"ONE OF A KIND" - MIKE MACDONALD REVEALED SEATTLE'S RELENTLESS DEFENSE - WK 1 FILM STUDY #seahawks

this video is going to be a film study look at three elements of the Seahawks defense from Sunday's win over the Broncos of course they held Denver in their rookie quarterback to to just 13 first downs and that included 3.3 yards per play two of those plays that the the Broncos ran that they were successful on his scrambles by Bon Knicks late in the game not that they don't count but I think I suspect that the yards per play would be even lower than 3.3 I'm going to focus on three parts to the Seahawks defense and go over I think a light amount of plays for for what I normally do in a film study I think we're talking about 12 plays a couple of them I'll show from both angles number one the pursuit and effort of the entirety of the group of guys that were on the field on defense it was borderline maniacal at times guys just flying around I'll show examples of of guys lining up on one side of the field and then and then finishing or getting involved in the tackle on the opposite side of the field additional to that a play a short yardage play where just multiple guys are attacking in waves and and there are some miss m tackles on the play which no coach wants to see no fan wants to see for that matter but there are times where it almost looks more impressive to see three four five guys at the point of attack one after the other the second part that I'd like to cover is the open field tackles whether it's Ron Jenkins whether it's Julian love whether it's Devon Witherspoon the Seahawks are blessed with guys I think who can make plays in the open field whe whether it's defending the pass or tackling I understand that that was an issue last year at least through one game against the Broncos admittedly with a rookie quarterback but certainly not a rookie quarter a rookie offensive coordinator head coach and Shawn pton they looked fantastic coming downhill moving laterally and making tackles and the third part we'll talk about some of the coverages that they played and how Mike McDonald has a lot of cards in his pocket to play in various situations I continue to call it the the Mike McDonald blender and we saw a lot of examples of it on Sunday against the Broncos so let's get right into the film let me know what you guys think of it as we move on here me trying to separate it into three parts so we're not going in a linear fashion in terms of the or progression of the game this is the element so what we're talking about here is just Pursuit that is incredible it ends up uh being an incomplete pass it's a third and two outside the pocket to the right and boy MAF is is look it's a cheat play I call it a cheat play meaning the Run back and the quarterback who's reverse pivoting are going in the same direction so you're putting a lot of conflict on this Edge Defender does it go to the quarterback some three four defenses old school 50 if you will you know don't have a rule don't let the running back cross your face so you Collision him and or run with him boy mafy doesn't do either of those he veers off to the quarterback and then when bonick kinds of starts to pull the pin on the grenade it it forces Bo Mafi to elevate but watch doson it's almost like these two were on a string here we'll rewatch it just from the beginning so we're talking about these two guys and their tandem reaction to this full flow with the running back and quarterback and then when boy MAF is in the air obviously vulnerable Bon Nick's able to escape doson is the second guy secondary contain is what I know it to be as and just guys flying around guys playing extremely fast there is a lot of Team Speed on this defense I think that's quite obvious you're not always going to be able to to stop a cheat play hence the name cheat play but I thought this was a great example to use to start off talking about you know fantastic Pursuit and effort by these guys across the board no a Bo Mafi doesn't hit the quarterback sometimes you say well man let's just go hit the quarterback let's go sack him but when he's getting ready to throw the football these guys are trained that they can't hit the quarterback unless they're within one step so there is an element to this where quarterbacks do this often Force the guy to elevate ends up being in complete pass wither spoon in coverage against Williams late excellent job if you ask me of covering up for your teammates operating on a string so now this one I actually showed in my Julian Love video from a couple of days ago love is down here to the field side you've got one tight end and one fullback and Ace formation Jamal Williams going to bounce it and you get you do have a Miss Tackle by Tariq woing up there into the boundary and no Julian love doesn't finish Jamal Williams look Williams is a beast he's always been a really difficult guy to tackle here's Julian love right here so he's away from the play and then it's going to take off horizontally you would often times see this tackle made and it's like an eight- yard gain maybe 10 this one went for three I think these guys react so fast and they're so committed to getting after the football whatever Mike McDonald and the defensive staff do um it shows up on film in terms of effort in terms of pursuit and and angles and just incredible effort really the same concept here guys this is a third possession wither spoon to the field nickel Defender to trips Bunch really and watch this reaction it's a pin pull pitch so I think I'll show you the end zone angle as well this only goes down as a four yard gain I kind of thought it should be five based on the way it's spotted but as the tight end goes in motion you're getting a pin down clock on the edge Defender and then the tackle looping around the tight end also looping around to lead block and Witherspoon all the way from the other side of the field ends up being the guy credited with the tackle multiple guys in Pursuit I love the angles here that you got from Baker and doson clearly defined angles you know not necessarily a 45 all the time but in that range of 40 to 45 yes you do have a Miss Tackle by raon Jenkins Witherspoon able to cover it up it's a second and seven Run play that into is Into The Boundary I think is designed to get close to the first down create a third and short it did not only goes for four yards Endzone same play so you can see what I'm talking about I do have some questions about what they're letting some certain offensive linemen do in terms of alignment uh versus others across the league but in any case same play pin pole pitch and Witherspoon is back here to the field side away from the play incredible effort and just refusing to to not end up near the football at the end of the play from a from a realistic perspective we used to tell our kids we want you in the in the in the camera view at the end of the play When the whistle blows you can't always do that this is the one that I'm talking about it's a short yardage situation well excuse me it's second and goal from the 13 so I shouldn't say it's short yardage the Broncos had been penalized I think they were down to like the eight or something like that so multiple guys make contact again Williams is a load you've got incredible e here by the edge Defender I think that's raan Jenkins making contact First another defensive lineman Tariq woen is actually given credit for the for the tackle along with Julian love I just know no one's a fan of Miss tackles and I'm not saying that you should be either but when there's so many guys that are getting after the football with you're you're almost sometimes turned up to like 110% and this may sound like I'm making excuses for for Miss tackles but there's times where you feel like you're turned up to 110% and you're almost beyond the governor for your car and some of you don't know what a governor is it's because I'm old I do so you're almost beyond what your car is capable of in terms of acceleration and burst and so the tackling sometimes can have reduced efficiency because you're showing so much effort Mike McDonald and the defensive staff's job is to fine-tune that and find the right balance all right tackling an open field which I thought was amazing Julian love missed one of these on who looks like an underrated receiver number 17 I think I'm pronouncing his name correctly but you've got three receivers to the side one of which is a tight end so it's a tray formation back to the side and I think Witherspoon is on a run blitz if you ask me and then in this case b knck keeps it swings it out here you got two on two to the field side it's Josh Reynolds who's a big tough receiver played for the Lions last year saw saw a lot of him playing football in 2023 because I do a lot of lions content as well um in this case Julian love downhill where his help is is all to the inside so he's going to make sure that he doesn't allow Reynolds an escape route to the outside from a simplistic standpoint you want to say miss the tackle to the inside meaning that let him let him escape to the inside if you're going to The Mist Of The Tackle you never actually let people do that it ends up working out almost like that some what here but it's to the field and Witherspoon uh widens this up because of how assertive he is with the block and he's at a look he's at a severe height strength and weight disparity or disadvantage this is Witherspoon against Josh Reynolds and it's V 177 on a little bubble screen from trips Witherspoon doesn't end up on the outside here which is what you're really taught to do such that the safety can fit on the inside but he overwhelms Josh Reynolds with effort and just tenacity he's a nasty football player I mean that in a good way that's a compliment I'm a defensive minded coach and defensive minded person in general it's just how I always connected with the game whether it was basketball or football the Witherspoon looks like the type of guy that if you have one you wish you had three because he's just every where and it doesn't look like you as an offense can just get away from him the Seahawks might be creating a whole team of those guys even though you know Witherspoon has a unique set of talent in terms of explosiveness and athleticism and obviously ball skills so I think this is quarter quarter half we'll get to the coverage stuff here now this is second possession so we're we're moving back and forth in the game again this is not a progression it's a third and nine and I call this a backwards quarter quarter half normally in quarter quarter half you'll have a flat corner to one side and a half field safety on that same side and then let's cut the field in half for a moment that's the that's the half up there and then down here you'll get a quarter responsibility for that safety and a quarter responsibility for that corner and as that occurs normally you will get a nickel Defender that pushes out into the flats well the nickel is to the field they're doing this backwards I would say with the the half to the field and the quarters to the boundary I hesitate to even call it quarters because quarters just being responsible for 1/4 of the field isn't exactly quarters coverage but I digress so the backwards nature of this to me is that you've got a corner responsible for the flats and then your nickel Defender which in this case is rayan Jenkins is on the hash which is really an inside linebacker alignment so the way that they're doing this backwards is pushing an inside linebacker into the flats to the boundary I think it's brilliant um I had not seen Mike McDonald do this a ton what I refer to as a backwards version of quarter quarter half or Madden and everybody else calls it cover six at this point but before it was called cover six it was called quarter quarter half so inside linebackers next to each other corner and nickel Defender next to each other and three deep alignment but the coverage responsibility is not not cut into thirds in any case the ball is thrown and T and Jenkins is breaking now he had missed two tackles earlier in this video I think he missed a third uh later on in the third quarter but that was a brilliant tackle on a third and nine that held the Broncos to a four-yard game got them off the field on their second possession they were a rock down here in the Red Zone near near the goal line backed up multiple guys making plays first of all I think this is Baker on a tackle against m blin it's three to the boundary for the Broncos so you've got three to the boundary the running back and what I think is two tight ends up to the top side boy MAF beats the left tackle I think he gets held after this win but I only have this angle view right now so perhaps they you know nobody else may agree with me but I think he's being held right now yes you want to keep fighting if you're the tackle but this to me is a hold when boy maf's left shoulder gets yanked back that way and his correspond or complimentary right shoulder ends up going there to me that's clear indication that he's being held from that side and that's why his body was torqued that way but back to the coverage for a moment inside linebacker to the boundary corner and then strong safety free safety whatever you want to call them to the boundary so you got three over three you can see some clear communication here telling the corner that you've got a wheel developing it could be a wheel and a sit down and basically what that does is he's passing that route off and now he's going to be responsible or dealing with the running back deal with the running back but it's a second and seven he doesn't want to press I mean he's almost got got he's almost not got enough depth as it is now the line of scrimmage was the 19 he's only got three yards depth you you'd really like to see a little bit more but it's a swing route he's trying to match the depth of the running back and and be able to close down when the ball is completed to McLaughlin it's a beautiful example another beautiful example if you ask me of a Seahawks player being able to come downhill on a short pass or a pass underneath and make a play make a tackle this is the ensuing play Third and nine after that loss of two B Nick is obviously staring down that side of the field it's a deeper out I do a pair of deeper outs excuse me I do think that Witherspoon does a nice job of carrying this they are playing some interesting stuff when he is the nickel versus other guys in terms of him carrying routes a a little bit deeper when and I and I can't quantify this in terms of the the coverage name but there are three other instances where a different player is the nickel Defender and they're not carrying similar routes in the same way so you know could an offensive coordinator say Okay Witherspoon if the nickel is possibly going to be this eventually I guess not certainly not after week one there's not enough film out there but because of his depth he's able to take over this intermediate out and then you got this fade Corner whatever you want to call it to Sutton and Julian love is all over it the ball is out should have been out way sooner than this if you're going to throw it to suon and it should have been way further towards the sideline bonick will learn from that I'm sure rookies struggle mightily obviously in their first game in the NFL I think that that was covered adium in the broadcast couple of more coverage examples this one I think is is where guys are like tied to a string very similar to the one I showed you earlier with with MAF and doson this is I think it's Hall 58 down here first of all he's a load incredibly physical and strong a couple of plays earlier I think I missed one pointing it out to you guys he brutally engages the right tackle and in this and and knocks him back in this case he's now in Bon Nick's face yes you have a route developing here that could be available to him this is typically not a route that you want to throw to all it's still all it is there for is to hold that Defender and allow the quarterback to throw it over the top here into the all onto this space here usually by the top or bottom of the number somewhere in that area the quarterback's able to get the ball out Hall is in his face they did a great job with the edge Defenders on this particular technique a play action or boot concept to them so run show or flow away and then the quarterback booting back here the edge Defender to the boot side I thought did a great job my face showed it earlier and here's Hall disengaging from the tight end being able to get to the quarterback he did get I think credit for a quarterback hit there that was a second and six important play the Broncos were looking to get the first down on that play if you ask me from the deeper over concept as it stood they didn't get a single yard and had to deal with a third and six and that's the situation where Mike McDonald is really going to be able to take over two more plays and these kind of really will focus on Tariq woen as the backside corner it would be greedy of me to do a standalone video on Tariq Wen or de Witherspoon I I don't know how often I'll be able to watch Seahawks games live in the next two weeks but certainly in week four I'll watch them play the Lions and that'll be a fun week because I'll be able to create a ton of content about both teams couple of things to notice you are getting a collision here of the running back maybe a screen check and I'm not sure where bonck is trying to go with this there's really nowhere to take this you got dual safety sitting between the hash and the top of the numbers so I'm talking about Julie love between this hash and the top of the numbers that extend there you can see his feet and then Ron Jenkins between the hash and the top of the numbers Jenkins maybe it's the angle we've got perhaps he's a little bit closer to that hash line but in any case you can't throw this ball there's nowhere to throw it you certainly can't throw it further in here to Jenkins and expect to complete it it's going to get picked off he tries to let me rephrase you can throw this I guess against certain corners but not Tariq Wen is not one of them there's a tremendous amount of range that he has has when he's connected to a receiver and I think it's quite obvious that there's times where he is allowing himself to appear to be behind a receiver such that the quarterback will throw it and he can break on it and try to get an interception I think that I think his rookie year um it's not a bad thing his rookie year trained him or showed him that he's capable of doing that at the NFL level obviously if you think my videos extend too long please let me know I a part of me wishes I could get these in in Under 12 or 15 minutes but I feel like covering the plays two or three times at least for me maybe it's my own limitations allows me to to talk about different elements of the play aspects of the play that maybe I can't cover in just one running of the play so anyway this is wen's interception and look if he doesn't intercept it it's going to be a a big hit or a pass defensed by like possibly two other guys I think doson has kind of allowed himself to drift for a moment so he's probably not going to be able to intercept this or deal with it but Julian love certainly would have been in a position to to make a big hit if they would allow it as it stands Wen undercuts it gets an interception his first of the year I am really interested in what Mike McDonald does from a coverage standpoint is he going to be more multiple or as multiple as he was last year with the Ravens in 2023 I'm not sure there may be some situations where you don't need to because you have so much talent there with Tariq woen and Devin Witherspoon I I think Trey Brown is a very underrated corner and I think he plays extreme extremely physically at times I saw him play against the Lions last year saw a pick six I think in the second quarter one thing to mention McDonald's system this is a generic observation that I feel like I can make after watching him for two years particularly in 2023 though he kind of moves guys around from a a secondary standpoint and I think it's quite intentional so I'll refer to 20123 you're a Seahawks fan if you've listened this long probably so you you may not have knowledge of this Brandon Stevens is a guy who I think played at a pro bowl SL all proo level over on the right hand side for the Ravens last year if you want to argue about which what the ceiling was or how great he played fine but he he played exceptional compared to what the expectation was for him going into the year he was a safy before 2023 ended up being an outside corner and played over there was a rock Marlin Humphrey missed a lot of time the Ravens had a veteran Ronald Derby who came in and played at a very high level there were times where all those guys were healthy and McDonald would mix and match them at times strategically and your rationale for doing so with the Seahawks in 2024 might be different the reason is Devon Witherspoon it's a different rationale or Reason perhaps than in 2023 with the Ravens but I think it adds another layer to the unpredictable nature that offensive coordinators are going to have to deal with meaning we the offense are an 11 personnel Mike McD Donald was responding with his nickel defense is Deon Witherspoon with the nickel is a ran Jenkins is is Witherspoon the left outside corner is Trey Brown in there's a lot of different matchup opportunities for them in terms of putting guys in different spots on the field and I think it plays into a this is me projecting forward some so forgive me for that I think it plays into McDonald's ability to kind of hold the cards last if you will be the last guy to show his cards because he's got you are deploying your personnel 11 personnel or 12 or 21 whatever and then he can put Devon Witherspoon damn near anywhere I thought I saw Devon Witherspoon at right outside corner One play this game but I couldn't find it today as I searched up for this video um in any case if you guys enjoyed the video please let me know there was a lot of feedback on the Julian Love video that got people were asking for some of this I had mentioned it so here you go it's going to come out late Tuesday night unfortunately for you guys I'll probably have to be done with Seahawks content for a couple of days I actually try to do some College film and still help or assist a couple of people with high school stuff in terms of scouting and just making decisions you know before games I'm unable to attend games myself at this point in time because of my family but if you enjoyed the video man please let me know I had a I had a heck of a fun time watching it I wish that there was a way I could watch the Seahawks game this week live or on television as it broadcast I don't think I'll be able to just because of other commitments but this was a fun one to create I tried to cover the elements that I thought were noticeable and obvious the pursuit and effort and finishing plays was there across all three levels of the defense the open field tackles tremendous other than one miss Tackle by Julian love on V and then the coverage element there was a great mixture by McDonald which was related to the safeties coming downhill and making tackles getting bonck to get rid of the ball quick because he wasn't sure where blitzers were coming from how much of that carries over to week two and three and Beyond I'm not sure I'm looking forward to finding out I know you are as a Seahawks fan if you listen this long thank you very much I really appreciate it and the feedback that you guys have given has been tremendous um I'm looking to see what McDonald does in terms of stopping or slowing down the Run game and continuing to put people into what I call the Mike McDonald blender because it works and it's fun to watch appreciate you guys time man if you think other Seahawks fans would enjoy this film study video one more look at the Seahawks defensive coverages and effort and pursuit from week one then please consider grabbing a link to this video sharing it out on social media to help this content get more reach