How Matt Nagy Set Malik Nabers Up For Big-Time Performance Against Commanders | Blue Rush

Malik Neighbors had his breakout game of the season, not his career, against the Commanders, 11 catches, 121 yards, and a touchdown off of 20 targets. Look, if I'm Matt Nagy and I got a guy like Malik Neighbors, I'm going to get the ball to him as many times as possible. I'm going to break down how Nagy was able to move Malik Neighbors across the field, put him in different situations and spots, and run different route concepts to win, and win over and over again and that's why he gets our week five New York Post Sports game ball all right let's do it I mean there was no secret you're going to get the ball to Malik N Neighbors in a game like this in a situation like this and you love to see him get his targets you love to see him get his catches and of course finishing on the touchdown that he had late in the game let's watch this first one because I mean they light him up all over the place they did different things with him to get him open to get Jameis comfortable with throwing him the football so let's watch this first one off this sail concept and then we'll uh we'll break it down see him here look at that wide open zone good ball by Jameis protects him with the throw let's break it down all right so let's bring it back and uh I mean I thought Matt Nagy did a great job of disguising a couple different things getting Malik in different places to get him his targets he's a guy you gotta give him his targets 20 targets is crazy in the game but hey that's sleek that's sleek so right here we've got the sail concept with the sail concept you can run it in different ways it's basically different levels to attack a zone Darnell Mooney right here your speed receiver is going to run the pylon I guess pylon route I want to break this down and simplify it for those who don't know um you know uh deep terminology when it comes to football he's going to fake like he's going across and then run a high pylon route the pylon means that's the angle you're taking and it's high and if Jameis likes it he's gonna we'll throw it this ball has been thrown at times Malik is going to run what we call that that sail route this is part of the concept so he's going to fake this deep over like he's running a crosser and then he's going to run like a bended corner route for for you guys to find the zone get into the space and then for flat control you usually have whether it be a tight end or a back here run to the flats this is your guy for again flat control or if Jameis gets in to some sort of trouble you dump it to the back but we'll check out the three layers so right here Malik Nabers knows that off this press he's got to be patient to allow Darnell Mooney to get up on the safeties and clear out the top part of this coverage so Malik wants to get lost in the sauce right here and he's setting up this deep crossing route which you're going to see him run throughout the course of this game he's setting it up buying time here to allow Mooney to clear things out and he puts his foot in the ground then comes right back out so you see him you see this Mike Backer here kind of walling him kind of eyeing him so you you have to be patient on this route plus you have to set up future routes that deep crosser we'll get to that later so you see Mooney now that he gets off the press you see him chopping you see him chopping you see the speed you see the angle now he sticks his foot into the ground and he's going to go high now one thing i like about malik's patience and you see not only patience but getting in faking that crosser that allows this zone here to open up in cover two looks like they have a cover two some sort of soft cover two being played here this safety is going to go over the top play his deep path and you see what Cam Scarbrough does with the flat route you see what it does to this the flat defender makes him jump to open up this space so you've got the pylon route to take the coverage off the top of the route you've got Malik on the sail to get to his spot to his zone and then you've got the flat right here to pull the corner to open up this spot for Malik Neighbors and you can see i think he catches it right here where the arrow is watch this boom foot in the ground still patient because he wants to make sure all this is clear out you want this nice and clear for Jameis Winston when he's throwing this football great pocket great protection great protection on by the offensive line Theo Johnson likely getting into it over there as well and now that clears out this space Jameis knows he's got this space right here for Malik Neighbors to throw that football in there again when I talk about that flat control you see what scat you see what his presence does it makes this corner late to getting to Malik now if you don't have any flat control this corner is going to see no work and go and look to Rob go look in the Rob anything that's coming out because they're taught someone goes in someone's coming and breaking right back out and you know you can rob that seven route or this sail route so great job of all three guys to get all three levels to hit all three levels to attack this coverage and Malik to get into his spot into his zone and then Jameis delivers a good ball for him to go down get it first down Giants second route here you'll see him run dig route he can run the tree he's not just some sort of explosive receiver or YAC guy this is a complete receiver in my eyes and that's not being a Malik Nabers glazer that's just saying looking at his progression and what you could call his second year his second season remember he was uh he was he he had missed a ton of last season because of the knee injury i think he only playing what three games three almost what two games and one quarter i believe so let's watch the route let's watch the concept the route how they use him to get him open how he gets himself open boom wins inside on the dig route big throw and catch now every play is going to be a big play i believe this was 16 yards on a third and long the third and 10 situation here you got to get the money you got to get the money to your money maker and this is a situation where Matt Nagy was like you know what I'm going player over plays I'm going to find a one-on-one with my one with my receiver one who rocks number one and we're going to get him the rock so he's got this dig route about 16 yard dig route here's what I like about what he does on the snap of the ball looks like it's some sort of cover one cover one situation we have here or man to man though he's playing outside he's got the tight end or you know it could be two man it could it could with this with this linebacker playing Theo Johnson here i believe playing him man to man so you got man man to man here man to man here man to man here man to man here with two high over the top so it looked like could have been cover one at the snap of the football but it now turns into cover two man two man this say this corner here can be aggressive can play underneath can jump routes because he knows he has safety help over the top Malik is running an inside route versus inside technique you gotta be patient with the route young receivers you have to be patient specifically at the top of the route so comes off the ball with the more controlled release wants to see what the defender is going to give him sees he's playing inside but here's what i love about what he does on the stem of his route he doesn't panic he doesn't give a tell he doesn't let this defender know that he's making that break until the last second watch this up and breaks and fights to cross face to get across too many times you see receivers start breaking down their route too early and that's going to make this defender break down it makes it harder to cross face to win in the cross face of this this defender here this corner so great job by him with the release to gather information now he gets his stem and he wants to get vertical puts his left foot into the ground gets vertical and now he's threatening this receiver threatening them with speed he's thinking this corner's thinking okay he could run some sort of go route and they can make take a shot to this honey hole right here Malik Neighbors route specialist boom you see the tat tat with the footwork at the end one two three get out you see him fight that arm bar right there to be physical at the top of the route and cross face now look at the separation he gets on the route and he wins for his quarterback in this situation. Cover 2 man. You got Mooney running up the chute to occupy that safety. He's one-on-one here. One-on-one. Ball delivered. Even when the ball gets there, look at the separation that he still has. And one thing I love about what he does at the top of this route, we talked about the cross face and to beat this defender, to beat him across his face. but one thing i love about him you don't see him fade too much waiting for the football we like to call this getting QB friendly to kind of make our way back towards the quarterback to keep our space so he breaks it what one yard across from the 40 yard 45 yard line so what's that the 44 catches at the 42 so he drifts a little bit but it doesn't matter here because he's got so much separation now if this corner would have been all over him then if he broke at the 44 you would like to see him catch it at the 45 yard line so that's what we call getting friendly but james gets this ball up in the up in the air early and it's a good enough throw and catch but a really good route to one get the separation but two what one cross phase two get the separation three be where you need to be on the third and long to move the chains get up leak all right we've got another one here uh money gets on to the onto the field late but they don't panic looks like there's going to be some sort of cover zero blitz here by cover zero if you don't know football term and that analogy that's blitz zero that means you're manned up you're manned up you're manned up you're manned up someone's got the back everybody else is blitzing uh without my rookie year with the giants 07 they called it uno mas uno mas that means one more in spanish that means they're blitzing one more than you can account for and block that one that free blitzer is the quarterback now has to account for him got to get the ball out so let's watch the play and then we'll break down cross face went on the post taking candy from a baby taking candy from a baby that's money here now here's where they mess up and i don't want to get too deep into it but when you're when you got cover zero you gotta blitz everybody's gotta come because if you don't give if you don't force this quarterback to get the ball out one two to obviously get some sort of sack that's why you bring it but you want to bring some press some sort of pressure on him to make the throw a lot harder um make it a lot harder than just pitch and catch so when they did you see how they drop out two guys it's no longer cover zero this can be blocked up and the Giants offensive line does a great job I believe the scataboo coming over here on the pass protection now you've got Malik Neighbors one-on-one with a safety or a corner or nickel whatever this guy is you've got him one-on-one he's playing this inside shade they got no help to the inside so they can't let defend uh the receivers cross face can't get beat to the inside but what i like what Malik Neighbors is doing this could this stem that he's taking this stem on his route looks like he could be running corner he could run post quick out he gives no tail zero tail while he's running this route boom sticks his right foot into the ground you see the left foot there but right right foot there now Jameis that's the indicator for that Jameis knows i can throw this football now got protection these guys drop to rob um the the the side adjustments or the hot routes they went to go rob the hot routes uh Malachi Fields is the hot route with the little under route that he has right here but Let's go back to Malik Neighbors. Puts that right foot in the ground and gets skinny. He allows Jameis to throw him flat if he needs to. These two are in sync. And look at the way he just... One thing I like about Malik Neighbors when he attacks the football, he goes straight up for the football. Rarely do you see him fade back too much. And that just goes to show how much of an athlete he is. But look at how he goes to attack the football to catch it with his hands. If he tries to catch this ball with the body, then this defender's got a chance to get his hands in there and to make a play but he's playing he's going up for a rebound looks like Mitch Robinson Mitch Robinson plays for the Boston Celtics now it looks like i don't want to say Andre Drummond but who, Karl-Anthony Towns, let's go Karl-Anthony Towns, looks like Towns, looks like KAT going up for a rebound extending his arms away from his body to catch that football, boom, catch secures the catch, hits the ground, touchdown Giants last but not least, we talked about him earlier in the slot they ran um the the sail concept with this receiver running the pylon taking that pylon route to to to take the top off of the coverage you're mirroring in it looking kind of like the same thing, the only difference is it's not Darnell Mooney there, it's Malachi Fields so let's watch Mooney's down here at the bottom let's watch the entire route the concept and then we'll get back to it, there he is, go goes over the top wins against cover two man, I'll keep this one quick again, he wins, he wins, he wins, he wins look at the stem, look what he does here, gets another, looks like another cover two man concept looks like it's two man over the top, they're trying to play a little trying to bracket him they got that uh the nickel wheel here a corner playing underneath, you see this corner here playing a catch technique right here, he'll jump that play underneath, you got safety help we saw him earlier when he ran the sail, remember how I said it made it, he made it look like he was running that deep crossing route or that deep over and then broke back out now he's making it look like he's going up the seam or could be running that sail or out route or some sort of out breaking route and then boom beats him with speed here beats him with speed over the top it looks like he's jogging it looks like he has some sort of tempo but this guy this guy's fast this guy's got wheels plus this corner is playing underneath so we're taught usually when it comes to these deep crossers go under the wheel over the mic and it's keeping the high angle to 18 to 22 and not here you're playing underneath so you don't want to force your way to try and go under this wheel right here he doesn't want to try to force it's all about getting it's all about getting depth getting getting your yardage getting down the field on this concept here particularly against this cover two man look and you see him doesn't have to do much to win he's winning with athleticism and speed but again Matt Nagy lining him up in different places running different types of routes and having different stems on these routes is keeping these defenders and his defenses on their toes and keeping them guessing if you're going to have 20 targets in a game come up with 100 something plus yards and a touchdown then you gotta throw different things at the defense when it comes to getting your wide receiver one the ball Malik Nabers had another day against the commanders crazy part about it is that there is all this doubt on this kid about him coming back into this season with the knee injury obviously week five now you see the knee is fine it's been fine the entire time it goes back towards a training camp when he got out there with the red jersey and people were like wow he's a little bit ahead of schedule a little bit ahead of where they thought he was going to be at the time but Malik Nabers uh a couple years ago with Brian Nabers had what 18 targets in a game against the Commanders so it's something about the Washington Commanders that Malik Nabers gets geared up for to play because you see it again 2026 the man picked puts up big numbers but i just showed you guys how having a true wide receiver one that can run the route tree and not be a one trick pony would help a Jackson Dart a Jameis Winston any quarterback that you put out there so Malik Nabers 11 catches buck 21 and a touchdown congratulations on this week five game ball