When the Detroit Lions travel to U.S. Bank Stadium to meet the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, Lions quarterback Jared Goff will be dealing with a defense like no other in the NFL, though led by a defensive coordinator in Brian Flores who has had Goff’s number through several different teams and defensive iterations.
The last time Goff faced a defense created by Flores, it was November 1, 2020. Goff was the Los Angeles Rams’ quarterback, and Flores was the Miami Dolphins’ head coach and defensive shot-caller. And in the end, it was an absolute nightmare for Goff. Flores threw all kinds of blitzes and coverages at him, but Miami’s Cover-0 blitzes specifically drove Goff nuts — and into the throes of a 28-17 loss. Goff attempted 61 passes in that game, completing 35 of 61 passes for 355 yards, one touchdown, two interceptions, two fumbles (one of which was returned for a touchdown), and a passer rating of 65.9.
The time before that was Super Bowl LIII at the end of the 2018 season. Things were no better for Goff in that game. Then, Flores, the New England Patriots’ defensive coordinator, did a brilliant job of flipping his defenses at the 15-second mark of the play clock, when head coach Sean McVay was no longer allowed to speak to Goff in his helmet headset. Goff completed 19 f 38 passes for 229 yards, no touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 57.9. The Patriots beat the Rams 10-3, and the Rams tied the Dolphins in Super Bowl VI for the lowest score in any Super Bowl.
Now, Goff has to solve a Flores defense that has planted its schematic identity at the four corners of the earth. This season, the Vikings have by far sent three or fewer rushers at the quarterback more than any other team, and they have by far sent six or more rushers more than any other team. The Vikings have also played the highest rate of Cover-0 in the league (12.1%), and they’ve played the highest rate of Cover-2 in the league (29.0%). Of course, the problem with Flores’ latest defense is that nothing post-snap is what it looked like pre-snap. Flores loves to muddy the picture with blitz looks that turn into drop-8 zone coverage, and he’s just as adept at showing you all-out blitzes that turn into two-high looks… and vice versa.
It’s a tough go for any offense right now, and given Goff’s history against Flores’ mastery, perhaps it’s a bit tougher.
In this week’s “Xs and Os with Greg Cosell and Doug Farrar,” the guys get into how the Lions can set Goff up for better success with the precision and spacing of their passing game in an offense where everybody is an alpha dog, but there’s no one featured player.
You can watch this week’s “Xs and Os,” featuring all of Week 16’s biggest NFL matchups (including Lions-Vikings of course), right here:
You can also listen and subscribe to the “Xs and Os” podcast on Spotify…
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Now, let’s review the previous Goff-Flores matchups, and how Goff might be able to finally bag his white whale.
The Dolphins blew Goff up in 2020 with Cover-0 blitzes.
Back in 2020, Flores’ call sheet wasn’t quite as diverse. He threw Cover-0 blitzes at Goff on 16 of his 61 attempts, and Goff completed eight of those passes for 76 yards, no touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 37.5.
Goff did get this nice 22-yard bender off to Cooper Kupp with 12:56 left in the first half…
…but for every one of those plays, there were four or five where the Rams had no answer for it. This interception to safety Eric Rowe was the most glaring example.
“They were bringing zero pressures,” head coach Sean McVay said after the game. “We had some answers. We didn’t execute them, and ultimately, the answers were not good enough on my part. That falls on me. We were not in alignment, and the communication wasn’t on par with what the expectations were with how we execute those plays… those situations never allowed us to get into rhythm.”
The Patriots gave Goff more coverage looks than he could handle.
In Super Bowl LIII, the clear plan was to give Goff one coverage look pre-snap, and another post-snap, and to flip those coverages as much as possible after less than 15 seconds was left on the play clock, which was when Sean McVay would be out of Goff’s headset. Flores wanted to blitz, but not too often. The Patriots sent extra rushers on 22 snaps, and Cover-0 blitzes on just two. However, one ended with Goff’s game-clinching interception to Stefon Gilmore with 4:24 left in the game. Goff got knocked off his spot, and Gilmore was in a better place than was receiver Brandin Cooks.
“We didn’t blitz them a lot, just because of their offense, so many missile motions, so many crossing routes, misdirections,” safety Jason McCourty said after the fact. “We talked about it—‘there’s going to be a time when we get in a second-and-long situation, and we’re going to want to switch it up and throw a blitz at them just so they respect that look, and they know, ‘Hey, they could be coming.’ Flo [Flores] waited until that moment and called an all-out blitz.”
More often, it was more about how Goff could never get a bead on Flores’ coverage switches. On this sack of Goff with 1:13 left in the first half, the Patriots gave Goff a two-high look pre-snap, so he likely thought he’d have an easy completion with the middle of the field open. But the Patriots flipped to Cover-1 post-snap, and with the deep picture muddied, and New England manning up on Goff’s underneath targets, linebacker Dont’a Hightower was able to get through out of a light Bear front, with Hightower and fellow linebacker Kyle Van Noy playing the parts of the ends to the outside shoulders of the guards. This was a Patriots staple at the time, so the Rams knew it was coming. What Goff didn’t expect was the changing coverage.
At the time, defenses were not flipping coverages post-snap as much as they are now; you could say that this game was a primer for the future. But as defensive back Devin McCourty said back then, per Albert Breer of The MMQB, even the GOAT wasn’t in favor of dealing with it in the week of practice leading up to the game.
“So then we did it against Brady,” McCourty said. “We’d be in walkthrough, doing all our different stuff, and Tom would check to a run play. Brady would be like, ‘I’m not dealing with all the sh– y’all are doing. I’d laugh with him after practice but he’d say, ‘It’s hard.’”
Even when you have a pretty good idea what’s coming, and when.
The Lions know exactly what they're in for.
When asked on Friday about Flores’ specific schematic preferences, and Goff’s historical troubles against them, Lions head coach Dan Campbell had ready answers regarding how he intends to counter it all.
“They’ve given a lot of quarterbacks trouble with the nature of how they play defense and what he calls and how they disguise and between max coverage, max pressure, a look that – one look can give you three different things. That’s what they do well. So, certainly, having an answer for those things is one. Two is, Goff’s not the same player he was then either. I mean, he’s just not. So, doesn’t mean he’s going to be perfect, but he’s different. He’s a different quarterback. He’s got answers, he’s going to have answers for this game and he looks comfortable and as this day – as it goes on, the next two [days], 48 hours, whatever this is going to be, he’s only going to get more comfortable with the plan we’ve got in, so we feel good about it and I think that’s the biggest thing is having answers. Now, you’ve got answers, that still means you’ve got to win one-on-ones and protection and the routes, he’s got to see it fast and then he’s got to pull the trigger with conviction.”
“Yeah, it’s – they try to create turnovers,” Goff said this week of Flores’ defenses. “Obviously, they do a good job of it and it’s a different scheme than really anywhere else in the league, and it’s effective. They’ve done a really good job teaching it and learning it, and it’s very effective, and he does a great job.
“You see a lot of defenses try different parts of what they do, but for them to do all of it is impressive. And again, it’s effective and it’s worked for them and it’s certainly a challenge.”
Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson had a lot to say about it earlier in the week.
“Yeah, it’s the two extremes. In certain situations, offensively, we always talk about, ‘Hey, they’re either max-coverage or max-pressure,’ as a general philosophy. A lot of teams do that down in the red zone, but Flores has kind of taken that to a new extreme. At any time, at any moment. It’s been fun this week trying to dissect their defense. They do a lot and it’s hard, but our staff’s done a nice job trying to narrow down some things that we can key in on potentially, but he’s got a new wrinkle each and every week that we’ll have to be able to adjust to. Our guys are – they understand the challenges that present themselves. I mean the safeties they disguise. [Vikings safety Harrison Smith] is as good as there is in the business. and he has been for a long time in this division.
But really, [Flores has] that whole crew beyond the scheme, to me, the fundamentals are what show up. The front seven, they shed blocks really well. You can tell they stress turnovers. They have so many fumbles already this season and then they tackle really well also. And then the other thing they do is they play very disciplined football. So, when you combine that with the scheme, the fact that their players are playing at such a high level, that’s what makes them so dangerous.”
Johnson also got into how Flores might use his past successes versus Goff against him this time around.
“I’m sure he knows how Jared – some of his style, I think Jared has evolved over the years, so we aren’t running the L.A. offense per se. We’ve got some elements of it, but Jared has grown as a quarterback as well, so if there’s anything that he’s going to draw from in his past, he also has to keep in mind the recent tape of Jared where he’s a little bit different player than he was a few years ago. And same thing with him, and his Miami stuff that he put on tape there. They’ve got some carryover things, but not all of it, so it’ll be a good battle here this week.”
How Goff can counter Flores' ideas.
This season, Goff has thrown the ball nine times against a Cover-0 blitz. He’s completed six of those attempts for 78 yards and a touchdown. The touchdown came in Week 10 against the Los Angeles Chargers, and this might be an ideal way for the Lions to go into this game — with a Kyle Shanahan/Mike McDaniel approach of getting explosive plays out of heavy personnel.
On this 30-yard touchdown pass to tight end Brock Wright, Detroit was in 22 personnel — Wright and tight end Sam LaPorta aligned to right tackle Penei Sewell, and LaPorta staying in to block while Wright released deep up the middle. Linebacker/fullback Malcolm Rodriguez helped pick up the blitz, and Goff threw this out of under-center play-action, faking to halfback David Montgomery, who also then helped with the blitz. Goff has the NFL’s most passes out of under center play-action this season, and he’s completed 74 of those passes on 103 attempts for 953 yards, 421 air yards, five touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 116.7.
Regarding the Rush 3/Drop 8 stuff which Goff will also see from Flores, he’s completed 16 of 26 passes against three or fewer rushers this season for 210 yards, 137 air yards, no touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 87.0. Goff is far more likely to chuck it underneath and let his playmakers do their thing against zone drops everywhere, but occasionally, one of those playmakers will pop free for an explosive play.
Back to that Chargers game, and Goff’s 46-yard completion to receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown, 17 yards of which was after the catch. The Chargers were in Quarters here, dropping eight defenders into coverage, and safety Alohi Gilman was late getting over the top against St. Brown’s deep over route.
Flores also knows that this will be no easy task.
Flores’ Vikings are coming off a disappointing 27-24 overtime loss to the Cincinnati Bengals in which backup quarterback Jake Browning completed 29 of 42 passes for 324 yards, two touchdowns, one interception, a passer rating of 97.7, and more explosive plays than Flores would ever prefer. So, Minnesota might hit this game with some extra juice. We haven’t yet talked about the Lions’ run game, which is as multiple and effective as any in the NFL… but Flores is all too aware of that challenge as well.
“Diverse,” Flores said Tuesday of the Lions’ run game. “Their 1-2 combo with [David] Montgomery and [Jahmyr] Gibbs is very good. Good offensive line, good scheme. I think Ben Johnson has done a really good job of mixing zone schemes and gap schemes, and putting their guys in good positions. Their runners run hard, and their offensive line blocks well. Receivers block, tight ends block… it’s a good overall group.
“It’s not easy against this group. They’re skilled at all positions, I think Goff’s playing really well, and it’ll certainly be a challenge.”
Game on, as they say.
