The next biggest thing, besides zone coverage/ run defense . Qbs need to throw it away or run. Seems simple enough . Inside pressure should result In the qb rolling out . .....then tucking it or throwing it away . Some of the worst offenders for sacks allowed do have 20 pass block, but most have 60 or 80 and even 100.

Some throw aways are ugly . The qb will lob the ball around 10 to 15 yards(as a clear throw away attempt) and my dline will travel as fast as the pass , from pressuring the qb to the pass destination . It's not those "blimp" ***** but the ball is moving too slow. Throw aways are down and out or up and out .

What makes it look most ugly is five defenders around the ball that can't pick it off. It seems less defenders have a better chance at picking it. No dline knock downs either .

More broken tackles. And broken run blocks ,all across the board . Open up that return game, an average punter forced 11 fair catches in a row.

General observations

1) I'm loving the check downs to the RBs, but RB routes are getting too deep into the well. Most RBs are catching the ball only a few yards off the sideline when there is a lot of room to cut up the field.

2) The flipside of RB route running is that coverage on RBs is sketchy. LBs and safeties will track RBs parallel to the LOS, which is nice, but they are often too deep to make a play on the ball. LBs also need CB or safety help to clean up RB passing plays.

Film review

1) [M2M cover] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337940
a) Not sure what happens to the CB on this play. Did the WR get him to trip over his own feet? I don't mind it. It's just hard to tell what happened.

2) [QB decision / Hot Read Bug] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337948
a) Hot reads appear to be bugged now. All of the hot reads I've seen in the past few games have been like this one.

3) [Holding penalty] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337951
a) Holding penalty happens 20 yards behind the play.

4) [M2M Cover] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337954
a) The LB tracks the RB 6 yards deep. The RB doesn't make the first down tho because the CB covering the outside WR comes back to make the play. If the CB doesn't come back, this is a 50/50 play.

5) [M2M Cover / RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337964
a) LB tracks the RB 6 yards deep. Also, this play does a good job of show how the swing passes may be going too deep in their routes.

6) [M2M Cover / RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337965
a) LB tracks the RB 6 yards deep. If the RB cuts this route shorter and cuts up field faster, this is an easy first down.

7) [RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337972
a) RB should cut upfield faster here too.

8) [Blocking / Coverage / I have no idea] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337981
a) What?

9) [M2M Cover] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1337997
a) LB tracks the RB 6 yards deep and is in no position to make a play. The CB has to come back to clean up the play before the RB makes the first.

10) [M2M / B&R Cover] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1338014
a) Really awful coverage on the TE here. This happens a lot in the non-beta leagues I've noticed. I think the SLB tries to play B&R, but since his B&R is so bad, the TE just flies right past. The thing is, the SLB is too far off the ball to begin with to come up and play B&R. This is a corollary to how LBs play coverage too far off the LOS when coverin g RBs. LBs need to move around the field when covering, especially if they are going to come up to B&R a TE. And, then, they shouldn't **** so hard at it that they basically stand there while TEs tear up the field. The only thing that prevents me from running TE streaks for TDs every game is when a safety has good B&R or when some player knocks the ball away from 30 yards behind the play.

11) [RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1338016
a) Route goes too deep. When the new code was implemented RBs no longer turn upfield after they hit the end of their route.

12) [RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1338034
a) Route goes to deep. Look how close to the sideline the RB catches the ball.

13) [RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1338040
a) If the RB cuts upfield at the 1:21 mark, this is a TD.

14) [RB passing] https://mfn1.myfootballnow.com/watch/7408#1338046
a) If this guy cuts upfield after his route ends, which is just beyond the TE on the strong side, this is a TD.

I don't have time to break down the full game in Beta-87. But here are some observations that I think are important for receivers and coverage.

1) [M2M Cover / RB Passing] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1115#205688
a) The QB delivers the ball to the RB at just about the right time on this play. This really exposes what happens when LBs track the RB too far away to make a play. The RB has a great angle (14:18) and lots of field to work. There is no way the LB can make a play here. In this case, being so deep saves the LB because he makes the play down the field, but if he's a step late, this is a TD.

2) [M2M Cover] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1115#205736
a) The WR gets good separation from the CB here by stutter stepping, which is good. Then the ball is underthrown, so the WR has to come back to get it. The CB should be in an ideal situation to pick this off because of being a step behind, but instead, he sprints ahead of the WR who has already turned around and then has to come back to the ball. Not exactly sure what is going on here, but I suspect it's a side effect of how DBs always run parallel to the WR once the ball arrives. It looks like the DB mirrors all of the WRs movement.

3) [route running] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1115#205748
a) This is similar to the RB route running problems. The WR here is running a drag to the sideline. In the old code, the WR would turn around as soon as he hit the end of his route. Now he continues to the sideline and out of bounds. He should probably cheat upfield as soon as he hits the end of the route.

4) [route running] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1115#205766
a) Here's another example where the receiver continues running in the direction that the route ended until he's out of bounds. We need more options for how receivers should move after their routes. They either need to sit down in the hole in the coverage, like here, or cheat up field. I don't know how you make that work tho. This may still be an improvement over the old code where the receiver just ran up field or reversed direction and ran the other way.

As always, thanks for the observations! Here are a few comments, feel free to discuss. I'm not defending, just explaining what I think is happening for the purpose of furthering discussion.



QB1 should be decreasing in his sharpness but he just may not be out of the game long enough to have a noticeable impact. In theory it should be about the time that QB2 starts doing well that QB1 would come back in and have difficulty. Curious how long QB1 was on the bench in these games.



I did turn up the impact of tight coverage on WRs, when I look at the code I feel like it's too much in favor of the defenders - but I can turn it up and see if it helps.



See below for some comments on this on some of the specific plays mentioned below.



Look in the play-by-play on these slow passes and see if there is pressure mentioned. What I believe is being simulated is that the QB's arm is being hit as he throws which is causing the ball to fly erratically.



Let me make a tweak to the positioning logic for solo M2M and see if it helps.





I think the LB on this play is biting on the play action fake.



I'll make some changes to increase the probability of a QB running.

- I'll post a comment when the changes listed above are into beta.

I don't think that's what happens all the time though. I've seen a lot of these plays even when my defense is keying pass, which makes me think this is a continued B&R problem. I'll look for other examples. (Granted, I haven't seen as many of these since the B&R changes were pushed in.)

In general, I think that 0.4.3 is a big improvement over what we have in the non-beta leagues. Even with RB routes going too deep, the games feel a lot more natural. But I'm only one person breaking down film right now, so I don't know what I'm missing.

* QBs should come in cold off the bench and it should take a little bit for a new QB to get into rhythm. Obviously this is to combat the ability to keep 'fresh' QBs on the field. I also reduced some of the fatigue impact on QBs.

This is definitely working as intended. I continued to run a rotation in the preseason and it was terrible. Was completing like 25% of passes.

* Since the end of the last season, I've attempted to add some pressure on QBs to get sack numbers up a little bit higher.

Pressure is definitely increased. I have a little concern that it’s too high, but it may just be a lucky first three weeks, cause the league averages are more reasonable.

* Removed holding calls far away from the play.

I feel like this is working. Feel like I haven’t noticed as many annoying calls.

* General QB decision making should be better, throwing to the open receiver more often. (Note that just because the QB doesn't throw to the best receiver does not mean this isn't working, because he still will make poor decisions - but in general, he should be making a better decision more often than previously)

Yes, definitely working.

* QB should be releasing the ball much more quickly

Yes, working. QBs do seem a little more prone to freezing under pressure now though.

* M2M coverage should be improved, where WR can juke and lose their M2M coverage, and good M2M coverage should reduce passes into tight coverage and reduce the success of passes that do go into tight coverage. Again, there will still be successful passes into tight coverage, but it should be more rare than before.

I feel like the DBs still need to be turned up more. With QBs hitting more open WRs, the top DBs should be more lock down feeling. There are 20 QBs with completion percentage above 70% right now. That’s insane.

* DL interceptions should be significantly reduced

Never really noticed this before or now so can’t say.

Overall, I like the code changes a lot, but the ease of passing is a big concern to me. I wouldn’t release it till that gets under control.

I would like to push to get the recent draft changes pushed into production with this patch though. While they may not 100% solve the late draft issues, they are a big step forward. We just started a new season in 15 and I found myself really missing the improvements made in MFN1 draft. I cared about the late rounds this last draft and I don’t anywhere else as much.

Part of the problem is that there are too many elite QBs in all leagues. I think that this is probably because of an overcorrection a year or two ago when QBs were barely getting to 50% accuracy.

I'm a little bit late, but my qb is taking a lot more sacks than last year. Does anyone notice that too ?
Last Game, my DTs combined for 4 Ints.

Realized I have been making the same observation for the last few games, so I only have a few observations here.

1) [RB passing] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1134#209038
a) This is the worst RB pass I've seen yet. But RB passing is still largely useless now. RBs need to turn upfield after hitting the end of their routes or something different. I think when you made the last change to RBs so that QBs would wait longer to throw the ball to them, it actually made the situation worse.

2) [RB passing] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1134#209052
a) Next drive. That's -9 yards in two catches because the RB ran out of bounds. That can't be released. RB passing is a major part of my offense, so I may be the only one that is having problems with this. I guess I can just go to a stupid vertical Madden offense if I have to.

3) [RB passing] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1134#209071
a) Not as bad here, but we can see the same thing. The RB gets too deep in his route and only ends up getting 3 yards instead of a lot if he would have turned upfield faster.

4) [RB passing] https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/watch/1134#209098
a) If the RB turns upfield right before the ball is thrown and the QB leads the RB up the field, this is a heck of a gain. Instead it goes for a few yards. Look at 14:17. The RB has a perfect lane upfield. In the non-beta leagues, this is a 15-20 yard gain.

Regarding this. Slow QBs are a complete liability again with the blocking updates. I don't know why we are wildly oscillating between 0 sacks and 100s of sacks.

In Paydirt year two, I only gave up 31 sacks all season with a QB with 12 SP: https://paydirt.myfootballnow.com/team/4

In Beta-87 now in year four, I have given up 30 sacks in 5 games with my 31 SP QB despite having a much better offensive line: https://beta87.myfootballnow.com/team/27

I'm running virtually the same game plan in both leagues, and I see remarkable differences between beta and non-beta -- some good and some very bad.

Pass blocking seems worse in beta, but QBs are more accurate and making better decisions. QB yardage is down in beta because receivers are "continuing their routes" rather than making cuts to the open field now.

All this means that vertical offenses with fast QBs may be the "only" way that the passing game is going to succeed now. In Beta-87, I'm going to put one together just to see if I'm completely crazy or not.