Disturbing Trend
July 13th, 2020
Joe read this and wanted to vomit.
Going through his copy of Warren Sharp’s 2020 Football Preview, Joe noticed an ugly trend last year that should give all Bucs fans the shivers.
When a team is trailing, one would hope said team is trying to get the ball to its best players, no? And one would hope when down by two scores, you are throwing downfield, no?
Well, those would be “no” for the Bucs last year.
Sharp has a stat that shows who on the Bucs’ offense touched the ball when it’s a one-score game, trailing or leading “big” (9-13 points) or in a “blowout” (14 or more points). When the Bucs were trailing by 9-13 points, they sure didn’t spread the ball to the many talented weapons.
The good: The guy who had the most catches when trailing by 9-13 points was tight end Cam Brate. He got 36 percent of the balls when trailing by 9-13 points. That’s good! He’s a good player.
The bad: The guys who had the most receptions when trailing by 9-13 points after Brate? The sorry Bucs running backs. Peyton Barber and Dare Ogunbowale each had the ball 18 percent of the time. Ronald Jones caught 16 percent of the passes in this category.
When a team has Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, O.J. Howard and Breshad Perriman on the roster and your running backs, who one guy doesn’t think are even the top-40 running backs, are getting fed the ball more, that’s alarming.
Outside of someone collecting a check from Team Glazer, who knows exactly why that was? Joe would hope this was because defenses blanketed the Bucs receivers to the point the running backs were the only guys open.
July 13th, 2020 at 1:39 am
Winston didnt take enough risks…
July 13th, 2020 at 1:49 am
I hope that was a joke!!!
July 13th, 2020 at 2:18 am
if Winston had gone to his relievers he would have had 50 ints instead of 30
July 13th, 2020 at 2:20 am
Recievers
July 13th, 2020 at 5:31 am
Stack the box early to force throwing the ball. Once up by a few scores, teams abandon the run-game giving the defense the opportunity to use coverage personnel. What’s left? The underneath stuff.
July 13th, 2020 at 6:30 am
When we were down 9-13 points it was likely due to interceptions and tight coverage on our primary receivers…..thus the TE & RBs were used.
July 13th, 2020 at 8:29 am
The challenge was JW had already thrown 2 picks to get you down that much and they didn’t trust him.thats why he is gone.
July 13th, 2020 at 9:11 am
Did this take into account that Evans and Godwin missed the end of the season? Just curious. Seems a bit off to me.
July 13th, 2020 at 9:18 am
Yes.
July 13th, 2020 at 10:26 am
Would love to see that same stat for other teams. Is that unusual, or common? Which teams did it better (KC?) Also, if I’m a DB and leading by 9-13 points, I’m giving the underneath and guarding the deeper stuff. So, the open stuff is underneath to the RB’s. Sadly, that was not ever much of a threat. The INT’s definitely played a role here to. Interesting stats though, Joe!
July 13th, 2020 at 11:15 am
Viking:
The same stats Joe cites from Warren Sharp on the Bucs are also available for all teams.
July 13th, 2020 at 11:16 am
Aaaaah, but they failed to account for the trickery of Arians and Leftwich. When the Bucs were behind, they knew the opponents would tightly cover the most obvious targets (Evans and Godwin), so they gave the ball to a tight end or RB. Great plan if you had a decent RB or a QB that could hit a receiver in stride, which we did not. And because this plan rarely worked, Leftwich and Arians knew the opponent wouldn’t be expecting it again. And when it didn’t work again, you just knew that the opponent would think it crazy to try it again, which we did, and again it didn’t work. And on and on and on……