49ers film room - How Kyle Shanahan sequences play calling part 1, 1 and 2-back running game and play action
Part 1 of this series looks at how the 1-back and 2-back running game and play action work together to create explosive pass plays
Earlier in the offseason, tight end George Kittle spent some time talking about the structure of the offense with Steven Ruiz and Kevin Clark on The Ringer Slow News Day podcast. He gave a lot of good tidbits into the mind of Kyle Shanahan and how he structures his play calling through the run and play action passing game and how everything they do sets up something they want to do later in the game.
Each play in the run or play action passing game is called with specific goals in mind: to reveal the defense’s intent with certain blocking schemes, to see how they’ll fit the run, and see what kinds of adjustments they’ll make and how they’ll line up later against certain formations.
There are two ways they do this: 1) through the running plays Kittle says that Kyle knows won’t work over and over and 2) through play action pass plays to see how the defensive ends and force players are going to fit the run to that side.
“We played Seattle in the playoffs this year and Kyle is just saying where like if he wants to set up like a play action or a bootleg type of pass, sometimes he'll just call a play that he knows is not going to work. I can't remember what game this was. I want to say it might have been like the Vikings one year, Seattle this year. Like we're running a run play multiple times and it's having like 2 yards per carry, 2 yards per carry, 2 yards per carry. And then we threw a play action behind it and Deebo goes for 75 yards against Seattle. And the whole thing is set up because it's the exact same motion, it's the exact same alignment, it looks exactly the same. And all of a sudden Deebo’s running the shallow. I'm faking like on the defensive end. Linebacker thinks it's power, he steps up 4 yards and Deebo's uncovered in the flat running for a touchdown.”
A couple of years ago, Joe Staley told Brandon Thorn of Trench Warfare how the play action pass helps with the run game keys:
“Guys would play completely different against us than they would show on film the whole year. So you’d have a chance early on with keepers to see how a guy would fit us on the frontside, see if that defensive end would play through the tight end on that frontside combination, come through my outside shoulder, or if he really is going to compress it outside on the tight end.”
In the same interview segment above with Kittle on the Ringer, Kittle talked about a scenario Shanahan showed the team on tape of his time in Atlanta and how they ran a sequence of plays in the run and play action pass that all looked the same. He said it was against Minnesota but my watch back of that game didn’t include the sequence the way he described it.
2016 Falcons play call sequencing
I set out and searched game logs for something similar and landed on the game and sequence I’m 99% sure is the correct one and it was in 2016 versus the Panthers late in the season. In back to back plays, Shanahan called play action passes that were pretty well covered, one ended up incomplete and the other ended up in a sack on Matt Ryan, nearly identical to how Kittle described it.
In this game, Shanahan called a ton of 2 back sets and ran a variety of wide zone, inside zone, and man blocking scheme runs before he called play action off of it. This had the effect of getting the LBs to react aggressively and much quicker over time throughout the game.
In the clips, Shanahan strictly adhered to 21 personnel I-slot and traditional I-formations with the occasional offset I-formation in there. Some variation of these formations were used in six play calls before Shanahan ever called play action from it.
On the play action pass called after this series of run calls, a concept in the Shanahan offense called “burner” or “yankee” as it’s commonly known, notice how the linebackers quickly flow to the line of scrimmage on seeing the run action.
Despite evidence that shows play action is effective without the run game, there is still no substitute for this kind of sequencing in a live game because defenders still have to react and Shanahan isn’t necessarily defying the data but rather playing a game of chess where he knows what his opponents next moves are going to be. For the defense, it’s still a guessing game with no easy indicators to key off of, and they’d better guess right.
Later in the game, Shanahan called 2 straight play action passes from these similar formations, and this time the Panthers were ready for it, expertly covering the routes and forcing Matt Ryan into a completion and then into a sack on the next play.
On the same drive, at mid field where teams will usually take a play action shot, Shanahan went back to the under center run game and called a wide zone run, “18 Release”, a strong side 2-back run with the tight end blocking the designated #1 on the end of the line of scrimmage and the fullback blocking the designated #2
Linebacker Luke Kuechly (No. 56) hesitated just enough at the snap with his initial read step toward the line of scrimmage in preparation for a play action pass, that he was unable to fast flow and get out to the edge of the defense. Tevin Coleman gets out behind his blockers and cuts up the field between his fullback and tight end and it’s off to the races.
Fast forward to 2022 in the wildcard game versus Seattle. Brock Purdy had taken over as quarterback several weeks prior and by this point a lot of the structure of Kyle Shanahan’s offense since that 2016 season has evolved. But the same basic principles still remain: keep presenting the same formations and offensive line movement whether it is a run play or play action pass.
Remember the very first Kittle quote from The Ringer podcast above? It wasn’t quite as Kittle remembered it, but the plays illustrate how Shanahan makes everything look the same and how eventually they’re able to get an explosive pass off presenting those same looks. And they did it out a 1 and 2 back formation running plays.
1-back running game and play action
In the single back running game, the 49ers set up a play action throw off of a wide zone concept to the same side. The idea is to get the run to the edge and get the force defender, the corner in cover-3 versus closed or nub-side formations, to come up and play the run.
The play call is likely “Wendy Bluff” or some kind of weak side wide zone run with a bluff tag. The “bluff” being the bluff block here by Kyle Juszczyk on the defensive end to get him to hesitate in setting the edge and allowing the blocker to kick him out. It sounds cliche, but show them enough times the same run from the same formation and they will overly and aggressively pursue it.
They ran it four more times before hitting the Seahawks over the top on a go route from the same weak side zone flow run action.
This is a play call that Shanahan killed Seattle with in week 15 versus Seattle in the Thursday night game. It’s a two vertical play action concept that is designed to put the outside corner in conflict where he has a deep third responsibility but also is the force defender as the outermost player versus the run. You can read more about this here from last season.
Instead of a closed two tight end formation, the 49ers come out in 11 personnel here with Jauan Jennings running the outside vertical to the sideline.
Seattle is in cover-3 with their strong side corner, Tariq Woolen, the force defender up on the line of scrimmage. It is a tough assignment for a corner to execute at the line of scrimmage where there is no detached receiver because the second they realize that it’s not a run play, they have to turn and locate the receiver they’re covering.
Woolen does everything right. He gets outside Jennings when he sees the run fake, that’s what he’s coached to do as the force, to try and turn everything back inside. As soon as he does though, Jennings runs downfield after he sells the run block on Woolen. Woolen is unable to get back and Jennings is wide open for a 28 yard gain.
2-back running game and play action
Also against Seattle in the same wildcard playoff game last season, the 49ers hit the Seahawks with a heavy dose of 18-19 Force.
“Force” designates the F (fullback in 21 personnel) to block the SAM linebacker if he’s on the ball outside the tight end and to block the safety coming down if the SAM is off the ball or is on the ball but lined up over the tight end.
Here, the same is on the ball over Kittle so Juszczyk’s track takes him on a path to block the safety coming down into the box as a run support defender.
I charted this play only three total times in the game but the Seahawks were aggressive on defense when they saw it coming at the edge thanks to this play and a variety of other zone running schemes. The perfect set-up for the play action pass off of this is FK 18 Force Keep LT Z Shallow, and it led to a 74-yard catch and run touchdown.
This is the 74-yard touchdown catch and run by Deebo Samuel that Kittle mentioned way above when describing the element of the play action looking like the run game. Shanahan is good at exploiting a team’s coverage rules and he’s put Seattle defenders in a blender more times than anyone they’ve played in 6 years as head coach (just due to being a division rival). And this play was no exception.
The 49ers create a 4-strong receiver distribution from 21 personnel again just before the snap. The pre-snap alignment/numbers the defense is counting go from the outermost wide receiver (#1), the tight end (#2), fullback (#3), and running back (#4). The 49ers are running a play action concept with wide zone flow to the offense’s right before the crossing routes cross to the left side of the field.
The defense is in “cover-6 sky” or “cover-6 skate” (Nick Saban coverage term” where the back side weak side safety Ryan Neal (No. 26) has coverage responsibility on the #4 (CMC) if the running back is out to his side of the formation and if he’s not, then he has to locate the first crossing route. On top of this, he has run keys he has to read before he reads pass.
Since McCaffrey is out away from Neal in the route distribution after the play action fake, Neal should be looking for Deebo. But Neal was aggressively chasing a potential cutback on a running play that he would be responsible for if Purdy handed the ball off. Deebo gets open in the space where the weak safety vacated to come downhill and Purdy tosses it out to him.
Neal might have blown the coverage responsibility here, but the more egregious aspect of this play is that if Seattle felt like they had a shot to get back into this game with plenty of time in the fourth quarter, over 11 minutes, the tackling attempts showed the audience and themselves that they pretty much threw in the towel on this one. Deebo evaded nearly every defender on his way to a 76 yard touchdown catch and run and he didn’t even look like he was running full speed. Also Brandon Aiyuk had a great downfield block on the corner.
In part two, we’ll look at some run-pass option tags and how the 49ers get to them through the running game.