***SNF - Raiders / Jets [Game thread]***

[Bunyan]

Looked to me like he was trying to avoid running into Renfrow himself. Lack of trust, maybe? Either in his teammate or the design of the play. Those two have collided before.

I assume they’ve practiced this play more than once. Maybe just not a good play.

 

[Sleet]

Ted’s sharpe

 

[Welsh Raider]

These films are really interesting. I've watched the last couple of weeks where he's looked at AO'C, and one criticism both times seems to be that O'Sullivan really isn't impressed with how the plays are drawn up. It's not overt criticism, but it is a constant theme (especially when you see how he describes other teams' offences in other films). How the combination of routes the Raiders run doesn't make sense or doesn't help with the success of the play. People have pointed out one example of two rub routes on the one play to free up Adams. There's similar types of comments on lots of other plays, which points to bad play design. I'm assuming we are still using Josh McD's plays (albeit with different emphasis) so that was surprising - I thought passing combos was his thing.

As for AO'C - I think both Ted and O'Sullivan make the same points. Sometimes he's so locked on Adams that the play fails as a result. Maybe a hopeful sign - the play they both said was the best was the one where Adams wasn't the first read (Ted talks about it from about 2:50 onwards). O'Sullivan in particular makes the point that AO'C does a whole field read on that play and that there's plenty of 'starting QBs' in the League not doing that and instead AO'C does a really good job reading the defense and moving through his reads. That's promising. I think AO'C's feet under pressure are a bit of a problem too, though hopefully he can get that under control as he hets more experience.

Two other points I thought - another play they both talked about was the play at 3:15 on Ted's film. Again, a bad play inasmuch as he was locked onto Adams (and it was a play where Adams couldn't really show much of his skill-set given the route drawn up). O'Sullivan makes the point that the post was coming open deep but that AO'C's progression was looking to the short routes and then maybe deep. It put me in mind of Al Davis, talking about his philosophy developed with the Gillman offense: that the first read was always the deep option and then you work back to the shorter routes. Al would have stopped AO'C in the parking lot to talk about that play to Adams that ended in a sack while the post ran free, were he still here!

Finally - on the interception, that gave the ball up deep in the Raiders' half - the thing I noticed was Maxx Crosby. He immediately stepped forward, picked Meyers up from where he was lying having made the tackle, then tapped Adams on the helmet as they passed one another, and then bounced onto the field to go play defense. Just a brilliant leader.