Picture the biggest and most powerful machine you can—a tank, maybe, or a 747, or a gigantic assembly line that never stops rolling. It doesn’t matter, really. Now picture that machine breaking down. You know it happens. Everything breaks.
It may not always be true that the bigger they are the harder they fall—but they do all fall. There’s always a weak spot—a wire you can disconnect, a gear you can jam. An NFL team is no different. The best of them are constructed with the express aim of becoming ruthlessly efficient machines, but they’re still vulnerable. There are a lot of things we don’t know about the eight teams beginning a playoff run this weekend, but they all have at least one weakness, at least one spot where a well-placed wrench can foul up the whole thing.
So before those weaknesses are exploited—or not—Saturday and Sunday, we thought we’d take a stab at finding them. Here is how you beat each of the eight teams taking to the field on wild card weekend. And it’s a funny thing, but often their weaknesses are right next to their strengths.
So, here’s how to beat the…
San Diego Chargers: The Chargers are not exactly a quality playoff team—so it’s hard to pick just one weakness. Their defence as a whole is not playoff calibre, especially their linebacker corps. Beyond Keenan Allen they lack reliable receivers and while Ryan Mathews has just put in the best four-week stretch of his career, it’s been despite his offensive line and not because of it. There’s a fairly simple formula for beating the Chargers: You need a cornerback who can lock down Allen and a defensive front seven that can exploit San Diego’s blocking deficiencies. Once Rivers is desperately looking for Eddie Royal, Vincent Brown or an ancient Antonio Gates as the pocket collapses around him, you’re three-fourths of the way to ending the Chargers season. Just make sure you lock down Allen. Seriously.
Green Bay Packers: Throw the ball. Do it methodically. Take your time, plant your feet, move through your progressions and then throw it. Someone will be open. The Packers are without their best pass rusher in Clay Matthews, and even with him in the lineup for about half the season, they could still only manage the NFL’s 26th best pass rush. Their best cornerback, according to Pro Football Focus, is the mediocre Tramon Williams, who ranks 39th in their grading system. Williams tends to play the slot, which leaves Sam Shields and rookie Micah Hyde attempting to hold down the outside—which means that opportunities will always be there for a quarterback who can assess the field and make smart decisions. Oh, and it wouldn’t hurt to show defensive coordinator Dom Capers a look or three he’s not seen during the regular season—that tends to baffle and confuse him.
Philadelphia Eagles: Meet Patrick Chung. Mr. Chung, a former New England Patriot, is one of the very worst safeties in football. To paraphrase a classic slacker comedy, he wasn’t even supposed to be here today. The Eagles would love to have Earl Wolff on the field. But he’s hurt. Wolff had come on lately, but wasn’t exactly an All-Pro himself, grading out 54th of 86 qualifying safeties according to Pro Football Focus. Chung, however, is ranked 71st. The Eagles secondary has not been strong this season, but replacing Wolff with Chung—again, as Wolff had won Chung’s job from him earlier in the year—only makes it more burnable. Put it this way: Chung wasn’t even an every-down player this year, but when he was asked to play in coverage, only four safeties in the NFL allowed more than the five touchdowns his men scored. It’s a good thing there’s so few quarterbacks in these playoffs who can recognize weak link in a secondary and exploit it…
Indianapolis Colts: Stop Robert Mathis. That’s it. That’s the flaw. Well, Mathis is a strength—but most of what’s around him is the flaw. When the NFL’s sack leader isn’t getting pressure on the quarterback, the rest of the Colts defence is ordinary at best, borderline incompetent at worst. The secondary is beatable, and doesn’t make a lot of big plays. The Colts are 25th in the NFL, allowing 4.5 yards per carry on the ground and 21st in the NFL giving up 7.4 yards per attempt in the air. They have, however, sacked opposing quarterbacks 42 times (11th in the NFL, 19.5 of those from Mathis) and forced 23 fumbles (second in the leagues, with eight of those from Mathis). Chip him, help on him, try some read option or quick-release West Coast passing to limit his impact. Whatever you need to do to keep the Colts defence from coalescing around the pressure he delivers. Do that, and Indy’s defence is somewhat less than fearsome.
Kansas City Chiefs: Get to Alex Smith. This plan will get tougher with the return of left tackle Brandon Albert from a knee injury, but it’s still the recipe for beating KC. Smith’s pedigree—though it’s somewhat overblown as a calling card—is his methodical approach, but that approach wavers under pressure. Usually one of the more accurate QBs in the league, Smith is also among the league leaders in the amount of time he gets to throw before the rush arrives—but once it does, he turns fairly ordinary, ranking solidly middle-to-low end of the pack in both completion and accuracy percentage, as well as how often he gets sacked. Opposing defences know it, too, which is why the screen pass to Jamaal Charles has been so effective for the Chiefs, as defenders go all out to get pressure on the quarterback a short dump off can prove deadly. If KC’s opponents can pressure Smith consistently however, he’ll be much less likely to pick them apart on short to medium throws.
New Orleans Saints: Get the Saints away from the Superdome, where they’re a totally different team, and a lot of your work is done for you. The Saints’ well-olied offensive machine averages 17.8 points on the road, just over half of what they average at home. But there are other ways to make the Saints look ordinary—their defence, much improved from last year’s historic level of awfulness, is vulnerable through the air, especially when Rob Ryan, as he so often does, sends a ridiculous number of defenders after the quarterback. Both rookie safety Kenny Vaccaro (who is done for the season with a broken ankle) and veteran safety Roman Harper (who takes his place) where among the safety leaders in how often they were asked to get after the quarterback. Whether it’s because they’re blitzing and out of position, or because Harper’s dropped back into coverage, where he has struggled for much of his career, the Saints are vulnerable to big passing plays. And that’s not a good look on the road, against high-powered offences, when you’re scoring half the points you do at home.
Cincinnati Bengals: Confuse Andy Dalton. It’s not that difficult. Dalton is one of those quarterbacks who is competent enough to bring a good team to the playoffs, and just bad enough to make everyone question how far they’ll go once they get there—kind of like, gulp, Joe Flacco last season. But while Flacco’s resume included a section about being careful with the football, Dalton’s most assuredly does not. When everything’s going well for Dalton, he can be one of the better non-elite QBs in the league. He’s got a nice array of weaponry and uses it effectively, and he’s especially adept at pouring it on once the Bengals get a rhythm going. But here’s the thing—Dalton throws picks, 20 of them this season, fifth in the NFL and the only quarterback in the top ten to make the playoffs. He can be baited into bad throws by creative coverage and once he throws one pick, it’s highly likely he’ll throw a second. If you can flummox him early, there’s a decent chance he’ll spend the rest of the game second-guessing his reads and wondering if he’s being tricked again—then you’ve got Cincy exactly where you want them.
San Francisco 49ers: The toughest team among those taking the field this weekend, the 49ers are relatively complete—relatively. It would have been easy a month ago to call Colin Kaepernick’s inconsistency their fatal flaw, but since Michael Crabtree returned to the lineup he’s performed better than at any time since last season’s playoff run. The Cardinals offered perhaps the best glimpse at how to beat the December version of the 49ers last week, selling out to stop the run and draping their best cornerback all over Crabtree. But not many teams have a Patrick Peterson to give that task to, and unlike the Chargers, the 49ers can turn to Anquan Boldin when Crabtree is blanketed. Still, there are lessons to be learned from Arizona’s attempt: The Cardinals began that game by holding back the pass rush, and Kaepernick responded with a near-perfect first quarter that gave San Fran a two-score lead. When the Cardinals started blitzing, Kaepernick completed less than half of his passes. It’s going to take a standout performance from at least one member of the secondary, and consistent pressure from the front seven, but the 49ers offence, even with Crabtree, still isn’t built to play shootout football. If an opponent takes an early lead, then starts throwing multiple rushers at the quarterback, San Francisco could be in trouble.