Over the past few days, I went back and watched every Redskins third down against the Giants last season, both home and away games. I wanted to get a look at both the Redskins offensive and Giants defensive tendencies on the most importa...
Over the past few days, I went back and watched every Redskins third down against the Giants last season, both home and away games. I wanted to get a look at both the Redskins offensive and Giants defensive tendencies on the most important down in the NFL, third. Having played two games against each other, it gave me a good opportunity to collect a bigger sample size and see how tendencies might have changed from the first game to the second.
I kept tally of a number of different categories, including: down and distance, quarter, personnel group, quarterback positioning, formation alignment, motions, defensive look pre-snap, run or pass, coverage scheme, play notes and the result of the play. I put them all together in this table, keeping the two games separate.
(Click to enlarge)
That's obviously a lot of information being thrown at you all at once, so here are some of the more interesting things I took out of it.
Conversion Rate
The Redskins only converted 6/13 (46%) third down attempts in the first game in New York, but managed 4/8 (50%) back home in Washington. That's a combined 10/21 (48%) converted third down attempts. For some comparison, the Patriots lead the NFL in 2012 for third down conversion rate, with 49% of their attempts being converted for first downs. The Redskins, for the season, averaged a 36% conversion rate, ranking 20th in the NFL.
Personnel Groups
The Redskins used just three personnel groups on third down; U, Tiger and Zebra. Zebra was the most frequently used (12 times), but that's probably because seven of the 21 third down attempts came from 10 or more yards, making the third receiver most useful than a second tight end or running back. Zebra saw all the snaps of third and six or more. That personnel group only managed to convert four of the 12 attempts they had, but the Redskins did manage to convert a couple of fourth downs after getting in range on third down.
The U group saw six third downs, mostly on short yard situations where the Redskins ran the ball, making use of the extra fullback and tight end as blockers. They converted four of six attempts, three of which came on the exact same play.
It's a rare power run, involving the tight end heavy side of the line, in this case, the left, to all crash down inside. That allows the right guard, Chris Chester to pull around from his spot and act as a lead blocker for Alfred Morris.
Fullback Darrel Young will take on the defensive end and kick him outside. Chester comes around on his pull and meets an incoming linebacker.
Chester is able to maintain the block long enough for Morris to get through the hole and pick up the first down.
The Redskins used that play three times over the course of the two games, and were successful converting on all three attempts.
Interestingly, the Redskins most successful conversion group, Tiger, only saw the field three times, all in the first game at the Giants. They were successful in converting two of three attempts, but never saw the field on third downs in the second game.
But clearly, the Redskins liked to have two tight ends on the field on third down when possible, be it with U or Tiger personnel groups. That should mean plenty of snaps for Fred Davis, Logan Paulsen, Niles Paul and rookie Jordan Reed.
Pre-Snap Looks
This was one of the most interesting parts of this study. They Giants showed a single-high-safety look on 8/13 third down plays in the first meeting, but only 3/8 third downs in the second game. Single-high-safety looks will generally mean the defense is running one deep safety with man coverage underneath, or Cover 3.
Whereas, New York showed two deep safety looks 5/13 snaps in the first game, and 5/8 snaps in the return game. Two deep safety looks can mean a couple of different things, like Cover 2, two-deep man under, quarters coverage or Tampa 2 among others.
This may have been a deliberate move by the Giants, having seen the Redskins burn the Cowboys safeties the week
