MiamiMan147
I'm a Rocket Man
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2002
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- Age
- 46
With the draft day approaching, there's a lot of talk about how whether we need DB help or LB help or OL help. For me personally, while I had a pretty good idea of what areas we were deficient in, they were based off my impressions from watching games. My basic feeling was: the QB play was awful, our pass blocking was decent but run blocking was sub-par, and our secondary was vulnerable. However, perception and reality often differ greatly. To get a clearer idea of where we stood, I decided to start looking at some stats to see where we ranked last year in different areas. Although most of my impressions were reinforced, I found that some of our weaknesses were even worse than I realized, while others weren't as bad. I'm going to go over a bunch of stats, and for simplicity's sake, I'll mainly focus on NFL ranking in these stats.
First lets start on offense:
Yards per game - 14th
Yards per play - 15th
So basically, our offense was very average overall last year. Now some more details:
Completion Percentage - 32nd (yep, dead last)
Yards per pass attempt - 25th
Sacks allowed - 4th
Pass attempts - 10th
Time of possession - 30th
3rd down conversion - 25th
Rush attempts - 17th
Yards per Rush - 7th
All right, so what does this tell us. For starters, the passing game is interesting. We were 4th in sacks allowed, yet 25th in yards per pass play and 32nd (dead last) in completion percentage. Part of that may have been dropped balls, but anyone who watched us last season would agree that the main culprit was the QB, who was highly ineffective despite having excellent protection. Now with the rushing stats, I was surprised to find that we were 7th in yards per rush. However, in terms of the actual number of rush attempts, we were 17th. In the passing game, we were 25th and 10th in attempts and yards per attempt, respectively. What this tells me is that we had a serious problem with the playcalling last season. Why were we passing more than running when we clearly a better running team? That coupled with our 3rd down conversion percentage, caused us to have one of the 3rd worst time of possession averages in the league.
So to recap the offense, where we were ranking 14th overall: our biggest problems were QB play, playcalling which favored our weakness over our strengths, and consequently, time of possession. Our biggest strengths were protecting that passer and the running game.
Now lets move on to defense, here's were things get more interesting and some of the things I thought were not necessarily true:
Yards per game - 18th
Passing yards per game - 20th
So from these stats, our defensive would seem to be slightly below average overall, but here's where you have to take a closer look:
Number of plays - 31st
Passing attempts - 25th
Rushing attempts - 22nd
Sacks - 2nd
Completion percentage - 15th
3rd down percentage - 25th
Yards per pass attempt - 9th
Yards per rush - 7th
Now this is where you start to see some truth emerge. The fact is that our defense was worse statistically than it really was due to the time of possession and number of plays against. Our defense was on the field for more plays than any team except San Francisco. Part of this was due to the allowed completion percentage, although here we were still slight better than average. Overall though, it seems that the biggest problem with our defense was actually our offense.
The other problem, and it wasn't a huge one, was our secondary. Overall our pass defense was pretty good - 9th in yards per pass attempt. However, you have to take into account our ferocious pass rush that ranked 2nd and only 1 sack behind the leader. If I were to guess what ranking our secondary alone would have gotten last season, I would say that it was around 16th-18th. Now consider that last season we had practice squad players at the nickel and dime positions, and those players were even starters at times. Here you see that the numbers back up the assertion that Saban is a wizard with the secondary.
So to recap the defense: our biggest problem on defense was our offense putting them back on the field constantly. Our secondary, while average as a unit, was ranked 9th overall while being helped out by an awesome pass rush. Our run defense was slightly better at 7th overall.
Ok, so lets get down to the point: what areas of the team need to improve personnel wise for us to become Superbowl contenders. The great news is that our biggest issues have been taken care of in spectacular fashion. Our big gaping hole, the QB position, has been massively upgraded, and consequently even if we keep the same pass-skewed playcalling ratio from last year, we should have a tremendously improved offense. That offense will in turn put less pressure on a defense that was better than given credit for.
After that we have no real weaknesses, as our rushing offense, rushing defense, and passing defense were all very solid (7th, 7th, and 9th on a per play basis). The next biggest weakness on the team was the secondary, which has also been improved. Even if Allen, Goodman, Cooper, and Hill don't set the world on fire, they provide excellent depth at a position were we had to make due with practice squad players for much of last year.
Now what does this mean for the draft. Well as many people have been saying, we have the luxury of taking the BPA. Contrary to popular opinion, we do not have a great need for an OLB, even if we don't sign Arrington. An OLB would help mostly with run defense and pass rush, and those were not weaknesses last year. We also have a very solid OL, which was 4th overall in sacks allowed and combined with an awesome RB core to be 7th in rushing yards. We don't have a great need for secondary help, since we've proved that even waiver wire guys can make our pass defense respectable. We don't have a need for a WR, as our QB upgrade will take care of our passing game.
Guys, what I guess I'm getting as is this: be excited. Be very excited. In 15 months Nick Saban has taken us from a 4-12 team making regular appearances in Jay Leno's nightly monologue to a team that has patched all its weaknesses by the end of March, leaving him the entire draft to make our team even better. While the Bills and Jets are in shambles and the sun is setting on the Patriot's dynasty, our star is ascending.
Damn it feels good to be a Dolphins fan.
First lets start on offense:
Yards per game - 14th
Yards per play - 15th
So basically, our offense was very average overall last year. Now some more details:
Completion Percentage - 32nd (yep, dead last)
Yards per pass attempt - 25th
Sacks allowed - 4th
Pass attempts - 10th
Time of possession - 30th
3rd down conversion - 25th
Rush attempts - 17th
Yards per Rush - 7th
All right, so what does this tell us. For starters, the passing game is interesting. We were 4th in sacks allowed, yet 25th in yards per pass play and 32nd (dead last) in completion percentage. Part of that may have been dropped balls, but anyone who watched us last season would agree that the main culprit was the QB, who was highly ineffective despite having excellent protection. Now with the rushing stats, I was surprised to find that we were 7th in yards per rush. However, in terms of the actual number of rush attempts, we were 17th. In the passing game, we were 25th and 10th in attempts and yards per attempt, respectively. What this tells me is that we had a serious problem with the playcalling last season. Why were we passing more than running when we clearly a better running team? That coupled with our 3rd down conversion percentage, caused us to have one of the 3rd worst time of possession averages in the league.
So to recap the offense, where we were ranking 14th overall: our biggest problems were QB play, playcalling which favored our weakness over our strengths, and consequently, time of possession. Our biggest strengths were protecting that passer and the running game.
Now lets move on to defense, here's were things get more interesting and some of the things I thought were not necessarily true:
Yards per game - 18th
Passing yards per game - 20th
So from these stats, our defensive would seem to be slightly below average overall, but here's where you have to take a closer look:
Number of plays - 31st
Passing attempts - 25th
Rushing attempts - 22nd
Sacks - 2nd
Completion percentage - 15th
3rd down percentage - 25th
Yards per pass attempt - 9th
Yards per rush - 7th
Now this is where you start to see some truth emerge. The fact is that our defense was worse statistically than it really was due to the time of possession and number of plays against. Our defense was on the field for more plays than any team except San Francisco. Part of this was due to the allowed completion percentage, although here we were still slight better than average. Overall though, it seems that the biggest problem with our defense was actually our offense.
The other problem, and it wasn't a huge one, was our secondary. Overall our pass defense was pretty good - 9th in yards per pass attempt. However, you have to take into account our ferocious pass rush that ranked 2nd and only 1 sack behind the leader. If I were to guess what ranking our secondary alone would have gotten last season, I would say that it was around 16th-18th. Now consider that last season we had practice squad players at the nickel and dime positions, and those players were even starters at times. Here you see that the numbers back up the assertion that Saban is a wizard with the secondary.
So to recap the defense: our biggest problem on defense was our offense putting them back on the field constantly. Our secondary, while average as a unit, was ranked 9th overall while being helped out by an awesome pass rush. Our run defense was slightly better at 7th overall.
Ok, so lets get down to the point: what areas of the team need to improve personnel wise for us to become Superbowl contenders. The great news is that our biggest issues have been taken care of in spectacular fashion. Our big gaping hole, the QB position, has been massively upgraded, and consequently even if we keep the same pass-skewed playcalling ratio from last year, we should have a tremendously improved offense. That offense will in turn put less pressure on a defense that was better than given credit for.
After that we have no real weaknesses, as our rushing offense, rushing defense, and passing defense were all very solid (7th, 7th, and 9th on a per play basis). The next biggest weakness on the team was the secondary, which has also been improved. Even if Allen, Goodman, Cooper, and Hill don't set the world on fire, they provide excellent depth at a position were we had to make due with practice squad players for much of last year.
Now what does this mean for the draft. Well as many people have been saying, we have the luxury of taking the BPA. Contrary to popular opinion, we do not have a great need for an OLB, even if we don't sign Arrington. An OLB would help mostly with run defense and pass rush, and those were not weaknesses last year. We also have a very solid OL, which was 4th overall in sacks allowed and combined with an awesome RB core to be 7th in rushing yards. We don't have a great need for secondary help, since we've proved that even waiver wire guys can make our pass defense respectable. We don't have a need for a WR, as our QB upgrade will take care of our passing game.
Guys, what I guess I'm getting as is this: be excited. Be very excited. In 15 months Nick Saban has taken us from a 4-12 team making regular appearances in Jay Leno's nightly monologue to a team that has patched all its weaknesses by the end of March, leaving him the entire draft to make our team even better. While the Bills and Jets are in shambles and the sun is setting on the Patriot's dynasty, our star is ascending.
Damn it feels good to be a Dolphins fan.
