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Aaron Donald is the real reason Aaron Rodgers never got a chance at a comebackWhat Donald did to Aaron Rodgers last week is a big reason the Rams are still undefeated. Retired NFL defensive end Stephen White breaks it down.Stephen White
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Last week against the San Francisco 49ers, Aaron Donald had one of those all-time great games that that rarely come along for even the best defensive linemen. It wasn’t exactly hard to understand how he earned Hoss Of The Week. Four sacks aside, Donald’s stat line was still pretty spectacular: two other tackles for a loss, a caused fumble, and a fumble recovery.
However, if we are keeping it a buck, while it was an outstanding game, the 49ers are not exactly world beaters. That game was also well out of hand by the time the fourth quarter rolled around, which meant there wasn’t a lot of pressure on Donald to come up with game-deciding plays, even as he continued to make them.
His stat line from this past Sunday wasn’t quite as gaudy, but his actual performance tells a whole other story, especially true when you factor in the Packers being a much more dangerous opponent than the 49ers and Aaron Rodgers being one of the scariest quarterbacks in NFL history, completely healthy or not.
Donald’s play against Green Bay might have been even more impressive than the San Francisco game if you put a little extra value on plays made on third down and/or late in a close game.
I could go back and sing all of Donald’s praises again before digging into the devastation that he unleashed on Rodgers and the Packers on Sunday, but hell, I did that already last week and ain’t nothing changed. So, I’m just going to dive right into some of his aforementioned third-down stops to illustrate just how much of an impact Donald had on the outcome of the game in Week 8.
Donald had a big first half that announcers didn’t even noticeI would assume some regular folks might not have noticed how well Donald played in the first half since the announcers overlooked a few of his plays themselves.
Well, one of them at least.
Early in the third quarter, one announcer commented that they hadn’t called Donald’s name all game. The statement was wrong on its face. Donald had already made quite an impact in the first half, even if that announcer some how hadn’t noticed.
For instance, Donald had a third-down pressure relatively early on in the second quarter that forced Rodgers into an incompletion. That incompletion also led to the Packers’ first punt of the game after their offense came out lighting the up Rams. In fact, Green Bay was already up 10-0 at that point.
Donald was lined up as the right three-technique, across from left guard Lane Taylor. On the snap, Donald came off the ball and exploded into Taylor’s chest and drove him inside with a bull rush. Ironically, Donald did such a good job that when the running back, Ty Montgomery, checked through the B gap to try to chip on him, he completely missed Donald because he had smushed Taylor all the way down into the A gap.
Once Donald felt Montgomery continue out into his route and the coast was clear, he abruptly stuck his inside foot in the ground to change directions back outside. He used his outside hand to grab Taylor’s outside arm and forklift him up in the air by his wrist. Because he’d already driven Taylor so far inside, by the time Donald redirected and came off the block back outside, he was in prime position right in front of Rodgers.
If he had just one more second, Rodgers would have had the opportunity to try a throw to Geronimo Allison, who was coming relatively wide open across the field on a dig route behind Jimmy Graham’s skinny post from the slot. And that pass would have had a chance to gain the 7 yards they needed to gain for a first down.
Instead, with Donald bearing down on him, all Rodgers could do was try to throw a ball up for grabs to Graham who was double covered running down middle of the field. Graham wasn’t able to haul it in, but, hey, at least the hurried throw wasn’t intercepted, shrug emoji. One thing’s for sure, and that’s Donald affected the hell out of that play and his pressure helped force the Packers to punt on the next play after scoring on their first two drives of the game.
And his first half production wasn’t done.
Keeping Aaron Rodgers off his game
Donald had another big pressure with a little more than five minutes left in the second quarter. For context, Donald was able to beat a double team involving Taylor and the center, Corey Linsley, on the play before the one I want to talk about. At the end of that play, he was able to push Linsley back into Rodgers’ lap where Linsley ended up stepping on Rodgers’ foot at almost the same time as Rodgers was sailing a pass over the head of Marquez Valdes-Scantling.
Donald beat that double team in the time it took the receiver to run a 5-yard quick out, for goodness sake, and Rodgers’ poor foot took the worst of it.
The play we are going to talk about today, however, was actually the next one, another third down. This time the Packers needed 12 yards. Donald was once again lined up as the three-technique on the right. Instead of coming inside, this time Donald was determined to beat Taylor around the edge.
Taylor tried to jump set Donald right at the line. Taylor knew he had the center sliding his way to help inside, so it appears he thought he would try to stone Donald right at the line of scrimmage by ambushing him with a big punch at the snap and try to force him inside to Linsley.
Against most three-techniques that’s probably a winning strategy. Against Donald, it turned out to be a disaster.
Donald jetted off the ball and, once he saw Taylor coming at him aggressively, he immediately went with with a cross chop with his hand and arm that was accurate and forceful enough to keep Taylor’s hand from ever making it to Donald’s chest, even with Taylor’s big punch attempt. Donald followed that up with a quick swat to the back of Taylor’s upper left arm to pin Taylor’s outside arm so he could slide right by him.
The fact that Donald was able to negate Taylor’s outside hand, but allowed Taylor’s inside hand to punch him actually worked against Taylor because it forced him to turn his body perpendicular to the line of scrimmage, instead of staying relatively parallel to it. Offensive linemen generally do not want to be perpendicular to the line of scrimmage because it tends to give pass rushers a shorter corner, but it is especially a killer if you have a beast like Donald on your ass.
The force of Taylor’s jump set did push Donald a little wide, so he ended up having to do a quick arm over on left tackle David Bakhtiari’s inside shoulder. But once he cleared Bakhtiari, Donald had a clear path to Rodgers again because Taylor was still struggling to catch up.
All Donald did was dip low and haul ass through Taylor’s outside edge at that point, and he was once again able to force Rodgers into speeding up his throw.
A throw that he also couldn’t step into.
Davante Adams was running a sort of double move that was ultimately just a dressed up, long comeback route. He had the slightest bit of separation on cornerback Marcus Peters. Had Rodgers been able to set his feet and step into the throw, there is a good chance that he throws a good ball to Adams who catches it at the sticks for the first down. Adams had himself one hell of a day on Sunday, after all.
It wasn’t to be, because Donald had once again wrecked shop.
The funny thing about the announcer saying they hadn’t called Donald’s name all game is right after he said it, the broadcast went into a montage of plays Donald had already made, including the two I just described.
Might be time to fill that new eyeglass prescription, bub!
Down in the blink of an eye
OK, so I’ve already established that Donald did in fact show up in the first half with the plays described up above. It’s also undeniably true that he turned all the way the hell up in the second half of the game.
When his team needed him the most is when Donald absolutely shined the brightest against Green Bay.
Up 10-8, the Packers had marched the ball all the way down to the Rams’ 26-yard line on their first possession of the second half on offense. They were facing yet another third down, but this time they only needed to gain two yards to get a new set of downs. They had to have been salivating at the prospect of tacking on another touchdown to give themselves a little more breathing room.
Once again, Donald came charging to the rescue.
He was lined up as the three-technique on the right. Taylor had to be tired of seeing him by then. I sure would have been. Nonetheless, Taylor was once again tasked with trying to at least slow Donald down.
Once again, he failed.
Sometimes it takes a lot of words to explain what Donald did to beat an offensive lineman. This time, however, what he did was simple. He just ran right past Taylor then jumped on Rodgers’ back in the blink of an eye.
I mean, sure, Donald appeared to be trying to run a TEX game at first, with his hands all extended like he was trying to get to Bakhtiari’s back. I don’t know if he was really trying to run that game or if he was trying to fake out Bakhtiari or if the edge rusher just didn’t cooperate. What I do know is when Donald saw that he wasn’t actually going to get to Bakhtiari’s back, he didn’t hesitate at all to transition into a straight speed rush. He went from fifth gear, to sixth, then hit the NOS. All Taylor could do was watch helplessly because he was beaten almost right from the get go.
See, Taylor was just a hair late on snap. That was all it took for him to be stuck watching the back of Donald’s jersey for the rest of the play.
Donald took Rodgers down for a loss of 9 yards, forcing Green Bay to settle for a field goal.
In a game that was won by a grand total of two points, I’d say that play qualified as a big @#$%& deal.
And now for the piece de resistance ...
I know a lot of people are complaining and whining that we were deprived of seeing one of those patented Rodgers comebacks on Sunday, all because Ty Montgomery fumbled on the kickoff return with just over two minutes left in the game. The Packers were only down two points after the Rams kicked a field goal to take the lead on the preceding drive, and Rodgers getting into field goal range in that situation is something we just expect.
A game-winning touchdown drive wouldn’t have been all that surprising, either.
But I want to point out that the Packers had already squandered a prime opportunity to go down the field and try to put the game away on offense, up a single point, and with just under six minutes left in the game. Even if they didn’t score on that drive, had they at least been able to milk the clock they would have at least put pressure on an L.A. offense that had uncharacteristically been running hot and cold all game.
Instead, the last time Rodgers actually saw the field on Sunday, he was being sacked by Donald for the second and final time. A sack on third down which forced the Packers into a three-and-out. A sack that forced the Packers to punt from their own 16-yard line.
On that third down, the Rams set the Green Bay offensive line up for the okie doke.
Donald was once again the right three-technique, but this time L.A. had one of their linebackers, Corey Littleton, walk up and mug Linsley. After the snap, Littleton faked as if he was blitzing to the center’s right hand, away from Donald, for a couple of steps into that A gap. But then, Littleton stopped and looped back to his right towards Donald.
That’s because he was actually running a sort of TOM game where Donald was the penetrator and Littleton was supposed to loop behind him.
And penetrate Donald did.
Talk about being on the details, Donald got into a right handed stance so that he could take one step upfield with his outside foot, then push off that foot to redirect into an inside rip move. Because Littleton had pulled Linsley away from Donald, that made the A gap inside Taylor that much wider, and Donald took full advantage. He beat Taylor so quickly and cleanly that Rodgers had barely finished his drop back and Donald was already on him.
Rodgers is legendary for his ability to avoid pass rushers, but Donald seemed to appear out of nowhere, right in his face. At that point all Rodgers could do was give up the ghost and accept his fate. Rodgers turtled up and allowed his legs to give so he could go down while taking the least amount of punishment possible. The result was a loss of 10 yards.
After Green Bay punted the Rams started their next drive already at the Packers’ 40-yard line, still down a single point. We all know how things finished up from there.
So, yeah, Donald may not have put up crazy sack numbers again, but his impact, especially on third downs, was glaring. Donald put his team on his back time and time again on Sunday. His two sacks, five pressures and two tackles against the Packers was just enough to help them get the victory by one of the slimmest of margins.
His film however, showed me that Aaron Donald was more than deserving of my Hoss Of The Week honors the second week in a row.
The reigning and defending Defensive Player Of The Year now leads the NFL in sacks with 10 on the year, and he looks well on his way to earning that title again.
