The Games That Changed the Game

by Ron Jaworski

  The Rams began the drive by orchestrating a favorable matchup: Isaac Bruce against Mike Vrabel. This was vintage Martz. He shifted to an empty set with Faulk split wide left, outside the numbers. Then he had Bruce motion across the formation to the slot, inside of Faulk. The formation and the motion dictated the matchup. If Bruce gets off the line unobstructed, Vrabel loses that one every time, and after getting a clean release, Ike picked up fifteen yards. The Rams tried a similar call on the next play, with Holt going to the opposite side. This time Vrabel was ready, blasting Holt right after the snap. But Warner still made the play work, hitting Faulk on an outlet throw to pick up 7 more yards. The reason Faulk was available as a safety valve for Warner was because of the Rams’ formation. Marshall lined up as an I-back, so the Patriots did not hit him after he released.

  An adjustment of Martz’s became evident two plays later. The Rams’ offense depended on its wide receivers having clean releases off the line of scrimmage, or “free access,” as it’s sometimes called, to get into their routes. It enabled them to generate the necessary velocity for executing their speed cuts. One way to get that free access was to put a receiver in motion, which they did with Hakim on this play. This made it extremely difficult for any Patriot to jam or reroute him. Coming out of his offset position, Faulk, as usual, got clobbered on his outside release, this time by Vrabel. But the play was to Hakim, whose earlier motion allowed him to avoid press coverage and pick up 14 yards for the first down. On the next play, both Holt and Bruce ran Go routes down either sideline. Warner, under heavy pressure, bought time, and hit Ernie Conwell on a check-down for 9 yards.

  I want to digress for a moment to point out something you might not know. There were no audibles in Martz’s system back then, and he still doesn’t think much of them today as offensive coordinator with the Chicago Bears. Given the fluctuating defenses of the modern game, this is amazing, but that’s what he believes in. Mike’s quarterbacks make their adjustments on the move, which is totally different from a Sid Gillman offense. Sid liked having the built-in big play rather than having to react in the form of a sight adjust after the ball was snapped. With Martz, you had the chance for a big play, but more on a look-in pass or slant as a blitz beater, not in the original design of the call. In 2001 Warner was in only his third full NFL season, still comparatively short on game experience. But when it came to understanding and seeing the field, he was very sound. I think his Arena League experience really helped him here. In the confined space of the AFL playing surface, there was always pressure, and the ball had to be out fast, so decisions were made on the move. In the Martz system, you have to react to the defense after the snap with sight adjustments, much like Kurt did as an Arena quarterback. Warner really showcased those skills during the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XXXVI.

  It had taken almost fifty minutes, but the Rams were finally looking like their old selves. After a short run picked up another first down, Martz put in both tight ends, along with the fullback Hodgins. For the first time all game, St. Louis had a tight end on the same side as Faulk when he was lined up in an offset position. This extra beef kept him from being smacked around, as tight end Jeff Robinson successfully tied up Vrabel. With no defender in his face, Marshall was able to get a free release out of the backfield, breaking open on an angle route. Warner drilled it to him, and the Rams gained 22 yards before Tebucky Jones finally dragged Marshall down. This was a really good adjustment by Martz. I’m not sure why he didn’t call it sooner.

  Three minutes into the fourth quarter, the Rams were, at last, inside New England’s 10-yard line. On a check-down, Warner hit Robinson inside for a 6-yard pickup, bringing up second-and-goal from the 3. But two great individual plays from Patriot defenders kept St. Louis out of the end zone—at least for the moment. The first came from McGinest, who steamrolled Tucker, forcing Warner into a hurried throw that was nearly intercepted by Milloy. The second great play came after Bruce ran a stutter fade route into the right corner of the end zone. Warner’s pass got there, but Law had Bruce blanketed, and the pass was incomplete.

  It was now fourth-and-3 with ten and a half minutes remaining. A field goal was out of the question. The Rams had finally put together a decent drive, and settling for 3 would have deflated their morale and only made the score 17-6. Warner dropped back to pass and got flushed out of the pocket, running to his right. Phifer blasted Kurt, and the ball popped free in the direction of Tebucky Jones.

  Lawyer Milloy had a front-row seat for what happened next: “The ball’s now in the hands of our fastest guy on defense, and he’s running untouched the other way, ninety-seven yards! At that point I’m thinking, We’ve won this game. This thing’s over. No way they come back from 24-3. As Tebucky’s running down, I looked around for any flags. Unfortunately, there was one, but it was behind us, near the goal line, where the infraction happened, so I didn’t see it. I’m celebrating with Tebucky, but the next thing you know, the refs are waving it off. That was a huge momentum swing in the Rams’ favor.”

  For one of the few times in the game, Belichick’s Bull’s-Eye strategy did more harm than good. McGinest was supposed to be Faulk’s designated hitter on the play. And at first, it appeared as if Willie was going to be a real hero, wrecking Bruce’s pattern with a hard jam, then taking off to find Faulk. McGinest found him, all right, but he didn’t hit him—he held him—and it was a flagrant hold the official easily spotted. Jones’s touchdown return was wiped off the books, and the Rams got a fresh set of downs just short of the goal line. Two plays later, Warner scored on a quarterback keeper, and after an uninspiring three-and-out series by the Patriots’ offense, the Rams were back in business, down by only a touchdown with plenty of time on the clock.

  Rams Series No. 4

  4th Quarter, 7:44 remaining: New England 17, St. Louis 10

  The Rams had the ball but were also stuck with lousy field position, beginning the drive on their own 7. Some teams would have tried a running play or two to get some breathing room. Martz doesn’t think that way, and called for a four-wide-receiver set on the first play. Across the line, the Patriots were equally as aggressive. New England’s corners crouched tightly to the line in press position, with only one safety to help out deep. This is a very risky defense to play when you’ve got 93 yards of open field to defend, but Belichick wasn’t going to stray from his original game plan.

  As expected, the Rams passed, and passed some more. St. Louis threw on its first six plays of this drive, picking up enough yardage to get into Patriots territory. New England rotated its secondary schemes on almost every down, with mixed results. On one play, the Patriots came out in the nickel, but it wasn’t a standard set. The inside defensive backs played man-to-man while the outside defenders went with zone coverage. Bothered by fierce front pressure, Warner had to throw the ball away, and he took a vicious hit in the process.

  On the next play, the Pats went for broke with the very risky Cover-Zero, a well-disguised double-safety blitz, which meant there was no help behind the corners if they got beat. It was the first time all day that New England called this, and it came at a critical point in the game. It was a decision made by a coaching staff confident in its belief that it had the St. Louis offense out of rhythm. But on this play, the Rams were in perfect synch. With Jones and Milloy rushing the passer, Faulk was forced to stay in and block. Marshall kept Warner out of harm’s way, and after a seven-step drop, Kurt gunned it to Proehl, who’d badly beaten Law on a corner route. Proehl picked up 30 yards, the Rams’ longest play of the night. After a 12-yard completion to Robinson, St. Louis found itself on the New England 39 with more than five minutes remaining.

  Martz then called the drive’s first running play: a trap to Faulk that Phifer and Vrabel shut down easily. Smarts, rather than strength, was the difference on the next play. When primary receiver Ernie Con-well went in motion prior to the snap, Milloy ran parallel to him, convincing Warner he’d be facing man-to-man coverage. Once the play began, however, N
ew England dropped into a three-deep zone with a safety sitting in the middle of the field, taking away Conwell’s availability on a seam route. Kurt’s check-down target was Robinson, but Vrabel matched up in his zone and cut it off. By then, the Rams’ protection had collapsed, and McGinest buried Warner for a drive-killing 16-yard sack. After a feeble third-and-long pass hit the ground, the Rams were forced to punt.

  A little over three and a half minutes remained. All the Patriots had to do was pick up a couple of first downs and drain the clock. They did neither. The Rams defense played one of its best series of the game, forcing a three-and-out. Then New England punter Ken Walter got off his worst kick of the game. His 30-yarder rolled out of bounds at the Rams’ 45, and St. Louis was given one last chance.

  Rams Series No. 5

  4th Quarter, 1:51 remaining: New England 17, St. Louis 10

  All night long, the Patriots had been successful with press coverage on the outside and a solid commitment to aggressive man-to-man schemes. So when this Rams drive began, I was surprised to see New England switch over to prevent coverage. Maybe the team made the change because the Rams had already burned all their time-outs. Belichick’s reasoning may have been that he hoped to force short throws underneath, keep everything in front, and make tackles on the field of play to keep the clock moving.

  It was good strategy on paper, but it had to be executed properly for it to work, and this time New England wasn’t able to do it. From the shotgun, Warner faced virtually no pressure on his first call. Faulk got jammed, of course, but he wasn’t getting the ball anyway. Hakim ran a drag route underneath, caught the pass, and took off. Mike Vrabel played one of his finest games ever in Super Bowl XXXVI, but on this play he failed to make the tackle. Az picked up eighteen yards and was able to run out of bounds to stop the clock.

  The ball now rested on the Patriots’ 37, and here we see another on-the-fly Martz adjustment. Mike put in his fifth receiver, named Llewellyn “Yo” Murphy, who’d played most of his career in Canada and had made the Rams squad primarily as a kick returner. In this formation, Murphy was the I-back, with Faulk in the fullback’s position! That’s classic Mike Martz: tinkering with tactics no matter how critical the juncture of the game. New England responded with seven defensive backs, including Antwan Harris, who took off for Warner right after the snap. I’m not certain, but I believe Harris’s responsibility on the play was Murphy, who had not caught a single pass all year in a Rams uniform. Anyway, the hard-charging Harris ran headlong into the right tackle Tucker and got splattered. Murphy ran past Harris and found himself wide open in the flat. Warner flicked it to the ex-CFL star, who picked up 11 yards before stepping to the sidelines at the New England 26.

  The clock read 1:37 to play, giving the Rams plenty of time—and perhaps an opportunity for a surprise Faulk running play out of passing formation against a soft front. But that’s not what Mike Martz does, especially in a two-minute situation. Instead Mike came up with a brilliant play selection that clearly outmaneuvered the Patriots’ coverage.

  With all four corners in press position as part of their two-man coverage, Bruce and Proehl aligned right next to each other on the outside, with Bruce on the line of scrimmage and Proehl slightly off the line. This concept is referred to as a “stack.” Frankly, I was a little surprised that the Rams didn’t go with this alignment more often. The Patriots relied heavily on press coverage, and a stacked release is a great way to neutralize and defeat that scheme. There are three problems a stacked release poses for defenders:

  If the DBs try to press, they run the risk of colliding into each other, leaving their receivers uncovered.

  Even if they don’t press, there’s still that moment of indecision. Does the defensive back switch to the receiver coming toward him, or stay with the guy he’s supposed to cover? In the NFL, just one moment of hesitation can be deadly.

  The stacked release puts receivers in great position to make legal picks or rubs, blocking out defenders, while putting at least one of the pass targets in open space.

  After the snap, the two Rams receivers crossed each other on their releases. Bruce basically ran a pick play on slot corner Terrance Shaw, which kept Shaw from getting outside to cover Proehl. Ricky appeared to be running a wheel route, which is a quick out, followed by a move upfield in a curved pattern. This worked beautifully against New England’s press coverage, giving Proehl free access to the outside, away from the deep safety Jones. A wide-open Proehl caught Warner’s throw, then juked Jones, and ran into the end zone, tying the game at 17 with a minute and a half remaining in regulation.

  We all know what happened next. Despite initial intentions to protect the football and play for overtime, Tom Brady reversed course, led the Patriots downfield and got his team into field goal range. With just seconds remaining, Adam Vinatieri drilled a 48-yard kick through the uprights, and the underdog Patriots were world champions.

  If New England hadn’t made that kick, and if the Rams had won the game in overtime, much of what the Patriots did that day might have been forgotten—at least by the general public. But either way, members of the coaching profession would have noticed and appreciated Bill Belichick’s Bull’s-Eye game plan and play-calling mastery. The fact that New England was even able to limit this incredible Rams attack for as long as it did was enough for defensive coordinators around the league to scream “Get me that coaching tape right now! I’ve gotta see how he did that!”

  ince Belichick came to New England in 2000, I’ve seen him devise defensive alignments that I never saw him use when he coached with the Giants or the Browns. I don’t remember stuff like defensive linemen standing upright, or a defense with no pass rushers. His creative juices have clearly flowed during his time with the Patriots. And as his schemes got better, so did his players. He beat the Rams with solid but unspectacular defensive personnel, but with each year, that personnel improved. Belichick won two more world championships in 2003 and ‘04. In 2007 New England came within 39 seconds of claiming yet another Lombardi Trophy and the first 19-0 perfect season in NFL history. When he lost Brady in the first quarter of the first game in ‘08, cynics predicted a quick demise for the Patriots. “We’ll see how good a coach Belichick is without the best quarterback in the league,” many observers sneered. Well, Bill turned in one of his best coaching performances, winning eleven games with backup Matt Cassel, a quarterback who previously hadn’t started a game since high school! Then in 2009, Bill led a young and injury-riddled Patriots team to its seventh division title of the decade.

  I personally believe that Bill achieved his greatest coaching accomplishment with his 2001 team, but good luck pinning him down on that. “I have three children,” Bill said. “It would be the same question as ‘Who is your favorite child?’ They’re each unique, and I love all of them. So I wouldn’t rank one child ahead of another, and I don’t know that I could rank one championship team ahead of another. To me, they’re all special.”

  Patriots teams that followed after 2001 clearly had better athletes, but they’ve rarely possessed the league’s best pure talent. They’ve managed to remain among the NFL elite because New England is one of the smartest and best-coached clubs in football. When you have a coach who modifies schemes and play design on a weekly basis, you’d better have bright people who can learn these changes quickly. I don’t have stats on this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if New England has more guys on its roster with college degrees than any other team. These players hit the books, study opponent’s tendencies, and just seem to have a better grasp of what’s supposed to happen in any circumstance. That’s why, with their personnel department, it’s critical they find people with both athletic skill and intelligence.

  When Bill talks to his scouts about a prospect, he never asks what that player can’t do but what he is capable of doing. Then he can take that athlete’s strength and plug it into spots where he’ll help the team. When the Patriots run an unorthodox scheme, they don’t put people in a position to
fail. Bill slots them in situations where they can be successful, playing to their strengths. This philosophy seems so obvious, but you’d be surprised how many NFL coaches do not buy into it. They fall in love with what they’ve created in their playbook and believe that simply through repetitive drills and their own teaching talents, they can hammer a square peg into a round hole. I prefer Belichick’s approach. The other way I find limiting and self-defeating.

  In 2007 our ESPN crew was in Baltimore to cover the PatriotsRavens game. The day before, Mike Tirico, Tony Kornheiser, and I met with Belichick to get background information for our Monday Night broadcast. Usually these meetings are routine; boilerplate chatter that doesn’t reveal much. Most fans think Belichick must be like that all the time anyway, because they only see him speaking in his monotonous drone during press conferences, a forum he obviously loathes.

  But at our meeting, Bill really got animated, because being in Baltimore was his homecoming. He wasn’t far from Annapolis, Maryland, where his dad coached at Navy when Bill was growing up. He could look out of his hotel window and see the building where he held his first pro job evaluating film for Ted Marchibroda back in 1975. Belichick really began to glow when reminiscing about coming to old Memorial Stadium, working in what was little more than a broom closet, next to the office of Orioles manager Earl Weaver. Inside that confined space was nothing but a projector and a chair, and Bill would sit in that sweatbox all day, painstakingly poring over game film. It was a memory he spoke about with great fondness. This was the place where his career path had begun.

  As a head coach, Bill has to deal regularly with public relations and marketing aspects of the game, stuff he doesn’t really care about. They’re necessary, but a distraction from what he enjoys best. Belichick loves coaching football players and has as much respect for the game’s history as anyone I know. But Bill is happiest when he once again becomes that twenty-three-year-old kid down in the basement of Memorial Stadium. When he’s alone in the dark, projection clicker in hand, studying game tape, watching tiny flickering football images on a blank wall, in search of the next innovation that will someday help his team win.