Commanders defense in shambles vs Bears

Breaking down the horrific performance from the Commanders defense against the Bears

The honeymoon period for Josh Harris and his ownership group is officially over. The Washington Commanders have been relatively competitive through the first four games of the season and after a loss to the Eagles where young quarterback Sam Howell stood out, there was a lot of optimism around the team ahead of a very winnable three game stretch. That stretch started on Thursday night in prime time, at home against the 0-4 Bears, who had the longest active losing streak in the NFL going into the game. 

It was a perfect opportunity to build on some momentum and really get the fans back on side with this new ownership group. However, the team put on an awful performance in front of a sold out stadium. They were down 27-3 at half time and despite a third quarter comeback from the offense, ended up losing the game 40-20. The offensive struggles are somewhat understandable to an extent. They have a young quarterback in his sixth career start, fifth in this system, playing on a short week for the first time. That situation is likely to provide some ups and downs. 

On the defensive side of the ball, however, that performance is totally unacceptable. This is the fourth year in this defensive system under Ron Rivera and Jack Del Rio. They have six first-round picks invested in the defense and multiple other assets invested on that side of the ball too. For them to give up 27 points in a half against an 0-4 team is disgraceful. 

So what exactly went wrong for the Commanders defense in this game? Let’s dive in and take a closer look. 

Run Game Concerns

The Commanders game plan was clearly built around trying to stop the run. The Bears have been a run-first team so far this season with their top two running backs and quarterback Justin Fields all averaging about five yards a carry so far this season. In the passing game, they survive leaning heavily on wide receiver DJ Moore and tight end Cole Kmet. No other wide receiver or tight end has double digit catches so far this season, which gives you some perspective on just how heavily their passing game relies on them. 

With that in mind, it made sense to load up the box and with an extra safety and try to stop the run, especially with the added threat of Justin Fields and read-option schemes. The problem was that when the Commanders loaded up the box, they didn’t always fit the run very well. 

This run came on the Bears second drive of the game. The send a receiver in motion from right to left, which causes the defense to rotate in response. Emmanuel Forbes rotates deep to replace safety Kam Curl who starts deep and rotates across to match the receiver in motion. Fellow safety Darrick Forrest also steps up towards the box as the eighth man in the box. At the snap of the ball, the Commanders are relatively sound defensively in theory. They have eight defenders in the box against seven blockers. 

Normally that would mean they can account for every single gap, but Fields adds one extra gap in the run game by being a threat to carry on read-option plays. To try and account for that threat of Fields keeping it, the Commanders use Forrest on the edge to account for Fields keeping outside and execute a stunt between Daron Payne and Montez Sweat to try and confuse the blocking scheme and steal back a gap in favor of the defense. 

Unfortunately, this stunt doesn’t work. Sweat ends up getting shoved inside while Payne gets pushed out to the edge. Linebacker Cody Barton attempts to crash the gap inside but ends up in the same gap as Sweat while Forrest is already on the edge accounting for Fields keeping the ball on the read-option. That results in Washington effectively having four defenders covering two gaps, which leaves a huge lane open for the running back to cut into on his way to a 34-yard run. 

The threat of the run game with the quarterback running element gave the defense a lot of issues. This is a defense that lives in two-deep safety looks pre-snap, enabling them to play zone and match coverage concepts behind a stout defensive line. But whenever they used that type of look against the Bears, the Bears were more than happy to lean into the run game and take their easy gains to stay ahead of the chains. 

Here we have an early example of Del Rio switching back to their defensive structure. The Commanders are in a nickel package with Benjamin St-Juste in the slot, Emmanuel Forbes and Kendall Fuller outside and safeties Kam Curl and Darrick Forrest back deep. This makes them more sound against the pass, but leaves them very light in the box. They have just six defenders in the box against six blockers. The Commanders do typically see this kind of look and are happy to deal with it most times, but the issue here is the added threat of Fields. 

When it’s six on six, the offense has one extra gap in their advantage normally, which can be made up by a defender making a good play, the defensive line stunting in a certain way or just having one defender using a two-gap technique. But when the offense has the added threat of a quarterback running, they effectively add an extra blocker because the front has to be able to account for him keeping the ball too. 

Here we can see from the end zone replay angle how the linebackers are staring at Fields in the backfield and are looking for him to keep the ball. Jamin Davis scrapes to the edge expecting Fields to keep the ball while Barton has to then take the inside gap that Davis would normally cover. That leaves the B gap between the left tackle and left guard wide open for the running back to work into. St-Juste, to his credit, does a great job reading run and working inside to fill that gap and make a tackle, but the Bears still managed five yards on the play before he got there. 

Whenever the Commanders went with two deep safeties, leaving them light in the box, the Bears did a great job manipulating the run look strongly into their favor. 

On this play, the Bears use two tight ends to the right of the formation and have a receiver aligned in a tight split to that side too. The Commanders respond by working out of their buffalo nickel package with Kam Curl in the nickel as a big nickel and two safeties back deep behind him. The receiver is sent in motion across the formation and the Commanders second level defenders all shuffle across a gap as a result. This means Curl shuffles inside to replace Barton, Barton shuffles across to replace Davis and Davis works outside to match the receiver in motion. 

When the ball is snapped, you can see the issues this causes the Commanders defense. Not only were they starting the play light in the box because they kept two safeties deep, Davis was also manipulated out of the box by the motion. This left the Bears with seven blockers in the box and the Commanders only having six defenders in the box to try and stop the run. With that type of numbers advantage, the Bears are able to generate double teams up front to help secure Daron Payne and Jonathan Allen. Curl and Barton are both slightly late to step up and fill their gaps, but Washington was outnumbered anyway. The left guard works off his double team on Allen and picks up Barton, swallowing him up and driving him outside to open a huge lane for the running back. 

So against the run, the Commanders were in a bind. Whenever they went light in the box, as they typically do, they got manipulated into bad looks and struggled. That resulted in them loading the box more with an extra safety to try and even up the numbers game, which largely saw them do better overall, but still had plays where they struggled as we saw on that 34-yard run earlier. However, there was a significant knock on effect of loading up the box.

Man Coverage Issues

This Commanders defense has been built around rushing their incredibly talented four defensive lineman up front and being able to drop seven into zone and match coverage schemes. They live in two-deep safety looks and corners like Kendall Fuller and Emmanuel Forbes added on the basis that they fit playing zone and match coverages better than man coverage because they suit playing off coverage with vision on the quarterback. 

Against the Bears, however, the structure of the defense changed. Because they felt the need to bring a safety down in the box to help them deal with the run, they could only play with one safety back deep. Now, there are still zone and match concepts you can run from this look, but the Commanders opted to play mostly man coverage. 

This is something we’ve been seeing more frequently from Washington of late, with rookie Emmanuel Forbes in particular getting tasked with some tough man coverage assignments against Stefon Diggs, A.J. Brown and then DJ Moore on Thursday night. It feels like an odd strategy given they drafted him on the premise he fit their zone and match coverage system. It feels almost like the reverse of the William Jackson III situation, where Jackson was signed in free agency as a good man coverage corner and then asked to play zone, where he struggled. 

Somewhat predictably, Forbes struggled against Moore when asked to cover him one-on-one in man coverage. 

These were two almost identical reps from Forbes against Moore. On both plays, Moore aligns to the right of the formation with Forbes across from him. The Commanders attempt to disguise their coverage on both plays pre-snap, showing two deep safeties but actually rotating to one deep safety just before the snap. Forrest rotates back deep and Curl steps up to match the tight end. This leaves Forbes with very little help against Moore, one of the best and most underrated receivers in the league. 

That doesn’t excuse how Forbes played these two reps. On both plays he got beat by Moore, who used a nice throw-by move to help generate multiple yards of separation before Forbes could recover and close. On the first play, Forbes gave up the catch and then compounded the mistake by failing to wrap up Moore and allowing him to break free of his tackle attempt and burst down the sideline for an extra 30 yards after the catch. 

On the second play, Forbes got out of the break a lot quickly but got greedy trying to make a play on the football. This is his natural instinct and a big part of why they drafted him, because he has a nose for the ball and is always looking to make plays, but here it costs him as he looks to undercut the throw and can’t quite get his hand on the ball. That allows Moore to secure the pass and burst up the sideline without having to break a tackle this time and would have likely resulted in a touchdown had he not have been judge to have marginally stepped out of bounds.

Forbes wasn’t the only one to struggle against Moore though. 

On the third play of the game, Benjamin St-Juste matched up against Moore in press man coverage. St-Juste looks to be patient off the snap, waiting for Moore to declare his intentions before reacting. Moore pauses at the snap and then bursts inside. St-Juste opts against trying to jam him and instead attempts to stay on his outside hip. Unfortunately, St-Juste then loses track of Moore as Moore runs his route. After gaining a step, Moore fakes a break inside on a basic cross which St-Juste bites heavily on. St-Juste is in recovery mode so he desperately works inside to attempt to undercut the break inside, but Moore suddenly takes off vertically and runs away from St-Juste. 

St-Juste is only saved by Forrest, who works over from the deep middle of the field to run down Moore on the sideline and save the touchdown, but the Bears still picked up 58-yards on a third and nine play. 

After St-Juste got beat early, it was mostly on Forbes to match up against Moore, and we’ve already seen the result of that. After his second instance of getting beat on a curl route by Moore, the Commanders benched their first-round pick and replaced him with veteran Danny Johnson. Amazingly though, the Commanders game plan didn’t change. Just a few plays into replacing Forbes, Johnson was matched up against Moore.

Here, the Bears line up Moore outside to the left of the formation. Back up cornerback Danny Johnson follows Moore outside, despite Kendall Fuller and St-Juste both still on the field. Moore runs a double move, getting to about seven or eight yards of depth before stuttering, selling a break. Johnson bites on the break and that’s all Moore needs to run by him down the sideline. Fortunately for Washington the pass was overthrown and Moore couldn’t quite catch up to it, but I have no idea why Johnson was put in that situation to begin with. 

I understand benching Forbes to take him out of the firing line. He’s had a rough week with how the Eagles went after him and then how Moore beat him a few times. But to not change the plan at all after benching Forbes and just expecting a back up corner to do a better job is ludicrous. At that point they really should have switched up the plan or at least put one of St-Juste or Fuller on Moore instead. That is indefensible from the coaching staff.

Unfortunately it didn’t stop there either. After getting back into the game and closing the deficit down to 30-20, the defense was on the verge of another stop that would get the offense the ball back with about four minutes remaining. On third and two, the Commanders expected the Bears to run the ball and keep the clock running, so Del Rio stacked the box with every available player, leaving Fuller on Moore. 

This rep played out remarkably similar to the second rep by Forbes in the clip above. Moore runs a quick hitch route against Fuller in off-coverage. Fuller reads the route well and breaks on it sharply, looking to undercut the route. Had he got there, there’s every chance Fuller takes that ball all the way back for a pick-six that could have completely changed the game. Unfortunately, the throw from Fields is just slightly out of reach of Fuller. Moore does a great job extending his hands away from his body and going up to make a play over the top of Fuller and because Fuller attempted the undercut, much like Forbes, he left Moore with a completely free run down the sideline for a 56-yard touchdown that ended any hopes of a comeback. 

The game plan from Washington has to come under heavy scrutiny here. Very few players actually played well, but they were also being put in bad positions. Forbes and Fuller aren’t man coverage cornerbacks, this team and this staff knows that. The run defense was consistently being manipulated into favorable run looks by the Bears and the only way Del Rio’s defense attempted to stop it was loading the box with an extra safety and playing man coverage behind it. Loading the box didn’t help as well as it should have and the man coverage got torn apart. 

There are plenty of other ways to load the box and still play zone coverage, or even a bracket coverage on Moore, who was the only wide receiver to make a catch in this game. But Del Rio consistently exposed his corners, including his back ups, in one-on-one situations against one of the better receivers in the league and was rightly punished for it. It’s easy to want to trash everyone and say this defense is terrible, because it was terrible in this game. But there is an incredible amount of talent on the defensive side of the ball and for them to put in that performance in their fourth year in this system against an 0-4 team looking to break the longest active losing streak in the NFL, at home, in prime time, speaks volumes of the job this coaching staff is currently doing.