In the second round of the 2015 Draft, the Vikings took Eric Kendricks with the idea that he would eventually replace long-time Will Chad Greenway. For the first four games of the season, Kendricks saw playing time, but primarily in nickel packages because the Vikings used Greenway, Gerald Hodges, and Anthony Barr in base sets. However, when they traded Hodges because they were disappointed in his performance, it also meant that Kendricks was geared up to get more playing time. With Greenway still at Will, this means that Kendricks is playing Mike LB for the Vikings.

In preseason, Kendricks showed a number of things that make him a promising prospect. While that performance against the Bucs was nice, it wasn’t against starters and it doesn’t count for much, so it’s hard to project his performance in that game to performance in the regular season. However, with Kendricks now basically an every down player, it’s interesting to take a look and see what he’s doing well and where he still needs to improve. Although he’s only had two games as a full starter, he’s already the Vikings’ leading tackler, and he’s had three sacks in his last two games against the Lions and Chiefs as well. This article will cover his game against the Chiefs, which was the first game he started full time in base defense situations.

1-10-KC 25 (Q1, 5:02) D.Thomas right end to KC 26 for 1 yard (E.Kendricks).

On this play, the Chiefs are running an outside zone play to the right, with speedster De’Anthony Thomas as the runner. On outside zone, the offensive line’s job is to block laterally, hopefully covering up every man on the defensive front and creating a hole for the RB to pick. To do this, there’s a pretty simple principle. If there’s a player on your playside shoulder, you have to try to “reach block” him, which means your job is to cover him up. If there’s a player on your opposite shoulder, your job is to get an arm on that man and then allow the player with him on his playside shoulder to take over, after which you release to the second level to block a LB (or potentially safety). So, on this play, the Chiefs have, from right to left, TE Travis Kelce and RT Eric Fisher combo blocking DE Brian Robison, before Kelce is supposed to release to the second level where he blocks S Andrew Sendejo. Next, we have RG Zach Fulton with a solo reach block on DT Sharrif Floyd. C Mitch Morse and LG Ben Grubbs are tasked with combo blocking NT Linval Joseph before Morse needs to release to block Kendricks, #54. Finally, on the backside, LT Donald Stephenson is tasked with blocking LB Anthony Barr.

As a whole, the Vikings’ defense does a really good job on this play. Robison defeats Fisher, and Floyd beats Fulton. This forces Thomas to stretch the run to the edge, because he doesn’t have room to cut back. There, he runs into Kendricks and CB Captain Munnerlyn. Kendricks is credited with the tackle, and looking back at what he did on this play, it’s a clear display of his excellent athleticism. Thomas is a dynamic punt returner, and is very fast to the edge, so for Kendricks to make this tackle and allow just one yard is really impressive and says great things about his sideline-to-sideline speed and ability to work through trash to get to the ball carrier. One of the first and most important things his does on this play is flowing in the same direction as the line. But, more importantly, he flattens toward the line of scrimmage. This makes Morse’s job a lot more difficult because he has to take a flatter angle to get to Kendricks. Morse had a relatively clean release from Joseph, but he was still too slow to get to Kendricks, and he’s only able to get his outside shoulder covering Kendricks before he engages the LB. Even so, it’s still possible at this point for Morse to win, but Kendricks quickly puts an end to that possibility by attacking the center’s block. He leans in and gives a shove to Morse, and while it’s not the strongest push in the world, it helps knock the already reaching player off his balance and to the ground. From that point, it’s a race to the edge, and it bears repeating that Thomas is really fast. Kendricks also has to be careful to avoid getting tangled up with Floyd, who he is right behind. As you can clearly see, Kendricks was able to meet Thomas at the edge and make the tackle for a gain of just one and a failed play by the Chiefs.

2-9-KC 26 (Q1, 4:35) (Shotgun) C.West up the middle to KC 32 for 6 yards (D.Hunter).

This play is in many ways different from the previous play, but is similar in that it uses a zone blocking scheme. This time, however, the Chiefs are employing a read option look, and the blocking is inside zone, not outside zone. The most important principle, combo blocking a defensive lineman and then going to the second level to block an LB stays the same for the OL, however. So, on this play, the player responsible for blocking Kendricks is Grubbs. Obviously, with the read option, there is an additional wrinkle that’s important to the success of the inside zone. Whether or not the QB actually has the option to keep the ball, the defense has to respect the threat of a QB run. If the QB has the option to run, this means that the offense can leave a defender unblocked that the QB reads, and will always be wrong with a good decision by the QB. Here, that unblocked player is Danielle Hunter, who got his first career start in place of the injured Everson Griffen. He initially takes a couple of wide steps, which prompts Smith to hand the ball off.

Once the ball is handed off, it’s up to West, the RB on this play, to make the correct read. Here, that choice is pretty obvious. The defense has gone with the flow of the offense, so there is a sizable cutback lane. He gets a respectable pickup of 6 on this play, but two defenders make nice recoveries or else West would have had a chance against safety Harrison Smith in the open field. The first was Hunter, who is very athletic and uses his length to dive and get his arms on West, and he gets credited for the tackle. However, even though it doesn’t show up on the stat sheet, Kendricks is equally important because he is the one to actually wrap up West so he can’t escape Hunter’s arm tackle. Kendricks is able to do this because of his athleticism. It should be noted that he doesn’t make a mistake on this play, because his responsibility is the A Gap. When he diagnoses run, he goes right to that gap. That’s a good situation for KC, however, because Grubbs is right there to block him and West makes the cutback into an open field. However, the reason Kendricks is able to get in on the play here is because he continues to keep his eyes in the backfield. This is fundamental football, but some guys can get caught up in the flow of the offense and miss things like this, especially when they are a rookie and possibly having trouble adjusting to the speed of the NFL game. Kendricks shows no such signs of problems, as he recognizes that West is making the cutback before he’s even engaged by Grubbs. This allows him to pretty much entirely avoid Grubbs and get in on the tackle. It’s a savvy play by the young LB.

3-3-KC 42 (Q1, 1:53) (Shotgun) A.Smith sacked at KC 38 for -4 yards (E.Kendricks).

1-20-KC 11 (Q2, 13:30) (Shotgun) A.Smith pass short left to T.Kelce to KC 16 for 5 yards (E.Kendricks).

It’s 3rd down, so the Vikings’ defense clearly wants to get off the field on this play near midfield. While Alex Smith isn’t the most athletic QB in the NFL, he can definitely do damage with his legs. As such, on this play the Vikings have Kendricks spy on the QB. His job here is to keep an eye on Smith and make sure he isn’t able to escape the pocket and run for a first down. Kendricks does make the sack on this play, and it’s nice padding for his stat sheet, but the play was really made by two other Vikings. First of all, Sharrif Floyd embarrassed the RG with a spin move and got immediate pressure up the middle. Danielle Hunter also beat LT Donald Stephenson, and while neither brought Smith down, they combined to flush him to his right, which Kendricks pounced on for the sack.

1-25-KC 6 (Q2, 13:05) C.West left tackle to KC 8 for 2 yards (E.Kendricks).

On 1st and 20, this play once again displays strong sideline-to-sideline speed from Kendricks. He has man coverage on TE Kelce, and the Chiefs run a screen to Kelce to gain back some yardage from their holding penalty on the last play. With a quick release off the line by the TE, there’s nothing Kendricks can do here to prevent the catch. He can, however, minimize yardage after the catch, which he does well. He gets help from Munnerlyn again, who did a very good job of taking on Maclin’s block and setting the edge so Kelce couldn’t get to the outside (Captain even had a disadvantage while trying to do this because Maclin committed OPI and started blocking before the ball was caught). This funneled Kelce back towards the middle, where Kendricks was there to stop him. Kelce, who is very good at being physical and shedding tackles after the catch, was almost able to power through Kendricks’ tackle, but Eric kept an arm around his leg and allowed Sendejo to come in and help finish the runner off. Even though this play doesn’t show up on the stat sheet either because of penalty, it would have held the Chiefs to a 2nd and 15, which is not a favorable situation for the offense.

As on the read option play, this is inside zone. However, there is a miscommunication on the Chiefs OL, as no one releases to block Kendricks. My inclination is that it was supposed to be LT Donald Stephenson blocking Kendricks, but he got overzealous in trying to block Hunter out of the play. He succeeded in creating a pretty wide hole, but there was a pretty big problem with that as it left Kendricks right in the middle of that hole. Kendricks once again does a good job of attacking on the play, and asserts himself in that hole, which forces West to try to bump the run outside. It’s too late, however, as Kendricks is able to make a very nice diving tackle to stop the play for a very short gain.