Former Redskins safety Matt Bowen, currently an analyst with the National Football Post, takes a look at key aspects to Washington’s season opener vs. the New York Giants.
On what the Redskins have to do to win: “You have to get Tim Hightower going. They have to establish the run with Rex Grossman at quarterback. I don’t that I’m coming down on him, but you want him in third and four-to-six instead of third and seven-to-10 because the playbook shrinks for those long distances. The defense knows you have to run something to the sticks. Perry Fewell was my defensive coordinator in Buffalo and we were a lot like Chicago. That’s all we ran; cover 2 and zone blitzes. They’re completely different now. He has a good front four and he’s not afraid to bring the house either. He’s a bigger pressure coach than you would imagine. So if you’re at third and four-to-six, and they bring pressure you can throw slants or some inside breaking route. On third and long you have to ask the line to block and give you time downfield. That makes for bad football. So Tim needs to run those stretch plays and be productive.”
On the difference with Osi Umenyiora out and Justin Tuck possibly out: “They’re two of the best pass rushers in the league. That’s the strength of that defense. You know they have injuries to the secondary. Pierre-Paul, he’s going to have a breakout year but when you lose Osi he’s one of the top five ends in terms of rushing. That’s gonna hurt them. What that tells me is they’ll try to rush with four but if I can’t, I’m bringing pressure.”
On attacking their defense: “If I was Mike Shanahan, I’d use a lot of three receiver sets. I’d force them to bring a nickelback on the field, see what kind of depth they’ve got and you can run the ball out of that, too. And I’d take a deep shot really early in the game, in the first three plays. I’d want to let them know we’re going to test the secondary all day.”
On Eli Manning: “He’s good, he’s not elite. He’s not Aaron Rodgers or Drew Brees. But he still moves the ball and he can still beat you. Losing LaRon Landry hurts. There’s no way around that; it hurts a lot in the run game because he was great in the box. It could hurt O.J. Atogwe in the middle of the field. … Eli can get rattled; he really can. And he can throw balls up for grabs. If he throws a bad ball, you have to make a play on it; you have to.”
What the Giants need to do offensively: “Run the ball. With Ahmad Bradshaw and Brandon Jacobs, you’d be crazy not to feature them. I know they have decent receivers but it’s all based on what you can do up front. When I think NFC East football, the first game of the year, if I’m Tom Coughlin I come out and establish the run. Let’s see how the strong safety is and we’ll run right at him…. Bradshaw gives you bigger-play ability and he’s great in the screen and draw game. But Jacobs gets going downhill and I wouldn’t want to tackle that guy. He can run over anyone he wants. He is something else. He has ball security issues, too. That has to be a big key for Jim Haslett’s defense.”
On Hakeem Nicks and Mario Manningham: “They’re good players, but they’re not what we saw in the [Green Bay-New Orleans game]. I don’t think I’d lose sleep over Manningham, but Nicks can beat you. It’s interesting to see if in pass situations if they play Cover 2 to Nicks’ side and get a jam on him at the line and re-route him and shade to that side of the field.”
On Josh Wilson: “I like him, he’s an above average corner. I’d be interested to see him in one-on-one matchups. One thing to realize about anyone that comes out of that system in Baltimore… I won’t say it’s easy but it’s a lot of fun to play in a system like that when you have that front seven, when that ball is coming out quick and you don’t have to rely on technique as much and you can take some risks… Is he going to be able to tackle? What if Jacobs is on the edge, what will he do? Can he tackle in space?”
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