Ryan outthinks Belichick

KC Joyner from ESPN NY, provided the below article, illustrating how great New York Jets head coach Rex Ryan performed last night with the Jets defense:

“The truth is, Ryan out-playcalled the NFL’s resident genius coach in many areas.

The first way he did this is by winning the personnel numbers battle. One common goal for a defensive coordinator is to confuse or convince the offense that more pass rushers are coming than the defense is actually sending.

For example, if the offense keeps six players in to block and the defense only rushes four, it means there are seven coverage players against only four receivers. When this happens, nearly every pass-catcher can be double-covered or blanketed with zones.

Ryan won this battle big-time, especially early on. The Patriots had 24 drop-backs on their first eight drives. On 18 of those plays, they kept in two more blockers than the Jets sent after the quarterback.

Now, check out the results of those plays. Tom Brady was 5-for-11 for 35 yards and one interception, and was sacked three times. That’s right — on three of the Jets’ sacks, the Pats had a two-man blocking advantage and still couldn’t keep their quarterback upright.”

In addition to Ryan, credit Drew Coleman for his coverage on Wes Welker last night as well. Assigned to cover Welker on 18 out of 24 non-zone defense pass plays, Welker caught three passes in four targets in that coverage scenario, for only 23 yards.

Of course, Darrelle Revis was Darrelle Revis. Covering Deion Branch for most of the game (33 out of the 48 pass plays), Branch was targeted only five times and caught only one pass for eight yards against Revis.