I know the preseason doesn’t mean much for a lot of things – the result on the scoreboard, the schematic approach on either side of the ball, etc. – but there are still things we can glean from the preseason games. The key factor is how individual players perform, which I will delve into later this week.
However, on a much more superficial level, there are sometimes cool and fun things that happen in a preseason game, and I like those moments, so I tend to write about them. Today, we’re looking at MarShawn
Lloyd’s big 33-yard gain in the 2nd quarter.
It came off a concept called Mesh Rail, and if that sounds familiar, it’s because we just talked about potentially seeing an uptick of the Packers running Mesh in 2025 after going away from it in recent years. Does seeing an explosive in this preseason game mean it’s really making a comeback in this Packers offense? Probably not, but it’s still fun to talk about.
The key part of Mesh is the two shallow crossing routes in the middle of the field (or, really, the threat of those two shallow crossing routes, but we’re not talking about that now). The Mesh Rail variation releases the RB on a vertical (Rail) route up the sideline. Mesh Rail – like most Mesh variants – tends to work best against Man coverage, so that TE running the vertical/stop route to that side can help build a wall.
Let’s talk about this specific play.
The Packers come out in 12 personnel (1 RB, 2 TE, 2 WR) in a YY Wing formation (both tight ends in-line on the same side of the formation). The Packers have their two WRs split wide to the left and the RB (MarShawn Lloyd) aligned to the right side of the QB (Malik Willis). With the two TEs on the right, a good run look from this formation would be crack-toss, with a TE blocking down to seal inside, a couple of pullers around the edge and the RB flaring out for a pitch. So something kind of like this:
(It’s not a perfect – or even complete – diagram, but I wanted to do a quick sketch of how that might look.)
So that YY Wing formation is what they come out in, and the Colts are in Man Coverage (Cover 1, Man Free, whatever). That puts a linebacker on MarShawn Lloyd, needing to fight through the traffic created by the routes on the right side of the formation. Beyond that, out of this formation, the LB may be looking for crack-toss, so you can see him kind of flatten his initial approach to Lloyd, which puts him behind the 8-ball from the jump.
The Colts are showing single-high pre-snap and they don’t change anything post-snap. Malik Willis checks the safety to make sure his pre-snap picture matches the post-snap picture, then checks the right side of the line. He sees the LB trying to fight through the vertical-pushing route from John FitzPatrick and he knows exactly where this ball is going.
Willis hits the top of his drop, hitches up and hits Lloyd up the right sideline with a nice throw.
Unfortunately, Lloyd was slow to get up after this play. After the game, it was revealed that Lloyd had “hamstring tightness”, so here’s to hoping that heals up quickly, as this play gives us a glimpse of the kind of weapon he can be out of the backfield.
One final note on this play. The pressure on Willis comes off a stunt up front against Jacob Monk [62] and Anthony Belton [71]. Monk passes this off well, but Belton stays with his initial man, which is what frees up the pressure on Willis.
Honestly, it’s not something I’m overly concerned about at the moment. Picking up stunts is often a feel thing; getting reps and knowing what the guy next to you is doing. It’s something to keep an eye on, but not something that’s setting off any alarms or anything.
Albums listened to: Poe – Haunted
