Film Breakdown - The Blocked Punt

[Chachie]

Three guys could have prevented the block. None of them did enough on the play.

This actually only makes me more in favor of a Danny Smith pink slip. If our breakdowns are from multiple players on the same play it indicates to me that nobody on that squad fears or respects him.

[roanoker]

The trend continues. Danny Smith needs to go.

[SittingBull]

Let's pray this thread doesn't become a weekly occurence.

[GoDeep81]

It's Riley, it's Doughty, it's Gomes, it's Gano, it's Rocca, it's the "Special Teams".. Over and over and over, (someone already said it) it's the entire special teams that are sloppy and undisciplined.. The ST scheme & coaching has got to be addressed at some point, why it never is is the 1,000,000,000 dollar question..

[bedlamVR]

I would tell Pacman.. "Look, i know you returned one 81 yards thru the entire Browns team, but we're rushing ten on every punt. You practice fair catches this week"

~Bang

I think EVERY team is going to be watching our special teams licking their lips and rushing the punter because we have proven we cannot get even our simple protections right . When it is multiple people messing up this week and last week and the coverage is not amazing it does come down to coaching .

Riley and Doughty have been playing special teams for a while so they must know their assignments something tells me there is something lacking in the scheme .

[amm0409]

Heck, Snow and Alexander get clogged up by one guy as well. Iv watched it too many times, two weeks in a row geez "BLOCK"

Its almost like Riley trips and runs straight up field, but Reed just bolts straight up field geez and Gomes is in lah lah land

How does this happen two weeks in a row, especially if no team had more than 1 punts blocked last year? Getting a little ridiculous.

[flexxskins]

Only here can you get break downs like this. Great stuff Dan.

I agree with the majority on the Riley, Gomes thing. Riley totally side stepped his guy and Gomes was much too locked in on a player that didn't even look like he had any intentions on rushing in in the first place.

However, IMHO Doughty is playing his position way too close up to the LOS, and if he was playing it further back both last week and Sunday, I believe that he would have picked those guys up. I mean, isn't the up-back position a type of last line of defense type of position?

Anyway, it all boils down to bad ST's coaching anyway you look at it.

[Missouri_Skins_Fan]

I thought I'd never say this, but I'm afraid we may just need to take more gambles on 4th & short.
Specially, if we are somewhere in the opponents territory. (beyond the 50)

If our punt protection is that bad, I have more confidence in RG3 converting 4th & 2, than Rocco having any room back there. Punt blocks are devastating and turn the game around on ya.

We could have lost the Saints game because of it & you can make a case, we lost the Rams game because of it.

This HAS to stop, now!

Someone needs to be accountable for this...

[RIPSean]

Inexcusable for this to happen 2 weeks in a row. This should be a once a season mistake at most, not a weekly occurrence. After so many times you have to blame coaching.

[SkinsFTW]

At this point I'll just put it all on Mike Shanahan. With the way special teams are now, most kickoffs are touchbacks, negating the so called great Danny Smith coverage units, and our punt coverage units are more than made up for negatively by the fact that we lead the lead in blocks year after year. Even if our coverage is great because of Danny Smith, is it worth all the other BS that really does cost us points in games, seemingly more and more as time goes by? Maybe "leaving early" is what helps us have better than average coverage on punts and thats what other teams have figured out, except Danny Smith is the one who hasn't adjusted.

After the 62 yard FG decision I won't expect Shanahan to get it though. Seemingly the only one who didn't know that Cundiff sucks beyond 50 was Mike Shanahan himself. Cundiff has made 1 50 yard kick since 2006, he's not going to make a 62 yarder, lol. To Mike Shanahan kicking a ball under zero pressure from a tee means that Cundiff can defy everything he has done in his career up till now. If you wanted to even try anything over 50 yards this year then cutting Gano was moronic. You can't blame Gano for the blocks and without them he was among the top kickers last year. Also he's probably 1000x more likely to kick a 62 yarder as well.

[aREDSKIN]

All boils down to poor coaching IMO.

Of course it does. PR is definitely a repeat offender on ST that cost us dearly. Was RD the culprit last week? DS is just not a very good or effective coach.

[Gurgeh]

OK looking at it again (ugh) on the replay from 0:31 to 0:34 Riley is in position to block but he only makes a token effort and gets shoulder charged out the way. At 0:36 Riley is almost down on his hands and knees while the defender is already past him. Riley then gets up and moves downfield. Gomes is staring down his assignment. There's a 1 second window (0:35) where he might have slowed the Ram down with a shove, but Gomes is doing what he should be.

From 0:35 to 0:37 Doughty had a chance to block but he didn't even see the guy, he's on the right-hand side looking right. It's speculation but I wonder if Riley thought the play called had Doughty behind him to finish the block while Riley ran downfield. It looks to me like one of the two of them had the play all wrong - and if it was Doughty, that would explain why Gomes did nothing as well.

[RGIIINATION]

That this is very similar to the blocked kick that occurred in the game against the Saints confirms to me that the ST coach has neither worked enough with his ST unit to make sure they're making their assignments, nor worked with them the week prior to the Rams game to ensure it wouldn't happen again; It did happen again; It resulted in points for the Rams that might have otherwise been avoided.

[G1]

If 3 players are messing up assignments, none of whom are rookies, it's a coaching issue, no doubt.

[Leonard Washington]

If 3 players are messing up assignments, none of whom are rookies, it's a coaching issue, no doubt.

Exactly!