose of slants and curls. We won’t be using much play action early, as our goal is to keep Mahomes under center with traditional 3-5 step dropbacks and his eyes on the defense to get the ball out quickly to counter early pressure/blitzing. Mike Williams is at the X spot, using his size and strength advantage to work over whatever CB Raleigh chooses to play on him. Olave will be off the line at Z and routinely go in motion to both keep the defender from pressing him and to help Mahomes identify zone vs. man. Elijah Moore will get a few snaps as well, replacing Mike Gesicki as the primary slot option or Olave at Z. Once we have an idea of how Raleigh is utilizing their safeties, we want to get more aggressive with more play-action, go with deeper 10-15 yard outs on the sidelines to Williams, and send the move TE/slot down the seam if we’re getting Cover-1 with the deep safety shading to one side of the field.

While we have two tight ends listed in the starting lineup, we’ll be playing four different players at that position throughout the game with different usages. Gesicki will operate almost exclusively as a receiver, as we don’t believe Raleigh has a linebacker that is strong enough in coverage to match up with him or a corner that can handle his size. Moreau and Mayer will alternate as in-line TEs that provide chip blocks before going out on routes or audible in to block if Mahomes sees a blitz. Lastly, Kyle Juszczyk will be our H-back playing both in-line and in the backfield as an extra blocker. Each of these TEs will get 10-15 plays throughout the game to keep the defense constantly adjusting to our personnel changes instead of allowing them to be aggressive.

TL;DR Rotate our backs to keep the run game fresh, get the ball out quick on safe routes early on and motion Olave to test the coverage, bully Jalen Carter, use our size at TE and X receiver to attack the secondary.

 

Week 1 we get Raleigh and their offense led by *checks notes* Daniel Jones. Despite their lack of quality quarterback play, we do want to respect CMC as a runner and out of the backfield or potentially even flexed out to the slot. We anticipate him to be a focal point of their offense along with Danny Dimes in the running game, with Jeff Wilson inactive and a washed Kareem Hunt sitting at home waiting for the phone to ring. Should Raleigh do the unthinkable and start Bryce Young, it won’t change much for us schematically.

We anticipate a heavy dose of CMC, Andrews, and personnel changes utilizing Double TE sets, as well as moving guys around, whether Andrews lines up wide or in the slot, 2 TE or 4 wide. We will only match personnel if Fant enters the game or if there is a second running back.

Defensively, our starting lineup is specifically geared towards short yardage and first and 10+ type situations. The rest of the time we'll be moving Rousseau inside to replace Jones and Thibs/Armstrong taking over at end.

We will be utilizing some blitz packages with Thibs at LB replacing Ernest Jones, so the defense doesn't know if he's blitzing, Pitre is blitzing, both are, or just a four man rush from the front.

Think of it as still having the 4-2-5 look but with of a 5-1 overload look or even a 6-1 overload with Pitre walking up on occasion.

May I introduce you all to the pressure box:

We are going to make a cat and mouse game of bluffing and sending pressure with varied man and zone looks.

We are also installing a read blitz/drop look in third and fourth downs to confuse the OL and QB.

 

As you can see in the below graphic, it forces the quarterback to get the ball out quickly while taking away the middle of the field, which is exactly where we plan on denying throws all game. Frankly we don’t think Danny can beat us outside of the numbers at all.

Below is a picture of an overload look with the left side bailing and the last guy on the line reading the RB in pass protection vs receiving. That guy will be Pitre.

Should Raleigh try to go more jumbo look with multiple TE, we will go with a 50 Bear front and put Thibs on, slide Jordan inside, and take Pitre off (unless they go single WR, then Sutton is off).

 

Raleigh Firebirds

OFFENSIVE GAME PLAN

Daniel Jones is the first man up at QB for the Firebirds. I think he’s dual threat ability will maximize my offense this week against Cancun.

Our goal will be to spread Cancun out, make them go deeper into their CB depth chart and put LB’s in conflict in both the run and pass game.

Our main offensive package will be 13 personnel and we want to use a lot of RPO and read option looks and concepts. We will force Cancun’s LB’s to have to read before they react or attempt to come downhill in the run game. 

In the run game, we plan to use McCaffrey a lot on counters, and traps and get him off tackle to force the defense to run sideline to sideline and flow to try and keep him contained. We especially plan to do this as much as possible to the left side behind Jordan Mailata and Landon Dickerson. Built into these run looks will give the option for Daniel Jones to pull the ball and take off if Cancun does not factor him into the running game. We want to run a decent amount early and force Cancun to be worried about McCaffrey and put the extra resources to stop him, to then open up the pass game.

In the pass game our goal will be to use a lot of bunch formation to the right with Fant and Diontae Johnson stacked in the slot and Courtland Sutton in the outside with Michael Thomas as the lone WR on the left. Variations of this will include 4 WR’s with Michael Thomas joining Johnson on the inside and Slayton or Johnston on the outside or bringing on Hunter Renfrow to join Johnson on the inside and keeping Thomas outside.

With the run game and McCaffrey pulling focus to the left side, having extra receiving options stacked to the right will put stress in the middle of Cancun’s defense. We then want to play a few route combinations to open up Andrews and Johnson like leveled inside In routes to get Johnson/Thomas between the LB’s and the safeties or drag/corner combinations to get Johnson deep or Fant/Renfrow on short crossers in open space to run after the catch. Throw in an out route by McCaffrey going from left to right and that will really pull Cancun’s defense in all directions. We plan to use Sutton to pull the defense deep with 9 routes and posts and then occasionally countering with slants and curls to hit him underneath. His main role will be to clear defenders to give space for all my underneath options in the pass game. We think Sutton will draw Tre White and that strategy will take him out of the game a bit, if not we like Sutton’s size advantage over Cancun’s other options at outside CB and we think he can make some plays against them.  Off of the run game and the bunching on the right side, putting Michael Thomas on the other side alone will allow him the space to do what he does best, run routes, get open and keep the chains moving. Slant boy is back and he should be the steading force especially in the RPO’s. Thomas and Johnson also can be very interchangeable in their roles and we can move them both around. Another wrinkle can be putting both Thomas and Johnson in the slot and then adding Slayton on Johnston on the outside

If Cancun decides to go heavy blitz, draw plays to McCaffrey, bubble screens to Johnson and Andrews from the slot, McCaffrey RB screens as well as quick slants to Michael Thomas on the outside, should allow us to counter with some strong blitz beaters.

 

DEFENSIVE GAME PLAN

Attacking 4-3/Cover 4 press bail. Looking at the Cancun offense my plan is clear. Attack the interior of the offensive line. I want to consistently make Mahomes uncomfortable and push the running game to the outside where Shaq Leonard, Jerome Baker and Budda Baker can run and chase and hold gains to a minimum.

 

In coverage, Darius Slay will cover Mike Williams for the most part, Kristian Fulton will take Olave with some help over the top with the safety. Avonte Maddox takes Moore in the slot. Whatever mid TE then want to try and roll out there should be easily take care of by a combo of Budda Baker and my LB’s. We want to play a lot of press bail technique with the idea to pressure up the middle and bring an extra rusher getting into the receivers early and disrupting them early in the route is key and then bailing back into cover 4 to try and prevent big plays if Mahomes is able to escape the initial rush.

 

Front formations and rush plans:

4 man front 5 DB’s

Hunter-Carter-Hill-Sweat. Hill and Carter pushing up front with some loops and twists pushing Hunter and Sweat into the guards will be the major plan and then blitzing Baker or Leonard from the inside or bailing Maddox back to safety and make Budda Baker as the rush LB with then Leonard and Baker picking up the shallow coverage on those mid-*** TE’s.

 

5 Man front

Early down or short yardage. Either Maddox or an LB comes off and Alim McNeil comes on to play nose while keeping Hill and Carter on the field. Hunter becomes more of an off ball rush LB.This can free him up to rush at times up the middle behind the 3 DT’s. A more pass rushing wrinkle could be swapping Hill with Brandon Graham as well to all Graham to rush over a guard.

Nascar Package

On obvious pass downs, subbing out Hill with Brandon Graham and rushing one of Graham or occasionally Sweat from the inside against the guards.

3 Safety 

Subbing out either Maddox or Jerome Baker with Jayron Kearse and bring down Budda Baker as either the 2nd or 3rd LB. This could open up coverage and blitz flexibility with Budda.

3 DE Package

In high leverage rush situations and maybe some early down situations, Jermaine Johnson comes on the field with either Maddox or Jerome Baker coming off. Johnson takes over as the DE across from Sweat, freeing up Danielle Hunter, my best Edge rusher to hover and play LB and blitz from the interior behind Carter and Hill. 

[Scoundrel]

I liked a lot of the scheme choices from Raleigh in this game. I think losing Andrews really alters their offense we though. Mahomes out duals Daniel Jones and I like the pressure box concept by Mwil and the splitting of the backs and getting Olave in motion (especially against Kristian Fulton) that Blue has implemented. Also the doubling of Carter is smart as well. I do like the Raleigh Dline a lot though as Hunter is back playing strong and BJ Hill has been an underrated player in this league. But the Cancun tackles are strong and I think they win most of their matchups and Mahomes is just a tough dude to get down regardless. Ironically this is the longest gameplan I can remember from Pete Mr complain about gameplan lengths…

[SirA1]

Godzilla beats Phoenix this week but I think will have trouble finding a passing game is Williams misses any significant time.

Cancun 24 - Raleigh 17

[TedLavie]

Cancun O vs Raleigh D

I wish Cancun put a bit more of an emphasis on the running game as I like what they can do there. I like Pete's plan to blitz up the middle, which would disrupt Blue's plan to double Carter. I think Raleigh can pressure Mahomes especially since I don't think anyone besides Olave can be relied on to get the ball out quickly. I do like what Cancun does with Olave though and I do think Mahomes will be able to escape outside on some plays and hit a couple of big plays to Williams or Olave.

Raleigh O vs Cancun D

I think Raleigh can run the ball in this one, and I generally like their offensive gameplan. I think Diontae can absolutely go off in this one. However, Cancun unbalanced defensive approach works well against the bunch formations Raleigh offer and, while I think Raleigh can hang around with CMC and Diontae, I don't think they can get their passing game outside the numbers going and that's going to limit them come crunch time. (EDIT: especially as I really like Cancun depth on the DL which will matter in the end)

 

23-13 Cancun

Edited September 12, 2023 by TedLavie

[MikeT14]

I like the Kaiju to force a late turnover to win this over Raleigh. Lower scoring matchup with Mahomes leading a GWD. 17-10.

[RedGold]

I think the Raleigh D does a decent enough job to slow down the Kaiju attack,   unfortunately..   The offense isn't able to reward the defense for their great effort. 

[Whicker]

“Our main offensive package will be 13 personnel” makes me want to throw up. I’ll read the rest later lmao 

[EaglesPeteC]

Firebirds by a million 

[EaglesPeteC]

29 minutes ago, Whicker said:

“Our main offensive package will be 13 personnel” makes me want to throw up. I’ll read the rest later lmao 

Oh whoops I meant 11 

[RuskieTitan]

Leaning towards Cancun but not sure how those receivers would work with Mahomes. Would they play more like Toney, dropping passes and converting pick sixes? That would keep Raleigh in the game. None of them play with Mahomes. May need to ponder some more.

[bcb1213]

Andrews absence and Jones play really hurts Raleigh here as I definitely like the plan they had going.  Not all of that can be placed on Jones as his offensive line irl was futile, but still.

I almost voted against Cancun based simply on the dog violence reference, poor taste but in the end, I think they can take this one over a game Raleigh squad 20-14

[Whicker]

I’m a little shocked at the total blowout here, but I agree that Cancun would be the favorite in this matchup

[EaglesPeteC]

I don’t think I win if I start led Russ but I think I get 4-6 votes