Ravens clearly had confidence in their redzone gameplan and it showed on the first drive when they ran essentially the same play concept (attack deep middle) twice in a row.
ABOVE: (2nd down) The Ravens come out in a 3x1 set with Pitta, Boldin and I'm not sure who the top WR is, maybe Jones. SF is showing Cover 5 (2 safeties play deep half zone and LBs and CBs are playing man coverage). Interesting to see Torrey Smith pressed and the CB on Jones is playing off-man coverage.
ABOVE: The Ravens run 4 Verts (everyone runs a vertical). The weakness in the coverage is exactly where the Ravens are attacking, deep middle, between the safeties. Yes it's just a picture, but Whitner is flat-footed as Pitta gets 10 yards down the field... He has to play over the top of Boldin but the Ravens OC sees this definitely.
ABOVE: The ball is overthrown by Flacco, but they still have 3rd down to work with. Here is their do-over. *below
ABOVE: Now on 3rd down, the Ravens come out in an empty set, 3 WRs to the right, this time, Boldin is the inside most WR. Notice the SF coverage... pretty familiar, no?
ABOVE: Well, this picture says it all. We'll start with backside, "Smash" concept, outside WR runs a hitch, inside WR runs a corner route. On the right side, Boldin runs the Void, attacking the middle of the 2 deep zone, Pitta runs a vertical and the outside WR runs a hitch, giving Pitta an option to go to the corner if he wants. But Flacco knows where this ball is going the whole time. Look at him, strong arm cocked, LB blind, and WHITNER (this is the key) flat footed as the WRs running past him. It's really not that hard of a throw, he can put the ball between the A and the E in "Ravens" and have a TD. Not taking anything away from Flacco, it was a perfect throw, especially after missing Pitta high last play.
ABOVE: Yup, that's about it.
Notes:
-The Ravens coaching staff clearly saw "When teams go into empty 3x1 or empty in redzone, they play Cover 5.
-SF's defensive coordinator did not change the play call even though Boldin and Pitta switched, giving more of a threat to the middle of the field.
-On Jacoby Jones 50 yard TD, the Ravens came out in 3x1 and Whitner jumped the curl route by the #2 WR and Jones ran a Post & Go right past Whitner.
-The Cover-5 is a pretty conservative coverage, no blitzers, but it doesn't work when players have poor technique like Whitner. His #1 rule is not to get beat deep. Head on a swivel, see #1 to #2, split the difference. It's literally HS level stuff.
-Whitner played an awful game.
-Flacco played outstanding.
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