I love it when people actually pay attention to what happened
Having seen specifics in the first drive, I was looking for trends on the second, more successful one. What I found interesting was that aside from a 13-yard quick out to Collie, every play that brought the Colts forward to their first touchdown was either a run or a Jets penalty. The Jets seemed to go a bit more vanilla, mirroring the Colts to a point — if Indy went three-wide, the Jets would counter with man looks on the wideouts, and off coverage on the slot. If the Colts went with a tight twins formation, the Jets seemed to prefer bracket concepts; even if they went to Revis’ side. But the real surprise here was that the Colts were able to get consistently productive runs by bouncing Addai outside in two-tight end sets, and sending Addai or Donald Brown up the middle as the line’s zone slides washed out the front. Manning orchestrated more plays out of two-tight end sets than I’d ever seen from this team, and it was clear that the Colts had a plan for it — augmenting a line that finished the season ranked 25th in Adjusted Line Yards, and splaying the Jets’ defense across the field.
The Colts also got a break on fourth-and-1 from the Jets’ 31 with 7:35 left in the first quarter, when Brown couldn’t penetrate the 46 front, but someone from Terry McAulay’s crew caught Bart Scott‘s blatant tripping penalty. Manning then sent an errant throw to Wayne in the vicinity of Revis Island. On the next play, the Jets played pass on second-and-10 from the Jets’ 21, and Manning handed the draw to Addai out of the shotgun up the middle as Indy’s interior line split New York’s front, and Addai blew in for a score. More and more, I was impressed by the Colts’ ability to adapt; as the Jets focused on Indy’s passing game despite the myriad under fronts, Manning saw and exploited vulnerabilities in the run defense. I don’t think Ryan will play pass out of run defense-style fronts in the same way in the rematch.
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