SANTA CLARA — The 49ers have one of the best play-action-passing attacks in the league. But they haven’t used it nearly as much this season as they have in the past because defenses have figured out how to discourage the 49ers from calling those plays in the first place.
Simply put six defenders on the line of scrimmage and the 49ers will check to a drop-back pass almost every time. So this week, I asked running game coordinator and offensive line coach Chris Foerster about this trend.
“Why are play action passes difficult to execute against defenses that are putting six defenders on the line of scrimmage?” I asked.
“I’ll put it this way,” Foerster said. “A lot of play action passes you’re selling a run where you’re able to actually help each other, right? So you can come off the ball like a run and there’s people to help and protect you. When all of a sudden you have five or six-man blocks, how aggressive can you really be when all of a sudden if I go after a guy, he just jumps inside or jumps outside, I have to temper what I do a little bit more. So while the ball action may still show, how aggressive can I really be? We had one a couple weeks ago we called one that was a play two weeks ago, Arizona, it might have been last week too. I can’t remember the week. It was second and 18. And we called a play, sort of a play action pass kind of play. And I’m always like, ‘hey, at your own risk, bro’ because it’s like second and 18, I’m not sure they’re buying the run. It’s like the three-technique last week that beat Jake up the field that Colton probably could have helped him on. Like I say, my fault, not Colton’s. They’re probably not playing the run on third-and-two or three, even though we’ve run the run, they’re not going to honor it as much on third-and-two to three. Same thing with the play action. So situationally, five or six-line of scrimmage you’re not having help, where so many of our play action passes there’s help inside so you can come off the ball a little bit harder and then when you don’t have the help, you come off the ball a little less. So all of a sudden you take five or six guys not able to come off the ball as hard, it’s harder to sell the runs.”
TRANSLATION: Against a four-man defensive front, the 49ers will have one double-team block and three man-to-man blocks in a play-action pass. The two offensive linemen executing the double team block can do so aggressively without fear of getting beaten which sells the run. But against a six-man front, there is no double team. Every blocker is on his own. And if one of those blockers whiffs while trying to sell play action, Purdy could get hit before he turns around and sees what’s coming.
Of course, the 49ers could put extra blockers in the backfield to create a numbers advantage, but Shanahan would rather go with an empty backfield and abandon the run game and play action entirely because he’s a genius.
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