Fins/Niners - The Breakdown (partial)

Note from the future: I began and wrote most of this analysis on December 20th, but never finished it. Since I still have it laying around, I decided to post it and sort it in its proper place. My apologies: the defensive analysis will forever remain unfinished...

Tight Ends:

Interestingly enough, I’m going to start the discussion with the tight ends this week, because I thought they were huge keys to the offense Sunday. I thought the coaches made a really great game plan, because by splitting the tight ends out wide early, it put the 49ers at a personnel mismatch. They were stuck with their bigs in the game, in to defend Miami’s Wildcat personnel groupings, while the Dolphins played out of a spread, hurry-up base offense. Great job of using your strengths, and as I have said all year, this offense is at its best when the tight ends are involved.

Immediately, on the first two offensive plays of the game, Pennington went to Martin and Fasano, and David Martin’s 61 yard touchdown catch and run was a work of beauty, the spectacular touchdown that Miami needed to get ahead. To that point, the tight ends were used brilliantly and were playing excellently, and it forced the 49ers to make adjustments. I can’t emphasize enough how important our backs and tight ends involvement in our passing game is to this offense. They are an advantage we have on almost any team we face. The touchdown pass to Haynos was a perfect example of how difficult this offense is to defend when we have teams concerned about our multiple running backs and different fronts.

Unfortunately, as the game wore on there were huge mistakes in the use of our tight ends. Specifically, the Dolphins continue to ask David Martin to make blocks at the point of attack, and he continues to fail time after time. On a third and one, the Dolphins asked Martin to block on the slide play and he got blown up. This was one of the few third and shorts that Miami hasn’t converted this year, and it contributed to the 1-7 showing on third down on Sunday. Likewise, on third down with the Dolphins driving at the end of the game, they ran behind Martin again, and the ensuing two yard loss was the margin by which Carpenter missed his field goal attempt, one that could’ve proved very costly. At this point, the coaches need to stop asking Martin to make pivotal blocks in key spots.

Offensive Line:

The Miami O-line, continuing to search for the best mix of players in the wake of injuries and/or underperforming by every player except Jake Long, had another mixed game. Sure, there were the mistakes. Alleman and Satele each had false starts that set the offense back, the type of mistakes that helped keep the offense off the field much of the day. Satele also allowed a bad sack immediately after his false start, a continuation of his season-long struggles, but what stood out today was the tactical experimentation by the coaches.

First and foremost, the Dolphins finally tried Satele at guard, a move that I have been anticipating for much of the season, as Samson is quick and athletic, but currently too weak to handle big time nose tackles. The move came almost immediately after the drive where he made the two mistakes, those possibly being the catalysts. Making it possible was Al Johnson, seeing his first action at center, and I thought the Dolphins had potentially their best personnel grouping on at that time, with those two in and Andy Alleman at left guard. It’s too soon, however, for a qualitative review, as the sample size isn’t big enough, but the important thing is that the look is there and we’ll see more of it. I think Satele could even find a permanent home at guard, as it seems like a much better natural fit, and he said he felt “quicker” without having to worry about the snap.

The other interesting development, besides that the Dolphins wisely employed false pulling a few times in their misdirection game, was that the Dolphins almost never ran between the tackles against the 49ers. More specifically, at first the Dolphins really didn’t run at all, but when they finally did, they relied almost exclusively on a speed game to the outside and their classic misdirection. Why would a team employ this strategy? Well, usually because they don’t feel like they can block anybody. The Dolphins won on Sunday, but they need to be careful with this strategy in the future. It will be impossible to be a consistent team in December without an interior running game, so let’s hope this was a one week plan to exploit matchups and not a blueprint for the future.

Quarterback:

Pennington played well, another efficient game for our star quarterback. His two first half touchdowns were enough to get the win, even if the Dolphins offense was far from dominant. Part of the blame for the 1-7 third down performance has to be on Chad, but as I look through each individually, it would probably be much more accurately attributed to dropped passes, negative plays, and penalties.

Chad’s worst throw of the day was just after the Dolphins got the ball at the 50 in the first half. He threw it right to a defender in double coverage, but luckily the interception was dropped. His best play of the day might have been his touchdown pass to Joey Haynos. The tight end was wide open, but the impressive aspect of the play was Chad’s ability to avoid the rush by stepping up in the pocket while still having the poise to make an accurate throw on time.

Wide Receivers:

The wideouts did not play well. In a game where passing was such a big part of the game plan, the hope was that Ginn might be able to do a little more with less attention placed on him by the defense. Unfortunately, he was terrible. His final line read two receptions for six yards, but if only his performance was so benign. He had at least one horrible drop, and failed to convert a third and three by running his crossing route only one yard down the field. Ladies and gentlemen, he is in a slump.

The only other real standout plays by the receivers were by Wilford and London, so you can imagine how those went. Wilford committed a false start penalty and didn’t see the field again. London, when the Dolphins had to get something going in the fourth quarter, had an interference penalty on first and ten. That drive was over before it started, as his career might be if he can’t stick as a special teams player next year. Poor game from this unit.

Running Backs:

The most talented members of the offense get last billing because that’s where they appeared in our offense. While I understand that the coaches were looking for matchups and to surprise the 49ers, I hope it is now clear to them that this is where the Dolphins offense needs to start. You need to use your talent, and these guys are our talent. Plain and simple.

Obviously not in much of a rhythm throughout the day, Ricky and Ronnie combined for three dropped passes. Still, after receiving virtually no carries in the first half, it’s hard to be too upset with their lack of impact. Nevertheless, when they did get the ball in the second half, especially Ronnie Brown, the running backs were very effective.

Most impressive, basically everything the backs did they got on their own. Almost all of their runs were outside in space, and no yardage was better earned than when Ronnie took his only Wildcat run for an important gain, moving the ball to help preserve victory. Brown literally had nothing in front of him, but he showed superior patience and vision, making use of sprawling blocks by Williams, Pennington, and Cobbs to get around the corner.

In the second half, when the running backs, especially Ronnie Brown, were utilized in the normal misdirection game, they had great success and moved the football well. The Dolphins owe it to themselves to see if one back or the other has the hot hand early because then they need to get the ball often. If that means doing it out of the Wildcat, fine, as long as it gets done, but I think there are more effective ways of using our immensely talented backfield.

Pass Rush:

The Dolphins switched some things up in their pass rush today and really attacked the 49ers to the tune of 5 sacks. After watching the Ravens play on Sunday night last week, I had longed for a pass rush like theirs, and I was pleased to see the Dolphins adopt a lot of the same principles to awaken their mostly dormant nickel pass rush. Their pressure was a big reason why the Dolphins made it through a third straight game without allowing a touchdown.

The Dolphins were very clever, and especially in the first half, effective. On one early play, the 49ers tried to isolate Matt Roth in space. All he did was come in untouched where the offense was outnumbered and register a punishing sack. Similarly, the Dolphins even experimented with putting two outside linebackers on the same side of the field in passing situations. Outnumbering an offense like this is how you guarantee easy pressure, and I was delighted to see the Dolphins make use of it.

Additionally, pressure came from the secondary. Renaldo Hill had a great time, seeming to enjoy his attacking role in the game plan. Still, no player caused more havoc in the Niner backfield than Nate Jones, who finished the day with two sacks from his nickel back position. He came in early and often, and I thought the most genius part of it was that his presence as the blitzing slot corner allowed Will Allen to lock down the outside, not wasting his skills rushing the passer.

As for our pass rushing specialists, it was Charlie Anderson who made a lot more noise than Joey Porter. Anderson had a first half sack, but before I could be too pleased with his ever-present attempts to swipe the ball away from the quarterback, he missed a sack in the second half because he neglected to wrap the quarterback up and take him down. Still, an active game is much better than a quiet one. He is really beginning to emerge. As for Porter, it was a quiet day for the loudest man on the field. That is, of course, until he ended the game with a huge sack and then gave me a heart attack by throwing his helmet. Luckily, the possession had already changed before the penalty could be enforced. Still, I wasn’t too happy about his effort, especially considering that Vernon Davis owned him all day, and the only reason he was able to make that sack was the Martz, arguably the stupidest genius in NFL history, took Davis out on that play.

Nevertheless, assuming the Dolphins keep up this attacking style in the future, there are only two real areas of concern as we look ahead. First of all, they simply need to finish sacks more consistently. You can’t let the quarterback get away from you, plain and simple. Additionally, Shaun Hill was really the second quarterback to give us fits in recent history, the first obviously being Matt Cassel, and the thing that both of these guys had in common was an ability to get rid of the ball quickly in the face of a blitz. Our defense was good enough today, as the 49ers made enough mistakes to bail us out in the end, but in the future, we need to find a way to disguise some blitzes so that when quarterbacks get into a rhythm with their hot receivers, we can come up with an easy turnover.