NFL wild-card weekend! Six games from Saturday to Monday that launch us into the second football season. For this week’s Playbook, I looked at each game and one specific matchup or aspect (sometimes multiple because I can’t help myself) that could swing things.

Starting with the Saturday afternoon game that should just be called “Texans time” by this point.

Can Texans, C.J. Stroud finally find answers for season-long issues?

The Texans’ run game isn’t good. It’s actually the worst run game this NFL season. It’s a reflection of an offensive line that has battled injuries, and a setback in play and cohesion. The poor run game creates tons of long downs and distances for C.J. Stroud to overcome. To make it worse, the lack of consistent protection means opponents can either blitz and win instantly on plays or not even bring pressure and have it still affect Stroud and his offense.

That lack of threat in the run game and ability to play passively against the Texans has allowed defenses to stay in soft coverages. They keep a lid on big plays to Nico Collins and dare Stroud and the rest of the offense to put together multiple plays in a row. Stroud has faced the third-most dropbacks this season with a defense using a split-safety coverage (with both safeties deep in a two-high shell and not in the box as another body against the run), and he’s struggled against those coverages, ranking 26th in dropback success rate and 24th in EPA per dropback.

This is more a reflection on the Texans’ current ecosystem as it’s hard to attack downfield if you can’t protect! This has me still optimistic about Stroud in the future. That’s the good news.

The bad news is that the Chargers run split-safety coverages under Jesse Minter at the second-highest rate in the NFL, with the coaching staff’s attention to detail being highlighted in these coverages that get unlocked with proper scouting.

Another reflection of how well-coached and aware this defense is is how well the Chargers tackle after the catch. They are tied for fewest yards allowed after catch per reception in the NFL. Again, this is tough sledding for the Texans, with Stroud currently ranking 23rd in YAC per completion among 28 qualifying QBs.

Even another avenue that Stroud could hit the Chargers with — scrambling — isn’t Stroud’s preferred way to attack. The Chargers are 24th in scramble EPA allowed this season because their coverage defenders stay keyed in on their assignments. Stroud has used his legs more often as the season has gone along, but he might have to continue to do so to find consistent answers against such a well-coached defense.

The playoffs are all about tweaking game plans to find an answer to win just that week. I’ll be curious to see what offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik and Stroud resort to against the sound (but not entirely overwhelming) Chargers defense.

Russell Wilson deep ball vs. Ravens’ rapidly improved defense

Both of these offenses are going to pound the rock. The Steelers have long been good against running quarterbacks and have had success in limiting the damage that Lamar Jackson does with his legs. But Jackson and this season’s Ravens have a variety of ways to answer what defenses throw at them.

The Steelers under offensive coordinator Arthur Smith are built off of their run-first ways, which has lifted the floor of their offense into something like an elevated rock fight. But the highs this Steelers offense and team can reach is based on the success of their passing attack, particularly their downfield passing attack, with Russell Wilson launching beautiful moon balls to primarily George Pickens. These explosive pass plays are key to helping creating breathing room for the Steelers’ offense that is so run-heavy and doesn’t rely on a straight dropback passing game to create chunks when Wilson throws.

When those downfield forays aren’t connecting, the Steelers’ offense can hit a wall with no other ways to crank out big plays. In the five games this season Wilson has connected on five or more explosive passing plays (defined as a gain of 16 yards or more), the Steelers are 4-1. In the games that he hasn’t, the Steelers are 2-5. When Pickens has been on the field with Wilson as the starting QB, the Steelers have one of the more explosive passing attacks in the NFL. They would rank fifth in explosive pass rate, and Wilson ranks second in success rate and EPA per dropback on throws of 20 or more air yards this season.

Against an average NFL defense, the Steelers may have been able to find a solid day on the ground and not have to rely on several deep balls connecting so much. It’ll be harder against the Ravens, who have one of the best rushing defenses in the NFL and a rapidly improving pass defense to match. Since Week 11, when the Ravens benched safety Marcus Williams, moved Ar’Darius Washington into the lineup and moved Kyle Hamilton back as a deep player, the Ravens’ passing defense went from one of the league’s worst to one of the best over the final two months of the regular season.

From Weeks 1 through 10, the Ravens were 23rd in dropback success rate allowed, 30th in EPA per dropback allowed (.19) and 29th in net yards per pass attempt (7.4). They surrendered the highest explosive pass rate in the NFL (a laughable 18.3%).

Since those defensive personnel changes, the Ravens rank first in dropback success rate (from 46.3% allowed to 35.3%), first in EPA per dropback allowed (-.15), first in net yards per attempt (5.3, over 2 yards improvement) and 12th in explosive pass rate allowed (13.2%).

I could have simply said the Ravens’ pass defense has gone from one of the league’s worst to one of the NFL’s best, but I wanted to throw numbers at you to drive home the point.

This Steelers’ offense against the Ravens’ defense is going to be a fistfight on early downs. The dozen or so uppercuts that Wilson will try to throw will swing the game. It’s a variance the Ravens might not have been able to withstand in the first half of the season, but were able to when these two division rivals met for the second time. The Ravens can keep surging forward toward a Super Bowl run if this defensive improvement continues to hold, but the Steelers can keep it frisky if a couple of 50/50 balls connect.

There are a lot of strength-on-strength aspects between the Bills offense and Broncos defense. The Broncos feature the best run defense in terms of success rate, EPA, and yards per rush allowed. The Bills offense is sixth in success rate and fourth in EPA per rush this season.

The Broncos defense led the NFL in sacks this year with 63 and recorded the second-highest pressure rate (40%). Josh Allen only took 14 sacks this season, with a miniscule 2.8% sack rate that sits in stark contrast to his reputation. In fact, Allen was only sacked on 8% of his pressured dropbacks this season, the lowest mark by any qualifying QB in a single season since 2002, which is far back as I can look in TruMedia’s database.

The Broncos love to blitz and use man coverage, generating pressure from all different angles and letting their cornerbacks play aggressive, buoyed by the Defensive Player of the Year favorite Patrick Surtain II locking down any receiver he’s tasked with going against.

Allen was one of the better operators against man coverage this season, finishing second in EPA per dropback against it. Allen will hunt his best matchup vs. man, with a slight preference to Dalton Kincaid. (Or scramble; Allen scrambled for 136 yards against man coverage this season, fifth-most in the NFL.) But the Broncos, of course, are good defending tight end targets.

Where this is a weakness for the Broncos is when offenses are able to sort out their protections and get the running back out on a route. That’s something the Bills are able to consistently do under the sound rules of offensive line coach Aaron Kromer. The Broncos have surrendered the most EPA to RB targets this season while in man coverage, with QBs going 26 of 30 for 245 yards and five touchdowns. With the explosive James Cook and the versatile Ty Johnson available for the Bills, look for some designs from Joe Brady (a Sean Payton-esque choice route from Brady’s background?) to try and get the RB out and on dropping outside linebacker.

The BIlls trying to get their running backs out on routes might create some unblocked pass rushers for the Broncos, but it’s a risk worth tolerating with an all-world QB.

How much man coverage do the Eagles play, and how do the Packers attack downfield without Christian Watson?

The Packers will miss their true No. 1 receiver in Christian Watson due to injury, but being forced to play without him might have a couple ancillary benefits.

When defenses want to run zone coverage, there are valid options for Jordan Love to find as he works through route combinations across the field. Love is fourth in EPA per dropback against zone coverages this season and seventh in dropback success rate. Even with his preference for attacking downfield, Love has been consistent in being able to pepper the holes that open up in a defense.

Man coverage, meanwhile, has been a bit more volatile for Love and the Packers offense this season. Love pushes the ball further than any other QB when he gets man coverage (he ranks first in average air depth per pass attempt), taking his chances and giving his receivers opportunities to win in one-on-one match-ups and 50/50 balls. But those haven’t been as consistent nor as consistently explosive as I’m sure the Packers would like, with Love ranking 26th in EPA per dropback and 22nd in dropback success rate against man coverage among qualifying QBs this season.

To make things even more dicey, Love’s primary deep ball threat is Watson, who reportedly tore his ACL and will miss wild-card weekend. Not that deep balls would have been an easy excursion for Love this weekend in Philadelphia against Quinyon Mitchell and the rest of the Eagles defenders, who currently allow the lowest rate of explosive passes in the NFL and ranked second in EPA per dropback against throws of 20 or more air yards.

The Eagles defense is one of the best against the pass overall no matter how you dice it up: explosive passes, situational, or efficiency. (The Eagles rank first in overall dropback success rate, too.) Schematically, coordinator Vic Fangio runs man and zone coverages at about an equal rate on early downs, but primarily leans to zone coverages on late downs (sixth-highest rate of zone coverage on third and fourth down), sitting in split safety structures and rotating based on game plan.

It’s going to be a fun matchup between a trick-shot throwing QB and a disciplined pass defense no matter what. But I’ll be curious Fangio tweaks his formula, perhaps leaning into more man coverage against the young Packers pass catchers, or continues to his well-balanced diet of coverages. Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores challenged the Packers receivers with man coverage a few weeks ago. We’ll see if Fangio does the same.

Jayden Daniels against Todd Bowles’ blitz-mad defense

Tampa Bay head coach Todd Bowles has always been one of the blitz-happiest defensive play-callers in the NFL, no matter the season or the team that he’s calling plays for. Since the Bucs’ Week 11 bye, however, Bowles has cranked the blitz dial up an extra notch.

Rather than just making “10” louder, Bowles has added an “11” to that blitzing dial. From Week 12 onward, the Bucs blitzed at the highest rate in the NFL, a 48.6% clip that is already pretty laughable. But on late downs, prime blitzing situations for NFL defenses, the Bucs have blitzed 66.7% of the time. That is not a misprint. Every two out of three third and fourth downs the Bucs defense has faced since their bye week, they have sent a blitz at the offense.

This isn’t just an abnormally high rate for this season or for Bowles, this is a historically high rate. The highest late-down blitz rate since 2016 (as far back as NextGenStats database goes) was 66.8% by the 2019 Ravens with Wink Martindale dialing it up. The next highest late-down blitz rate is the 2017 Browns at 55.4%. The Bucs’ season-long late down blitz rate would still rank eighth since 2016, but their rate since Week 12 would be battling for the highest we’ve seen recorded. That’s not blitz-happy. That’s blitz-mad.

The Bucs’ run defense, led by the ever-stout nose tackle Vita Vea, has allowed the lowest rushing success rate on early downs in the NFL this season and ranks fourth in stuff rate (runs that go for zero or negative yards). The Bucs remain effective against designed QB runs as well, ranking fifth in combined success and explosive play rate against QB running plays. It should be a battle up front going against Jayden Daniels and the Commanders’ creative run game that has had some strong performances this year (and ranks third in early down rushing success rate).

Late downs is where this game will be decided, however. And while Bowles was able to limit Daniels in Week 1 during Daniels’ NFL debut (he went 5 of 9 for 45 yards and was sacked twice on nine pressures against the blitz), he has played well against the blitz this season. Daniels often finds scramble lanes to punish defenses not staying disciplined with their pass rush lanes. He scrambled 13% of the time against the blitz, more than any other QB, and accumulated more EPA than any QB on his scrambles against the blitz.

Daniels and the Commanders offense has had answers in the passing game too, often finding screens and go-balls to Terry McLaurin on early downs and quickly throwing hot answers over the middle on late downs. (Look at the clump of throws over the middle and to the right side on the target map below.) Daniels ranked third in EPA per dropback and eighth in dropback success rate among all qualifying QBs against the blitz since Week 1, which speaks to the consistent answers he keeps finding when defenses try to heat him up.

Both sides have tweaked their approaches since their first matchup. The Bucs are blitzing more than ever and Daniels has been finding answers against the blitz this season, but can get forced into scrambling mode when he sees extra pass rushers coming.

How the Bucs corral Daniels in the pocket, and how they limit pass-catchers after the catch on screens and over the middle, will be huge for getting both the Commanders’ offense off the field and the ball back into the hands of the Bucs’ own dangerous offense.

Rams vs. Vikings is a tale of the trenches

How the offensive lines perform, especially on early downs and particularly in pass protection, will be the crux of this game.

The good thing for the Vikings is that David Quessenberry won’t be starting at tackle in this rematch from Week 8. The bad news is that Cam Robinson has yielded the highest pressure rate on one-on-one blocks among all starting tackles in the NFL since he took over at left tackle for the Vikings after a midseason trade from Jacksonville.

Robinson is not alone up front in allowing pressure, a side effect of the Vikings’ heavy downfield attack, but also indicative of the weakness of this offense: basically any offensive lineman not named Brian O’Neill. And while Sam Darnold has played well this year, even under pressure, Week 18 was a bucket of cold water from Lake Minnetonka. While leaning into Darnold’s devil-may-care playing style of pushing the ball to Justin Jefferson and the other talented Vikings pass catchers can rack up points in a hurry, there is a thin margin that can unravel the whole offense if pressure starts racking up and Darnold is just a hair off with his throws or starts overthinking his reads.

When these two teams played in Week 8, the Rams were getting pressure as frequently as any other team in the NFL. In the back half of the season, the Rams’ young front, led by Defensive Rookie of the Year favorite Jared Verse, had their overall pressure rate taper off a bit to something around league average (tied for 16th since Week 9 and 11th when rushing four or fewer, per NextGenStats). The Rams can still get after the QB, whether it’s Verse, Byron Young on the outside or Kobie Turner or Braden Fiske along the interior. Verse and Young teed off on Quessenberry the first go-round, how the Rams attack Robinson and the Vikings’ interior is essential to their success. It’s a three-second race to not only disrupt Darnold, but to save their own defensive back end from having to protect against Jefferson and Jordan Addison shredding them.

On the other side, it’s another tackle playing that will help the Rams coaches sleep easier. Starting right tackle Rob Havenstein has missed a few games this year, including the last couple of the regular season, but head coach Sean McVay gave an optimistic update on Havenstein playing against the Vikings. Havenstein is one of the better right tackles in the league, firmly an above-average-to-good starter as he’s well into the back half of his career. This is reflected in the eye test and his pressure rates allowed this season (6.9% overall and 7.8% in one-on-one pressure rate allowed, both well below the league average rate for right tackles). When Joe Noteboom and Warren McClendon Jr. filled in for Havenstein, it created unstable pockets a bit too often when the Rams want to pass the ball. Noteboom and McClendon Jr.’s combined one-on-one pressure rate allowed of 10.9% would be the fifth-highest among NFL right tackles.

The Rams and Vikings share DNA. They will run the ball, but they also want to chuck it down the field with their big-armed QBs. The difference between a handful of pressures in a game, and the domino effect it can have on players, is huge.

The Vikings defense can still give offenses fits with its heavy movement after the snap. But it started to take some lumps in the back half of the season. The Rams won 30-20 in Week 8 and showed the balanced run game, protection and aggressive passing game needed to gash a Brian Flores knuckleball defense.

There are plenty of other keys to this game, and early downs will be especially huge. The Rams are going to test the run game, which the Vikings are going to try and make edgy with their post-snap movement. (The Rams’ preference for the duo run concept is a great answer to try and steamroll the Vikings’ bolo punches.) Los Angeles is sixth in early down rushing success rate this season, and the Vikings run defense has become more gettable as the season has gone along (and especially before linebacker Ivan Pace Jr. returned from injury). The Vikings defense ranks 17th in early down rushing success rate since Week 9 and is 31st since Week 12. They are also in the bottom quartile in explosive runs allowed (10+ yards gained), although the Rams don’t feature an explosive run game, living in the world of jabs and crosses instead of haymakers.

The Vikings pass rush has also fallen off in the second half of the season, especially when they aren’t bringing a blitz. The Vikings rank fifth in pressure rate when blitzing since Week 9. But that pressure rate drops from 46.5% while blitzing to 28.5% when bringing four or fewer pass rushers, which ranks 23rd over the same time period. Flores prefers to blitz primarily on early downs, using the post-snap movement to confound QBs and pass protectors when teams throw the ball, but to also change blocking angles when teams try to run the ball.

Minnesota, of course, leads the NFL in early down blitzes this season. Stafford has had some high-end moments against the blitz during his career, and sure enough he ranks fifth in dropback success rate and fourth in EPA per dropback against early down blitzes this season, often finding success by throwing to Puka Nacua, who leads all NFL players in target share when his QB was blitzed with a scorching 44.9% rate.

Both QBs and offensive lines are going to be tested by these pass rushes and the heavy movement they like to throw at teams. Stafford and the Rams were able to get after Flores and the Vikings the first time in Week 8, and Darnold and the Vikings offensive line are licking their wounds after their Week 18 loss to the Lions that dropped them to the fifth seed and sent them on the road. But things change quickly in the NFL, and how the Vikings adjust, and how the Rams protect, will decide this ballgame.