3rd downs have killed the Bills this year

[Mikie2times]

A successful offense is required to score points, and gain yards, but in order to accomplish those things a team must put themselves in make able third downs. For a team with a weak line it is even more important because a 3rd and long puts you in predictable pass situations. Predictable pass situations will get you blitzed, and a below average line will look even worse.

 

If you can’t convert on third the trickle down effect will even extend to your defense. You will likely lose the time of possession battle, and see much more of the opposing team’s offense, and with a bad defense to begin with you could get yourself in trouble fast.

 

What Buffalo doesn’t do well is get themselves in make able third downs, and when this happens our defense either must force turnovers, or pray, because we aren’t good enough to stop teams consistently. I broke down plays Buffalo has had on 3rd and 7 or more, and the frequency in which a third down was 3rd and 7 or more. The results will probably not surprise anybody.

 

The following is how I did it

 

GOOD= A conversion of 3rd and 7 or longer

BAD= Not converting 3rd and 7 or longer, excluding penalties, turnovers, and sacks.

NEG= A 3rd and 7 or longer that involved an offensive penalty, sack, or turnover

 

Total 3rd Downs: 127

Total 3rd Downs 3rd and 7 or longer: 59 (46%)

GOOD: 10 (16.9%)

BAD: 37 (62.7%)

NEG: 12 (20.3%)

 

 

EDIT: I made a mistake on the amount of 3rd down attempts for the Bills. It's actually 127, not 118.

[/dev/null]

To sum up the Bills Defensive 3rd down performance:

 

Down 1: Steal Underpants

Down 2: ???

Down 3: First down!

[Sisyphean Bills]

I don't get this thread.

 

The first post is about the Bills offense. The second post is about the Bills defense. I think.

 

Oh, well. It doesn't much matter. They both suck.

[BB2004]

A successful offense is required to score points, and gain yards, but in order to accomplish those things a team must put themselves in make able third downs.  For a team with a weak line it is even more important because a 3rd and long puts you in predictable pass situations. Predictable pass situations will get you blitzed, and a below average line will look even worse.

 

If you can’t convert on third the trickle down effect will even extend to your defense. You will likely lose the time of possession battle, and see much more of the opposing team’s offense, and with a bad defense to begin with you could get yourself in trouble fast.

 

What Buffalo doesn’t do well is get themselves in make able third downs, and when this happens our defense either must force turnovers, or pray, because we aren’t good enough to stop teams consistently.  I broke down plays Buffalo has had on 3rd and 7 or more, and the frequency in which a third down was 3rd and 7 or more. The results will probably not surprise anybody.

 

The following is how I did it

 

GOOD= A conversion of 3rd and 7 or longer

BAD= Not converting 3rd and 7 or longer, excluding penalties, turnovers, and sacks.

NEG= A 3rd and 7 or longer that involved an offensive penalty, sack, or turnover

 

Total 3rd Downs: 118

Total 3rd Downs 3rd and 7 or longer: 59 (50%)

GOOD: 10 (16.9%)

BAD: 37 (62.7%)

NEG: 12 (20.3%)

510566[/snapback]

 

Wow were did you come up those stats? I'd like to see the stats when we have 3rd and less than 2. I think those numbers aren't very good either.

[Mikie2times]

Wow were did you come up those stats?  I'd like to see the stats when we have 3rd and less than 2.  I think those numbers aren't very good either.

510642[/snapback]

 

I spend a lot of time analyzing statistics for handicapping. At the end of the year I'm going to do this statistic and several others for all the teams by going over the play by play logs.

 

Just so we have some point of reference on how a good team does in these circumstances I also did the Colts. They have a stat line that looks like this.

 

GOOD= A conversion of 3rd and 7 or longer

BAD= Not converting 3rd and 7 or longer, excluding penalties, turnovers, and sacks.

NEG= A 3rd and 7 or longer that involved an offensive penalty, sack, or turnover

 

Total 3rd Downs: 118

Total 3rd Downs 3rd and 7 or longer: 43 (36%)

GOOD: 15 (34.9%)

BAD: 22 (51.2%)

NEG: 6 (14%)

 

So what is probably the leagues best offense gets in these situations about 10% less often then Buffalo, and is 18% more likely to convert then the Bills.

 

The other one I was interested in doing is something I'm going to call First Down success rate. This will measure the frequency in which a team picks up at least 4 yards on first down. Maybe I'll throw that one into this thread later tonight.

[Tortured Soul]

Good stuff, Kzoo. The problem I have with ths argument is not that the Bills are poor on third downs, but that they get into those situations in the first place. While the Colts have about 9% fewer third downs, they have about 35% fewer 3rd and longs. The key is to avoid the 3rd and long to begin with.

 

But big picture - if you have the time to do a league-wde analysis, look at how often teams score when they get into 3rd down situations at all. Seemingly, an offense that coverts 75% third downs is doing better than an offense that converts 50%, but if the 50% offense is a big play offense who is generally good at avoiding 3rd downs in the first place, ala the Colts, Chargers, etc., then they will score more than the team that converts 75% playing ball control.

[Mikie2times]

Good stuff, Kzoo.  The problem I have with ths argument is not that the Bills are poor on third downs, but that they get into those situations in the first place.  While the Colts have about 9% fewer third downs, they have about 35% fewer 3rd and longs.  The key is to avoid the 3rd and long to begin with. 

 

But big picture - if you have the time to do a league-wde analysis, look at how often teams score when they get into 3rd down situations at all.  Seemingly, an offense that coverts 75% third downs is doing better than an offense that converts 50%, but if the 50% offense is a big play offense who is generally good at avoiding 3rd downs in the first place, ala the Colts, Chargers, etc., then they will score more than the team that converts 75% playing ball control.

510658[/snapback]

 

I agree that many of the good offenses won't even see a third down to begin with. So to take into account a good offenses ability to avoid third down all together we could compare the amount of 3rd downs an offense has to the overall plays it runs.

 

Buffalo has 563 passing and Running Plays

Indianapolis has 636 Passing and Running plays

 

Knowing already how many third downs each team has attempted, and how many of those 3rd downs are 7 yards or longer we can get a much better overall picture of the offense.

 

22% Of Buffalos plays have come on third down, and of those 3rd downs 59 or 46% have involved a third and 7 or longer situation.

 

18% Of the Colts plays have come on third down, and of those 3rd downs 43, or 36% have involved a situation of third a 7 or longer.

 

While 4% doesn't seem like the world, a number like that probably has a big overall effect on a team’s offense in the scheme of things. Then when you factor in the other numbers I had in previous posts you can really see how much more efficiently a good offense operates compared to Buffalo's.

 

I appreciate the comments and tips.

[eSJayDee]

That's somewhat insightful, thanks.

And the conclusion that one should draw from these #s?

We should start putting one of our best players on 3rd & long - Moorman!

Actually, based on that kind of performance, as sad as that is, I think that would yield better results.

Seriously, I'd be curious as to how we compare to other teams in this regard.

I've gotta assume it's pretty abysmal.

[Tortured Soul]

I agree that many of the good offenses won't even see a third down to begin with. So to take into account a good offenses ability to avoid third down all together we could compare the amount of 3rd downs an offense has to the overall plays it runs.

 

Buffalo has 563 passing and Running Plays

Indianapolis has 636 Passing and Running plays

 

Knowing already how many third downs each team has attempted, and how many of those 3rd downs are 7 yards or longer we can get a much better overall picture of the offense.

 

22% Of Buffalos plays have come on third down, and of those 3rd downs 59 or 46% have involved a third and 7 or longer situation.

 

18% Of the Colts plays have come on third down, and of those 3rd downs 43, or 36% have involved a situation of third a 7 or longer.

 

While 4% doesn't seem like the world, a number like that probably has a big overall effect on a team’s offense in the scheme of things. Then when you factor in the other numbers I had in previous posts you can really see how much more efficiently a good offense operates compared to Buffalo's.

 

I appreciate the comments and tips.

510666[/snapback]

Thanks for taking the time.

 

Just to put what you said in different terms:

1 out of ever 9.5 plays the Bills have on offense is a 3rd and long.

1 out of every 14.7 plays the Colts face on offense is a 3rd and long.

[Mikie2times]

Thanks for taking the time.

 

Just to put what you said in different terms:

1 out of ever 9.5 plays the Bills have on offense is a 3rd and long.

1 out of every 14.7 plays the Colts face on offense is a 3rd and long.

510719[/snapback]

 

Again great idea to convert it to a per play ratio, that really shows the impact how often Buffalo is getting in these situations.

 

You can also convert the percentages on 3rd and 7 and longer into the per play format. Those would look like this for the Colts and Bills on 3rd and 7 or longer.

 

1 out of every 5.9 plays the Bills will convert a third and 7 or more

1 out of every 2.8 plays the Colts will convert of third and 7 or more

[Mikie2times]

I just used a similar stat to look at the SD game. All it does is break down the amount of plays each offense faced at 3rd and 6 or longer, and how often that team converted.

 

BUF Ran- 49 Rushing and Passing plays

SD Ran- 67 Rushing and Passing plays

 

Of the Chargers 67 plays 2 plays came in a situation of 3rd and 6 or longer, they converted both.

 

Of Buffalos 49 plays 7 plays came in a situation of 3rd and 6 or longer, and they converted once.

 

One more stat I looked at combined performance on second and first down, and it looks on par with what you would expect with the 3rd and 6 numbers. The stat credits a team 1 point for converting a first down on the first two downs, or one point for putting your offense in 3rd and 3 or less. If the team fails to achieve either one of these objectives they lose 1 point. The points are then all totaled up and you can find each team’s success rate in these situations.

 

For a little more detail pretend you have a team that received 10 Positive points, and 5 Negative Points. That means we have a total of 15 occurrences that this situation happened in. Just divide 10/15 and that’s how I came up with the success rate for these situations.

 

SD- Had an 89.3% success rate in this category

 

Buff- Had a 50% success rate in this category.