The modernity bias is a slender drug. And the conference title games and the Super Bowl always form a narrative of how to build a team, what style of offense and defense to incorporate, what the rest of the league should prioritize during the team building process, and so on. It happens every year. After the Eagles’ first Super Bowl win, their use of “Run-Pass Option” made RPO slang overnight. Mahomes’ Super Bowl victory the following year prompted the new mold of the typical franchise quarterback.
Last year, it highlighted the league’s increasing propensity to run in fourth place, pass in first place, and prioritize YAC. These trends are not going anywhere. To touch on it briefly here – the teams are still noticeably more aggressive in fourth down than they were five to ten years ago. thats good.
The Bengals and Chiefs are third and fourth, respectively, in first pass rate during the regular season. Eight of the 14 teams were in the top 10 in first-down success rate and first-down success rate in single-score game scenarios. If the NFL is a copycat league, other teams will need to copy what the best teams do, and one of those things is to pass it more frequently than to run it in first, even if the game is close.
And YAC is here to stay for a while. The Chiefs have finished with the most YACs during the regular season. The 49ers had the best average YAC per reception. The Chiefs were second in the class, with the Eagles fifth and the Bengals 11th despite the Ja’Marr Chase missing four contests.
Sometimes these trends are drawn straight from the regular season. But they are mostly pulled out of the playoffs.
Let’s outline those trends before Super Bowl LVII.
He invested heavily in the offensive line
The 49ers made it to the Super Bowl after the 2019 season, ultimately losing to Mahomes and the Chiefs. Less than two months later, they traded the fifth spot for future first-ball Hall of Fame runner-up Trent Williams. Big swing.
While they let burgeoning guard Laken Tomlinson join free agency after the 2021 season, they drafted Aaron Banks in the second round in 2021 and spent a fourth-round pick on guard Spencer Burford last April, two players who were the starting guard at the 2022 season.
After Burrow led the NFL in sacks taken (51) in 20221, the Bengals spent a total of $22 million in average collegiate pear annual salary on three sackers in the 2022 season — La’el Collins, Ted Karras, and Alex Cappa. They did this despite drafting four offensive linemen since Boro finished first overall in 2020, and they drafted another fourth-round blocker with Cordell Fulson selected last April.
Unsurprisingly, Burrow’s sacks (51 to 41) and sacks rate (8.9% to 6.3%) decreased from 2021 to 2022. His interception rate also dropped from 2.7% to 2.0%.
After a disastrous development in a Super Bowl loss to the Buccaneers — in a game without multiple offensive players — Kansas City now knows the dangers of that development: The Chiefs didn’t sit on their hands. GM Brett Fitch signed top free agent guard Joe Thune to a five-year, $80 million deal with full collateral of about $32 million, and traded multiple picks for touchdowns against Orlando Brown from the AFC rival Ravens, but a blockbuster reconstruction wasn’t done. The completion of the.
In the draft, Veach selected longtime Oklahoma center Creed Humphrey in the second round and took a flyer for guard Trey Smith in the sixth round, a big and talented blocker for the SEC who dealt with blood clots in college.
Now, Kansas City may have the best handicap unit in the AFC.
Eagles and GM Howie Roseman always prioritized the trenches and for a while boasted one of the most devastating offensive lines in the league. It’s mostly a veteran-loaded group led by center Jason Kelsey and properly tackled Lyn Johnson. But Rossman’s persistence in building the blocking unit has once again paid off.
After Jordan Mailata was a seventh-round flyer in the 2018 draft, Roseman selected Andre Dillard in the first round in 2019. Dillard did not become the clerk many thought he would be in the NFL. Mailata has blossomed into a giant grader. The arrow up front didn’t stop Rosman from selecting all-around blocker Landon Dickerson in the second round of the 2021 draft — he’s now the starting left guard — and even grabbing talent center Uber Cam Jurgens in the second round of the 2022 draft would be Kelsey’s eventual replacement.
The Eagles have the best offensive line in football and most manhandled the 49ers’ best defense in the NFC title game.
During the regular season, only 12 eligible quarterbacks managed a passer rating above 75 under pressure. When she got clean, 39 passers had a quarterback rating above 75.
When in doubt, take fliers on the quarterback
In the 2020 draft, with the 53rd pick, after selecting five quarterbacks, the Eagles selected Jalen Hurts after one highly productive season at Oklahoma that followed a unique career at Alabama. The selection was made less than four months after the Eagles won a league title and star quarterback Carson Wentz was knocked out for a playoff loss with a concussion. Prior to that season, Wentz had a major four-year, $128 million extension with the Eagles that included a $100 million guaranteed.
Wentz has thrown for over 4,000 yards this season with 27 touchdowns to just seven interceptions.
The Eagles could have gone a lot of other directions with this choice. But they understood the potential added value of selecting a quarterback there and they did. Wentz collapsed in 2020 and was subsequently traded. Hurts was then the quarterback on a seven-ranked Philadelphia team that lost in the first round of the 2021 playoffs and will now start in the Super Bowl.
The 49ers got the Super Bowl and the NFC with Jimmy Garoppolo and then decided to trade a bunch of early picks to step up to the draft plate to pick Trey Lance. Of course last April they used the last pick in the draft over Brock Purdy.
Be aggressive… Be aggressive
From the cheer most prevalent on the sidelines of high school games in America to the application in the NFL. This is somewhat of a combination of the previous two points, but… be aggressive. I am not suggesting more blitzkriegs. I’m talking about aggression with menu building. This could really be an extension of what the Rams did prior to their Super Bowl winning season a year ago.
Consider fleshing out this idea Roseman showed off last season. He traded a first round pick to AJ Brown during the first day of the draft. If that wasn’t enough – and it is usually seen as enough – he acquired James Bradbury nine days after he was released by the Giants in May. Then, to really knock home his aggressive style—Rosman traded the fifth and sixth overall in the 2024 draft for pesky safety/slot corner Chauncey Gardner-Johnson and a 2025 pick in August.
Let’s not forget — and you’ll hear plenty of reminders over the next two weeks leading up to the Super Bowl — Chiefs GM Brett Veach TRADED TYREEK HILL in the offseason, an idea that previously seemed so implausible, it wasn’t quite a start.
Bosses harvested:
- Part of the compensation package for trading up to CB Trent McDuffie’s selection
- WR Skymore
- Hill’s contract voiding averaged $30 million a year and $52.5 million in total warranties
- 2024 fourth round selection
- 2024 sixth-round pick
Then, Kansas City had the money to sign the likes of Justin Reed, Jojo Smith-Schuster, Marquis Valdez-Scantling and Carlos Dunlap in July. It would also give the Chiefs flexibility to sign themselves this season.
