Bengals Film Breakdown: How Joe Burrow And His All-Star Receivers Decimated The Falcons

Cincinnati's passing offense was dominant in Week 7.

Author:
Mike Santagata
Publish date:
Oct 26, 2022 10:34 AM EDT

In this story:

Joe Burrow and the Bengals' passing offense was a flamethrower in Sunday's 35-17 win over the Falcons.

Tyler Boyd (155) and Ja’Marr Chase (130) each topped the 100-yard mark, Tee Higgins racked up 93 yards receiving, and even Hayden Hurst managed 48 yards of his own. This was the best performance of the season for this offense.

It was Burrow’s second best game of his career according to Pro Football Focus. He threw for the second-most yards (481) in his career and it was his second best game by EPA (expected-points-added) as well.

So how did the Bengals obliterate the Falcons' pass defense? Let’s take a look at the film:

The Back Shoulder King

Burrow possesses a superhuman ability to throw his receivers open with the back shoulder fade. While the receivers deserve plenty of praise for these plays, Burrow’s accuracy is unbelievable. He consistently puts it where only his receiver can catch it. To go with his insane ability to throw this ball, the Bengals have assembled a group of receivers who excel at catching it on the receiving end. The Bengals' group of receivers all have fantastic body control allowing them to contort in the air to adjust and bring in this back shoulder pass. This combination of talent creates one of the most unguardable concepts in football.

When playing man coverage, defensive backs are either in phase or out of phase. If the defensive back is in phase, then he has eyes on the quarterback and can play the ball. The Bengals rarely allow defensive backs to play in phase because they try to press these players vertically until they are forced to be out of phase. Out of phase means that the defensive back has his eyes on the hip of the receiver and will have to play the eyes and hands of the receiver rather than the ball. Due to the body control and late hands of the Bengals receivers, the defensive back can almost never break up one of these back shoulder balls when they are out of phase. Burrow can go over the top if the receiver is even or has beaten the defensive back vertically. If the defensive back can stay slightly on top of the receiver, but they are out of phase, then Burrow can hammer them with these back shoulder throws.

Notice how the corner is turned to the receiver and has to play the hands and eyes of Chase rather than being able to react as the ball is thrown. Burrow throws this immediately once his back foot hits at the end of his drop because he can see this corner is out of phase with Chase. Even though the corner is able to stay over the top of Chase here, he still loses because of the magical chemistry and ability between the duo. Chase jumps and turns to catch this at its highest point and he does so away from the defender because Burrow has optimal placement on this pass.

This play is pretty similar. The corner is able to stay over the top of Chase, but he is still out of phase. Burrow throws this to the back shoulder and Chase turns and catches this ball at the last possible moment. This shields the corner away from the ball with his entire body making it nearly impossible to end up in a PBU [pass break-up] or interception. Then, Chase is just an absolute freak show after the catch and he turns up field to create a touchdown with effortless burst and speed.

This example from Burrow to Boyd is slightly different. This is a slot fade from Boyd, so he’s expanding outwards as well as pushing vertical. The corner is slightly on top of Boyd, but he's out of phase looking directly at the veteran receiver. Boyd makes a spectacular grab by contorting his body to make this reception. Burrow makes these throws look easy, but they take deadly accuracy to complete. They’re also not completed if the receivers aren’t some of the best in the league.

Doubles Concepts

Doubles is a 3-man concept with two outside routes that are the same with a “middle read” from the slot. The middle read is an in route against middle of the field closed looks (single-high), but a post against middle of the field open looks (two-high). The most common variation of this for the Bengals is the 989 concept, which is outside go routes along with that middle read. However, this does not have to be just go routes on the outside. There is a variation with stop routes (484) or out routes (585) the constant is the middle read from the slot, but the outside routes are variables. This concept is designed to isolate the outside receivers against the opposing corner while giving the slot the ability to always be right off of his option.

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Against single-high coverage, the 989 concept for the Bengals will almost always go to the outside on the go route. Burrow is one of the best in the league at throwing the go ball and this takes full advantage of that. Burrow’s beautiful pass is not the only part of this play though. Chase on the outside is the best in the league at the 9-route. Watch on this play where he takes a slightly slower release, almost lulling the defender to sleep like he’s James Harden dribbling at the top of the key.

Once he gains the advantage, he changes gears and starts to really push down the field. The corner cannot keep up with him and then Chase finishes this play with late hands that make it impossible for the corner to read his body language. Fantastic catch and a touchdown on a ball that couldn't have been placed better by a drone.

Still 989 here, but this time it’s against a middle of the field open defense. The Bengals add play action and start from a condensed split making this almost an entirely different look for them even though it’s the same concept. The spread look does a great job to attack single-high, but this condensed look is more designed to attack two-high. Boyd runs the post from the middle read but keeps it very skinny because he is starting so tight to the inside. Higgins is going to push vertically with an inside release. This puts the safety in conflict. It’s Tampa 2 and he has to stay over the top of both of these routes. Then Higgins expands outwards as Boyd breaks to the inside. The safety is overwhelmed and falls over creating an easy touchdown for the Bengals.

As I mentioned, doubles can also be run with routes on the outside that are not just vertical go balls. Here the Bengals use stop routes on the outside. The corner over Higgins is trying his hardest to stay over the top of this route, which is great if this was 989, but this is 484. Burrow gets the ball out before Higgins starts to break and this throw is subtly good. Burrow sees that the corner is not only over the top, but to the inside of Higgins, so he places this ball slightly to the outside which creates more room for his receiver. Higgins is able to catch the ball with ease and creates a first down. Great anticipation and the ability to throw his receiver open on this play.

Despite the Bengals propensity to play in spread formations, this is once again a condensed look for them with both receivers to the field inside of the numbers. They’re in a stack with Boyd on the outside and Higgins on the inside. Despite this being unfamiliar territory for Boyd on the outside he does an inspired job to create space. Boyd starts by releasing outwards so that he can gain outside leverage against the corner. Then he pushes vertically to get the corner to honor his ability as a deep threat. Finally, he breaks to the outside and makes a really nice catch. Another interesting note on this play is Higgins playing from the slot and he had a touchdown if Burrow decided to throw the middle read. The Falcons are playing quarters which makes this essentially one-on-ones across the board for the receivers. Higgins puts a little bit of sauce on his middle read with a jab step to the inside before immediately getting vertical again. Something worth noting if the Bengals ever get back to this concept in the high red zone.

Attacking The Middle of the Field

Teams are playing an abundance of two-high coverages against the Bengals. While they have been able to get teams out of these coverages by more effectively running the ball from shotgun, almost every game starts the same with some variation of Cover 2 or Quarters. Four of the first five coverages called against the Bengals were two-high coverages on Sunday. Rather than just pounding the rock against these coverages though, the Bengals decided to dice them up through the air.

Burrow was 10-of-12 for 188 yards and a touchdown against two-high coverages this week. He took one sack, but those numbers are out of this world. That would be a 146.3 passer rating and tremendous efficiency at 15.7 yards per attempt. The Bengals attacked the middle of the field and destroyed the Falcons' two-high coverages.

The Bengals are running one of their staple concepts on this play in “race." Race is a two-man combination with a sit route on the inside and a 12 yard in on the outside. Typically Higgins runs the in route because he’s one of the best in the league at it. This variation of race comes on the weak side of the formation against the Falcons Tampa 2. This means that the MIKE is not going to be a factor because he is going to open his hips to the passing strength. The weak hook is now put in conflict between the in route and the sit route. Here they utilize Hurst as the sit route and you can see the weak hook start to come up to play the sit. Once the hook plays the sit, Higgins comes free behind him on the in route. This creates a first down from second and long against a two-high coverage.

Now the Bengals are going to attack the Falcons quarter defense with a scissors concept. Scissors is a corner route from the inside and a post route from the outside. Higgins runs this post a little bit more flat than usual because the Bengals are just outside the red zone which gives them less room than normal. In quarters, once both route push to about eight yards of depth, the defenders have to match up with the player’s they are guarding. This means that the safety is going to be responsible for the corner route and the cornerback is going to be responsible for the post. This is difficult for a defense because whichever of those two routes is more shallow is going to get a natural rub. Just look at how much ground the corner has to cover because he has to go over the top of the corner route and his safety. This creates an opening for Burrow to put this ball on Higgins. This was nearly a touchdown and set the Bengals up for success on the drive.

There are other ways that the Bengals attacked the Falcons in this game, but these three ideas were the most important. They were able to structurally attack the middle of the field against two-high coverages, isolate their uber talented receivers against the Falcons injured corners, and sprinkled in some impossible to guard back shoulder throws.

With Burrow playing out of his mind and these receivers being a mismatch for any defense when they step on the field, this passing offense should continue shred opposing defenses.

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