Breaking Down Jayden Daniels' Game-Sealing Touchdown Pass
It took Jayden Daniels just 3 games to make NFL history. On Monday night against the Bengals, he became the first player ever to complete 90% of his passes, throw for 250 yards and 2 touchdowns, and run for a touchdown in the same game.
Daniels was aided by Kliff Kingsbury’s system, which got him many easy completions throughout the night. But there was nothing easy about his final and most important throw.
This was a 3rd-and-7 from the Bengals’ 27-yard line with just over 2 minutes remaining and the Commanders clinging to a 5-point lead.
Pre-snap, Cincinnati appeared to be bringing the house. This would be a cover-0 blitz, which meant extra pass rushers, no deep safeties in the middle of the field, and 1-on-1 matchups across the board:
Defenses utilize cover-0 blitzes for a variety of reasons. The main objective is to put pressure on the offense by bringing more pass rushers than the offense can handle. In this situation, the goal was to either create a negative play or force a quick throw underneath where the Bengals’ defensive backs could rally to tackle any pass catchers short of the first-down marker.
Because the DBs in coverage are expecting a quick throw due to the pressure scheme, they generally sit on their receivers’ routes, ready to pounce. But that leaves them vulnerable to the deep ball.
Kingsbury anticipated this, and he attacked it by calling two vertical routes on both sides of the field, including a stutter-go by Terry McLaurin on the right:
High risk, high reward.
Daniels recognized the cover-0 look pre-snap, as he said after the game. Against cover-0, there really is no reading the field post-snap for the quarterback. You confirm that it is indeed cover-0, pick your best matchup, and then let it rip.
Daniels chose to take a chance with McLaurin’s stutter-go.
To complete a deep pass against cover-0 blitz on a route that takes time to develop, Daniels would have to throw this with great anticipation and ball placement, and likely take a hit.
No problem: