Divisional playoff preview: How the Rams can beat the Buccaneers

You’d be hard-pressed to find a time this season when Rams head coach Sean McVay was happier than he was after his team’s 34-24 Week 3 win over the defending Super Bowl champion Buccaneers. The Rams had traded Jared Goff, two first-round picks, and a third-round pick to the Lions for Matthew Stafford, and this was one instance in which Stafford’s plus-level attributes showed up en masse. McVay had grown tired of Goff hitting his head on his own ceiling, but with Stafford, the Rams had nothing but blue sky, as he completed 27 of 38 passes for 343 yards, four touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 134.0.

Stafford bombed the Bucs’ depleted secondary for three completions on five attempts of 20 or more air yards for 117 yards and a touchdown, and this as close to McVay’s ideal vision for his passing game as you’ll ever see.

“What he’s done through three games, I think his resumé speaks for itself,” the giddy coach said after the game. “He’s done a great job through these three games. And that’s all he can really do. I think he’s just seamlessly accommodated himself or really acclimated himself to being in our building. His teammates love him. His coaches love him. And he just goes about his business. He’s so steady, so consistent. And I just thought he got better as the game progressed. And, you know, love working with him.”

Stafford has had his ups and downs since, and there are clear things about his game that can be countered, but if he’s able to put together a similar performance, and everything else breaks as it did for the Rams in Week 3, there’s a pretty good chance that McVay is about to dethrone the champs and head back to the NFC Championship game for the first time since the 2018 season.

Here’s what the Rams should do in a schematic sense to ensure that the second verse is the same as the first. .

Take advantage whenever Todd Bowles decides to blitz.

(Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports)

In their wild-card round loss to the Rams, the Cardinals decided to blitz Matthew Stafford with some frequency.

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It did not go well for the Cardinals.

It hasn’t gone well for most opponents. Against five or more pass-rushers this season, per Sports Info Solutions, Stafford has completed 85 of 118 passes for 1,031 yards, 530 air yards, 14 touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 138.1. His Positive Play Rate of 59.5% against the blitz is the NFL’s best — Patrick Mahomes ranks second at 58.0%.

This will be a crucial strategic back-and-forth this time around as it was in Week 3.

In the 2021 regular season, no defense blitzed at a higher rate than the Buccaneers’ defense — 40.8% of the time, and the Bucs got a 28.6% pressure rate out of that, which ranked second in the NFL behind the Bills’ 30.8%. But there was something in the Rams’ offense that had defensive coordinator Todd Bowles backing off more than he pinned back the ears of his rushers.

In Week 3, the Buccaneers sent five or more pass-rushers on just 11 of Stafford’s 39 dropbacks, and against the blitz, Stafford completed eight of 10 passes for 81 yards and one of his four touchdowns.

The touchdown was a two-yard pass to Cooper Kupp in which the Bucs, perhaps reading run here, stuffed the middle with bodies, and left Kupp wide open in the left end zone. Any call that leaves Kupp with a small cow pasture around him should probably be checked at the door.

One positive alternative the Buccaneers should throw at Stafford is exchange rushes, as they did on this deep incompletion to Kupp. Here, linebacker Devin White came up in a blitz look and did rush to Stafford’s back side, creating pressure, but end Shaquil Barrett dropped into coverage.

Stafford has had trouble reading things late in the down this season, and the more time he has to think, the better things can be for the defense. But if you blitz and don’t get home, Stafford’s more than savvy enough to take advantage of those openings — as Arians alluded to after the game.

“It’s just a thing we’ve got to iron out. When we’re playing coverage, we’re not rushing and when we’re rushing, we’re not playing coverage.”

Welp. That sums it up, and it can’t happen this time around.

Fill the offensive game plan with empty formations.

(Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports)

The Week 3 game was one of Stafford’s best out of empty formations before things went south — he completed 10 of 14 passes out of empty for 129 yards, 61 air yards, one touchdown, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 123.8. Only five of those attempts came on dropbacks of zero to three steps, so this wasn’t dink-and-dunk.

This played to type, as no team lined up in empty more often this season than the Rams. Stafford completed 107 passes on 168 attempts on 182 empty dropbacks for 1,381 yards, 875 air yards, 13 touchdowns, three interceptions, and a passer rating of 107.8. Things got a bit reductive down the stretch as defenses were able to stop the Rams’ generally static route concepts out of empty, but that wasn’t the case in Week 3, and the Bucs should expect to see a lot of empty again.

This 10-yard touchdown pass to Cooper Kupp was obviously shorter, but you can see how the Rams make empty formations problematic for defenses when the routes break based on coverage. That’s a lot of geometry in a very short time.

Stafford saw blitz on just one of his empty attempts against the Buccaneers, and based on what we know about Stafford against the blitz in general, I’m not sure how much that will change.

Shut down the run game as you did before.

(Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports)

Here’s a Valuable Football Insight: Anytime Tom Brady is your leading rusher in a game, your offense is going to be a bit off-center. That’s what happened in Week 3. Brady ran three times for 14 yards and a touchdown. Ronald Jones II ran five times for 11 yards. Leonard Fournette ran four times for eight yards, and receiver Chris Godwin ran once for a two-yard touchdown. Amazingly, it wasn’t the first time Brady led his team in rushing yards in a game — he led the Patriots with 15 yards and a touchdown on four carries in an 30-23, October 25, 2015 win over the Jets.

The run game kept the Bucs close from a score perspective, but it was the nadir of their search for any kind of balance, and Arians did not appreciate the historical significance. 13 runs for 35 yards isn’t good even if you’re playing catch-up the whole game, which the Bucs were.

“It’s not blocking well enough and not running well enough,” Arians said the day after. “When you’re only getting two, two, two or three [yards] – I mean ‘RoJo’ (Ronald Jones II) had a couple fives – if you’re getting five [yards] you’re going to run it. If you’re getting two or three-[yard runs], throw it. It’s just a matter of what it takes to win the game.”

Well, throwing it didn’t work, either. Brady completed a season-high 41 passes on a season-high 55 attempts for a season-high 432 yards… and one touchdown. He was also sacked three times. When the Bucs did try to run, the Rams countered with bear front after bear front, forcing one-on-ones through the line, and from there, everything turned into Shark Week.

Coming into the rematch, things don’t look great for Tampa Bay’s backs. Fournette is dealing with a hamstring injury, and Jones is one of many Bucs players with ankle issues. Ke’Shawn Vaughn and Giovani Bernard were reasonably productive in the wild-card win over the Eagles, but between the running back and offensive line injuries, this scenario doesn’t look any better for the defending champs.

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