The Patriots are preparing to host their first playoff game in over six years vs. the Los Angeles Chargers on Sunday night and this time head coach Mike Vrabel will be on the home team’s sideline.
The big-picture view with New England back in the playoffs is about a lot of firsts for this era of Patriots football. Although he coached five playoff games as Titans head coach, it’s Vrabel’s first postseason game as head coach of the Patriots, and he’s going into the Wild Card round with a 23-year-old quarterback playing in his first NFL playoff game. It’s also the first playoff game for CB Christian Gonzalez, LT Will Campbell, and other Pats who were acquired during the team’s three-year playoff drought. Vrabel and OC Josh McDaniels’s playoff experience will help them prepare QB Drake Maye and other key contributors who are experiencing the playoffs for the first time for what’s to come.
To pull out a win, Maye needs to play at the level he has all season, WR Stefon Diggs has to find the openings in the Chargers zone coverages, the Pats running back duo has to keep it rolling, and maybe most importantly, DTs Milton Williams and Christian Barmore must dominate a banged-up Chargers O-Line, while Gonzalez, Carlton Davis III, and Marcus Jones win their battles with Herbert’s receivers in the passing game.
“In this league, your best players have to play well for you to win,” Vrabel said last month. “We expect the quarterback’s going to have to play well for us to win. Whoever we consider to be our best players, they have to play well in this league. That’s what this thing comes down to.”
Vrabel and the coaching staff must also elevate their performance. McDaniels will be calling plays against an impressive Chargers defense, coordinated by rising star Jesse Minter, who many believe is a future head coach. Vrabel and defensive play-caller Zak Kuhr need to devise a game plan to slow down star QB Justin Herbert while finding ways to exploit a Chargers offensive line missing its Pro Bowl tackles. Schematically, it’s time to see what this staff has got in a win-or-go-home scenario.
Before we get into our matchup breakdown, Sunday night’s Wild Card playoff game is as much about the Vrabel, Maye, and McDaniels trio rising to the occasion against Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh, Herbert, and company. New England needs their top dawgs and their braintrust to outperform their counterparts, which you feel pretty good about, given the coaching pedigree and the MVP season that Maye has put together.
Now is the time when we find out if this team is ready to compete for championships, the next box that Vrabel is aiming to check after winning the division and hosting a home playoff game for the first time since 2019, when Vrabel’s Titans knocked the Patriots out of the postseason in what turned out to be Tom Brady’s last game in New England. Now, the tournament begins.
Let’s preview the chess match between the Chargers and Patriots with kickoff at 8:00 p.m. ET at Gillette Stadium on Sunday night.
Offense Key: Generate Explosive Pass Plays vs. Stingy Chargers Pass Defense
Starting with the Patriots offense, QB Drake Maye’s first-ever playoff game will come against a Chargers defense that’s rolling in the second half of the season.
When he transitioned from head coach at the University of Michigan back to the NFL, Harbaugh brought his defensive coordinator, Jesse Minter, with him from Ann Arbor. Overall, the Chargers rank ninth in scoring defense (20.0), seventh in drop-back EPA, and fourth in rush EPA allowed. Plus, they’re fifth in explosive pass play rate allowed, using zone coverage at the fifth-highest rate in the NFL to prevent big plays (80.7%).
Schematically, Minter’s defense majors in match quarters coverages, where the Chargers have four deep defenders across the field. Los Angeles plays quarters at the fourth-highest rate (25.6%) and is in split-safety coverages on 49.7% of their coverage snaps (third), complementing their split-safety zones with cover-three (33.7%). On early downs, they typically play spread formations out of four-man fronts and five-man fronts against run formations, while pivoting into pass-rush (load) fronts on third down.
As for their personnel, do-it-all safety Derwin James makes their scheme shine by playing the all-important nickel spot, which carries a lot of responsibility in run support and difficult zone assignments. Although he primarily plays in the slot, the five-time Pro Bowler moves around all three levels of the defense as a versatile chess piece. Los Angeles also has underrated pass-rusher Tuli Tuipulotu, who moves around the front, lining up both outside the tackles and over the interior O-Line as their pass-rushing weapon.
Future Hall of Famer Khalil Mack is still a productive two-way player vs. the pass (39 pressures) and run, Odafe Oweh adds some pass-rush juice on the interior, and they have some big run-stuffers inside that are tough to move (Tart, Hand, Caldwell). Lastly, in the front seven, LB Daiyan Henley is a rangy coverage linebacker who can play high-stress zone assignments. As for the secondary, CB Donte Jackson is having a good year on the outside, NCB Tarheeb Still plays the slot in their three-corner packages, and second-year CB Cam Hart is their other outside corner – it’s a talented group.
