Eskies: Current Telling Stats And Moving On And Up

Indeed stats can be deceiving and often are manipulated for various agendae, but IMHO these are the most telling from which we must improvise to adapt to succeed.

LAST in offencive points scored and touchdowns though tied for FIRST in field goals

3 points is sure better than 0 when you can't score a major, but that does not win you most games when you have a defence that is not tough and can't hold on in close games.

LAST in rush defence and average yards per rush

Strip out even Wes Cates' 83-yarder on which our defence looked about as good as an average NCAA team, and it's still awful guys. Where did the back 8 learn how to tackle? Seriously they need tackling drills and some old-timer to show them the old-school way of wrapping, pulling, and playing for the team tackle instead of going for the stick, pop, dive, cut, or highlight! Inexcusable for a "PROFESSIONAL" football team!

SECOND in passing and pass completions and THIRD in completion % (and really close to 2nd)

Looks to me like the timing and routes are okay here just with those key drops holding us back.

FIRST in fumbles, probably FIRST in giveaway/takeaway at -10, and THIRD in offencive penalties

And note the difference between third and worse is basically one PI penalty mind you as well! It's pretty hard to win when you are defeating yourself like this in any league.

Tied for FIRST in allowed QB sacks at 9

As 5 of these came in the first game, marked improvement for us here at the very least.

Congrats to Mo Lloyd and Noel Prefontaine on their game performance for players of the week. :smiley:

That made some interesting reading and backs what I’ve said before - i.e. these guys cannot stop the run. I saw 5 missed tackles in one play on Saturday which is unacceptable. It seems my buddies and I are always screaming “put the guy on the ground!” I totally agree, a tackling 101 is definitely in order for the team.

I’m glad to see him stepping up his game. He had sort of a subpar year last season. So far this season he has 20 tackles and 3 sacks. Not bad. Hope he keeps it up. :thup:

Regarding the Cates run, I agree that our guys can’t seem to tackle, but you gotta give Sask credit on that play. Their O-Line completely owned our D-Line on that play, which allowed Cates to get out in the open.

As for our passing stats, I’d say those are a little deceiving. We may be a dominant passing team between the 20s, but when we get into the redzone, the offence completely stalls. It’s not just the turnovers that are hurting us.

Just wondering if there is a stat with how many times they have been in the Red zone and how many points they have come away with .

Here is my latest take after week 5 …

The bottom line is we defeat ourselves most games with our combination of the following bad fundamentals excluding pass drops hopefully in the past. In the next post I’ll put down the positives as stand almost entirely on pass defence.

Defence
-LAST in rush defence:
Total net rushing yards, and yards per attempt, and rushing TDs … pretty hard to win allowing over 160 rushing yards per game!

Alarmingly, we allow more average yards per rush (7.9) than we do average yards per pass (7.8) and are the only team to accomplish that unlikely feat. When teams can run on you effectively and almost always get one run to break for mega-yards, they sure don’t need to pass as much do they?

It’s almost enough to make one wonder if like the Roughriders on that 83-yd run by Cates as one example if more teams will just use even more of an old-school ball-control double-tight set to just mow us down instead of spreading us out! I sure hope they are not adapting too much after watching a lot of film!

Offence
-Third to last in penalties with 485 yards in five games! :o

-LAST in sacks allowed with 15. Since those 5 in our first game, improvement here but still too many to allow an average of three sacks a game!

What we're doing well/positive stats to go with the previous post:

3rd In Completion %: 64.6%
1st In Kickoff Return Yards: 584

Defence
1st in the following:

Fewest 1st Downs
Fewest 1st Downs Passing
Passes Completed
Passing Yards
Passing Yards/Game
Passing TDs (Tied)

2nd
Lowest Completion % (60)
Interceptions

3rd
Fewest Yards Net Offence
Avg Yards Offence/Game
Avg Gain/Pass (7.8)

Based on this post and the previous, you would think it would be easier to find more linebackers and defencive backs who could tackle and stop the run as opposed to cover, but somehow we've managed to do the opposite! :?

For sake of any transactions we could use a few guys for the back eight who are heavy on run-stopping with even average coverage skills it would seem.

Either that or some old-school tackling drills without pads and only helmets on I say. :slight_smile:

Congrats to DB Chris Thompson on his weekly award. Well the Esk's are 1-4 at the moment, so realistically speaking; after the Sept.10th game in Edmonton with a win over Calgary, I hope the team will be 4-6. On the flip side of things............you know how it goes.

AKA on the heading “How Low Can We Go” or “Starting Again From Rock Bottom” with the hiring of the new GM,
even with two wins since my last post six weeks ago, things statistically and tactically (X’s and O’s) have gone from bad to worse.

No doubt since early August playing the best team in the Stampeders three times was most of the trouble after blowing it against Toronto.

If you are looking for more of a silver lining, well okay we still have the most kickoff return yards in the CFL plus also the second-best kicker ex-punting. But hey after the most TDs in the CFL are scored on your team, of course you are going to receive more kickoffs right?

Otherwise here is weeping reality as far as what is on Tillman’s executive dinner table to hell with his plate. Or perhaps turn that table into firewood with a chainsaw and order a mahogany one anew? :? You get the idea.

Serious house cleaning is more in order than I had thought and than some have been saying too given how this team’s defence not only stinks but the entire team makes too many mistakes to defeat itself.

Worst Run Defence In The CFL:
Includes allowing 6.8 yards per running play

2nd Worst Pass Defence In The CFL:
8.6 yards per pass; let’s just call it the worst considering we have allowed more TDs than any other team!

2nd Worst Passing Offence

Tied For Most Penalised Team In The League With BC (and Montreal after taking out the bogus penalties in the Ti-Cats game)

2nd Least Sacks By Defence

2nd Most Sacks Allowed (Tied w/ Toronto)

Giveaway/Takeway ratio a whopping -19 – Worst in the CFL by a -15!

Visually there is too much evidence, particularly against the Stamps in the red zone, to show our ineffectiveness against the Stamps play-action run sets in the red zone that involve slot bunches, or a stand-up slot receiver otherwise, lining up where in the old school there would be a tight end:

[url=http://forums.cfl.ca/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59159#p983047]viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59159#p983047[/url]

Note that all those examples were from the FIRST game against the Stamps this season, and we improved nothing since as far as I can tell. If the pass coverage is not bad enough to make you gag, check out the absent pass rush in which Burris can just have his way each time!

It seems somewhat frightening right now to think about playing Toronto given that they run successfully some of the same offencive sets, not to neglect to mention other teams who have premier access to such film. Winnipeg is also running more tight-end sets now as evidenced in their trouncing of the Riders last weekend.

http://www.cfl.ca/video/index/id/13155?autostart=true

3:40 – Here is it not like I did not warn the Eskies – double tight-end screen pass to Boyd at LOS T42 to set up the mismatch against TJ Hill with hardly a chance against Boyd. First down Argos. Most credit here goes to Barker well over Hall’s head for this great call.

4:13 – Key converted 3rd and 2 on the winning drive off the double-tight set.