Preseason Starting Unit Statistics

[Fin #10]

Per Armando

The Dolphins starting offense has gotten 4 1/2 quarters of work so far this preseason. During that work, the unit has gotten three field goals and two touchdowns. That's 23 points, which is good.
Chad Pennington has had a very good preseason so far. I mean, very, very good. I would argue he's had the best preseason of any player on the team.
His completion percentage of 61.8 is down for last season's 67.4 but that doesn't really worry me because the tradeoff has been that he's been looking downfield a bit more than last season.
His yards per attempt is at 8.0 while last year it was 7.67. His TD percentage is at 5.9 while last year it was 4.0. And while he's completing more passes downfield, he's making fewer mistakes in that he has not thrown an interception. That makes his interception percentage 0.0, which is an improbable but welcome improvement from last season's outstanding 1.5 percent.
By the way, those downfield passes have brought the Dolphins hidden yardage also. Because Pennington went deep to Ted Ginn in the preseason opener, the Dolphins picked up a 34-yard pass interference penalty against Jacksonville.
Ever the perfectionist, Pennington today said, "I fell like I've been about a foot off with some of my passes." He added that he thought he could have completed 13 instead of 9 of 16 passes against the Bucs Friday. But that's not how coach Tony Sparano sees things.
The coach today called Pennington, "regular-season ready."
It has been a much slower go for Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams. Brown is averaging 3.5 yards per carry, all behind the first-team offensive line. Williams is averaging 3.9 yards on his 18 carries, with 16 of those coming behind the first-team OL.
The Dolphins have averaged 3.5 yards per rush behind their first-team offensive line so far this preseason. Not terrible. Not good, either.
The defense?
They've seemingly adopted a bend-but-don't break personality. Although the unit has yielded significant yardage, it has allowed only 16 points in 4 1/2 quarters of work this preseason. Opponents have scored only one TD and three FGs versus Miami's starters.
The unit does have work to do. I have counted 8 missed tackles so far this preseason -- or more than two per quarter of work.
The starters have three sacks -- from Jason Ferguson, Nathan Jones, and Kendall Langford. Yes, Jones is a starter in the dime package. Obviously, this mean neither Joey Porter nor Jason Taylor have a sack yet in 4 1/2 quarters of work. Nothing to get alarmed about -- yet. Taylor has been credit with three quarterback hurries this preseason but those are unofficial stats.
The starting defense has zero interceptions. Yes, Sean Smith has one interception this preseason and, yes, he is a starter now. But when he got his interception versus Jacksonville, he was playing with the backups against Jacksonville's backups.
By the way, it was funny to me that Tampa Bay named Byron Leftwich the starting QB Saturday. Watching that game again, I counted four passes, including a potential TD, that Leftwich blew with wildly inaccurate throws. Receivers were running wide open, but the plays resulted in incomplete passes because Leftwich was, as Bob Uecker would say, "juuust a bit outside."
That's good news for the Dolphins in the statistics column because the passes go down as incompletions. But Miami has to tighten up that coverage by the regular season because good NFL QBs such as Peyton Manning, Phillip Rivers, Tom Brady, Matt Ryan, Drew Brees and others likely won't throw four passes that totally miss the mark in the span of two quarters.

 

[oasis]

Armando's paying you, isn't he?

Nice to hear Penny's preseason has gone well statistically. Sometimes that's hard to gauge given that the team as a whole has looked off-kilter.

As for the "bend-but-don't-break" personality of our defense, I'd really prefer a "we'll-break-your-face-mutha*****", but whatever.

 

[Fin #10]

Armando's paying you, isn't he?

Nice to hear Penny's preseason has gone well statistically. Sometimes that's hard to gauge given that the team as a whole has looked off-kilter.

As for the "bend-but-don't-break" personality of our defense, I'd really prefer a "we'll-break-your-face-mutha*****", but whatever.

Ha! I just thought it was some pretty good info.

Agree w/ you on the defense, but as long as it works I really don't care how they get it done.

 

[Mr772]

If the D can hold Atlanta to FG's we win.

 

[Kistner10]

Hopefully we can continue our redzone Defense against Atlanta. Holding teams to FG's rather than TD's is huge.

 

[ArmyFin7]

The problem is these stats are a little skewed as well when you take Murphys rotation with Thomas and the starting wr opposite Ginn rotation, the fact that Green started 1 game....overall it's not bad, but it still doesn't mean squat.

 

[Fin #10]

The problem is these stats are a little skewed as well when you take Murphys rotation with Thomas and the starting wr opposite Ginn rotation, the fact that Green started 1 game....overall it's not bad, but it still doesn't mean squat.

I know it doesn't mean a whole lot, but I wouldn't say it doesn't mean squat. I thought it was some pretty interesting info.

 

[ArmyFin7]

I know it doesn't mean a whole lot, but I wouldn't say it doesn't mean squat. I thought it was some pretty interesting info.

So if Atlanta comes out and scores 3 td's on 3 posessions we can all look back at this and think that the preseason gave us all the wrong idea.

 

[Fin #10]

So if Atlanta comes out and scores 3 td's on 3 posessions we can all look back at this and think that the preseason gave us all the wrong idea.

Good lord man, I just thought it was some pretty interesting stuff. OK, I guess I'll just go back to threads about how Henne's a bust and Penny's arm is about to fall off :crazy:

 

[dellzip]

Not to bad i guess

 

[NyPhan23]

Good lord man, I just thought it was some pretty interesting stuff. OK, I guess I'll just go back to threads about how Henne's a bust and Penny's arm is about to fall off :crazy:

sometimes i wonder why i read this forum when people like you are being chastized for legitimate posts while others dont seem to shut up about the same nonsense which means nothing.

oh yea... btw have you guys heard? apparently fans dont like that there is an M on our dolphins helmet, wait why does he have a helmet, he's a dolphin... right... lets talk about that... it seems like time well spent.

 

[finfan54]

It's just preseason. When the full-timers are in full time, the inconsistancies get cleaned up as they adjust. In preseason, too many players getting time in creating serious illusions. Alot of good stuff seen and some bad but when the real games start, you cant screw up and its just different.

Its kinda like the hype starting up on Dirty Sanchez again cus he looked so good the other night, but when the real games start, he will find out that they will be studying him to get to his weakness early and often week to week. So preseason only gives us glimpses of what could be but reality is 11 guys want to tear your rookie head off your shoulders. Particularly when your all hyped up over one preseason game.