WEEK 5 KEY MATCHUPS TO WATCH: WIRFS VS MACK
Tristan Wirfs has gotten a lot of attention in the first month of his career. And it’s largely been overwhelmingly positive.
He’s coming off a Week 4 performance in which he stonewalled Joey Bosa of the Los Angeles Chargers. Several analysts have claimed his showing was the best they’ve seen against the former Top 5 Draft pick. His continued work proved that he’s a legit top talent as an OT in the League.
He also drew a high praise from Bosa, himself.
So far, he’s faced and the likes of Bosa, Cameron Jordan and Brian Burns. All notable DEs with a penchant for causing issues against lesser talent. Wirfs all but shutdown all of them.
While he did get help from both O.J. Howard and Rob Gronkowski, he more than held his own when he went 1-on-1.
Heading into Thursday night’s prime time game, Tristan Wirfs has yet another prime time individual matchup. This time, he’ll be facing the challenge slowing down the ALL WORD Defensive End Khalil Mack.
Khalil Mack has been a terror since arriving in the League. And he’s not slowing down any time soon, it seems.
Through 4 games, he’s got 1.5 sacks, 2 tackles for loss and 4 QB hits.
The 6ft 3, 269 uber athlete is gonna draw out the best in Tristan Wirfs.
Let’s take a look at some tendencies and how both performed over the last few weeks.
Oh, what a rush
#52 isn’t some one trick pony.
Dude plays the run just as well as he does the pass.
On many of his pass rushes, Mack will line up wide outside of the tackle and just beat ‘em with speed.
He had the RT beat here even before the rip move.
Here, the rip move is definitely in full force(Not my type of hype).
Quicke sack fumble.
But Mack isn’t all braun and no brains.
He keeps his eyes on the prize and doesn’t get distracted by the TEs.
He’s looking to disrupt the QB any way he can and he’ll play the ball as well as any DE in the League.
Wonder Wall Wirfs
Wirfs has shown the ability to get into his pass protection stance quickly and not stand straight up making himself easy to get thrown off balanced.
That’s something the previous starter in Tampa had an issue with.
And at 6ft5, 320lbs, the movement is impressive.
The hand fighting skills are on display here.
However, as seen above, Mack likes to utilize the rip move.
And he’ll delay it until the offensive tackle is on his heels rather than fire it right away.
Wirfs will have to be quick on the draw and show the ability to recover if anticipates the rip move coming from Mack too soon.
Again, with the hand fighting skill here.
Wirfs does well with anticipating and reacting to the hands of the defender.
Against Mack, he may be end up doing more reacting than trying to anticipate or guessing his moves.
While the rookie has handled himself well, he did get some assistance every now and again.
With Howard out of the game as well as Godwin and Watson, it’s gonna be interesting to see if and how Gronkowski or the other TEs are gonna be utilized to help him if needed.
They also need to step up and be more active as receivers with all the injuries being considered.
Once again, you the help shifted his way.
It’s not unreasonable to thing he’ll need some help against Mack.
Yet and still, he may take on the challenge just fine without much help at all.
The rookie has good so far. Against Mack, he can set himself up for an entire season of praise if he continue to show what’s made him one of the most talked about rookies of this extremely challenging season.
