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"Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - Hulk01 - 10-30-2014

Baffled and dismayed by our mistakes on offense this season, I compiled a list.

Here are those offensive mistakes: Penalties, followed by sacks and then turnovers—fumbles and interceptions. The number in parenthesis indicates the ongoing season total of penalties committed by that player.

I think some insights come from these, and I attempt a few at the conclusion

Davis
Garnett false start:  Ist and 22
Garnett (2d of season) holding: 2d and 20
Shuler hold; 1st and 20
Sack
Sack
Fumble, Young (this and next three in garbage time)
Fumble, Ward
Fumble, team
Fumble, Burns
Interception
Total:  10.  Very bad, but much of it from the backups.

USC
Caspers false start: 1st and 15
Caspers (2) tripping: 2d and 32
Cajuste false start: 2d and 11
Peat holding: 2d and 18
Illegal formation: 3rd and 5
Delay of game: 3rd and 10
Wright chop block negates touchdown pass, results in 3rd and 19
Sack
Sack
Fumble, Team
Fumble, Hogan
Fumble, Hogan
Fumble (Shuler bad snap)
Total: 13.  A mess.

Army
Garnett (3) holding, 2d and 13
Sack
Sack
Total: 3.  We play with more precision against military academies?  We had fixed the problems of the first two games?

Washington 
Hooper false start, 2d and 8
Wright (2) chop block, negates 26 yard completion to Cajuste, results in 3rd and 19
Sack
Fumble, Wright (strip by Thompson, TD)
Fumble, Hogan
Fumble, Hogan
Interception
Total: 7.  But not a bad day for the O Line: Hooper the only OL/TE penalty, and only one sack allowed to Washington’s Three Superstar front seven. 

Notre Dame
Hooper (2) false start, 3rd and 12
Garnett (4) false start, 1st and 15
Peat (2) false start, 3rd and 17
Sack
Sack
Sack
Sack
Fumble, Hogan
Interception
Total: 9.  It seemed even worse, didn’t it?

WSU 
Caspers (3) holding, 2d and 20
Caspers (4) false start, 2d and 7
Murphy holding, 2d and 30
Cajuste (2) offensive pass interference, negates pass to Pratt to result in 2d and 4, results in 1st and 25
Cajuste (3) illegal shift, negates 35 yard touchdown pass to Montgomery, results in 3rd and 16
Ward holding, 1st and 20
Sack
Sack
Fumble, Skov
Total: 9.  Shaw said “this game finally felt like us,” but perhaps our flurry of points obscured his and our view of six costly offensive penalties—particularly the two killers by Cajuste.

Arizona State
Substitution infraction; 2d and 15
False start, Murphy (2),  2d and 18
Sack
Sack
Fumble, Hogan
Fumble
Total: Six.  Only one OL penalty.  The mistakes that killed us came on special teams.

Oregon State
Murphy false start (3), 3rd and 14
Murphy (4) holding, 3rd and 18
12 men on the field, 3rd and 23 (same sequence as Murphy holding) 
Sack
Fumble, Hogan
Fumble, Shuler bad snap
Fumble, Taboada (good strip)
Fumble, Team
Interception
Interception
Total: 10.

This list makes me aware that the old saw, “Only three things can happen when you pass, and two of them are bad” doesn’t capture—at least for purposes of Stanford 2014—the bad things that can happen when we are forced to pass: the risk of 10-15 yard holding penalties, big losses on sacks, and fumbles by the quarterback—to which we have been terribly prone. 

I think the “Team” fumbles are, without exception, snap and QB exchange problems.  We’ve had five of those and eight by our quarterbacks, seven by Hogan.  That’s 13 snap/QB fumbles in just eight games. 

Our fullbacks have two fumbles, our tight ends two, and none of our receivers have fumbled.  (Ty has fumbled twice on punt returns, and Christian fumbled on a kickoff return, and our botched FG snap against ND also was recorded as a fumble.)  And our running backs have fumbled only once, and that was a phenomenal strip by Washington’s phenom LB, Shaq Thompson.

So to a brobdingnagian degree, Stanford’s “fumble problem” is a center and QB problem.

These stats also highlight that Stanford’s offense played cleanly against ASU, and the defense played very well.  But the two fumbles that aren’t shown here—Ty’s ill-advised, over-the-shoulder attempted catch on the punt, and Christian’s fumble on the kickoff return—turned a 10-14 game into a 10-28 game that makes it appear Stanford was badly outplayed on both sides. Not really. We actually played a much cleaner game against Arizona State than against either Washington State or Oregon State, but our big offensive plays against both those teams obscure the bad plays we suffered—the rash of penalties against the Cougars and the four fumbles and two int’s against the Beavers.

This list also suggests the limitations of conventional yards per rush, yards per pass offensive stats.  Those stats partly obscure the impact of bad plays—penalties, fumbles, and interceptions—that have resulted in an offense that scores seven fewer points per game than last season.

And finally, this list suggests—or may shout, actually—why Stanford fans have been so disappointed in Hogans’s performance.  When he actually gets off a pass, the results have most often been pretty good, particularly when he goes downfield.  But his fumbles/bad exchanges often all but end drives.

One more point.  We lost at Notre Dame and at Arizona State, and that reinforces our fears that we are worse at home and may fare even worse in the noise at Autzen.  You figure refs tend to want to appease the local fans—and OLs commit more false starts—while, fired-up defenders make more sacks and force more Stanford fumbles and interceptions.  That makes intuitive sense.  But that doesn’t seem to be our pattern so far this season.

Stanford “bad” offensive plays—false starts and other penalties, sacks allowed, fumbles and interceptions—per game”
At home: 9.0
Away: 7.3

And a related point: We assume refs probably tip one call a game to the home team, and that it sometimes—or more often—hurts us.  Perhaps there is a tiny influence but that may all the effect it has, based on penalties in games involving Pac-12 teams:

[b]Average penalties and penalty yards per game:[/b]
Pac-12 home teams: 7.3 : 65.8
Pac-12 visiting teams: 7.8 : 69.5

Seems pretty small, and might even be explained by visiting teams getting hit with a false start in a loud rival’s stadium every other game.  In any case, it seems encouraging to me. 

Re: "Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - CTcard - 10-30-2014

That's a long post that's hard to know just what to make of it without some context - how many such mistakes do other teams make? how many mistakes did Stanford make in other years? etc.

I think your conclusion is that mistakes are killing our offense - which certainly appears to be true. Not much more to say there, but below are some responses to small things.

(10-30-2014, 04:24 PM)Hulk01 link Wrote:Here are those offensive mistakes: Penalties, followed by sacks and then turnovers—fumbles and interceptions. 

U$€
Wright chop block negates touchdown pass, results in 3rd and 19

This rather misses your point, but I will use this occasion to maintain that Wright did not make a mistake on that play. Wright made a very good play that is probably exactly as he was taught. Mostly the official made a mistake on that play. To a lesser extent Garnett made a mistake by not leaving his man alone once he had clearly missed him and thus putting the idea of an illegal chop into the official's head.

Quote:These stats also highlight that Stanford’s offense played cleanly against ASU,

Which highlights that there can be a big difference between playing cleanly and playing well.

Quote:and the defense played very well. 

That would be a "compared to what" situation.

The defense did hold ASU to their pre-UW season low in yards, yds/play, and points [they had fewer in all those categories vs UW]. However, ASU also had the most points anyone has scored against us, second most yards, third most yds/play. More importantly, we had trouble getting them off the field; forcing only 4 punts on 11 drives and allowing 9/19 on third downs and 1/1 on fourth down.

It was a pretty good defensive performance, but probably the poorest of the year (with und the other contender).

Quote:This list also suggests the limitations of conventional yards per rush, yards per pass offensive stats.  These stats partly obscure the impact of bad plays—penalties, fumbles, and interceptions—that have resulted in an offense that scores seven fewer points per game than last season.

I don't think they obscure the impact of bad plays, rather they mostly don't address the issue (at least penalties and turnovers). Every stat has limitations, and no stat should be used in isolation to answer broad questions such as "how good is the offense?". If you start with that approach, you're not surprised to find something else that matters.

And for Stanford 2014, mistakes are certainly high on the list of other things that matter.

Quote:One more point.  We lost at the University of Dead Fake Girlfriends and at Arizona State, and that reinforces our fears that we are worse at home and may fare even worse in the noise at Autzen.

I am a little confused here, but assume you meant "reinforces our fears that we are worse on the road".

I watched those games, a few times. We have played worse on the road - whether or not we had more penalties and mistake-plays. That's just one aspect of our play.



Re: "Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - Hulk01 - 10-31-2014

Good points, CT.

Yes, definitely a difference between playing cleanly and playing well.  We played cleanly against Army, but certainly not well. 

But playing cleanly also makes it difficult to play well.  The bad plays listed against USC time and again put is in position to have to make big plays to overcome them. 

I also limited the charactertization of our play to the offense.  The offense played relatively cleanly against ASU, but not well, and the defense did not play to its high standard.  But again, our mistakes made the defense look much worse: the two special teams mistakes ended our possession before it started and put Arizona State in immediate field goal position.  That made the final score appear as if we were overwhelmed by ASU.  We certainly were outplayed, but perhaps not 10-28 outplayed.

Again, excellent points. Thanks.

Re: "Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - washingtonismoney - 10-31-2014

I think this is interesting stuff. One issue: it can be hard to distinguish sometimes between cleanly and well. Against ND it felt like we had approximately fifty thousand drops, which feels borderline. It's not quite the egregious level of dumbness as the errant shotgun snaps, or Skov trying to reach over the goalline in a scrum, but then again still feels sloppy.

Re: "Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - OutsiderFan - 10-31-2014

The bottom line is units run by very good coordinators simply don't make so many mistakes.  Coaches are responsible for getting the players to execute. 





Re: "Bad" offensive plays, plus comments (long) - BostonCard - 10-31-2014

(10-31-2014, 06:19 AM)OutsiderFan link Wrote:The bottom line is units run by very good coordinators simply don't make so many mistakes.  Coaches are responsible for getting the players to execute.

Really?  Are you saying that Baylor isn't run by a good coordinator?  Cause they are 126th in penalties and dead last in penalty yardage.  Oregon is 109th in penalties and 110th in penalty yardage (out of 128 D1A schools).  Turnovers (or lack thereof) are more strongly correlated with winning, but even then, Mississippi State, the top team in the country, has fumbled the ball 18 times (that's tied for 121st).

Yes, generally speaking, better teams make fewer mistakes.  In part that is because mistakes contribute to losses, as Hulk has shown.  But I'd avoid sweeping overgeneralizations.

BC