The Big Cat Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly?
ChevyVanMiller Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 In a word, "No." The D was designed to stop the run against the best rushing offense in the NFL last year and they did just that. They smothered the ball carrier on most plays right at the line of scrimmage. It's not Washington/Williams yet, but it's moving in that direction.
Spiderweb Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly? Running games are built on 3 and 4 yard carries, sprinkled in with the 10, 15, 20 etc., bursts. (a la Fred Jackson). I was not impressed with the run D either. I remember after the game being thankful they didn't and then couldn't (due to the score) run the ball more.
McD Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Not sure, but... were those runs against us when we had a larger lead? Were we in more of a pass coverage D alignment? If so, that would explain some of it. Sorry, I don't know first hand, I missed the game as I was at the Rams/Eagles game.
Haven Moses Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Every time they threw the ball I said Thank You.
TheBrownBear Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 The longer runs occurred once we had a 20+ point lead and were running a pass-protection defense. I believe both of those runs were also draws that caught us off-guard since we were rushing the passer. The Chiefs running game did absolutely squat early in the game when it counted and when they were willfully trying to establish it. The 6.0 ypc stat is a misleading and meaningless one - sort of like our 3rd ranked pass defense last year.
eball Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 I'm sorry, but anyone who thought KC ran the ball "successfully" in that game doesn't know much about football. I don't care what the YPC were.
GaryPinC Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly? From what I remember, their larger runs were on misdirection running plays which we were overpursuing on and got caught. That should be easily correctable.
DrDawkinstein Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 cmjoyce put together a great post/thread about this that shows how much our run D has acutally improved... http://forums.twobillsdrive.com/topic/134606-defensive-statistics/ I posted this in another thread but thought people might be interested in seeing the information I gathered. I think the best part about these stats is that we did give up some big plays but overall we had a consistent performance with great stops. Below you will see the play by play starting in the 1st quarter for all run plays the chiefs had. Hash marks will separate the series. 1-10-KC 28 (11:37) J.Charles left end pushed ob at KC 32 for 4 yards (J.Byrd) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2-10-KC 20 (8:08) J.Charles up the middle to KC 23 for 3 yards (N.Barnett). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1-10-KC 14 (6:09) J.Charles left tackle to KC 18 for 4 yards (S.Merriman). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1-10-KC 20 (:55) J.Charles left end pushed ob at KC 42 for 22 yards (B.Scott). 1-10-KC 42 (:26) (Shotgun) J.Charles up the middle to KC 42 for no gain (C.Kelsay) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2nd quarter 1-10-BUF 37 (13:51) (No Huddle, Shotgun) T.Jones up the middle to BUF 36 for 1 yard (M.Dareus). 1-10-BUF 21 (12:53) (No Huddle, Shotgun) J.Charles right guard to BUF 19 for 2 yards (G.Wilson). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1-10 KC 18 (6:37) J.Charles right end to KC 21 for 3 yards (G.Wilson). FUMBLES (G.Wilson), RECOVERED by BUFL. McKelvin at KC 21. L.McKelvin to KC 21 for no gain (J.Charles). Kansas City challenged the fumble ruling, and the play was Upheld. (Timeout #1 at 06:27.) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2-10-KC 19 (5:28) (Shotgun) D.McCluster up the middle to KC 21 for 2 yards (M.Dareus) 2-9-KC 31 (3:56) (No Huddle, Shotgun) D.McCluster left tackle ran ob at BUF 46 for 23 yards (D.Florence). 1-10-BUF 46 (3:28) (No Huddle, Shotgun) T.Jones up the middle to BUF 44 for 2 yards (G.Wilson). 2-8-BUF 44 (2:55) (No Huddle, Shotgun) J.Charles up the middle to BUF 30 for 14 yards (J.Byrd). --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3rd quarter NO RUSHING ATTEMPTS 4th Quarter 1-10-KC 16 (11:43) (Shotgun) J.Charles right end to KC 21 for 5 yards (D.Batten). 1-10-KC 31 (10:37) (No Huddle, Shotgun) J.Charles up the middle to KC 30 for -1 yards (D.Batten). ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2-11-KC 19 (6:05) (No Huddle) D.McCluster up the middle to KC 24 for 5 yards (G.Wilson). ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1-10-KC 31 (:59) J.Battle up the middle to KC 35 for 4 yards (K.Morrison). 2-6-KC 35 (:22) (No Huddle) J.Battle right end to KC 38 for 3 yards (Sp.Johnson). In looking at this what's amazing is they gave up 3 runs of 23,22,14 for a total of 59 yards. That means on the other 15 attempts they averaged 3.26 yards per carry. The same goes for the passing - They had plays of 20,15,15,15,12,11,10 - For 98 yards. Out of the other 29 Pass Attempts - 15 completions they gained 21 yards. On those pass attempts they averaged under 1 yard per attempt. Now let's look at Drive Production .... 5 plays - ending in punt 4 plays - punt (3 and out) 4 plays - punt (3 and out) 10 plays - missed FG 1 play - fumble 11 plays - TD 5 plays - punt 4 plays - punt (3 and out) 5 plays - intercetption 6 plays - punt 4 plays - punt (3 and out) 5 plays - punt 2 plays - end of game All in all I would say that is a great defensive performance.
John from Riverside Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 The key to look for is improvement.....they gashed us last year for how many yards? Like 250? Barely over 100 yards today.....and the Bills killer Jamal Charles was held to 58 yards. Our boys did good.
timba Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 The first 20+ yard run occurred with :55 left in the 1st, Bills 20 Chiefs 0. They drew us over to the strong side with motions before the snap, leaving 1 WR on the weak side. Ran it weak side and got good blocking. I do find the 6ypc stat itself worrisome. I don't think we can expect our offense to put on the show that it did on Sunday each week. We'll have to see next week against Oakland, who also has a very good running team. If we can't make them throw, 6ypc will kill.
OCinBuffalo Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 (edited) There may be something to this, but there may not be. This may be one of those Football Outsiders-identified deceiving-type stats. Consider: Our O scored points early and often, which takes them out of the running game to a degree...so, they run less. However, we know they have to pass more to get back into the game...so, we expect the run less. And, when we are up by 3 scores...why do we care if they run the ball? We are most concerned about not giving up the big play, home run, TD score that swings momentum. They got some decent runs in...but they also didn't get first downs in the series overall. IIRC, the first long run came in the 2 minute drill at the end of the game. We were expecting and defending the pass, etc.(EDIT: must have missed the one posted above...I was in bar...so ) And, it's not our fault that their QB threw the ball poorly, just like it wasn't the other team's fault when our QBs couldn't throw in the past either. If you know the other team can't throw it on you, then you can run on them without worrying about running out of time. You can gameplan it. Bottom line: They did try to re-commit to the run in the 2nd quarter, and that's when we stopped them...when it counted the most, we forced them to keep trying to pass on 2nd and 7-8, because we didn't let them run for 6 yards on first down with any consistency. Edited September 12, 2011 by OCinBuffalo
Cookiemonster Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 (edited) I think that a bigger concern is letting the RB catch the ball out of the backfield out in the flat, they were getting huge chunks of yardage rigt in the seam of our defense there, we have to do a better job on that, but not much else to complain about. Edited September 12, 2011 by Cookiemonster
nonprophet Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly? Do you know what the most important statistic is? The final score. Obviously, the Chiefs running game was not effective enough against the Bills 'D'; it failed to control the clock, it failed to set up the pass and it failed to put the Chiefs in scoring position.
Doc Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 The first 20+ yard run occurred with :55 left in the 1st, Bills 20 Chiefs 0. And Carrington, who was playing LDE for Dareus, took himself out of the play.
Kelly the Dog Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Another in an endless series of misleading stats. I think anyone watching that game would say that Jamal Charles was pretty much a non-factor. If you were a Chief fan, sure you may say that he should have been given the rock a little more. But if that were true, he may not have got the same YPC. The Bills, for all intents and purposes, took Charles out of the game, like they did Dwayne Bowe. To me, it was great run defense, and just what I wanted to see, despite the stats. And despite reports to the contrary, stats do lie. They lie all the time. In fact, you can't trust the bastards.
1000YearFrankReich Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly? I saw that stat too. Some people are pointing out that it happened in the 2nd half once we had a big lead, but it did not. Charles got a couple of big gains and got most of his yards in the first half, and on those drives the chiefs were the most successful (missed FG, scored TD). 6 yards per carry is obviously not great, and if they have that stat at the end of the season then we are a lock for Andrew Luck. But in total they only had 108 yards surrendered on the ground and 60 of them were on 3 carries alone, as other people have pointed out here. On most drives they contained Charles very well and got the ball back for the offense. In turn the offense was aggressive and put points up early and often and forced the chiefs to basically abandon the run mid way through the 3rd quarter. The chiefs averaged 165 yards per game on the ground last year (1st), and the Bills averaged about 170 rushing yards surrendered per game (worst), so only giving up 108 is very good, and throat-stomping a great running team on the road is pretty dang amazing, actually. I think you can chalk it up to a great game plan by Gaily & Co and great execution by the players, as the managed to dictate the style of game instead of the other way around. I think we'll see in the coming weeks if that 6.0 ypc means anything, but I'm very happy with 108 ypg, 9 tackles for a loss and the defense limiting a good running team to 5 possessions of 5 plays or less in the first half.
Heels20X6 Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 Six yards per carry. That's what the Chiefs managed yesterday. Does anyone else find this stunning? Even if you take away they're two longest runs, they still come in at 3.9, hardly a "dominating" effort from our guys. Granted they ran the ball less than 20 times (when was the last time a Bills opponent did THAT?), and when you eliminate they're 22 and 23 yarders, they had a paltry 63 yards on 16 attempts, but I'm left wondering if the run D is as good as we think it was. In a closer game, our guys would have seen A LOT more carries. Could things have grown ugly? I figured right away that this was a Big Cat post... Tell us again how great the run D was under the amazing Dick Jauron again Cat.
billsfan89 Posted September 12, 2011 Posted September 12, 2011 When it mattered most (The beginning of the game when the game was still in doubt) the Bills smothered the run. The Chiefs popped bigger runs towards garbage time when it was clear the Bills had the game in hand
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