September 2, 20214 yr 2 hours ago, ManuManu said: PHILADELPHIA EAGLES. The Eagles are going to run a lot more two-high, zone coverages in 2021. The Eagles ran man coverage at a top-five rate in the NFL during the 2020 season, but it looks like that’s changing under new defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon. Philadelphia led all defenses this preseason in Cover 2 rate (39%) and number of snaps with two-high safeties post-snap. On the flip side, no defense ran less Cover 1 than the Eagles over the past month (7%). It’s a trend that should carry over into the regular season, given Gannon’s tendencies while with the Colts. Or maybe the coverage that needed work in the preseason was Cover 2 and two high Ss. Cover 2 is mostly zone so getting some zone in there for the lower level DBs that played a lot of zone in college makes sense. Work for the Ss at high S makes sense. So they got work there and when Arnold was playing nickel it was like having three Ss on the field. PFF is reading too much into PS, maybe. Now it is a solid guess because Eberflus brought the Tampa 2 defense to the Colts initially. (Do the Eagles LBs strike anyone as being so good against the run that they don’t bring the S up some of the time, especially in 4-2-5). But the Colts did bring an integration of Coverage 3 too. Coverage 3 is not my favorite coverage. But 2/5ths of the time in a zone coverage like Cover 2 isn’t that unusual. Depends whether it is one high or two S. Now Nelson is going to need S help and so will McPhearson at this point, so some zone with at least one high S is to be expected. Interesting to note that they did put McPhearson in man and really tested him some in the second preseason game. Now with so much base being the nickel with a WIL on the field or a MIKE with WIL skills like Wilson and some third S thrown in, the closeness of defensive player to the receivers is a smaller zone with man tendencies. Now with Gannon supposedly a sharp defensive mind, I also hope we see some version of Belichek’s Cover 1. (I think Gannon starts out a little like McDermott, getting his feet wet and dabbling until comfortable. That might mean a little less innovative than we hope for initially.). Belichek’s Cover 1 has a switchable function that is almost like a zone/man combo. Think of it as RPO of coverages. It is beautiful to observe in the All 22 for those that get Game Pass, take a look but probably after Gilmore is back off PUP.
