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Good “Bye Week” Musings

Tomorrow, we dive back into our Cowboys routine (Analyze the Falcons), as the bye week is over. Until then, here are 5,000 Words of Football Dorkdom:

I want to show you the results of a study or two we did during the bye week about the Cowboys offense. Hopefully, by now, you have some interest in our findings every Tuesday during the Season with our various “Football 301″ studies. Well, this week, and then the week after Thanksgiving will allow us a day or two to catch our breath and look at the bigger picture.

Here are two things we wanted to look at:

1) – Tendancies of the Cowboys offense. Every week, we look at the raw numbers of the personnel packages , but what do they like to do in certain situations? If you are a Defensive Coordinator who is preparing to play the Dallas Cowboys, you would have all of these stats on a chart, so that during the week, you learn what Jason Garrett does and when he does it.

1st and 10 is the most base of plays. There are no down and distance considerations at all. In these spots, Garrrett chooses to run 57% of the time. If you are interested, the NFL runs 52% of the time on 1st and 10. But, then what? That was the question of our study:

What do the Cowboys like to do on 2nd Down? They Run 36.4% of the time.

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Let’s move to the all-important 3rd Down – where they run 23.3% of the time:

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I understand you are looking at plenty of numbers here, but the things that jump out at me initially is how bad this team is on 3rd down. Also, how bad they are on 2nd or 3rd down and more than 8. The Cowboys have run 55 pass plays on 2nd or 3rd and 8+ and have converted 12 times! 12-55 in those situations is not what you would expect of a dynamic offense. 21.8% means that most of the time, 2nd and long then becomes 3rd and long. And 3rd and long becomes a punt. This is why Roy Williams and the WRs must be better in getting in sync with Tony Romo.

If it stays like it is, I think Garrett must consider running on 2nd and long. This, gives you a chance to set up a 3rd and short or medium where opposing blitzes should be much less likely.

What used to be a real weapon for this team has now turned into a real weakness. There was a time in 2007 that the Cowboys were nothing short of amazing on 3rd down. Now, 3rd and 8+ they are 26th in the NFL. 3rd and 10+ they are 29th in the NFL! 3 teams have converted fewer times on 3rd and 10+ than the Cowboys (2). They are: Buffalo (1), Chicago (1), and Philadelphia with 0! So, there are a few teams worse, but the point is there are 28 teams better. New York is 6-15 on 3rd and 10+ so why are the Cowboys 2 for 21?

This is altogether discouraging, but last week we saw that the Cowboys were positively dynamite in other situations like “22″ personnel:

They are running 67% out of this look. The defense knows it. And yet they are getting steamrolled. And, to me, that is where Witten/Bennett are dominating linebackers at the point of attack. To show run, and to still get 8.44 yards per carry is something that the coaches realize, and the rest of the NFL does, too. In 2008, the Cowboys ran this look 5.75 times per game, now they are running it over 10 times.

So, is it time to realize what they do well? Power Run and Short Pass. And what they don’t do well? Convert on long passing situations. And does that explain why they are starting to run more and more on 1st and 10? I would hope so.

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And since we are looking at what the Cowboys do poorly, check this out.

2) Goal to Go. Horrible. Atlanta comes to Dallas with a Goal to Go record to be proud of. Only the Vikings have matched the Falcons record of 11 GtG Touchdowns this season. Ask any personnel man why this is, and they will show you Tony Gonzalez and a solid running game. And then they will tell you how much Brett Favre loves using his Tight End in the red zone and the Vikings running game, too.

Wait! Don’t the Cowboys have a great TE? And a great running game? What is going on here? If the Falcons are 11-12 in TDs after getting a GtG situation, and the Vikings are 11-13, then why are the Cowboys 6-13, and 26th in the NFL?

If there is any issue that needs to be cured quickly, this is the one that I hope they concentrated on during the bye week. You must come away with points when you get the chance in the NFL.

Look at 2nd and 3rd Down and Goal to Go:

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As a quick note of reference, it helps to know where you were inside the 10 on these plays. On 2nd and Goal, the average yard line was the 4, and on 3rd and Goal, the average yard line was 3 1/2. Think about that for a second.

Now, consider this: The Cowboys are 1-12 on passes in this situation? 1 for 12? Could you, complete 1 for 12 if given the QB spot in your dreams? This is flat out dreadful. If this improves, the Cowboys can compete in the playoffs. If it doesn’t, Jason Garrett should be fired and Tony Romo should be doubted severely.

And you want the most frustrating result of this 1-12 stat on passes on 2nd or 3rd and Goal? The one success was the one and only time Jason Witten was targeted. The other 11 passes were to people not named Witten, and the failure rate was 100%.

Here is a good chance to remind us where the Cowboys are going with the ball on 3rd down this season:

3rd Down Targets – Season Totals

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82. 82. 82. 82. 82. 82.

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Turnover numbers for Week 6:

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Season Turnover rate Records:

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100 Yard Rushers for Week 6:

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300 Yard Passers for Week 6:

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TC’s DRIVE OF THE WEEK:

(Each week, my trusty intern, TC Fleming breaks down a Cowboys drive that was important to the outcome of the game and trys to deconstruct it with all of his might. – This week, he provides an evolution to his project that has me all excited. Let’s check it out.)

When Bob first talked to me about doing something on Wednesdays, it had very little in the way of structure or format. I could just write whatever I wanted to about football. For the past three weeks, I have chosen to write about the Cowboys and about the plays on their key drives. With the Cowboys off this week, I’m going to use the break as a nice launching point for broadening the focus from just the Cowboys to the NFL in general. The point is still to be able to understand the Cowboys and what they’re doing on offense, but in order to better do that, it’s nice to have some perspective on what other NFL teams are doing. I feel like I’m starting to get a rough idea of Garrett’s offensive goals and tools and such, but honestly, I don’t know if they’re Garrett’s or they’re the tools and goals and such of every offensive coordinator in the NFL. In order to better understand Garrett, I think it would be helpful to understand Average NFL OC. To do that, I’m going to look sometimes at the key drives in other games, while still mixing in plenty of Cowboys.

For this week, I settled on a key drive in the game that most interested me this week: the Saints and the Giants. In the Saints’ second drive, they took the ball at their own 20 after a touchback holding a 7-0 lead. Six plays later—all passes—they led 14-0, taking a promising start and turning it into a clear edge.

On the first play, the Saints line up in a running set with clear running personnel. As Troy Aikman pointed out on the broadcast, the Saints even go so far as to put a lineman, Zach Streif, in at tight end. Brees play actions to Pierre Thomas. Devery Henderson is on the left and runs a ‘Go,’ while Lance Moore runs upfield before heading across the formation from the right to the left. After taking the fake, Thomas runs into the flat. Thomas pulls the weakside linebacker into that flat along with him. Henderson and his considerable speed takes both the corner and safety to his side with him.  So Moore’s job is to run to the area vacated by Henderson and get open from any defenders by the time he gets there. The secondary appears to be playing Cover-3 because the corner drops back pretty far and makes little effort to chase Moore as he begins crossing the field. Meanwhile, safety CC Brown comes up towards Moore. However, Brown doesn’t get particularly close and is certainly too far off him to contest the catch. As will become a theme, Brown seems far more interested in limiting major damage rather than preventing any damage at all. The middle linebacker also has a little bit to say about the coverage of Moore if he can get underneath the receiver, but he is tricked for a second by the play action and is running pretty hard to get back. In doing so, he falls down. The bottom line is that Henderson is clearing out an open area on the field, and Moore has ample room and time to get open before he reaches that vacated space. The only catch is that it’s a fairly slow-developing play, since Moore has to run across the field. That’s where Strief comes in. Not only is he selling the play fake by being part of what should be a pretty obvious running package, he also is a huge boon to the pass protection, giving Brees plenty of time to wait for Moore to open up. Usually when a team brings in an offensive lineman, it tips their plans to a certain extent. By using his blocking talents to execute a slow-developing pass, the Saints are removing the idea that bringing in an extra lineman means they are going to run. Though they didn’t take advantage of it in this drive, it sets them up to be able to run from this formation without the defense being sure that the play is a run before the snap.

In the next play, the Saints keep the same personnel (2 WR, 1 TE, 1 FB, 1 HB), though Shockey is in for Strief. They deploy this personnel in more of a three-wide set, though. Shockey is wide by himself to the left while Colston and Henderson form a stack close in to the line on the right with Henderson standing directly behind Colston. Colston runs a ‘Go’ (or at least he appears to, he is not on the screen for very long), while Henderson runs behind him, drifting a little to the right before stopping altogether and turning back towards Brees. The safety and corner are both out of the picture by this point, so I can’t tell exactly what they’re doing. I can, however, tell you that they are not particularly close to Henderson. Brees, however, has been more interested in the other side of the play. Shockey is just running a ‘Go’ himself. The weakside linebacker initially helps in coverage of Shockey, but the fullback releases into the flat, and the linebacker stays shallow with him, so once Shockey is downfield enough, he is one-on-one with a cornerback. Against a lot of coverages, there would come a point where Shockey would be deep enough to draw the interest of the safety. However, the safety is nowhere to be found on this play. I’m serious: he never shows up in the shot. He’s probably playing so deep that he never comes onscreen. This reminds me of the Giants’ coverage of the Cowboys when they thought the Cowboys were thinking about a shot deep. Remember that long interception in Sam Hurd’s direction? The Giants seem pretty content playing a safety so deep that he is only useful in a) defending extremely deep passes and b) cleaning up plays if someone else misses a tackle. This seems a really confounding strategy to me, as a defender should be in position to have far more uses than those two. It shows up on this play, where the cornerback has to defend Shockey by himself. The corner has pretty good coverage inside of Shockey, as good as you could want. But Brees puts it on Shockey’s outside shoulder, and Shockey makes the catch.

Brees also has to throw the ball over the linebacker that hasn’t dropped. That linebacker is still shallow enough to make the throw, but if it’s a bullet to Shockey, the linebacker probably bats it down around the line. There really isn’t a way to defend a quarterback that accurate with just one man. The corner cannot have good coverage both inside and outside of the receiver. He has to pick a side, and Brees will deliver a pass in the perfect spot on the other side. Bob has referenced a video before (found here) where one of those sports science shows demonstrates that Brees is considerably more accurate with his arm than Olympic archers are with their bows on the same target from the same distance. If you’re looking for why a 6’1” quarterback can throw for 5,000+ yards, there’s a good spot to start.

On the third play, Strief comes back in at tight end, though Shockey stays in, again split out wide. This time it’s to the right. There’s a fullback and halfback, along with Colston split not far off the line to the left. The play bears a number of similarities to the first play of the drive. The receivers switch sides, with Shockey running the ‘Go’ to the right and Colston running across the formation from the left, but that’s what their routes are, and it’s a play action pass with an extra lineman. Another difference is that Brees runs a full bootleg to his right rather than just faking to the back and setting up like normal as he did in the first play. Though the Saints have not run yet on this drive, the Giants’ linebackers bite hard on the play action. The weakside and middle linebackers play run for their first three full steps. I believe the strongside linebacker is responsible for covering Strief, and when that linebacker verifies that Strief is definitely going to block, he comes after Brees. This is one of two blitzes on this drive. The linebackers are effectively out of the play. The cornerback plays to keep Colston in front of him, so there’s no one between him and Brees. Brees isn’t waiting for Colston to get all the way across the field this time, he has him open much sooner. Further, Shockey isn’t really made to clear out space like Henderson. He doesn’t have the speed to get downfield and open up the sort of room Henderson can. But with the linebackers biting as they do, it doesn’t matter. One does kind of wonder how this play would look if the linebackers played more disciplined. If the linebackers force Colston to go all the way across the field by not opening up the passing lanes they did when they bit on the fake, Colston would end up on Shockey’s side. Shockey, however, is slow enough that he would be at a pretty similar depth to Colston. So the Saints would have their only two downfield targets standing next to each other, each of them potentially double-covered. I guess then they would just check down or something, but it’s all moot because of those linebackers. Just to go back to it for a second, it is kind of astounding that the Giants linebackers would be so keyed to defend the run when the Saints hadn’t shown run yet, but maybe that’s why they were keyed to play the run: the linebackers figure the Saints have to run some time.  But now twice they’ve fallen for the extra lineman, so either they will keep falling for it and continue to give up easy 11-yard completions, or they will play the pass with six offensive lineman on the field and get gashed by a big running play. I mean, they could guess right one of these times and stop the play, but I’ll tell you right now: the Giants do not guess right at any point on this drive.

Next, the Saints take the fullback off the field for the first time, bringing in another tight end, noted former Longhorn and man with two first names, David Thomas. Both tight ends act more as receivers, standing up before the snap. The formation is close in, with each tight end just a few feet off the line and the outside receivers just outside of the tight ends. The pair to the right (Shockey and Robert Meachem) both run half-speed to the sideline, looking back in anticipation of a pass. Henderson does the same thing on his side, but Thomas runs up, engages the middle linebacker a bit, then breaks at a harder angle to the sideline. There are many things I do not yet know about football, and the value of this move falls into that category. I also do not know why the corner plays as far off as he does.

This was the Broncos’ reaction as well when the Cowboys went to a similar formation, so defenses must think this is a good enough idea. So the corner is playing off, and he drops even deeper at the snap, enough so that he isn’t really a factor in covering Henderson. That leaves the weakside linebacker defending Henderson. Not only is Henderson much faster than the linebacker, he has a head start. Henderson is very open and makes the catch easily, but the linebacker plays a good angle and forces Henderson out of bounds after minimal yards after catch, which is pretty key on a quick pass like this. Now, the play was probably a quick pass because this is the second instance of blitzing. New York blitzes one safety, while the other is again lined up so deep that the television viewer cannot see him for the whole of the play. I continue to think that this is essentially insisting on playing 10-on-11. Also, watching the way the Saints make the Giants pay for their decision to play a safety so deep with these intermediate throws (this particular throw is not intermediate obviously, but the others are) makes it all the more frustrating to know that Romo saw this coverage and still decided to force the ball deep.

What follows is my weekly nominee for “Best Play I Have Ever Seen.” In fact, this play is so awesome that Chris Brown of Smart Football has already explained the general ideas behind it in a much more full manner than I can. I really suggest reading what he has to say about the different ways the Saints execute this play. This particular version of the play, however, has a wrinkle that Brown does not cover. Facing the only second down they would encounter on the drive, the Saints break the huddle with Thomas, Colston, Lance Moore, Devery Henderson, and Reggie Bush. This suggests a three-wide set, so the Giants do add their nickel corner. That does not turn out to be enough, as the Saints line up with all five men as receivers at or near the line of scrimmage. Moore and Henderson take the outside receiver spots, while Bush is in the left slot. Thomas and Colston are both in the right slot, but they mix it up a bit by lining Colston up close in to the offensive line with Thomas farther out. That is the nifty wrinkle. The Giants put corners on the outside receivers, and then put the nickel back over Thomas, leaving the two most inside receivers to the linebackers. That means Marques Colston is matched up on Antonio Pierce.

That is a very nice matchup, as Colston is considerably faster and considerably taller. Reggie Bush runs a little square-in at the first-down marker. Brown’s diagrams suggest this is an option route. The other four receivers run ‘Go’ routes, just heading straight down the field. The Giants again have a safety so deep he is out of the picture, but Brees uses his eyes to move him over and create a space where Colston has gotten comfortably behind Pierce but is too far into the middle of the field for the safety to reach, since he followed Brees’ eyes to the sideline.  Brees puts the ball over Pierce’s head, Colston goes up to get it, absorbs a hit from the safety to hold onto the 40-yard gain.

With four receivers running downfield and the Giants only having two safeties, two of the receivers are going to be single-covered down the field in a best-case scenario. As with any play from 5-wide, pass protection is a concern, but the Gaints make no attempt to press the receivers, and when an NFL receiver is sprinting downfield, it doesn’t take that long. Colston gained 40 yards, and was just running in a straight line, so you would figure that took about as long as his combine 40 time of 4.55. That’s a little long (but only a little) for a play with only five pass protectors, but Drew Brees is regarded as one of the premier quarterbacks in regards to moving in the pocket and using a few steps to avoid pressure. He does that expertly here.

At first Colston was ruled to have scored on the play, but a Giants’ challenge ends with the ball being placed on the one-yard line. The Saints up the ante of their extra lineman bit, deploying a full seven offensive lineman. In additon, they have Shockey on the line, with the fullback Heath Evans and halfback Pierre Thomas in the backfield. Brees play-actions to Thomas. The play is almost done there, with a rusher coming free, but Thomas does well to lay a nice, effective, cut block right after the fake. It was a little thing that saved the play. Evans started out to the right as if to block for the run and after the fake continued to run along the line of scrimmage in a pass route. This kept two of the linebackers close to the line of scrimmage. The Saints wanted this because at the snap Shockey had immediately run a corner route. The Giants were so keyed on the run (which makes sense, what with the situation and the two extra linemen), that by the time they saw it wasn’t a run, Shockey was already well into his pattern. One of the linebackers remains aware of Shockey, though even his first step is to defend the run. As was the case for Colston, Shockey is faster and taller than the one linebacker chasing him. Again Brees puts the ball up for Shockey to use his height and separation to make a pretty easy catch.

The Saints had some very well-designed plays on this drive that made defenders confused as to what would come next (this is evident when you have players biting on the play action on a drive where you do not run the ball once). The Saints also have such a wide range of players they obviously feel comfortable with incorporating into their offense. This series of six plays featured seven different offensive lineman, two different tight ends, two different running backs, and four different receivers. All on the one series. That certainly adds to the unpredictable nature of what they’re doing, especially when none of these players tip the Saints’ hand as to what they want to do on the play. All that said, I think the Giants put on a clinic for how not to defend this offense. The Giants decided to rush four and drop the rest into coverage. Then the Saints, either through a clever play design or just by having more dynamic weapons than the Giants had competent defenders (sidenote: CC Brown is not a competent defender), would have something come open, especially given the time afforded by rushing four against Drew Brees. And consider this: the Saints have proven to be pretty deep at receiver, especially when you account for Shockey as well. By contrast, they were starting their backup left tackle and have an offensive line that, while quite functional, is largely made up of late-round picks and other teams’ cast-offs. If I were going to challenge one of those groups, it would be the offensive line. This seems like a clear choice to me. I would blitz them often, especially going after that left tackle. Is Brees good enough to quickly identify the blitz, maneuver in the pocket, deliver an accurate pass to his hot route? Yeah, probably. But at some point, you want to make sure he can do all that rather than just give him time and wait for him to pick you apart. After all, the only time the Giants sent a designed blitz, it resulted in the only play on this drive where the Saints did not gain a first down or a touchdown. This idea, that the Giants should have blitzed more, is certainly something that was suggested by the film, but I have no qualms with telling you that I was also nudged in that direction by the gentlemen at Football Ousiders. If you scroll down on this article, you can read a couple of their thoughts on this game.

Another one of their thoughts perked my interest, that the Saints were running based on when the defense dictated it. That’s a Mike Leach thing. Texas Tech almost never has a run called in the huddle, they only switch to it after looking at the defense. So how much teams fear the pass dictates how often Tech will run it. If this is how the Saints call their plays, it makes sense that they have called more runs than passes this season (Aikman indicated they had during the broadcast). Any smart defense would line up to stop the Saints’ passing game more often than not. This is something I would like to know more about (Is this in fact how they are calling plays? How committed one way or the other does the defense have to be in order to change the play? How long has Payton been doing things this way?)

As far as the implications for the Cowboys, I drew a couple conclusions. First, it confirmed a position I have long held concerning an argument I hear against Jason Garrett. There are those who say that Garrett tries to get too cute with isolating players on certain defenders and being focused in so much on matchups, that he should instead just run his plays and expect his players to win their battles. It is my contention that all the best offenses put their players in a position to succeed by using formations and such to create favorable match-ups. I felt pretty confident about that, but I’d never devoted this much time to studying an elite offense before. I can now say with confidence that this is indeed the case: making good matchups is so key, like in the long pass to Colston. If Garrett can do that well, it’s a real asset.

It also appeared the Saints were switching out personnel at a rate similar to the Cowboys, though they all kept it around the fullback and halfback in the I for the first five plays. The exotic formations that they did use (the snug 4-wide formation, the five-wides) are things we have seen before the Cowboys. Payton and Garrett never, to my knowledge, worked together. Payton left to coach the Saints two years before Garrett arrived in Dallas. I would be interested to find out, though, how much Garrett was influenced by whatever remnants of the people who worked with Payton (I guess Tony Sparano seems like the most obvious example). In following the always-popular 12 package, the Saints employed it the once, on the fourth play but did not use either tight end in the traditional sense. I think that’s a pretty neat advantage that I am not sure if Bob has mentioned: when you break the huddle with two wide receivers and two tight ends, there’s a lot of places you can go with where you’re going to line them up.

Bonus Coverage: Jeremy Shockey pretending to ride a horse