Sean McVay explains Rams’ shift in play-action usage this season

Play-action passes were a staple of Sean McVay’s offense when Jared Goff was the quarterback of the Los Angeles Rams. McVay’s usage of play-action this season has declined, and there’s no other logical reason as to why besides the arrival of Matthew Stafford.

Following a question about calling play-action passes this season, McVay iterated why the Rams are utilizing fewer of those plays in their offense this season.

“I think it’s really predicated on which phases of our offense do we want to try to utilize to attack the opposing defense. We could sit here and really talk about the depths of that for a really long period of time. Play action is a part of our offense as is the keeper game,” McVay said. “The drop-back game you’re seeing a little bit more of, but there’s different phases of the drop-back game. Are you talking empty? Are we in six-man protection? There’s a lot of different phases of our offense. I think what you’re talking about is you want to be as multiple as you can presenting a variety of looks that the defense has to prepare for, but you also want to be smart when you’re utilizing some of those things that might put a little bit more stress on the offensive line and some of those known passing situations. It’s a give and take, but we’ve done a lot more out of the shotgun, like we’ve talked about.

The timing of this question is not by coincidence as Los Angeles will host the Detroit Lions in Week 7. Goff is now the starting quarterback of the Lions and he’ll get an opportunity to face his former team on Sunday.

In previous seasons when Goff was under center, the Rams were always near — or at — the top of the league in play-action rate. From 2017-2020, Los Angeles ran play-action on 32% of their dropbacks, which was the most in the NFL, per Next Gen Stats.

It has been quite different this season as Stafford is ranked 25th in play-action passing attempts among quarterbacks in the first six weeks, according to Pro Football Reference. Of Stafford’s 200 passing attempts thus far, only 33 of them have come on a play-action play. So why is that?

Whenever McVay was scheming up an offense for Goff, play-action was used as more of a crutch rather than an efficient way to attack a defense. While it was plenty effective with Goff at times, the offense became predictable in the end, prompting Los Angeles to make a change at the most important position in football.

Even though McVay didn’t mention Goff by name or flat out exclaim why he’s shifted away from play-action, he did admit that the Rams can do a bit more with Stafford.

“Each year if you really look at it, whether it’s ‘17, ‘18, ‘19, ‘20, there’s always been a little bit different narrative, even though there’s still a similar philosophy, but it always starts with the quarterback,” he said. “Some of those things are a reflection of what we feel like it takes advantage of what Matthew does best for the 2021 Rams. And that’s what you’re seeing through six games. We might come out of this game and utilize a lot more things that maybe we haven’t done. Each week is kind of how the game plan comes together and then what our players ultimately feel most comfortable with and then what the defense is presenting.”

McVay has been running more empty sets and shotgun formations this season, and it’s easy to say it’s been working. While play-action passes are still sprinkled in for certain moments, McVay understands that he now has a quarterback that doesn’t need it to succeed.

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