Heading into the Cowboys game on Thursday on a short week, Chip clearly saw something on tape of the Dallas defense. Most likely he saw a very aggressive defense that attacks in the run game. As a result, Chip tortured the Cowboys defense on the first 2 opening drives by running misdirection plays over and over again. Whether it was tempo or style, the Cowboys looked completely dumbfounded.
All action to the left and Sanchez hands off to McCoy. Note the blocking downfield from Riley Cooper and Jordan Matthews. Clearly a designed running play, but a set up for things to come. The Cowboys do a nice job setting the edge and McCoy has no room to run. Good start for the Cowboys, but it was all downhill after that:
A couple of plays later, we run an outside stretch play again, although this time we run a familiar trick. All action to the left, but the play is designed as a counter to go right:
The DB highlighted in red is responsible for outside contain and does an absolutely terrible job. Watch how hard he bites on the misdirection:
In the backfield, Mark will turn left off the snap and fake the handoff, which helps sell the misdirection counter play. McCoy with a jab step left, and look how the hard the Dallas defense bites:
Later in the red zone possession, the Eagles show their first pass play off the outside zone run action, and it will be a familiar theme. Sanchez will fake the run action left and roll to the right and will have 3 passing options with Cooper coming across the formation, Matthews running a corner route and Brad Smith on a comeback route underneath:
As you can see Cooper is recovered and Sanchez is looking for Matthews on the corner route:
There's a big throwing window but Sanchez overthrows Matthews. Tough throw on the run (something Sanchez has excelled at) and Sanchez can't make the play. Good conservative throw in the red zone where only your receiver can make a play on the ball:
First play of the second drive and the Eagles go back to a similar concept although with a different route package. Same run action fake to the left with Sanchez rolling right. This time, Jordan Matthews will come across the formation behind the LB zone drop. Maclin will run a clear out downthe field:
After an initial downblock, Celek is going to release creating a nice hi-lo combo for Sanchez to choose from. Here you can see Matthews sneaking uncovered behind the LBs zone drop. Also note the safety cheat up on Celek on the underneath route. This creates huge space for Matthews:
If anything, Sanchez holds this ball too long, but he eventually hits Matthews wide open over the middle for a big gain. If he has the ball out now, I am not sure the safety (not in the screen) can close fast enough giving Matthews more open field:
either way Sanchez hits him for a big gain:
It worked so well, the Eagles went back to the exact same play 2 plays later:
As Sanchez rolls out, this time the DE sticks to Celek in coverage. As a result, the safety on the bottom of the screen doesn't step up as much. Still, it appears Sanchez had Matthews on the same route, but didn't pull the trigger:
In fairness, we'll have to wait for he All-22 to see how close the safety was to Matthews on this one:
If that isn't enough, the Eagles go back to the exact same play for a 3rd time in this possession. They simply flip the formation:
Sanchez will roll out to the left with Matthews crossing the formation again getting behind the LB level. As Matthews crosses the middle of the field check out the LBs biting on the run fake:
Again Matthews has loads of space and it's an easy throw for Sanchez for the 2nd TD of the game:
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