Digging Deeper into the Box Score: Week 9

I’m going to just post what info I have before I get two games behind.  I haven’t been doing this, but I really should – here’s the link to the NFL Game Book for the Redskins game.

Offense

I’m going to take the easy way out and put up some quotes from Football Outsiders’ Quick Reads.

Matt Ryan, who FO ranked the #18 most valuable QB in Week 9:

He'll take the win, but something's up with Ryan. He has eight picks in his last four games, and his interception today wasn't the sort of good decision he's become associated with; it was a crossing pattern that Ryan threw into triple coverage. The rest of his day was low-risk, low-reward stuff against an average pass defense.

This is further driven home by the fact that nobody averaged more than 9.0 yards per reception, and the fact that his longest completions went for 14, 13, 13, and 12 yards.  You can see here that he never tried to go downfield.  The biggest plays were all on the ground – Turner for 58, 33, and 30.

Michael Turner, who FO ranked the #2 most valuable RB in Week 9 (he was far and away the best runner, but Frank Gore had a big game catching passes out of the backfield for the 49ers):

The Redskins have exhibited an excellent run defense this year, but they sure didn't look like it on Sunday. LaRon Landry took the cake with a dismal performance on Turner's two touchdown runs (and that doesn't even include his cheap shot at Matt Ryan that led to a brawl). The first one was a more subtle mistake, an awful route to the ballcarrier that gave Turner an easy path on his sweep and allowed him to score virtually untouched from 30 yards out. The second one was worse, as Landry lined up Turner for a tackle and then decided to dive with his helmet at Turner's feet like he was a running back attempting to cut block a pass rusher. It failed miserably, and when DeAngelo Hall followed with a DeAngelo Hall-esque tackle, Turner was gone for his second long touchdown of the day. Neither run should have happened.

This is true, but almost all big plays are a combination of a great play by one player and a mistake by another.  Even if Landry took him down for a gain of “only” 10 yards on each of those big runs, he still would’ve averaged 5.4 YPC for the game – which is still very good, as opposed to the ridiculous day he actually ended up having.

Defense

Babineaux was a man among boys; Houston, Abe, Lofton, Vance Walker, and DeCoud were solid; Peterson and Coleman were cleaning up a lot of trash; somehow Tye Hill played 58 snaps and didn’t make a single tackle (maybe that’s good for a CB, though), but his one “Play” was kind of a big deal – the 62 yard Interception return for a TD.

Did anybody else get mad at the announcing crew (I’m pretty sure it was color commentator/analyst Daryl “Moose” Johnston) for ripping John Abraham for “not holding his ground” on a Betts run in the second half.  They kept showing the replay of Abe backpedaling a few steps before trying to make a play as Betts rumbled through the hole where he originally lined up outside Left Tackle, even going back to it after a few more plays were run.  The problem here?  That was what Abe was supposed to do – it was a Zone Blitz with two guys coming from the Offensive Right side.  I don’t expect much from TV announcers, but c’mon – you are paid to explain to us what is happening, not make us dumber fans for having heard your “analysis”.  Yeesh!

Special Teams Tackles: one each for Weems, Biermann, Nicholas, and Stecker.