Las Vegas Raiders edge defender Charles Snowden doesn’t get talked about much because he’s more of a rotational player, but Snowden could be in for a bigger role moving forward. He only participated in 27
defensive snaps on Thursday night against the Denver Broncos, per Pro Football Focus, but he certainly made them count.
Snowden was third on the team with six total tackles, accounting for one of the Raiders’ two sacks, two out of four quarterback hits and a pass defended in Denver. Additionally, he registered three pressures on three pass-rush opportunities, just one behind Maxx Crosby for the team lead, and led Las Vegas with five defensive stops for an active evening. That allowed him to finish as the team’s third-highest graded defender at 75.0.
Seeing as the veteran outside linebacker has started over the last two games for the Silver and Black, and appears to have moved above Malcolm Koonce on the defense’s depth chart, let’s dive into and break down his performance.
Snowden has primiarily been used on early downs and collected three of his five stop against the run, tied for the second-most among edge defenders in Week 10, per PFF, and the clip above highlights one of those three.
The Broncos come out in a jumbo formation with 12 personnel, where an extra offensive lineman is in the game, and they run a toss outside zone right at Snowden. That puts him one-on-one with the tight end, and the defender does a great job of getting his hands up to gain control of the block and set the edge. Also, he uses a long arm to maximize his extension against the tight end and keeps his shoulders parallel to the line of scrimmage.
So, when running back JK Dobbins still tries to run outside, the defender escapes the block and escorts the running back out of bounds for a two-yard gain on second and four. That gave the defense a chance to get off the field on third down, and Denver ended up punting just two plays later.
We’ll see a similar rep in the clip above, with the Broncos running power-lead right at Snowden.
With both tight ends and the entire front side of the offensive line down blocking, that puts him one-on-one with the fullback on the edge for the kickout block. Clearly, that’s a matchup offensive play-caller/head coach Sean Payton likes, but Snowden wins by creating a stalemate in the backfield. Additionally, he manages to escape the block and make the tackle in his gap for just a one-yard gain.
Also, this is a great rep from Crosby to get penetration and not only defeat his block, but also pick the puller to help Elandon Roberts to create even more havoc in the backfield.
This time, Denver avoids blocking the veteran edge by making him the read man on a read option call, but he does a good job of playing both the quarterback and running back and makes the tackle for another defensive stop.
Snowden recognizes that he’s unblocked and stays close to the line of scrimmage instead of flying up the field. He also keeps his shoulders square to the line, which influences the quarterback to hand the ball off. Once the defender reads the mesh point and sees the handoff, he crashes down the line and makes the tackle for no gain with Thomas Booker IV resetting the line of scrimmage on the front side.
Also, shoutout to Crosby for defeating his block and getting involved in the tackle, too.
Moving onto a couple of pass-rush snaps, Snowden gets a pressure/QB hit here because Bo Nix drifts out of the pocket. But, he does get his hands up and manages to get a piece of the ball to record the PD mentioned above. That changes the spin of Nix’s pass as it ducks toward the receiver, making it harder to catch and leading to the drop on third down.
I touched on the coverage of this play when breaking down Jeremy Chinn’s performance on Thursday night, and this definitely falls into the coverage sack category. But Snowden does use a nice long arm to beat tight end Marcedes Lewis, who has made a 20-year career out of being a quality blocker. Finally, Snowden does a good job of running the hoop as a pass-rusher to finish the play with a sack.
Finally, Snowden dropped in coverage six times and was targeted twice, giving up a couple of catches for 17 yards according to PFF. While one of the completions went for 13 yards and a first down, he made a quality tackle for a four-yard gain/coverage stop on the play above.
Las Vegas tries to disguise its coverage by having all of its second-level defenders line up on the line of scrimmage pre-snap before dropping into a Cover 2 look post-snap.
That puts Snowden as the weak curl defender, where he shows good zone eyes to recognize that Courtland Sutton is coming into his area on a curl route. So, the defender drives on the route and closes right after the ball arrives to Sutton, making the tackle before the receiver can turn up the field and get any YAC.
Considering the edge defender transitions from a backpedal to moving forward and is out of his element a bit by dropping into coverage, this is an impressive rep.
Especially since Koonce hasn’t done much outside of one game against the Tennessee Titans, don’t be surprised if Snowden gets more opportunities to prove himself over the next two months.
