Acme Packing Company
If you look at the overall Team Stats for this game at Pro Football Reference, it tells an accurate story of this being an extremely close game. The difference? The Green Bay Packers were 3-for-3 when going for it on 4th down, while the Detroit Lions were 0-2. Today, we’re just going to take a quick look at those 3 converted 4th downs for the Packers’ offense.
After the Packers scored a field goal on the opening drive of the game, the Packers and Lions went punt-punt-punt on their next 3 drives. The Packers started their 3rd drive on their own 23-yard line and put together a 9-play drive that got down to the Lions’ 22-yard line. Now on their 10th play, the Packers – up 3-0 – decide to go for it on 4th down rather than settle for a field goal.
Like any offense looking to attack a man coverage-heavy defense, the Packers arrived at Ford Field with some Mesh calls in their arsenal. Mesh is an Air Raid concept consisting of two shallow drag routes that cross each other in the middle of the field. This is one I typically tag as Mesh Stop, with Josh Whyle [81] initially running a crossing route, then pulling up in the middle of the field on a Stop route. That allows Christian Watson [9] to pivot out of his crossing route in search of space to the right.
While Mesh is a good man-beater – and a solid call in this situation – the Lions have a Rat player in the middle of the field, smack-dab in the mesh point. In addition to that, the initial vertical push from Watson is supposed to act as a kind of a wall for Romeo Doubs [87], but the spacing is a little off, and the defender over Doubs is able to release freely under Watson.
Love could keep his eyes on the middle to hold that linebacker and wait for Doubs to pop out the other side, but the coverage is good, and that would take a bit of time. The pocket is good early, but there are some outside rushers starting to break free.
Away from the action of Mesh, Dontayvion Wicks [13] is running an isolated vertical route on the outside. He slow-plays the initial release on a stalk block (likely looking to engage if it ends up being a quick pass underneath), then releases to the outside. With the single-high safety held in the middle of the field, Love throws this ball up the sideline, over the boundary defender.
A drop in the bucket, man.
Packers lead 10-0.
The Lions had just scored a TD, their first points of the game. The Packers lead 10-7 with 7:54 remaining in the 1st half. The Packers put together an 11-play drive, getting the ball to the Lions’...
