Eagles vs. Cardinals: Breaking Down Arizona's Game Plan

The Arizona Cardinals take on the Philadelphia Eagles this week in a key NFC battle. The Eagles are tied with the Dallas Cowboys for the top spot in the NFC East at 6-5, while the 7-4 Cardinals are just on the outside of the playoffs looking in.

Philadelphia is fresh off of a bye week, so it should be ready to run its high-speed offense under the direction of head coach Chip Kelly with fresh legs. The Cardinals have won four in a row riding the arm of quarterback Carson Palmer to wins. 

Both teams need this win to boost their chances of making the playoffs but only one will get it. Let’s take a look at what the Cardinals need to do on both sides of the ball to come out on top.

Defensive Game Plan

1. Keep Your Eyes on the Ball

It’s no secret that the Eagles like to run the offense that head coach Chip Kelly used at the University of Oregon. It’s fast-paced, high-scoring and relies on a lot of misdirection. This becomes even more difficult to defend against near the goal line.

Let’s take a look at two Philadelphia touchdowns from their Week 11 game against the Washington Redskins.

On this play, quarterback Nick Foles fakes the hand off to running back LeSean McCoy (white circle). Foles knows there is wide-open space to the right of his position.

The defender in the yellow box closest to the play-action fake has to make a quick decision. Does he go after Foles or McCoy? He picks McCoy, but Foles has the ball.

Foles looks to run to the right, but the safety (yellow box on goal line) has come up to try and plug the hole. He overruns the play a little bit, but it forces Foles to come back inside. The safety gets a hold of him, but it doesn’t slow Foles down enough before he stretches the ball over the goal line for the score.

That’s the kind of misdirection that will cause the Arizona defense confusion. The Cardinals have to know who has the ball at all times. There should be a defender who is able to get into the backfield on each play like we showed above. He needs to be able to see the ball and call out who has it so his teammates know who to go after.

In this second play, wide receiver DeSean Jackson (red arrow) runs in motion just behind the offensive line. Jackson’s motion looks like he could run in front of Foles and take the ball on a wide receiver sweep. Instead, he changes course and heads behind Foles and McCoy to be nothing more than a decoy.

The safety bites on the motion and drifts to his right (yellow arrow) which gives the Eagles what they want. The path is now clear for McCoy (white line) to take the hand off and dart up the middle untouched for six points.

Motion, like play action, is designed to expose defensive coverage schemes, and the Redskins took the bait on this play. Arizona needs to do an excellent job of disguising its coverage to keep the Eagles guessing.

2. Bring Pressure Up The Middle

On this play, we’ll see what happens when the offensive line of the Eagles has a problem.

Safety Reed Doughty, No. 37, drifts back in coverage on the tight end (white line).

McCoy switches to the right side of Foles before going out on a wheel route. Ryan Kerrigan, No. 91, flares out from his linebacker spot to cover McCoy. This is where the problem starts on this play. The right tackle (red line) drops back in pass protection but has nobody to block. The other four linemen have their blocks, but linebacker London Fletcher, No. 59, is not accounted for.

There are no other backs to help Foles after McCoy left. Fletcher takes a step to his left to freeze the tackle before cutting back to the right (blue arrow). Fletcher is able to get a good head of steam up before he drills Foles for an eight-yard sack. The ball also came out on this play, but Foles was ruled down before it did.

The other reason the pressure needs to come up the middle is less apparent. With Foles running nearly every play out of the shotgun, it creates an interesting situation. In order to run the read option effectively, Foles and McCoy have to run together or stand still for a second to pull the fake off.

That gives Arizona the green light to shoot through the A-gaps (between the guards and center) to try and blow it up in the backfield. In reviewing the tape of the Week 11 game, it showed that the fake occurred between the hash marks on nearly every play.

Without an extra back to slow down the rush, the Cardinals should be able to pressure Foles and disrupt the read option.

Offensive Game Plan

1. Take Your Time

The by-product of Philadelphia’s lightning-quick offense is they are the worst team in the league in terms of time of possession, according to the statistics on NFL.com. 

The Eagles hold onto the ball for an average of 25:16 per game. Their opponents get the other 34:44 with the pigskin. Arizona needs to milk as much of the clock as possible. This would be a great week to see the ground game continue to build on its recent efforts and be more productive. Arizona should also look to have receivers stay in bounds to keep the clock running. Look for more passes toward the tight end position and running backs coming out of the backfield.

Football is a game of time management. In this case, the Cardinals are going to have a surplus of it. The best thing they can do is not snap the ball until there are fewer than three seconds left on the play clock. This takes time off of the game clock and it does another important thing. It allows the defense to get time to rest if the Cardinals can wind the play clock down before snapping the ball.

That idea also takes us into the second point on the game plan.

2. Convert Third Downs

The Cardinals are one of the worst teams in football when it comes to third downs. The ESPN.com stats show Arizona is 28^th in the league with a 33.3-percent success rate on third down.

Arizona needs to start picking up third downs in this game to extend drives and let the Philadelphia offense stand on the sidelines.

Examining the data on third down on Pro-Football-Reference.com shows a couple of startling trends.

First, the Cardinals average 7.41 yards to go on third down. Arizona doesn’t get many easy 3^rd-and-short situations. Because of this, they pass nearly six times more than they run on third down (118 passes to 20 runs). Palmer has been sacked 13 times on third down this season which has killed drives.

If Arizona can’t convert on third down, it will be the opening the Eagles need to get back on the field and pile on the points.

The game plan could focus on just these two things on each side of the ball. Arizona could send Philadelphia to 1-5 at home this season if they are able to follow through.