Inside the Jets vs. Chargers Film Room: Offense

Dec. 23, 2012; East Rutherford, NJ, USA; San Diego Chargers defensive end Damik Scafe celebrates after New York Jets quarterback Greg McElroy (14) is sacked during the second half at MetLife Stadium. Chargers won 27-17. Mandatory Credit: Debby Wong-USA TODAY Sports

Even though it doesn’t matter in the standings anymore, we still are going to break down the film here at the Jet Press. As usual, the defense will be here in the afternoon, but we start the day with the offense. We had a new quarterback making his first NFL start in Greg McElroy on Sunday, so I wanted to take a look at his performance.

The trouble was, it was difficult to evaluate. The reason for that is that Greg spent more time on his back than he did standing up. He was sacked 11 times, and hit and hurried more than that. So instead of looking at his play, were are going to look at how the offensive line was abused. Specifically, we are going to take a look at two examples, the first from the opening drive. Scroll down for the opening shot:

McElroy is lined up in the shotgun. Watch the matchup circled in green, D’Brickashaw Ferguson against the pass rusher. He is going to get his hand up in Brick’s face, and work to his outside shoulder.

See how the rusher has his hand up on on Ferguson? He has the leverage on him, and already has a step on him to his outside shoulder. Once the rusher has leverage, the offensive lineman has no chance, as you will see as we go forward.

Brick is beaten badly and Greg has no chance.

Down he goes. It’s hard to give a fair shake when looking at a QB’s performance when even the Pro Bowl left tackle is getting beaten badly. Turn the page and we will take a look at one more.

This next one if from around 4 minutes remaining in the third quarter.

Again, McElroy is lined up in the shotgun. The gun should give the quarterback a bit more time, since he is obviously farther away from the line of scrimmage, but this is not the case. Take a look again at Ferguson’s matchup, this time at the right side of the screen. The rusher is going to make a beautiful spin move, causing the line to collapse on him. Watch.

See the spin move? The rusher totally takes Ferguson out of the play by the move, forcing the Jets two interior linemen to come over and help block down on him, indicated by the green line. What happens from there is the rusher circled in blue. He runs a stunt, coming around those two blockers, and meeting Greg McElroy in the backfield. Take a look.

This is right as the stunt begins. The blockers have come over to help Ferguson, freeing #94 to make his move, circled in blue, to the quarterback.

Down he goes again.

The bottom line is this, it’s hard to give McElroy a really good evaluation when he is on his back. Hopefully we can see him more upright this week.