Preseason Gameday Research: Ravens Edition

[redbuddha]

I was looking at some stats this morning and noticed some interesting and disturbing things, then I looked at the Ravens stats and found out we have a lot in common with the Baltimore Ravens.

I recently took some criticism for focusing on preseason events. So these stats are from the regular season.

 

TOTAL FIRST DOWNS

Carolina            328

Baltimore          314

 

FIRST DOWNS (RUSHING-PASSING-BY-PENALTY)           

Carolina            123-171-34

Baltimore            98-182-34

 

THIRD DOWN CONVERSIONS

Carolina            88/204

Baltimore          83/232

 

I think much of that comes from Newton’s running ability.

           

FOURTH DOWN CONVERSIONS

Carolina            3/9

Baltimore          6/12

 

TOTAL OFFENSIVE YARDS

Carolina            5,771

Baltimore          5,640

 

OFFENSE (PLAYS-AVERAGE YARDS)

Carolina            988-5.8

Baltimore          1,042-5.4

 

TOTAL RUSHING YARDS

Carolina            2,088

Baltimore          1,901

 

Most of their rushing yards are from Ray Rice.

 

RUSHING (PLAYS-AVERAGE YARDS)

Carolina            462-4.5

Baltimore            444-4.3

 

PASSING (COMP-ATT-INT-AVG)

Carolina            284-490-12-8

Baltimore         334-560-11-7.1

 

SACKS

Carolina            39

Baltimore          37

 

Is our defense better than the Ravens?

 

FIELD GOALS

Carolina            16/21

Baltimore           30/33

 

We didn’t trust our kicker(s). Going in depth, we attempted fewer field goals as a team at every distance. Especially after 40 yards.

 

TOUCHDOWNS

Carolina            44

Baltimore          44

 

TOUCHDOWNS (RUSHING-PASSING-RETURNS-DEFENSIVE)

Carolina            21-19-0-4

Baltimore            17-22-3-2

 

Interesting that their quarterback is worth $100Mil and ours is constantly criticized.

 

TIME OF POSSESSION

Carolina            29:51

Baltimore            28:39

 

TURNOVER RATIO           

Carolina            +1

Baltimore            +9

 

Interceptions

Carolina            11

Baltimore          13

 

As much as we heard about the Ravens secondary, they only have two more interceptions. Maybe our secondary isn’t as bad as we think.

 

Upon further review, Kuechly (2) Beason (1), and Davis (1) had 4 of the 11.

 

QB Discussion

The QB’s are almost like twin brothers with stats that are very similar in most categories TD, INT, Comp%, Sacks, QBR. The big difference is in number of Completions, with Newton having 280, and Flacco having  (317) 37 additional completions, but still having fewer yards passing than Newton. In addition, Newton is damn near our leading rusher for the last 2 years.

Also interesting, despite throwing shorter throws, and running more plays, he got sacked almost as much as the more athletic Newton.

 

Interesting Note about Kick Returns

Sione Fua a fan favorite has a 9 yard average.

 

Defense

Luke Kuechly led the league/team in tackles with 164, but had only 1 sack. I think that may be the only sack we had by a linebacker all year. I assume this has to do with them helping out our secondary.

 

We had 1084 tackles on defense, our opponents defense 975 tackles seems to be getting more rest than ours.

 

Random thoughts

It seems with all of the running backs we have and our success in the running game as a team, that it would be helpful, to run a no-huddle offense, that we just sending in fresh running backs for. Almost all of our running backs are averaging 10 yards a catch; with the addition of Barner this year, I would think we could turn that into something really dangerous if our receivers are still avg.

 

I have yet to peruse their messageboards and see what they are saying about us. Or if they even care about us for that matter.

[SCP]

I have always argued that turnover differential is the single biggest difference between a good team and a bad team. That spans every level of football. The above illustrates how that plays out when most other things are even.

It's pretty much proven that if you win the turnover battle, you win the game.

[PantherPhann89]

Very nice write up. I know that it's still preseason, "a little caption to add for everyone that's gonna post, it's preseason, get over it, it's only a preseason game, it doesn't matter, la da de la da da."... This is the preseason game that I expect the most out of, I'd like to see something from our offense. I'd like to see completed passes to open WR's and good blocking up front. I'd like to see a good showing by our defense, contesting WR'ers and laying legal wood, along with a good ST. Heck, it sounds like I just want to see us impose our identity on the Ravens and I think that our identity, on offense, will be a balanced team that can run, pass and QB scramble well.

[AceBoogie]

Great post. Scary how similar we are

[*FreeFua*]

Good post.

You don't even have to dig that far into the stats to see how close we are to being a good team. Just go and take a look at the scores of all our games last year. 7 of our 9 losses were 1 possession games. 4 of those 7 we should have won.

Seattle (had the ball at the goal line with chance to win) Atlanta (thanks naka) Tampa Bay and Chicago (final 5 minute meltdown).

This team could have easily have been 11-5. But that's the difference between good teams and the rest, they find ways to win not lose. I believe this comes with experience. That is why I'm excited about this season but think we may still be a year or two away.

[carolinarolls]

Great post. Proves my perception of the importance of stats even more.

Panthers -eliminated from contention almost immediately

Ravens -Superbowl champions

[Udogg]

It's not complicated for us.  If we run 30-35 times we win (except for Atlanta and Chicago which we should have won).   When we don't we lose.  

[Jackofalltrades]

Thanks for doing that, interesting to see the picture numbers paint.

[Cyberjag]

Harbaugh or Rivera?  You choose.

[PhillyB]

nice work. i would not have guessed we'd look so similar stat-wise. SCP's right, the turnover differential is part of what explains the difference. how many times did our turning the ball over at horribly inconvenient times (cam's fumble versus atlanta, smitty falling down against the bears leading to that pick six) directly contribute to a last-minute loss?

 

i expect our defense will force its share of turnovers this season, likely far more than we've seen in a long, long time, and i fully expect our offense to be more efficient, picking up where they left off last season. run those same stats with even a marginal decrease in offensive turnovers and increase in defensive takeaways and i think we've got ourselves a playoff team.

[redbuddha]

The thing that really sticks out to me is our non-use or even non-attempt at kicking field goals. Did you realize the Carolina Panthers were last place in field goals attempted and made.

 

If you take the success rate of our two kickers and add in the extra attempts they should have gotten, we would probably have won those 4 games.

 

http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/player/_/stat/kicking/sort/fieldGoalsMade/qualified/false

 

http://espn.go.com/nfl/statistics/team/_/stat/kicking/sort/fieldGoalsMade

 

Breaking Carolina Panther News:

This seasons MVP will be our kicker if he makes 30 field goals. Coach of the year our Special Teams Coach!

[redbuddha]

Upon further reflection I have found our greatest flaw.

 

For whatever reason Carolina has been using FG kickers with decreasing frequency. Since 2010 we made 25/29 FG's, then 22/28 in 2011, and finally 16 of 21 in 2012. 2012 was good (bad) enough for last place in the NFL.

 

If we kept attempting kicks with the same frequency as some of the top kickers in the league would have added possibly 10 field goals as a minimum to our scoring. To illustrate the point I give you these games.

 

Atlanta (Game 1) 1 fg during regulation

Seattle 2 fg's

Dallas 2 fg's

Chicago 1 fg

Tampa (Game 2) 1 fg during regulation

KC 2 fg's to tie the game

 

That's six games that could have been changed by just using a field kicker at least 30 times a season

 

Despite their Kicker being horrible SF attempted 42 fg's and made only 29.

 

Atlanta with their prolific offense kicked 33/38 fg's  that's 99 points.

[Captain Morgan]

Interesting Note about Kick Returns

Sione Fua a fan favorite has a 9 yard average.

 

 

 

[rayzor]

we haven't been using them because they have all done poorly.

 

we don't use them because we don't trust them.