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Cincinnati Bengals Film Breakdown: How Chase Brown Took Big Step Forward in Win Over Carolina Panthers

Brown is averaging 6.3 yards-per-carry this season.

Mike Santagata

Sep 29, 2024; Charlotte, North Carolina, USA; Cincinnati Bengals running back Chase Brown (30) runs around end against the Carolina Panthers during 1st quarter at Bank of America Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images
Sep 29, 2024; Charlotte, North Carolina, USA; Cincinnati Bengals running back Chase Brown (30) runs around end against the Carolina Panthers during 1st quarter at Bank of America Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images / Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images
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Bengals running back Chase Brown leads the NFL in yards-per-carry.

He’s done it despite only having one rushing attempt of 20 yards or more. That attempt went for exactly 20 yards in Cincinnati's win over Carolina. He has a rushing success rate of 65.5% and is generating 0.25 EPA per rush attempt.

Brown is currently an efficiency monster and he’s coming off a game in which he finally got some volume to go with it. Brown’s 15 rush attempts against Carolina is the most he’s ever received in an NFL game. He made good on those 15 attempts and turned them into 80 yards and two touchdowns, averaging 5.3 yards-per-attempt. It’s also important to look at the types of runs that Brown got in the game against Carolina compared to the types of runs that he got in other weeks.

Pre-Carolina Rushing Attempts

Before this week, Brown was often running concepts that did not require him to read anything out. He had a tight end leading him where to go or there was only one hole for him to hit. Some examples of these concepts are iso, wind back, influence trap, and crunch. Let’s look at each as an example.

Iso is a downhill 'A gap' concept that is designed to isolate the fullback (in the Bengals case it’s a tight end) on a linebacker. The back’s job on this play is to immediately get downhill and then to follow the fullback and read his leverage.

Brown’s athleticism shines as he gets downhill very quickly and then is able to get up to the safeties right after Drew Sample reaches the backer. Worth shouting out Cordell Volson on this play for straining and sustaining against the 3-technique.

The next concept used in this game was windback. Wind back is a lot like a counter play with the back taking a step away from the playside before following his lead block from the tight end. The tight end will lead him through the first level and then the back should be in space to go make a play.

Erick All is leading Brown on this wind back concept. All Brown has to do is follow All and read his leverage. Once All establishes leverage, Brown gets skinny through the hole and hits the open field.

Influence trap is another concept that only has one designed hole for the running back to go. The back’s job is to allow the tackle to get to the nose and then to explode into the open field.

It sure helps when the nose is practically running away from the 360 pound right tackle as well. Once that block is made, it’s off to the second and third level for the back. Brown’s explosion shines as it seems like he’s shot out of a cannon once that block is established.

Crunch is a similar deal to influence trap for a running back. This time the block he’s cutting off of is the tight end wham block though. Once that block is established his job is to go be an athlete in the open field.

Sample makes a nice wham block on the 3 technique and Brown doesn’t have to slow up for it whatsoever. Brown hits the open field quickly and makes a defender miss as he keeps churning yardage.

These concepts were great for Brown because it allowed him to play quickly and to go be an athlete in the open field. For any young back who just reached the NFL it’s nice to give them concepts with designed reads or lead blocking. The issue is that these concepts are generally not the backbone of an offense. They’re built to be utilized a couple times in a game instead. The back is not tasked with a lot of processing either. He’s reading the leverage of a single block and cutting off of it. Sometimes even led where to go by his tight end. While he still got some of these looks in Week 4, he also was given some more mentally tasking runs as well.

Zone and Duo

Brown was awesome running those more designer concepts which gave the Bengals staff confidence that they could increase his responsibilities in Week 4. To be fair, Brown had a wide zone rushing attempt against Washington and a duo rushing attempt against New England but he was not getting multiple reps of these runs until his game against Carolina. Let’s take a look at him running wide zone, inside zone, and duo from this week.

Starting with wide zone which is a concept designed to horizontally displace the defense. The back starts by reading the leverage of his most outside block and then continues working inside until he gets to an opening. Take a look at how far Brown has to read this thing out.:

The extra offensive lineman, fullback, tackle, guard, center, and backside guard all have the same leverage so he keeps working down the line until he gets to the backside tackle who has established inside leverage. Once he reads that all out, he gets downhill quickly and picks up what yardage he can as the second level is unblocked. That’s a lot to ask out of the running back mentally before he even makes his cut.

Inside zone has a similar read for the running back although it starts with the first down lineman to the play side outside of a nose tackle. If the defender is to the outside of the guard, then the back works inside. If the defender ends up inside of the guard, then the back works outside. The back then progresses their eyes to the next defender and works off of them.

On this touchdown run, Brown’s first read is the 3-technique outside of Alex Cappa. Cappa makes a fantastic block to torque that defensive tackle to the outside. Brown then works inside of that block and sees that Volson has made a really nice block to get inside of the nose tackle. Ted Karras gets on the MIKE linebacker and it’s an easy score for Brown. It all starts with having disciplined eyes and tempo though.

Duo is a concept that is frequently mistaken for inside zone but it’s pretty different. One of the main differences is that the back generally reads the second level rather than the first level for duo. The back’s goal on duo is to make the MIKE linebacker wrong. If they come down hard to fill, then the back can bounce the run. If they either work outside or stay put, then the back can take the run right up the middle.

This was made a little easier by the linebacker coming down pre-snap but you can see it play out the same way. The linebacker is down, so the back bounces outside before getting upfield. Brown does a great job to press toward the line of scrimmage before making an excellent jump cut to the outside. This forces the defenders to work to the inside and doesn’t allow them to try to cheat. 

Overall these runs typically require quicker processing and more to read out before hitting the line of scrimmage. Brown was incredible this week and these runs were no exception. He read everything out correctly, played with good tempo to allow his blocks to set up, and even pressed the line of scrimmage to set up his runs. This week seems to be the first step toward Brown developing more into a complete running back. The Bengals should continue to give him a similar workload with all kinds of concepts for him to read out. It’s only a matter of time before he finally breaks one for a long touchdown.

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Mike Santagata
MIKE SANTAGATA

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