1st & 10: Browns Offensive Explosion, Rams Rebound, The Giants & More From Week 13

There is no shortage of things to discuss about Week 13 of the 2020 NFL season and there are still three games left on the schedule. Let's get right into it.

1. The Browns Out Titans’d the Titans

If there was a football version of the Spider-man meme, it would be the Cleveland Browns and Tennessee Titans. Both teams were among the most run-heavy in the league heading into the game with offenses that rely on staying on pace on the ground and living off of play-action to open up the passing game. To this point, the Titans had been significantly better at pulling that strategy off throughout an entire game (they entered the week third in offensive DVOA) but the Browns had the advantage in Week 13.

The 41-35 final score would suggest these two teams were evenly matched, but Cleveland took a 38-7 lead into halftime. The Browns probably let up a little more than they would have liked into the second half, but the early explosion of points showed what the Browns could do at their best.

Tennessee’s weakness has been on defense, especially with a coverage unit that has been susceptible to play-action and misdirection. Without pressure (the Titans ranked 27th in pressure rate though Week 12, per Sports Info Solutions), that leaves a lot of potential open throws. The Browns picked on that all game.

On the third play of the game, the Browns faced a second-and-7. Donovan Peoples-Jones (11) motioned from the tight trips bunch on the left to a tight alignment on the right. As Peoples-Jones sold the run at the snap, Breon Borders (39) broke toward the line of scrimmage and left a huge hole for Rashard Higgins and a gain of 35 yards.

 

 

The highlight came on Cleveland’s third drive of the game with a third-and-goal from the 1-yard line. The Browns came out with both Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt on the field plus an extra offensive lineman. Both backs were integral to the play. Chubb was the fullback, who took the fake handoff and lept into the end zone to really sell the run. Hunt released into the right flat, which pulled the linebacker and opened the back of the end zone for offensive lineman Kendall Lamm.

 

 

On the Browns’ next offensive play following the Lamm touchdown, Cleveland sprung Peoples-Jones free for a 75-yard touchdown off play-action from 13 personnel (three tight ends). Tennessee sold out hard to stop a first-and-10 run from the heavy personnel package and again Breon Borders was too aggressive reacting to movement, this time a double-move from Peoples-Jones that got him into open space down the sideline.

 

 

Before the snap, you can see Titans defenders pointing and trying to adjust to Cleveland’s pre-snap motion. People-Jones motioned from left to right. Austin Hooper (81) motioned from in-line tight end into the backfield then back to his original alignment. Harrison Bryant (88) then motioned as an off-set fullback. All the movement forced the Titans to creep closer to the line and it moved the safety to Peoples-Jones’s side down into the box.

 

 

Tennessee sold out so hard for the run that even if Borders had stayed with Peoples-Jones in coverage, David Njoku (85) was also wide open on a crossing route with plenty of room to run.

Baker Mayfield finished the game with four touchdowns, 10.1 yards per attempt, and 0.71 Expected Points Added per dropback, according to nflfastR. But this wasn’t so much a Mayfield game as it was a Kevin Stefanski game. The Browns were able to work the Titans defense and create open throws throughout the first half. Mayfield even had a reception with a nice toe-tap on the sideline off a Jarvis Landy reverse pass. 

When Mayfield threw, there wasn’t much in his way. He into a tight window on just 6.1% of his attempts against the Titans, per NFL Next Gen Stats, the second-lowest rate of the week and well below Mayfield’s 15.6% season average.

Mayfield was significantly more comfortable executing the offense than he has been through stretches of this season and a confident Mayfield is pretty good. It’s not even a clean pocket vs pressure thing (though pressure is an issue) because Mayfield has bailed from and looked uncomfortable in clean pockets at times this season. That was not the case on Sunday and when he has trust in what he’s seeing, where his receivers should be, and the offense should be doing, he can look like a highly draft quarterback — like he did on his 17-yard touchdown throw to Rashard Higgins in the second quarter.

 

 

The problem, of course, is that’s not the Mayfield we’ve seen consistently, or even a majority of the time. How Mayfield can handle that for the remainder of the season will set the Browns’ ceiling.

Cleveland’s early lead gave the team plenty of cushion on the defensive side of the ball. The Browns were able to contain Derrick Henry throughout the game — a questionable fourth-down spot and a lost fumble helped — and the back had just 60 yards on 15 carries with a long of 10 yards. Tennessee has been a stubborn team on offense that has stuck to the run game and play-action strategy even when trailing this season, but the Titans had to get a little more aggressive to start the second half.

When the Titans started throwing, they were able to move the ball down the field. Ryan Tannehill ended with an impressive looking stat line — 8.3 yards per attempt, 0.31 EPA per dropback, with three touchdowns to one interception. Corey Davis was the main beneficiary with 182 yards and a touchdown on 11 receptions.

Davis had a 43-yard gain on Tennessee’s first drive of the third quarter off play-action which left him wide open in the middle of the field hitting a hole in the zone. That was followed by a well-designed touchdown to MyCole Pruitt that used motion to manipulate the Browns’ defense. The tight end motion and Henry’s orbit motion moved safety Andrew Sendejo from the left hash to the middle of the field. That allowed Pruitt to release inside the left tackle and up the seam and Sendejo was too late to react.

 

 

These are still two flawed teams that currently sit with some of the best records in the AFC. The Browns are now 9-3 and have an 88.6% chance to make the playoffs, according to Football Outsiders, a 20.3% increase with the win. The Browns were only 22nd in DVOA heading into this game, though that should improve at least slightly this week. Cleveland also ranked 30th in variance through Week 12, which means only two teams had been less consistent from week-to-week than the Browns. That past two weeks alone prove that to be pretty true.

Cleveland might not be one of the best teams in the league but they sit in a tier of high upside performers with an offensive head coach who can scheme a way to protect an inconsistent quarterback. A lot of potential playoff teams are in a similar spot…

2. Sean McVay put the training wheels back on

…and what a way to bring up Jared Goff. Goff was a disaster last week against the 49ers and it led Sean McVay to publicly call out his quarterback for his ball security. After the Rams’ 38-28 win over the Arizona Cardinals, McVay told reporters he wasn’t concerned with Goff being overwhelmed by a tough outing and being able to respond. That sounds like support for the quarterback but part of the reason McVay wasn’t worried was because he had the offense set up to not force the quarterback to do too much.

Goff’s average pass against the Cardinals only traveled 3.5 yards beyond the line of scrimmage and his average completion was 2.6 yards past the line. Just 4.3% of his attempts were into tight coverage. All three of those were the lowest marks among quarterbacks in Week 13 per Next Gen Stats. He had 13 passes behind the line of scrimmage and no attempts that traveled over 20 air yards. To Goff’s credit, he executed what he was asked and finished with a week-high +10.2% competition percentage over expectation.

McVay continually opened things up off jet motion and misdirection. The Rams’ longest play of the game came on a third-and-7 from empty on a late release from Malcolm Brown down an open sideline.

 

 

Still, Goff was able to handle a high volume passing attack to cover for a running game that wasn’t clicking consistently. Darrell Henderson had 49 yards on three carries, but rookie Cam Akers took the lead role with 21 carries that produced just a 38% success rate and -0.31 EPA per carry.

If last week’s problem was Goff losing the ball, the adjustment this week was to keep hold of the ball for as long as possible. With the short passes, the Rams ran 79 plays against the Cardinals, their second-highest total of the season. A high number of plays isn’t always good — the Rams’ high was 92 plays in the offensive struggle against the Dolphins — but the Rams were able to keep the ball moving, limiting the chance for turnovers while still scoring points.

On the other side of the ball, the Rams’ defense held the Cardinals to just 3.7 yards per play. Kyler Murray averaged just 4.4 yards per attempt and that included a 59-yard touchdown to Dan Arnold that capped the first drive of the game. Arizona went three-and-out on its following four drives before ending the half with a missed field goal.

The Cardinals’ offensive line had been a pleasant surprise this season — third in ESPN’s Pass Block Win Rate — but they struggled against the Rams’ defensive line. Aaron Donald had a sack early in the game with an inside move on the edge against D.J. Humphries. In the fourth quarter, Justin Hollins beat Humphries around the edge for a strip-sack while Murray tried to bail from the pocket.

Arizona’s passing game was off for much of the first half with timing consistently thrown off. DeAndre Hopkins has been Arizona’s safety net throughout his first season with the team, but he was covered well by Jalen Ramsey in this game. Ramsey has been a versatile piece of the Los Angeles defense this season bouncing all over the field. He’s played a Star role as a middle of the field defender with more slot work than he’s had in past seasons but when it’s called for it, he’s gone back to lockdown outside shadow corner. He did that against D.K. Metcalf and he held Hopkins to limited production.

Per Next Gen Stats, Ramsey was on Hopkins for 34 of his 40 routes, and those plays resulted in just six catches for 36 yards on 11 targets. There was a defensive pass interference penalty in there, but Ramsey’s coverage was good enough to hold Hopkins to just three targets in the first half, including the DPI penalty. A lot of the completions Hopkins did have against Ramsey were quick stop routes against Ramsey’s cushion that did not go for big gains. Ramsey didn’t have an official pass defensed in the game, but he was routinely impacting the catch point.

The win put the Rams on top of the NFC West with a 66% chance to win the division per Football Outsiders. Arizona’s second straight loss dropped them out of the current playoff standings and the Cardinals now have just a 40.5% chance to make the playoffs according to FO. FiveThirtyEight has them even lower at 34%. 

3. Colts Outlast The Texans

Thanks to Tennessee’s loss to Cleveland, the Indianapolis Colts have become the favorites to win the AFC South, by a slight margin (53.1% to 46.9% per FO) following a 26-20 win over the Houston Texans.

The Colts haven’t always made their wins look pretty and they’re still working out who they are against who they want to be. Indianapolis wants to be a team that leans on the run. They have what should be a dominant offensive line (but injuries have hamstrung it) and a rookie second-round pick at running back in Jonathan Taylor. It hadn’t worked much this season; they were 27th in positive play rate on the ground entering the week, per SIS. But there were some flashes against a weak Houston run defense.

Taylor had 91 yards on 13 carries with a 77% success rate on the ground. But still, it was the Colts’ passing attack that paved the way for the win. Philip Rivers finished with 8.1 yards per attempt and 0.26 EPA per dropback. 

Houston’s secondary has been poor for much of the season and injuries haven’t helped. Indianapolis took advantage of the weak links and out those defenders in conflict, especially on late downs with a Frank Reich favorite concept: Mesh. The T.Y Hilton 21-yard touchdown in the first quarter was on Mesh with Hilton free as one of the crossers.

 

 

In the second quarter, a Mesh concept on second-and-4 occupied all middle of the field defenders and cleared the sidle for Taylor on a 39-yard touchdown reception.

 

 

Rivers, though, did take three sacks, all in the second half and two on third down. The Colts were just 3-of-11 on third downs in the game, which a place they have struggled this season with a 36.8% conversion rate, 29th in the league. But as has been the case for most of the season, Indianapolis was effective enough on early downs, especially through the air, to keep the ball moving.

On defense, the Colts felt the loss of DeForest Buckner last week, but his presence was welcome early in the game. He sacked Deshaun Watson twice with one on Houston’s second drive of the game, and added another quarterback hit. 

Watson started the game hot but cooled as the game wore on with a lack of receiving options. Brandin Cooks missed a portion of the game while being checked for a concussion. That led to Keke Coutee and Chad Hansen becoming Houston’s top targets. Both put up over 100 yards — Coutee effortlessly had eight catches for 141 yards on nine targets after struggling to see the field under Bill O’Brien.

But the talent disparity across the board allowed the Colts to make plays on defense. There were seven passes defensed, eight quarterback hits, and 6.5 tackles for loss.

Though still with all of that, the Texans had a chance to take the lead at the end of the game after Watson led Houston down the field on a two-minute drive that went 73 yards in seven plays and under a minute and a half. But a fumbled snap was recovered by the Colts with 1:28 and no timeouts remaining for the Texans.

Watson is making the most of a bad situation, but the situation keeps looking worse.

4. The Chiefs Keep Finding A Way

It continues the be the same story for the Kansas City Chiefs. They played another probably-closer-than-it-should-have-been game against a weaker opponent, but they still won without really being in danger of losing. At no time was the 22-16 victory over the Denver Broncos in question. The game started with a bad Drew Lock interception to Tyrann Mathieu and ended with a bad Drew Lock interception to Tyrann Mathieu. In between, there was a lot of greatness from Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce but nothing that was sustainable enough to turn this into the blowout it could have been.

We’ve talked a lot about teams selling out to stop the big play and that was again the case with the Broncos defense, which led to one of Mahomes’s least productive games throwing deep in his career. Mahomes did have a 48-yard touchdown pass to Tyreek Hill wiped away by a holding penalty in the fourth quarter, but officially Mahomes was 0-for-5 on passes that traveled at least 20 air yards. It was the fifth time Mahomes has been held without a completion of at least 20 air yards and the third time this season.

Patrick Mahomes 0-For Deep Passes, Career

The Chiefs were only 3-10 on third downs in the game, a down where Mahomes has made magic this season. 

But the Chiefs have found solace in the intermediate area. Kelce continued to dominate that area and put up 136 and a touchdown on eight receptions and 13 targets. He’s a tight end, but he’s truly the league’s most dominant slot receiver. His alignment out there either puts a linebacker in space or brings a smaller cornerback into coverage. Denver opted mostly for the corner and when Kelce was wide or in the slot against a cornerback he had five receptions and nine targets for 87 yards on 17 routes per Next Gen Stats.

Kansas City doesn’t appear to be interested in proving they can blow inferior teams out, and even with that they still have the second-best point differential in the league (+116) but this late in the season, it would be nice to see more of the fourth gear that makes the Chiefs special.

5. Should we be taking the Giants seriously?

There might not have been a more surprising Week 13 result than the New York Giants defeating the Seattle Seahawks 17-12 on the road with a backup quarterback. After a 1-7 start to the season, the Giants have won four games in a row and now sit with a half-game lead in the NFC East, pending Washington’s Monday game.

It was easy to overlook the first three Giants win in the streak with wins against Washington, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati without Joe Burrow. But the stifling of the Seahawks gives more legitimacy to everything, right? Maybe.

The offense remains a mess, whether Colt McCoy or Daniel Jones is under center. It’s overly reliant on short passing and often there’s not a lot of separation built into those plays, which can lead to some throws that are way more dangerous than they should be. McCoy only averaged 4.8 yards per attempt and -0.29 EPA per dropback for a QBR of 32.4. 

Something has clicked on the ground as Wayne Gallman has taken over the lead role, by default due to injuries. The offensive line blocking has improved run blocking and credit has been pointed there but Gallman is second among running backs in the percentage of runs that gain more yards than expected, according to Next Gen Stats. It’s an impressive development from a running back the Giants have gone out of their way to not give a bigger role for years.

If there is a unit to truly take seriously, it’s the defense. Last year defensive coordinator Patrick Graham was part of a Miami Dolphins team that was doing a lot of interesting things schematically but didn’t have the talent for any of it to really matter. It’s been a similar situation with the Giants this season. Graham has been able to scheme up a number of looks that have allowed the Giants to outplay their talent level. 

The Giants created a sack on a third-and-4 on Seattle’s second drive by doing their best Dolphins impression. There were a lot of bodies bouncing around with just one down lineman. At the snap, the Giants faked six pass rushers but two immediately dropped into coverage. That left a path for linebacker Tae Crowder to pick up an unblocked sack.

 

There’s also just enough high-level talent for impact plays. James Bradberry has played like one of the league’s best cornerbacks despite little help elsewhere at that position. Leonard Williams has figured something out that has allowed him to sustain production. He had 2.5 sacks and five quarterback hits against Seattle and he has a career-high 7.5 sacks on the season.

The Giants made Russell Wilson and the Seahawks look like the version of the offense we’ve seen over the past few seasons, not the one we saw earlier in 2020. Wilson consistently held the ball too long — a week-high 3.38 seconds on average — while he desperately looked for something to open downfield. It also got to the point when Wilson took the snap expecting pressure and was ready to bail.

This was easily the Giants’ best defensive performance of the season but this is still a unit that was 21st in defensive DVOA entering the week. They still hold a -34 point differential and have little upside for explosive plays on offense.

There’s an extremely low bar set to take an NFC East team seriously and while the Giants might have risen above it, they’re not yet some frisky team getting hot at the right time that will be a pain for better teams in the playoffs. 

6. Bill Belichick vs Rookie QB

Rookie quarterbacks who face Bill Belichick get their “Welcome to the NFL” moment. He was 20-5 against rookie quarterbacks entering the week and that’s not 21-5 after the Patriots’ 45-0 win over the Los Angeles Chargers. 

Justin Herbert didn’t really have a chance to get going in this game and the Patriots defense, one of the worst in the league entering the game, was on top of everything the Chargers wanted to do. New England had 11 quarterback hits and nine passes defensed in the game as the early and big lead allowed the defense to aggressively attack Herbert. That led to -0.49 EPA per dropback and a 29% success rate with 3.9 yards per attempt, two interceptions, and an 8.8 QBR for the rookie passer.

Early in the game, the Patriots messed with Herbert’s expectations. His first sack came on a third-and-10 in the first quarter. New England created pressure with a three-man rush and Herbert had nowhere to go with the ball.

 

 

Throughout the game, Herbert’s timing was disrupted and while we can chalk some of that up to Belichick’s plan, this has been a trend for Herbert after his hot start. Over the past few weeks, Herbert hasn’t been on nearly the tear he was on earlier in the season. Herbert’s production early in the season came off explosive plays without a lot of down-to-down consistency but over the past four weeks, those haven’t been there as often.

Justin Herbert, 2020

The Chargers now have a ton of problems. The offense is a new one but special teams have been a mess for years and this year’s unit is potentially one of the worst of the past 20 years. Los Angeles couldn’t even get the correct number of plays on the field to return punts. On New England’s first four punts, the Chargers had 11, 10, 12, and 10 men on the field.

New England’s offense didn’t do much — Cam Newton only averaged 3.6 yards per attempt on 19 passes — but it didn’t matter given how ineffective the Chargers were everywhere else. 

7. The Vikings Are in a playoff spot

All of a sudden, the Minnesota Vikings find themselves in playoff position. It took an ovetime win over the Jacksonville Jaguars just to get to 6-6, but Minnesota is the current No. 7 seed in the NFC with a tiebreaker over the Cardinals.

Minnesota was a team that started the season as one of the worst in the league, but the talent on the roster, both young and old, has started to blossom. On defense, Ifeadi Odenigbo had three quarterback hits against the Jaguars after a slow start to the season. Rookie cornerback Cameron Dantzler had an impressive undercutting interception in the second quarter. The Vikings have jumped up to 12th in defensive DVOA with a borderline top-10 pass defense.

The Vikings have also risen to a top-10 offense this season with an efficient running game (sixth in DVOA) and a suddenly explosive passing offense. Kirk Cousins leads all quarterbacks in Next Gen Stats’ CPOE and he’s been one of the league’s best deep throwers. That has combined with the breakout of rookie Justin Jefferson, who has already eclipsed 1,000 receiving yards and is currently fourth in the league with 1,039.

Jefferson had 121 yards on nine receptions and 12 targets against Jacksonville, including a 20-yard touchdown that worked Jaguars corner Luq Barcoo. Jefferson sold a deep cross to go with Cousins’s rollout to the left before he cut back to the outside and left the corner behind.

 

 

Minnesota still has to play Tampa Bay and New Orleans over the final four weeks of the season, which gives them just a 26.5% chance of making the playoff despite holding the spot at the moment. The Vikings are actually one of those frisky teams that has improved significantly over the second half of the season and could cause problems if they made it to January.

8. Chart of the day

Darren Waller went for 200 yards and two touchdowns on 13 receptions and 17 targets against a New York Jets secondary that had no answers. There were some linebackers involved, some safeties, undrafted rookie cornerback Bryce Hall had that responsibility for some of the game. Nothing worked and Waller ran wild, which brings us to…

9. Play of the day

No play will be talked about more. With 13 seconds left and a four-point lead, the Jets sent a Cover-0 blitz against the Raiders on a third-and-10 from the Jets’ 46-yard line. Henry Ruggs ran past rookie Lamar Jackson for a touchdown and a 31-28 Raiders win.

Some believe this was a call to intentionally blow the game to ensure the Jets get the first overall pick and that’s insane. First, look above to what the Jets did with Waller all game, they had no answers in coverage. Second, a call to give up a touchdown would mean Gregg Williams was invested 

In a draft pick he’s not going to see. Gregg Williams. He absolutely thought Cover-0 was the correct call.

It’s not preposterous, either. Blitzing a Hail Mary is a better strategy than passively sitting back and possibly allowing a shorter completion that gives way to another chance at the end zone. The problem is the lack of deep coverage. In order for Cover-0 to work good corners who can hold up one-on-one are needed. That’s why the Dolphins can get away with it so often this season. The Jets don’t have that. The Jets are bad. It’s not a conspiracy. This coaching staff has made bad decisions all season. That’s why they’re winless. If you think any thought was given to that call, you’re giving this staff way too much credit.

10. Have we seen the end of Carson Wentz?

Midway through the third quarter in a 30-16 loss to the Green Bay Packers, the Philadelphia Eagles pulled Carson Wentz for Jalen Hurts. Wentz was 6-of-15 for 79 yards with four sacks, good for -0.20 EPA per dropback. Hurts came in and immediately provided a spark, albeit a brief one. Hurts’s second throw was a 34-yard pass to Jalen Reagor down the left sideline on a third-and-4. He had a 20-yard pass to Zach Ertz on another third-and-4 in the fourth quarter and capped that drive with a 32-yard touchdown to Greg Ward.

Hurts wasn’t perfect, he finished with just 0.03 EPA per dropback, but his quick processing and athleticism gave the passing game something it hasn’t had all season.

For the short-term, Hurts potentially provides more of a spark than the current version of Wentz. In the long-term, it’s worth it for the Eagles to see what Hurts can bring as a starter. It would be difficult to move on from Wentz with $59 million in dead money still on the deal in 2021 and a potential loss of $24 million in cap space with a release. But there could be a Brock Osweiler-like trade involving a draft pick from the Eagles to the acquiring team to take on more of Wentz’s salary.

The Eagles aren’t at that spot yet, but they’re better off finding out if they can afford to be in that spot this offseason with Hurts as the starter in the future or if all of their quarterback plans need to be figured out. Philadelphia can get a jump start on that with a quarterback change for the rest of the season.