Cosell was concerned about how we'd handle the bunch formation.
Here's what he said:
COSELL: That’s really what I want to talk about. I heard a lot of people saying, “That won’t happen against Seattle because Richard Sherman will play press-man.” Really? They’re not going to let him do that.
When I watched Carolina against Seattle, on five plays on their first series they lined up in bunch. Richard Sherman was 12 yards off the ball on every play because you can’t play press-man to bunch unless you’re the point man and he’s not going to play the point man.
The Niners did an unbelievably great job with bunch because they know what Boldin is.
Boldin was shut down that game.
However, then we played Houston. Only one team passed for more yards against us than they averaged the rest of the season and that was Houston. This is what a Houston analyst
had to say BEFORE that game:
What do Jerry Rice, Rod Smith, and Andre Johnson all have in common? If your answer is "Everyone knew they were getting the ball, but they still couldn’t stop it," you would be correct. Gary Kubiak has worked with all three of these receivers from the early 1990s up until the present day, and every single one of them has accumulated countless yards from one concept – the pick play. The pick play, to put it as simply as possible, is using one receiver’s route to "accidentally" run into a defender that is trying to guard a second receiver in man coverage to delay them just long enough to give that second receiver some space to catch the ball. Houston in particular loves running pick plays out of stacks and bunch sets that pack as many bodies into as small an area as possible in order to create chaos within coverage schemes.
That does not bode well.
He then goes on to dissect why SF failed in their bunch formations. Mainly because of the pass rush. It will be difficult to get a pass rush against Peyton.
This articletakes a long look at how to beat Seattle's secondary. It focuses on the Indy game.
The Colts run the three level concept out of a condensed bunch formation. With free safety Earl Thomas in the middle of the field, the Colts now have their 3 on 2 advantage with a vertical, corner & flat route versus the corner and flat defender. The cornerback (Richard Sherman) gets caught too shallow trying to take away the corner route and passes off T.Y. Hilton’s vertical route. Thomas can’t make the play from the middle of the field and Sherman does not have the proper depth playing a deep 1/3. The result is Hilton taking the top off the #1 pass defense in the league for a 73 yard touchdown with the three level concept.
That isn't to say we're doomed. Our team knows full well what they're up against and they're smart, footballs savvy players.
Here's a look into what our guys have to say about it:
Denver utilizes a bunch formation -- two receivers at the line of scrimmage and one at least one yard behind. The tactic can be effective in getting receivers into their routes without being jammed at the line of scrimmage by hyper-aggressive coverage defenders. That accurately describes the entire crew in the Seahawks secondary.
"Well, there are different ways that you can counter it," Sherman said. "A lot of the times the middle linebacker will go bone speed is what they call it, which is pretty much he'll look up the Wes Welkers of the world or Demaryius Thomases just to combat that if we're running man coverage. That's what the Patriots did from time to time, that's one of the ways you could do it or sometimes you just have to slip screen and fight.
This website focuses on the Bunch formation and does a great job of explaining how and why it works. Interestingly, they show the Seahawks using the bunch formation to get Tate open for a 43 yard gain, so it's not like the Hawks defense doesn't practice against it. Here's what that article had to say about stopping the bunch:
As I illustrated, it's not easy. That said, with excellent, physical corners, safeties, nickelbacks, and linebackers, all sound tacklers, a defense can successfully stymie bunch concepts. It's about understanding of route concepts, discipline in your zone, good communication, changing coverages on the fly, and the basic tenets of the bunch can be stifiled.
Sounds like the Legion of Boom doesn't it?
