If I had to vote right now for the CFL’s Most Outstanding Player, I wouldn’t hesitate to cast my ballot for Vernon Adams Jr. of the B.C. Lions.
The veteran quarterback leads the league in passing yards (1,752), touchdown-to-interception ratio (11:1), and quarterback efficiency (121.7), but it’s his controlled aggression that has impressed me most.
V.A. is constantly attacking downfield, so his depth of target numbers are absurd, but he’s also kept the ball out of harm’s way, which is a rare combination.
As with any position in football, a quarterback’s performance relies heavily on the support of others. He’s seen outstanding play from his top two receivers, Alexander Hollins and Justin McInnis, he’s got a weapon at running back in William Stanback, and his offensive coordinator, Jordan Maksymic, is a wizard.
Sunday’s game against the Tiger-Cats was over at halftime, which is rare to say about a CFL game. In one half of play, V.A. completed 18-of-25 passes for 321 yards, four touchdowns, and no interceptions. What struck me was how the four touchdowns were scored — each were brilliant, yet completely unlike the other three, which is what makes the Lions’ offence so hard to stop.
Let’s take a close look at those four first-half touchdown passes.
Touchdown No. 1
Situation: Second-and-four from the Hamilton 45-yard-line
Result: 45-yard touchdown pass from Vernon Adams Jr. to William Stanback
The Tiger-Cats had two deep defenders on this play — safety Stavros Katsantonis to Adams’ right and strong-side linebacker Jonathan Moxey to Adams’ left. The brilliance of this play stemmed from the film study of Hamilton’s defence that undoubtedly contributed to its design.
With a star receiver on either side of the formation, Katsantonis was locked onto Hollins, while Moxey was staring down McInnis. Offensive coordinator Jordan Maksymic, by design, turned both deep defenders away from the middle of the field by having Hollins attack Katsantonis’ outside shoulder and McInnis release to Moxey’s outside before eventually cutting off his pattern.
With both deep defenders facing outwards, no one noticed Stanback streaking up the middle of the field. Adams deserves credit as well — not only for recognizing the forced bust in coverage, but for freezing Katsantonis in place by initially staring Hollins down.
Touchdown No. 2
Situation: Second-and-goal from the Hamilton five-yard-line
Result: Five-yard touchdown pass from Vernon Adams to Justin McInnis
At the professional level, pre-snap motion always has a purpose and defenders know this, so they try to quickly decode it before it burns them. Most commonly, teams use pre-snap motion to create a numbers advantage on one side of the field, to gain leverage on drag route or quick out, or to confuse defenders as to their assignment in man-coverage.
At the start of this play, Adams had three receivers to his left with Stanley Berryhill III out wide, Justin McInnis in the middle, and Jevon Cottoy inside. Before the snap, Cottoy motioned across the formation to the right side, leaving just two receivers on the left, but then a split second later, Ayden Eberhardt motioned from the right slot to Cottoy’s original position on the inside left.
Tactically, there may not appear to be a difference here. B.C. began with three receivers on the left and ended up with three receivers on the left. The key here, however, is how the Tiger-Cats’ defenders interpreted the motion.
Initially, cornerback Dexter Lawson Jr. was lined up over Berryhill III, halfback Kenneth George Jr. was lined up over McInnis, and strong-side linebacker Jonathan Moxey was lined up over Cottoy. When Cottoy motioned to the other side, Moxey began to skinny inside, but then indicated he would pick up Eberhardt when he crossed back into the spot vacated by Cottoy.
To the defender, Eberhardt’s motion probably looked suspicious as it was late and near the goal line, where teams generally play a lot of man coverage. The late motion probably seemed like it was designed to leave Eberhardt uncovered. On the snap of the ball, however, Eberhardt crossed outside of McInnis and then cut back inside on the goal line.
The cross caused George Jr. to banjo — or switch responsibilities — giving McInnis to Moxey and taking Eberhardt himself. Moxey, meanwhile, never took his eyes off Eberhardt and broke towards him when he cut back inside at the goal line. McInnis had a simple corner route and no one took notice of him as he casually looked back and tracked the ball from Adams to the back pylon for the touchdown.
Touchdown #3
Situation: Second-and-goal from the Hamilton seven-yard-line
Result: Seven-yard touchdown pass from Vernon Adams to Justin McInnis
The Tiger-Cats were in cover zero, meaning man coverage across the board with no safety help. Cornerback Jamal Peters was on Hollins and rookie halfback Destin Talbert, who had been playing strong-side linebacker until last week, was on McInnis.
The decision was easy for Adams. Not only did McInnis have almost half a foot of height on Talbert, he had the experience advantage as well. As soon as he saw Talbert turn his back to track McInnis, Adams lofted the ball up for his receiver, purposely underthrowing him, knowing McInnis would either come back to make the catch or draw a pass interference penalty. He did both.
Touchdown #4
Situation: First-and-10 from the B.C. 41-yard-line
Results: 69-yard touchdown pass from Vernon Adams to Alexander Hollins
It must have been unnerving then for Hamilton’s defensive coordinator Mark Washington to see Hollins lined up on the inside of a boundary trips formation, especially knowing the coverage he’d just dialed up. Without getting too far into the weeds, the Tiger-Cats ended up with three defenders covering Justin McInnis and Jevon Cottoy, three defenders covering Stanley Berryhill III and Ayden Eberhardt, and strong-side linebacker Jonathan Moxey covering Hollins, perhaps the league’s best receiver, one-on-one in the middle of the field.
There isn’t a defensive back in the CFL I’d feel comfortable leaving one-on-one with Hollins in the middle of the field with a running start. Moxey is a much better player than he showed in this game, but there was nothing he could do on this play.
Without help, Moxey correctly had an inside shade on Hollins but, with a fast waggle, Hollins quickly attacked the veteran defender’s technique, forcing him to open inside, got back on his stem, which forced Moxey to speed turn back outside, then broke hard inside, leaving Moxey in his dust.
Defenders are generally only left one-on-one with a receiver in the middle of the field like this on a cover zero blitz where the defence sends more rushers than the offence can block, which means the ball has to come out immediately. On this play, further highlighting how unfair this was for Moxey, Hamilton was only rushing four. Adams had time to casually step up in the pocket and deliver a strike to Hollins over three-and-a-half seconds into the play.
Last year was Jordan Maksymic’s first full season with Vernon Adams and his quarterback put up career highs in completion percentage, yardage, touchdown passes, and quarterback rating. Through five games, Adams is on pace to shatter all of those numbers. Alexander Hollins and Justin McInnis are first and third in the league in receiving yards, respectively, and Adams’ favourite target from a season ago, Keon Hatcher is practicing and could return from his Achillies injury as soon as next week.
The B.C. Lions (4-1) will host the Saskatchewan Roughriders (4-0) on Saturday, July 13 at B.C. Place Stadium with kickoff slated for 7:00 p.m. EDT.
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