Josh Allen is one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL and he is going to be a nightmare for most opposing defenses this upcoming season. He has made tremendous strides as a passer during his time in the NFL and combined with the running ability he always had, it is going to keep defensive coordinators guessing in trying to figure out how to stop him.
However, these coordinators can do themselves some favors if they avoid running these two coverage schemes, Cover-0 and Cover-4, which Doug Farrar at TouchdownWire recently mentioned Josh Allen performed the best in the NFL against them.
Cover-0 defense is probably the most aggressive as it doesn’t give cornerbacks much help with no safeties back to help them on deep throws. As Farrar wrote, Allen did a good job against this scheme due to his ability to complete passes against tight coverage:
"Against Cover-0 in 2021, Allen completed 10 of 16 passes for 114 yards, 89 air yards, five touchdowns, no interceptions, a passer rating of 123.4, and an Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt of 13.4.One reason Allen is so good at exploiting aggressive this kind of man coverage? His ability to stick throws into tight windows with anticipation."
While Farrar believes this is something Allen does well, it also was something he recently said he hopes to work on this offseason.
Josh Allen also had success against Cover-4 last season
In addition to Cover-0, Josh Allen was the best quarterback in the league against Cover-4 which is a scheme that splits the deep part of the field into four zones with cornerbacks dropping into zones along the sideline with safeties splitting the middle of the field.
"When facing Cover-4 in 2021, Allen completed 62 of 90 passes for 699 yards, 472 air yards, four touchdowns, two interceptions, a passer rating of 97.4, and an ANY/A of 7.8. Justin Herbert was the most explosive quarterback against Cover-4 in 2021, throwing seven touchdowns against it, but he also threw four interceptions."
While Allen didn’t have as many touchdowns as Los Angeles Chargers’ quarterback Justin Herbert, he did do a better job of protecting the football against this scheme with only two interceptions compared to Herbert who had four.
Josh Allen didn’t face these schemes often as the total pass attempts against both were only 106, which was only 16% of all his pass attempts in 2021. However, what it does show is that defensive coordinators are going to be limited in how they can defend Josh Allen knowing that these are two schemes that he has great success against last season.