Bleeding Green Nation
A closer look at Super Bowl LIX between Philadelphia and Kansas City.
I decided whether or not to focus on a few specific areas, but it’s the Super Bowl! I spent too long watching the Chiefs’ offense, so this preview is a bit shorter than the offensive preview. But it’s still pretty long... Let’s go!
I use a bunch of stats in this one, and credit goes to Team Rankings, PFF, and Sports Info Solutions. Lastly, my podcast co-host @ShaneHaffNFL is responsible for putting some of the graphics together in this one.
This Chiefs’ defense is pretty multiple with their personnel usage. However, they are predictable in terms of their defensive structure. This is a 2-high defense that plays MOFO (no single-high safety), and that results in light boxes. The Chiefs rank 28th in stacked box usage, and it’s easy to see why. They rank 32nd in success rate when they stack the box.
If they want to stack the box against the Eagles’ offense... I say bring it on! Stacking the box doesn’t always help against explosive runs. The extra defender in the box can expose you to huge runs. The Chiefs' two starting safeties are Justin Reid and Bryan Cook, both of whom are on the slower side. I expect them to stick to a two-high structure.
Everyone knows that this Chiefs’ defense, led by Steve Spagnuolo, loves to blitz. We will get to that... but did you know they drop 8 into coverage at the 3rd highest rate too? I expect to see some drop 8 with a spy on Jalen Hurts in this game. This is something I saw vs. the Bills. Nick Bolton will often perform the role of a spy.
We will get into this more later, but this chart scares me the most. I’ll explain why later. For now, you can see that this Chiefs’ defense lives in a split-safety world (Cover 4) and doesn’t play as much single-high coverage as most teams do. The Eagles excel against single-high coverage.
Jalen Hurts vs. Split-Safety
Remember I mentioned the Chiefs’ defensive coverage chart worrying in the above section? This is why. Jalen Hurts and the Eagles’ offense are good against Cover 4 and Cover 6 (split-safety), but they rarely face it! Teams don’t play a lot of split-safety against them because of the threat of Barkley running. The numbers show that this offense is good against it, but I wish the Eagles had seen more of it prepare them for this one.
I think Hurts is a better quarterback when everything is simplified. Without putting this too simply, I think it’s easier to throw against single-high because you know you have one-on-one coverage on the outside a lot. This helps Hurts to excel against this coverage. Throwing against split-safety often requires more processing and this can sometimes cause Hurts issues.
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When I watched the Chiefs vs. Bills, I was a little surprised to see how the...
