Special Teams

Been banging that drum for awhile now!

Sturgis was dreadful and Fields had an off yr, though Landry was actually really solid as a returner.

Not sure what to do to fix it, changing out sturgis will fix a lot of ills if he is only competent

 

Yeah it's a good question. Sturgis could easily be the reason our record will have one less in the win column.

 

Do we have enough upgrades to the unit overall for it to improve by a notable amount?
No.

Can Fields return to form? Does anybody know what his problem was last year?
IIRC he battled a hamstring... but I could be making that up.

Would you expect us to bring in another kicker to replace Captain Kickball?
No. That would be sensible though.

Is Rizzi on his game or should we expect more of the same?
Is Phibs up his ***? If so, Rizzi will change. But Philbs doesn't fire his co-ordinators unless he is threatened with being fired himself, and even then he refuses for awhile. So I doubt Rizzi is concerned about any pressure to have to perform or else.

Can we succeed into the post-season with a performance equal to last year's in that unit?
Hm. Guessing we would need a top ten D rank and a top ten O rank.

 

put more starters on special teams, improve athleticism with your depth..problem solved.

 

I don't think Fields was healthy for most of last season.

 

Yah...no one is really saying anything either. Could have been an off year though......kickers go through that.

Sturgis though has that guy EVER been healthy?

 

Will John Denney make the team this year?

 

I still think that our perception of Sturgis is a little off base...it's colored largely by a couple misses in big situations, but he hasn't been as bad as we all act...and I've done my fair share of complaining about Sturgis. From 45 and under, he's been pretty automatic.

 

I have lost all confidence and faith in Sturgis. He has been injured every year that he has been here. I am not sure what happened between college and now,but he just does not seem to be the kicker he was at the "Swamp". I sure do not want to lose a game because of a missed extra point or field goal so rather it is him,or someone else,we need this problem solved going into the season.We also need to have more touchback's and make teams have to drive the length of the field to score. I am hoping that Fields is 100% healthy this year and returns to his all pro form. One off kilter season from him does not cause me to lose any faith in him and towards the end of last season,he was getting his form back. We did great in our punt and fieldgoal blocking unit,so I hope they can keep it up. I also think that a few of our rookies that excelled in college on special teams like Bobby McCain will really help our coverage teams....when we went 17-0, we were #1 in all three phases of the game.

 

Personally, I think our injuries last year impacted our STs. STs coverage is largely about the LBs, RBs and CBs you have on STs (basically depth at those positions). The Ellerbe injury allowed Jenkins to prosper as a starter, but took away one of our best STs players. Moreno's injury and to a lesser extent Finnegan's injury gave players more snaps in the offensive and defensive units but took away snaps on STs. I don't know what we'll have this year, but I believe STs is largely about depth. I think our depth is improved and hopefully that should improve our STs performance.

 

ireland got rid of carpenter, bad mistake.took a perfectly good draft pick as well from us.

 

So glad for this thread. We are not good enough to overcome bad ST play. KO return was solid and I'm surprised out PR game wasn't a little better, but as a whole that unit cost us games last year.

Sturgis has been a disappointment but not terrible; should have kept Carpenter.

I think our KO and punt teams have been putrid. Poor execution and susceptible to trick plays when it should be obvious they are coming. You play Rexy you expect trick plays. Duh. This lack of preparation is on Rizzi. He needs to go. I feel really strongly about that. I expect w/ him in charge that we will lose a game(s) due to ST play.

 

He will probably be let go of next year.

 

I was 100% in favor of getting rid of Carpenter, and still stand behind that. I liked the pick of Sturgis, but I admit that he's underperformed a bit. You make a good point though in perception. Last season, his misses were from 50, 48, 45 (end of half), 43, 56, and 53, and he had two blocked. That's really only one "bad" miss. He's been roughly 50% on 50+ FG through his first two seasons. I'm not sure how that rates to the average kicker, but he does have the leg to make them, its just his accuracy becomes untrustworthy that far out.

Add to that the fact that in both seasons, some of his misses have come in situations where the team was in a closer FG range but then got sacked or otherwise lost yardage, putting themselves in worse field position, and making the miss hurt even more, leaving a bad taste in the mouth from the whole process. For the sake of argument, what if he had made several shorter kicks, leading to a few more close wins, rather than missing really long ones in losses? We likely wouldn't be having this converation, even though at the end of the day, it was the situation Sturgis was put in that prompted the whole thing. He wouldn't have really proven anything by making those shorter kicks, but we'd feel better about it.

 

Last season, Sturgis was perfect inside 29 yards. He was 7 of 8 within 39 yards. 6 of 10 within 49 yards, and 3 of 6 at 50+ yards. His FG% was at 78.4%.

Carpenter was automatic inside 49 yards and had an 81.5% FG% when we cut him. Since joining Buffalo, his FG% is at 90%.

 

Yeah.. two things to point out.

1) Sturgis was ranked 28th in overall FG%, so 78.4% is pretty low

2) NFL kickers (nowadays) usually do quite a bit better than 60% in the 40-49 yards range while doing similarly well up to 39 yards. So pointing out Sturgis is nearly money up to 39 doesn't help the argument (50+ yards is where you can forgive a miss.. not less than 50 in today's game).

So I do think we need an upgrade there.

 

Carpenter did not have a great season the year we traded him and I believe he was making $2.5 million? More than he was worth for the season he had. Hindsight.

 

I was always a fan of Carpenter while here,and one of the biggest things I liked about him was that he was going for tackles after the KO. He saved more than one TD return on ST's with his tackling ability.

 

We were dead last because of our kickoff return coverage.

Brandon Fields, if healthy, was a top three punter. Jarvis Landry was one of the top five return men in 2014, especially in KOs where his average was fantastic 28.1 #5). And Caleb Sturgis was injured, or something? (Miami was 19/20 in FGs under forty yards and 9/16 beyond.)

However, our special teams coverage sucked. At the 29.5 yard line, we joined JAX, TEN, WAS, TB, PHI, and OAK as the seven worst regarding opponents' starting field position.

 

Well, I am no doctor that is for sure so maybe FFG or KB would kindly verify, but it seems every year that he injures his groin, or hamstring, or both, so I am pretty sure that the type of injuries that he seems to always get will really hurt his kickoffs. That is why we were 32nd or last in the league on touchbacks. I don't know if surgery is an option, or if he has ever had it, but if he can't get healed once and for all, I feel like he never will. I thought Sturgis was going to really do good here.