NFL Open Thread: 13 seconds edition

This is a really good post about what went wrong for Buffalo during the endgame of last weekend’s classic. First, it appears that the call was to force Kansas City to return the kickoff or sacrifice field position, and either Bass didn’t execute the kick or there was a communication breakdown:

When kicker Tyler Bass booted the ball, the right side of the Bills’ kickoff coverage unit immediately began sprinting to their left. Given those first steps, it was clear the call was to direct the ball to the left side. From there, after the coverage unit realized the ball had traveled through the end zone, there were a couple of unusual reactions from core special teams players.

Cornerback Siran Neal, who has played almost every core-four special teams snap this season, had the same reaction as Johnson only a few steps later. Neal looked like he was trying to figure out what had happened.

Then one second later, Johnson and Neal both had their arms out in confusion, with Johnson looking toward Bass and Neal looking toward the sideline. Given these reactions, this must be part of the “execution” McDermott was referring to on Tuesday.

A touchback made little sense, given the situation. They wanted to take time off the clock without Patrick Mahomes, Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce on the field. According to both Football Outsider’s DVOA metrics and Rick Gosselin’s annual special teams rankings, they also boasted the third-best kickoff coverage unit this season.

The Bills have a kicker they trust to leave the ball short in clutch situations on kickoffs and have utilized it all season. With all the visual clues of the kickoff, it all points to them calling for an angled kick that landed just shy the goal line. It either would have made the returner waste time by fielding the ball, sacrifice field position with a fair catch, or make a quick run out of bounds to accomplish both. We still don’t know if it was an operator error by Bass, or if coaches didn’t correctly communicate the call to him, but all signs point to the Bills wanting something other than a touchback.

The other major mistakes were also pointed out by Romo in real time — rushing four there makes no sense:

The two defensive plays that set up the field goal attempt were flawed given the game situation. The Bills lined up in a prevent defense on the first play with defenders in a row 15 yards off the line of scrimmage. I don’t mind the idea of a prevent on that first play in general, but the Chiefs were going to have to pass quickly if they wanted to get to a field goal situation.

The biggest flaw was in sending four pass rushers when the Bills would have had only a second or two at most to get home. The likelihood for a sack or an influenced pass was very low. If the Bills had just rushed two, given a first line of defense with those extra two defenders in the in-between to supplement the 15-yard prevent line, it would have altered how the Chiefs played the first snap. On to the second play.

Given how the Bills lined up on the second snap (image above), they looked like they were hellbent on stopping Hill at all costs and were frightened of him ending the game right then and there. The cost here was leaving Kelce wide open.

Once again, the Bills went with four pass rushers despite a likely quick throw. Defensive end Jerry Hughes actually won his rep clean against right tackle Andrew Wylie and was one step from sacking Mahomes on the play. However, the Bills could have subbed in A.J. Klein and Siran Neal for two pass rushers and had two players who can play in space and tackle well and thus fill the open field they left for Kelce. Heck, even if they rushed three and put Neal one-on-one with Kelce, which they did on two different defensive snaps during the game, it would have made the Chiefs’ lives way more difficult. Everything that could have gone wrong in that three-play sequence did, and it’s the reason why the Bills aren’t playing anymore.

When there’s closer to a minute left, a pure prevent defense may not be optimal because it can give the QB time to wait for long routes to play out if there’s only a 2-or-3-man rush. But with 13 seconds left, the clock is your pass rush — Mahomes is going to be getting rid of the ball quickly no matter what, and the defensive focus has to be on limiting YAC. And certainly their second-best receiving target can’t be left wide open.

The Chiefs still had to make two great throws and these are marginal mistakes. But against great teams margins are everything.

For today’s games, this piece by Ben Solak about the entwined evolutions of Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay is really fascinating. After watching Jimmy Garoppolo last weekend my guess is that today is when the student finally beats the teacher, but it should be fun.