A detailed preview of Super Bowl LVI

The X-factors

Bengals:

Bengals tight-end Drew Sample & nickelback Mike Hilton Rams tight-end Kendall Blanton & linebacker Ernest Jones Enter caption

Drew Sample

This was a fairly obvious pick for me, having pointed out tight-end C.J. Uzomah as Cincinnati’s X-factor heading into the playoffs. He quietly came just one catch short of hitting 50 for just under 500 yards and five touchdowns throughout the regular season and was a key figure for them through the first two playoff contests, against teams that showed some vulnerability against the position, hauling 13 of 14 targets for 135 yards a score. Well, Uzomah suffered a knee injury in the AFC Championship. Although he was carted off the field in tears and has been listed as DNP (did not practice) on their injury report, he said he “will no stone unturned” in order to get himself, but I would be kind of shocked if he played a substantial amount of snaps just two weeks after getting hurt.

Stepping up for him should be 2019 second-round pick Drew Sample out of Washington. When the Bengals made the selection, a large part of it was trying to acquire an in-line tight end who could contribute in their zone rushing attack, trying to reproduce what Shanahan and McVay like to do. So his work as a blocker, especially allowing Joe Mixon to get to the edges a few times by landing those crack blocks or where the back can at least press that way before putting his foot in the ground, will be important, which is why Sample played 42 percent of offensive snaps during the regular season, despite only being targeted 15 times. That, along with his usage in pass-pro, but of course also affecting a questionable second level of the Rams coverage will be asked of the third-year pro.

Mike Hilton

Defensively, I’m also looking at that area between the numbers and the hashes. I already mentioned the Bengals' issues at defending slot receivers, ranking in the bottom-fourth of the league in terms of completion percentage and yards per target surrendered to the positioned. Mike Hilton lines up inside for them on 83 percent of his defensive snaps, and while the raw coverage numbers would suggest he’s had a slight down season, a lot of that has to do with how Cincinnati structures some of their coverages and how defenders are charged with numbers altogether, since Hilton to me is still in that top-tier among nickelbacks. What I’m interested in is how exactly they will deploy him on the game’s biggest stage, because we obviously know who’s on the opposite side, capable of picking apart zone patterns, putting man-defenders on skates on option routes and also win vertically, if teams to try to in-and-out him. I would think Sean McVay shows enough of a commitment to the run game, so the Bengals can’t run those man-coverage with “free defenders” to bracket guys on too many occasions, so it will be about how much they trust Hilton in true one-on-one situations against the best receiver in football this season. And even though the formula for success seems to be more zone coverages, looking at the passing efficiency splits for Stafford, the slot DB’s ability to pick up crossers and some of the ways they even rotate him into a deep middle safety role at times – like I showed in a clip earlier – will be crucial, as well as just some open-field tackling situations.

Rams:

Enter caption

Kendall Blanton

Once again, I will talk about the tight-end position here for the Rams, because just like Cincinnati’s C.J. Uzomah, we saw Tyler Higbee limp off the field and not return in the AFC title game – unlike he did in the regular season finale against the 49ers. Higbee has yet to participate in Rams practice in any capacity since that day and at this point it’s looking more like he won’t be able to go on Sunday. His absence, however, opened the door for an unexpected performance from backup Kendall Blanton, who caught five passes for 57 yards, after having hauled in just four passes prior to that in his career (and two for 18, including a touchdown in the Divisional Round). He was only active for one game prior to this season and wasn’t even on an active roster in 2020. So for him to step up in a prominent role over a promising All-American and fourth-round pick in Brycen Hopkins from a year ago, that’s pretty telling. Blanton does not look or move like he’s 6’6”, 260 pounds, quickly getting vertical after the catch and eating up ground. Against those Niners, we saw him pick up nice yardage off check-downs, chipping and then peeling off like I just described, along with a really cool design on the flea-flicker screen pass (which I shared on my Twitter account). Securing those guys on the edges and then creating positive results even when the Bengals have good coverage downfield could help extend some drives or just help out in the field-position battle.

Ernest Jones

A rather surprising third-round pick out of South Carolina, going back to the regular season, I saw Jones more on tape than I even thought I would, considering I said he might turn into their best coverage linebacker by the end of his rookie season. Between weeks eight and 15, he was on the field for an average of 83.3 percent of defensive snaps per game. He was hurt the following week and was limited to just 22 snaps in the NFC title game. I’d expect Jones to be on the field a lot more on Sunday, especially if this becomes more of a drop-back game on Cincinnati’s side or in certain situations, when they go to more four-man rushes and leave Jones as the only guy between the tackles.

Now, his issues appear when you run right at him, because there’s not enough aggressiveness all the time, trying to fill the gap and allowing combo-blocks to develop or attacking the outside shoulder of a pulling lineman, to force the run back inside. But exactly what I described as opportunities to target fellow linebacker Troy Reeder in coverage, putting an extra safety on the field, with Jordan Fuller looking like he might be ready to return, and not giving the offense those favorable matchups could be key. He can cover plenty of ground and I even saw him being able to stick with running backs on wheel routes at times.