James Bettcher Readies Giants Defense for Arizona

Giants defensive coordinator James Bettcher won't spend too much time Sunday exchanging pleasantries with his former associates from his days with the Arizona Cardinals. Instead, Bettcher will be making sure his Giants defense has some answers to handle Kyler Murray and the Cardinals offense.

Defensive coordinator James Bettcher spent five years with the Arizona Cardinals, where he knew their defense inside and out.

But his focus heading into this Sunday though when the Cardinals

come to MetLife Stadium, is no longer on the defense, but the offense.

“I haven’t sat down and had time to take a look at a snap of what they are doing on defense,” Bettcher said Thursday.

“I honestly couldn’t tell you. I know a little bit about Vance’s background, it’s a little different style 3-4 than kind of the tree that I believe in or come from. I haven’t really watched any of it.”

Bettcher joined the Cardinals coaching staff in 2013, where he spent two years as the outside linebacker coach before transitioning to the defensive coordinator role for the next three years.

In the three years that Bettcher was the defensive coordinator in Arizona, the Cardinals led the NFL by allowing only 3.67 yards per rushing attempt and were third in the league by yielding an average of 4.99 yards per play. During that time, Arizona also tied for fourth with 11 defensive touchdowns.

Since joining the Giants in 2018, though, Bettcher has shifted focus to mastering a new defense with new faces, most of which this year are young players.

The 2019 Cardinals, in particular, are running a different scheme than most NFL offenses.

As noted in our film breakdown, head coach Kliff Kingsbury has brought with him most of the offensive schemes that he ran at Texas Tech, which is a mixture of the “Air Raid, and “West Coast” and “Spread” concepts in which the Cardinals tend to utilize an inordinate amount of 10-personnel (4-receiver sets).

Those concepts not only vary from what the Giants have seen the last two weeks but also what they’ve seen for most of the season.

“We all know they are going to go four wides and spread the field, or they are going to put a tight end and spread it out with a tight end in the game,” Bettcher said.

“They are going to be in empty, spread formations. Those things are different. But at the end of the day, the point that we made to the guys in the room is, it comes down to us and us doing our jobs, aligning with good leverage, playing with good eyes. You do that, and that helps eliminate some of the differences in the scheme.”

For Bettcher, it helps his preparation to have players like inside linebacker David Mayo.

In his five-year career, Mayo has played in 65 games, recording 66 tackles, including 41 solo and two tackles for loss.

In just six games with the Giants this season, Mayo has notched 30 tackles, with 18 solo.

“He’s come and worked his tail off,” Bettcher said. “This guy loves the game-- he’s tough, he’s physical. It’s not shade on anybody that’s on our roster anywhere.”

Mayo’s skill set also gives Bettcher the flexibility to counter Arizona’s use of 10 personnel.

“What it allows us to do is put another defensive back on the field,” he said. “I think just going back to what I believe, the more spread they get, the more space the game becomes, the more second-level players you want to try and get on the field.”

It also helps Bettcher to have a familiar face on defense in preparation for Sunday in outside linebacker Markus Golden, who played for Bettcher for three years in Arizona.

Golden, the Giants sack leader, saw Cardinals’ running back David Johnson in practice many times when the two were in Arizona and said that he is looking forward to facing him in a game environment.

“It’s going to be exciting anytime you can play against a great player like David Johnson and get out there and compete against him,” Golden said.

“He’s a great running back, can run in-between tackles, runs hard,” Golden added.

“The crazy thing about it is he’s really a great receiver, so that’s what you have to watch. You have to watch him out in the backfield, you’ve got to watch him when you line up in the slot.”

One player that Golden is not used to seeing, however, is Cardinals quarterback, Kyler Murray. Golden said that the young quarterback reminds him of Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson.

“He looks like he’s hard to sack out there,” Golden said. 

“When you get a guy like that, you’ve got to be excited to get out there and run them down and get after him. He’s like a running back playing quarterback, so you’re going to have to keep an eye on him, and you’re going to have to have a game plan to be able to get after him.”

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