Looking for the needle to change

I agree. The O couldn't stay on the field and the D couldn't get off the field especially against the run. Pass D would shut it down get us a Third and 3 and the other teams knew they could pick it up on the ground.

I can't put my finger on why the O was so bad on third down. That's the money down.

 

I'm not sure we can call Thomas a "legit threat" at TE though. Sure, he had a strong season or two with Peyton, but that was a pretty dynamic offense, with a GOAT caliber QB, and outstanding options at WR. I'm not sure our personnel stacks up to that at the skilled positions. Thomas has struggled recently with injuries and such, and his production was down anyways. Sure, some of that may be due to the fact he was in Jacksonville (aka the Cleveland Browns of the south), but there's enough there to cause concern on my part in labeling him as a legit threat. There's some hurdles to overcome for that to be true.

I think the addition of Anthony Fasano actually should help the offense on third downs. He's still an exceptional blocker from the TE position, that can help out bigtime in possibly buying RT some extra time on a third down play, or some extra blocking on a run.

When doing this research, did you note down how much of that 28% of our 3 and outs occurred during the early part of the season when we struggled compared to the later part of the season as things got rolling? I'd be curious to know if the frequency was much higher early on as we adapted to the new offense/system, and if that reduced at the season rolled on. Just curious if that bad start we had maybe skewed this stat a bit.

Off my cloudy memory, I think we struggled to be consistent on the early downs. We survived a lot in part to some big plays from Ajayi, and downfield from Tannehill as things rolled on, but we had a lot of stuffed runs from what I recall too. The blocking situation needs to be resolved IMO. It's currently got me nervous too with the health of Pouncey to consider. I think having those guys healthy, and playing well up front in the trenches can help this offense avoid that same stat this year.

As for the D. I think we've made enough improvement to the LB unit to see them improve against the run. I think it will be a big improvement too. The concern there though for me is still a lack of speed on defense across the board. I think our LB unit can still be picked apart pretty good in coverage. The return of Reshad Jones though, should help in all areas.

 

I think a lot of the bad stats you see in 2016 were padded so to speak by such an abysmal offensive performance the first 5 weeks. That offense had about 3 good quarters in that stretch.

If we get the offense we saw after that that featured Ajayi and a much improved looking RT then I'm not worried about the offense in 2017.

 

I think the defense will be dramatically improved this season. I personally feel that on paper, we've greatly improved our chances on stopping the run, which will greatly improve the ranking. The overlooked signing of William Hayes, the signing of Timmons and the drafting of the LB prodigy himself, Raekwon, plus getting Jones back should help.

The only problem the offense will have may be the interior oline oand/or injuries.

 

Yes, 3 quarters of the Rams game was putrid. Props to Kiko for keeping us in it.

Baltimore game is certainly scary. They just sat on the underneath routes and played good team defense and it resulted in 3 INT's. Pats game at the end of the year is meh to me. They wanted to win sure, but I doubt we gave too much away from a game planning standpoint.

 

I feel like such a blind homer when saying this, but I really believe we are legitimate AFC contenders.

 

Yeah. Ajayi kinda blew up the bad teams and looked mortal against the good ones. We also had a rotating O Line due to injury so that may have had a lot to do with it. Regarding Ajayi, I'm not 1000% confident he's the baller we need him to be but hope he;ll continue to grow.

 

Yes, we absolutely can. First, take into account that a big part of why the ranking is SO LOW came from the first five games last season, when the OL was total garbage. In many important categories, those were our five worst games of the year when it came to plays run, ball control, 3rd down percentage, and sacks taken. All of those got better from the Pittsburgh game onward. Not to the point where we were good, but not a garbage fire like the early part of the year either.

Then, realize that our horrible rankings in plays run for and against are usually the mark of a team thats absolutely terrible and punchless and wins three or four games, like our 2004 club. For a 10 win team to be ranked like we were is extremely uncommon, and is a sign that those numbers will balance out in 2018 in our favor. And then, even moving up to league average levels would dramatically improve how many plays that we run vs our opponents.

And as Fin D said, thats not even taking into account the improvements that we've made on the defensive side of the ball. Plus, the important players that we have coming back from injury, and how the entire offense will likely function better this season knowing one another and the scheme well. There is every reason to believe that things will be dramatically better.

 

We were so horrible last year playing second stringers, we would have to be vastly improved I'd think. But if you look at the actual pieces we added (which you pointed out) and then consider that we are returning from IR two starting corners, one of the best safeties in the league, a healthy Kiko and a few critical DL pieces (Harris, etc), we could actually be really, really darn good on D.

That's the big piece we were missing from 2016, as our offense started taking huge strides, the defense fizzled out. We didn't have anywhere near that same D that held Seattle to 12 in week one.

 

I don't think it's deceiving at all- if the defense can't get off the field, then the offense will have less plays. I don't have the stats but we lost big-time in time of possession last season, and it's very hard to win anything when the other team has the ball an extra 15-20 minutes. If our defense improves then this stat should take care of itself.

This stat surprised me because I thought we would have been a lot higher here. Personally, I blame this stat on Gase since he had the habit of calling 1st/2nd quarter drives so conservatively (which he's personally admitted many times). Run on 1st, screen pass on 2nd, short throw on 3rd and hopefully Landry can drag someone past the chains. We'd do that for three drives and then launch the bomb for a TD...which scores a quick 6 but also plays against us in time of possession.

I'm hoping we get more aggressive early in the games though to buck this trend a little- by running more power sweeps with Damian, pounding the middle with Ajayi and then taking more shots downfield on early downs. The little screen stuff drives me crazy.

 

I think it is more than just Ajayi and Thomas getting to the sticks. The receivers like Parker, Stills and Landry also have to get there and beyond and Tannehill needs to challenge the defense for more than what they are willing to give him, especially on third down. Hopefully we have the personnel and familiarity to open up the playbook like you suggest. We have to be able to still make a first down when either first or second down do not yield the yards we hoped for. All good offense can overcome 3rd and 7-9. Seems like we haven't done that with consistency yet. I wonder how we rank in third and 7-10.