Chiefs DC Bob Sutton: 'Don't be the guy that's telling Peyton Manning what the coverage is'

Kansas City Chiefs defensive coordinator Bob Sutton has the toughest task of this young season in taking the Chiefs defense up against Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos offense. I would love to be a fly on the wall of those defensive meetings to see what kinds of things they brainstorm when facing Manning.

Sutton was asked by the media today what he does to prepare for an opponent like Manning.

"Well I think anytime you are dealing with the Peyton Manning's of the world, those elite guys, they're a great challenge because they have physical skills obviously to get balls in tight quarters which is challenging in itself," Sutton said, via quotes from the Chiefs.

"The second part of it is a guy like Peyton is renowned for how much he knows and how well he studies and all that, so that makes it challenging too. So a lot of the gameplan is trying to drill down on our techniques and understanding like we've talked about with our players. You can have these guys pretty tightly covered. A lot of quarterbacks that means he's going someplace else, whereas with a guy like Peyton that just means he's going to locate the ball in slightly wider, tighter whatever it is. So you have to play through a whole play no matter how tightly you think you have him covered."

Manning studies so much so he can know as much about the defense before the snap as possible. That's why Sutton says it's important not to be the guy giving the coverage away.

"And then obviously you have to do a good job of realizing that like we always say, ‘don't be the ‘tell,' don't be the guy that's telling him what the coverage is.' Because he's done a great job over his career recognizing that so you work hard at that as well. You can't give Peyton just one thing all the time. It's hard for any quarterback in our league to do that but he definitely falls in that category."

The KC Star's Terez Paylor had a cool piece today with some of the exotic formations the Chiefs showed against the Titans last week. I imagine we will be seeing some new things this week because your technique will only get you so far.

While we're on the topic of Manning, BJ Kissel had a nice piece today at KCChiefs.com.