RG3 Or Not, Redskins Will Have To Play Keep Up

I'm not a stats guy. I never have been, because I am of the mind that games are played on the field and not on paper. That being said, there are some statistics that tell the tale of how a team fares in certain areas of the game.

One such stat (bottom of the page) is that the Redskins are truly awful against #2 wide receivers, courtesy of Football Outsiders. They're ranked dead last, and their coverage of tight ends is hardly better: 29th.

I went to the Redskins official website to draw information from the games that they played. However, their box scores have the Redskins' information for both the home and away teams.

And their Week 4 game box score link takes you right back to the season schedule page. Come on, people. Somebody's sleeping on the job.

The Redskins have faced the Saints (win), the Rams (loss), Bengals (loss), and Bucs (win).

Here's an idea of the #2 WR and TE they have faced. I based the #2 WR on my opinion of who I thought was the #2 WR for that game using knowledge I have about the teams. Performance was a factor in the decision.

Team WR (Catches/Yards/TD) TE

Saints: Moore (6/120/1) Graham (6/85/1)

Rams: Gibson (2/53/1) Kendricks (2/25/0)

Bengals: Hawkins (2/66/1) Gresham (5/64/1)

Bucs: Williams (4/115/0) Clark (3/15/0)

(These stats don't make any sense. The Falcons are rated at #1 by a huge margin at defending against TEs, but it seems like TEs are all that do real damage to our D)

As you can see, the Skins have trouble at the least defending the #2 WR. I would attribute this to partially poor corner play, partially poor safety play. No matter which WR you consider to be the Falcons' #2, they're both capable of going ham on a D that is not known for its defensive play thus far in the season.

The TE defense is a different story. Dallas Clark isn't his young self, and Lance Kendricks hasn't done anything to warrant respect in the league. However, both Graham and Gresham, two very good pass catchers, have done moderate damage to the Skins' defense. Thankfully, we have a pretty good pass catcher of our own.

The Skins also like to give up the big play. All four of the receivers mentioned (if I have their numbers right) averaged 20 yards per catch. That's a huge number to give up week in and week out. The difference between the Falcons and the previous four opponents of the Redskins is that the Falcons' D forces a lot of turnovers, AND have a better turnover ratio per away game (3) than per home game (2).

All of these things add up to, at the very worst for the Falcons, a shootout with the Redskins. The Skins have suffered some pretty unfortunate injuries already this season. Thankfully, the Falcons stand to benefit from it.

Thoughts?