Super Bowl 57 is proving to be one of the more interesting matchups we’ve seen from a film study standpoint in quite some time. The two teams have commonalities, but neither has played an opponent like the one they’ll face on Sunday evening in Glendale. What assumptions can we make from what we’ve seen throughout the season from these two teams?
The Philadelphia Eagles haven’t faced anyone close to the level of Patrick Mahomes. In two games against Aaron Rodgers and Dak Prescott, the Eagles allowed 73 points. The Kansas City Chiefs‘ only real introduction to a mobile quarterback in 2022 was against the Houston Texans when Jeff Driskel played some snaps.
Super Bowl 57 Film Review
When the two best teams in the league face off in the title game, every single advantage matters. Each team’s strong points have been narratively beaten to death for two weeks now. But the question remains, “how do these teams mitigate their opponent’s advantages?
That’s what we’ll aim to address here.
Steve Spagnuolo Is the Chiefs’ Key
Unless you’ve been rooming with Patrick Star for the past six months, you know that the Eagles can run the football. In fact, Philadelphia has one of the better rushing attacks that we’ve seen since the turn of the century.
In two playoff games, the Eagles have run the ball 88 times for 416 yards, and their offensive line is looking more dominant than ever before.
Stopping the Eagles’ run game is no easy task for any team. It’s an especially tall task for the Chiefs, who don’t possess the edge or linebacker play of the San Francisco 49ers, particularly because they’ll absolutely need Chris Jones on the interior.
However, Steve Spagnuolo is an incredible single-game planner, and there is no doubt he’s come up with a few different ideas about minimizing the Eagles’ rushing efficiency.
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The difficult part about defending the option against Philadelphia is that they don’t allow for a cut-and-dry read structure. In the NFL, we’re used to seeing quarterbacks almost exclusively reading the end man on the line (EMOL) for their decision to give or keep the ball. But especially against San Francisco and at other times during the season, Philadelphia chose to block at the first level and let Jalen Hurts read the second-level defender.
Defending the option isn’t easy for those who major in defending it at the high school and college levels. NFL teams, in general, are terrible at it. Because of NFL quarterbacks’ ability to throw the ball at the highest level, it’s simply too difficult to consistently account for the extra gap created by the QB as a running threat.
Spagnuolo and the Chiefs lived in two-high pre-snap in 2022. That will not be an option against Philadelphia. His blitz rate also dropped close to 10% in 2022 to just 24.2%. That will also not be an option against Hurts and the Eagles.
That will mean 1-on-1 opportunities on the outside against DeVonta Smith and A.J. Brown against rookie cornerbacks. But that is a necessary evil this week.
Spagnuolo’s instructions to the Chiefs’ EDGEs and linebackers must be crystal clear. Plating the option to force a keep for Hurts is a bad idea because Lane Johnson and Jordan Mailata are going to seal your scraping linebacker outside, just as Johnson does in the above video.
Jack Sanborn makes a very nice play later in the game, seeing the keep and diving into the opposite B-gap to tackle Hurts for minimal gain. But that’s a lot to ask of any linebacker to do with any sort of consistency.
Spagnuolo’s best course of action is to “play it safe” and have his EDGEs force a give when left unblocked. There are examples of Frank Clark and Carlos Dunlap doing exactly that on tape. They “squat” to have Hurts give the ball, then squeeze down to take away the cutback lane.
But forcing a give isn’t enough on its own. The Eagles’ offensive line majors in double-teaming first-level defenders and climbing to the second level. Their dominance at the point of attack creates positive yardage consistently. All Philadelphia needs is to get to 4th-and-short, and they’ll almost surely move the sticks.
Kansas City needs to get stops at the line. And to do that, they need to be aggressive.
The crudely-drawn photo above is an example of how Spagnuolo could attack the Eagles’ run game after the snap. Philadelphia wants to secure double-teams at the first level, so having the linebacker slice into the A-gap opposite of the 1-technique could force a negative play or two before Philadelphia adjusts to the run blitz.
The Chiefs are no stranger to playing Cover 1. According to Sports Info Solutions, of their 498 coverage snaps in Cover 0-6, Kansas City ran Cover 1 second most of any coverage (113). They’ll need to play man in those instances so as not to be absolutely estimated by quick slants on RPOs.
The other option Kansas City has is creeping their linebackers to or close to the line of scrimmage before dropping them back at or slightly before the snap. If anything, pre-snap movement from the front seven will at least make the Eagles’ offensive line think a bit more. Staying static pre-snap will get the defense burnt.
Few are better at cultivating a one-game plan than Spags. He spoiled the Patriots’ perfect season, and his defense was the reason Kansas City won Super Bowl 54.
The Eagles’ physical dominance and Shane Steichen’s impressive week-to-week play-calling adjustments will be hard to handle. Philadelphia’s offense is as infallible as they come. But if anyone can spoil their party, that person is Steve Spagnuolo.
Defending Travis Kelce
It doesn’t matter if Travis Kelce is playing against man or zone coverage. He ranks inside the top 10 in just about every receiving metric against both types of coverage.
Philadelphia’s defense was first in dropback EPA and fifth in dropback success rate. They have two outstanding cornerbacks on the outside, strong safety play, and the most dangerous defensive front since 1989.
The Eagles may be uniquely qualified to defend Kelce because of everything aforementioned. The Chiefs will field JuJu Smith-Schuster and Marquez Valdes-Scantling on the outside, with a little bit of Kadarius Toney sprinkled in. That’s not enough to scare Darius Slay and James Bradberry.
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And because Kelce is so incredibly good against zone coverages in particular, we’ll likely see the Eagles run a lot of man coverage with extra help Kelce’s way. Even when Philadelphia does decide they want to play Quarters, expect extra attention to be paid to Kelce, who might be the best in the league at finding space in the zone. Matched with Mahomes, it’s a deadly combination.
This will put a lot of pressure on Bradberry and Slay, but Gannon will probably take his chances against Smith-Schuster and MVS.
Rushing Patrick Mahomes
Because of the last bullet point, the Eagles’ pass rushers are under more pressure than they’d normally be. Even on an ankle that’s less than 100%, Mahomes is one of the most mobile passers in the NFL.
Philadelphia didn’t struggle in many areas offensively or defensively in 2022, but they were bad against QB runs. Whether by design or by scramble, the Eagles’ defense struggled to bottle up opposing QBs.
This a two-edged sword for Philadelphia. They need to pin their ears back and do everything in their power to get Mahomes out of rhythm in the pocket. If he’s consistently given three seconds to operate, he’d pick the ’85 Bears’ defense apart.
The Eagles faced the fifth-most quarterback runs in the league, allowing 8.3 yards per attempt on 55 attempts and a first-down rate of 47.3%, which was fifth worst in the league. They also had the third-worst EPA and positive EPA rate per attempt as well.
It’s an inevitability that Mahomes will get a few on Philadelphia’s defense. Facing Kansas City’s offense is a pick-your-poison affair. The Eagles’ defense might be able to afford a few Mahomes scrambles here and there. After all, their first priority is defending the pass.
But they need to pick and choose their spots, because if they blindly shove their way forward with the secondary’s back turned to Mahomes, even a hobbled Mahomes will do irreversible damage to the Eagles’ defense on the ground.