Below, I’ve posted the transcript of the most recent Football Film Room podcast covering the AFC and NFC Championship Games and included clips of the plays I talked about in the episode.
Feel free to read the transcript on it’s own or use it (and the plays I included) to follow along with the podcast to get more context for what I’m talking about.
In this episode, I discuss:
Rams vs. Seahawks - Sam Darnold delivered
Patriots vs. Broncos - Just like Karate Kid 3
Here is a direct link to the podcast, and below that you can find the transcript and plays:
The Football Film Room Show - Episode #18 Transcript
Welcome to the Football Film Room Show. I’m Nick Kehoe. We’ve got another great episode for you today.
We’re going to break down all the action from Conference Championship Sunday. We finally know who will be playing in Super Bowl LX…the Patriots and Seahawks. Some people happy about that. A lot of people probably not. We’ll get to all that.
But both games were…they were different games, but they were entertaining because they were close. The outcome was in doubt until the end, and that’s kind of all you can ask for in a conference championship game.
Rams vs. Seahawks
Now, the story of the weekend was, without a doubt, Sam Darnold. He answered all the critics, all the people saying that he couldn’t get it done in a big spot, including myself.
And I didn’t necessarily think he couldn’t get it done. I just hadn’t seen him get it done yet in a big spot, and so I wasn’t going to be a betting man and say, “Oh, yes, Sam Darnold, I can absolutely count on him.”
But he absolutely delivered. 25-of-36, 346 yards, three touchdowns, and most importantly, no turnovers.
Because that was the question coming into this game. Which Sam Darnold was going to show up? The one that had played the Rams twice this year had six interceptions.
Many of which, as I wrote about last week, were the result of disguise. Him not recognizing what the Rams were doing. The Rams doing a good job of either completely masking their coverage or slow playing their coverage after the snap:
In this game, though, he was outstanding. And there were really three things that he did especially well.
One, he put the ball wherever he wanted to. Two, he processed quickly. Any of those disguises, any of those different looks that the Rams were giving him, he had no problems with. And then three, he threw the ball well in the face of pressure.
When there were bodies around him, he did a great job of sliding to find the soft spot in the pocket to throw from:
There was one play where his tackle’s feet got pushed back in the pocket pretty much to the spot where Darnold wanted to throw from, and ho-hum wasn’t a big deal. He just slid his feet to the left, threw back to the right, accurate pass, completion: