Wednesday Film Review: Key Plays

Time to take a look at the coaches film to see where the game was won by the Jets.

🗽 Good morning Jets fans. I hope you’re still enjoying the holiday before getting back to the grind in January, hopefully you’re still enjoying that winning feeling from Sunday as well. I dived back into the game last night to pick out a few key plays, using the wider angle of coaches film to better understand what was happening. Let’s get into it.

🏈 An early goal line stand for the Jets sets the tempo for the game. There were a lot of players who did a fine job in this series, but none more so than Jason Pinnock.

Everyone dives down on the running back here, the offensive line do a good job in selling it with their slide right blocking and Trevor Lawrence makes the right decision to keep it. Issue for Lawrence and the Jaguars is that Pinnock didn’t dive inside, he held his containment, maintained his assignment and made the open field tackle. His acceleration to get up field allowed him the space to bring down a big QB without the ball breaking the plain.

Earlier this season Jeff Ulbrich spoke about missed assignments and players just not executing, this is the perfect play to highlight that. A great play from Pinnock who’s looking more comfortable at safety than he did at corner, although it’s still obviously early days.

🏈 This may not seem like a very exciting play, a run up the middle for a 6-7 yard gain. But I just really liked the blocking on this one.

You have combi blocks with Fant/Feeney and McGovern and GVR and it's that one that opens up the space for Carter. Look at the ease with which both George Fant and Connor McGovern move to their second level blocks. The yets combi blocked a lot against Jacksonville, more than I can remember them doing this year and it worked to perfection.

I know a lot of people (myself included) were critical of Connor McGovern earlier this season, but he has been excellent for a good 10-11 weeks now. With him missing the final 2 games through injury, it’s going to be interesting to see how the line performs.

🏈 Here is the Zach Wilson touchdown run and it's a thing of beauty. A couple of analysts suggested that Wilson could and should have hit the underneath crossing route to Berrios, but Moses is beaten so cleanly if he unloads that ball to Berrios the more likely scenario is a strip sack, there are three key points on this play worth highlighting:

1. The job that Dan Feeney does picking up and slowing down two rushers. That’s good awareness to pick up the 2nd rusher.

2. The job that GVR does to not only pick up the stunt, but the fact he maintains his block and gives Zach that opportunity to escape.

3. The pure athleticism that Zach Shows to escape the pocket, the intelligence and awareness to stay in bounds, and then the desire to get that ball into the end-zone. It's a great play from Zach.

🏈 Here’s another example of Zach showing off his athleticism. It’s a really good run by the QB but I wanted to show this angle to demonstrate why he ran. I don’t think this is by design but the nature of the bootleg is to have it as a possibility. This is a quick and easy read for Zach, the underneath crossing route isn't there because the defender undercuts it and nobody else is open so you turn on the gas and pick up the first down. Simple but good, like a well made pizza 🍕.

🏈 When I first looked at this play I really didn’t like the design. You have two receivers within two yards of each other which brings 3 defenders into the area, that’s not a clean or easy read for the QB. Is that by design or did someone run the wrong route?

But, look at the bottom of the screen and you see Keelan Cole (I think) run a go post route and he’s completely open. The two receivers underneath have dragged the safety over and Cole is free to make a house call.

Now this is not an easy throw, Zach is moving to his right and Cole is already 20+ yards down field. But we’ve seen Zach make this throw and these are the kind of off platform throws that excited so many viewers during his pro day. Earlier in the season he let’s this go, i’ve recently said he’s over corrected a little bit and this is what I mean. You don’t want to turn Zach into a game manager.

🏈 I have to show the big man TD. This angle indicates what a good job Zach did. He has nobody open when he hits the top of his drop, so he moves around until McDermott becomes available. Two things I like from Zach here, the movement in the pocket to keep this thing alive, and keeping his eyes down field to find the target. It’s a good play by the rookie and look at the big man go up and get it.

🏈 The role of the deep safety is to protect against these long completions, and Pinnock does that to perfection here. The receiver gets a step on Bryce Hall and Pinnock arrives just in time to knock the ball loose. This is a big play in the moment, Pinnock wasn’t perfect but he made 4-5 big plays that impacted the result of the game and this was one of them. It’s a great play.

🏈 I love this play from George Fant from start to finish. Not only does he absolutely smash the defensive lineman but he keeps his head in the play until the final moment, putting a hit on the Linebacker to ensure he can't complete the INT. It’s an outstanding play from a guy who's had an outstanding year.

🏈 I couldn't not touch on this play. It’s a play from Lawrence that I absolutely hated. Remember the game situation here, the Jaguars down by a score with the clock running down and the Jets have lost containment on a mobile QB.

Lawrence does everything right until he gets to the 5. Remember that Lawrence is a 6'5 and 220lb QB, he’s a big dude. Brandin Echols is a 5’10 and 180lbs…so he’s giving up 40lbs and Lawrence elects to take the ball out of bounds instead of lowering the shoulder to try and score.

Some will say you don't take that chance as a QB but I think that’s BS, the game is on the line, your team needs their big players to make a play, you lower that shoulder and try and score. I hate that decision in the circumstance.