Below is the play by play break down of the offensive line from the Sunday week 7 game versus the Miami Dolphins. It is merely a pass or fail grade on if I think the lineman did his job or not. It also should be noted that we go under assumptions that we know what the assignment on each play was and sometimes it is not obvious. We have to grade on what we see and go from there. We added small notes to each play as well. As always if you disagree with any play, do so respectfully in the comments and give your reason so I can go back through and re-watch your disagreement. I also did not include Read more [...]

Below is the play by play break down of the offensive line from the Sunday week 6 game versus the Cleveland Browns. It is merely a pass or fail grade on if I think the lineman did his job or not. It also should be noted that we go under assumptions that we know what the assignment on each play was and sometimes it is not obvious. We have to grade on what we see and go from there. We added small notes to each play as well. As always if you disagree with any play, do so respectfully in the comments and give your reason so I can go back through and re-watch your disagreement. Overall Rating # POS Player Plays Yes No %Yes 68 LG Chris Read more [...]

Here are the compiled Steelers stats for the down analysis through the first 40 games of the 2010 season. They should be pretty self explanatory, but do ask if you have any questions. First Down 64 rushing plays (4.72 average yards per rush), 25 passing plays (6.44 average yards per passing play) Yards to Go Rushing Plays Avg Yds Per Rush Rushing 1st Downs % Rush Plays Converted Pass Plays Avg Yds Per Pass Pass 1st Downs % Pass Converted 1 to 2 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 to 5 2 1 1 50.00% 0 0 0 0 6 to 10 59 5.05 8 13.56% 23 6.61 4 17.39% 11 Read more [...]

The first quarter of the Steelers 2010 season is in the books and it is time to recap the play by play breakdowns of the first 4 weeks of the season and post the totals. I have linked to each individual breakdown page so as you can go back and look at that weeks play by play breakdown. Total Through Weeks 1-4 Players Plays Yes No %Yes Jonathan Scott 88 82 6 93% Chris Kemoeatu 200 186 14 93% Maurkice Pouncey 211 192 19 91% Ramon Foster 26 23 3 88% Trai Essex 101 87 14 86% Max Starks 130 110 20 85% Flozell Adams 181 152 29 84% Doug Read more [...]

Below is the play direction report for the first 4 games of the Steelers 2010 season of both the rushing offense and rushing defense as well as the passing offense and passing defense. It is broken down by the number of plays to each direction and the average gain along with the NFL rank for each compared to the other 31 teams thus far. You can clearly see where running back Rashard Mendenhall has been most effective and that is off right tackle. In addition the deep left and deep middle are results of big plays by Mike Wallace and Antwaan Randle El through 4 games. Rushing Offense Left Read more [...]

Below is the play by play break down of the offensive line from the Sunday week 4 game versus the Baltimore Ravens. It is merely a pass or fail grade on if I think the lineman did his job or not. It also should be noted that we go under assumptions that we know what the assignment on each play was and sometimes it is not obvious. We have to grade on what we see and go from there. We added small notes to each play as well. As always if you disagree with any play, do so respectfully in the comments and give your reason so I can go back through and re-watch your disagreement. Overall Rating # POS Player Plays Yes No %Yes 72 RG Ramon Read more [...]

I received an email asking me to post the cumulative pass target stats through the Steelers first two preseason games of 2010. I got these together in a hurry, so here they are for those that value them. You can see that rookie Antonio Brown leads the way with 5 catches of 5 targets thus far for 96 yards and 1 touchdown. Player TARG REC YDS AVG LG TD Antonio Brown 5 5 96 19.2 68 1 Emmanuel Sanders 5 4 56 14.0 24 0 Mike Wallace 5 3 91 30.3 68 1 Antwaan Randle El 5 3 37 12.3 17 0 Heath Miller 4 4 37 9.3 13 0 Arnaz Battle 3 2 62 31.0 51 0 Isaac Read more [...]

This post is going to be a close spin off to the Steelers and Rashard Mendenhall needing to run better against the division post I did a few days ago. Tuesday, Steelers offensive coordinator Bruce Arians talked with John Seibel and Joe Starkey about the running game where Arians said in the first 15 seconds of the interview, "We ran the ball well last year from the 20's, 20 to 20!" Stop the tape right there. In all of my recent research, I thought something did not sound right so I researched the numbers. In the first table below, I compiled all 32 teams running back stats from their own 20 Read more [...]

I have a new stats program I am playing with an wanted to isolate some running game stats against the teams in the division. I compiled stats all the way back to 2002 of just the running backs and their rushing stats versus the other teams in the AFC North. In the same table I also compiled the stats of the Steelers running back with the most carries in each year against the Ravens, Bengals and Browns as well for comparison. Lastly in the bottom tables I broke down the individual stats of Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall against the division in 2009 and all games outside of the division. Mendenhall Read more [...]

After long wait, I finally have my first mock draft of this offseason done. Much like when Axl Rose writes a song for a soon to be released album, I changed it and scrapped it several times. There are so many things that go into research for mock drafts. Team needs, player rankings and free agency. I never like to release a mock draft before free agency starts as I believe the first week of so of free agency can tell you a ton of what teams are thinking. I will likely have 2.0 out by April 1st and only suspect 4 versions at most. I do not have the want or do I think it is feasible to do a complete Read more [...]

The word came down last weekend that Art Rooney II wants to run more effectively in the redzone and in games in which the Steelers have the lead. Here is what Rooney II told Scott Brown in a recent interview. “We need to be better at running the football. We were not consistently good at running the football this year, and I think that was a problem, and it’s certainly something that traditionally has been one of the foundations of the team and we need to get back to that. We need to be able to run the ball to be successful. Some of or troubles in the red zone this year, I think, can be traced Read more [...]

Second year running back has now carried the ball 213 times in his young NFL career. I thought I would compile his stats for his first 200 carries and compare them to the some other running backs currently in the NFL at the same point in their careers at the 200 carry mark. You can see that Mendenhall is some great company at this point. He is 7th in yards and yards per carry thus far compared to the others at the same point. I also listed the stats of Willie Parker as well through 200 carries and as you can see, he has edged out Willie so far. I will examine these stats again after the season Read more [...]

Just as they were a year ago, the Steelers go into their 9th game of the season with a 6-2 record. The 2009 defense will not yet be confused with the 2008 unit, but things are getting better. Below are the stats after 8 games for both the 2008 and 2009 defenses. The most glaring differences is the 3rd down percentage which improved mightily versus Denver. Also the 2009 defense is giving up 1.1 yard per play more, but that 4.8 still ranks them 4th in the AFC and 7th overall. While the 2009 unit is giving up .74 more yards per carry, that number also is good for a 2nd in the AFC and a 5th overall. While Read more [...]

The 29 carries running back Rashard Mendenhall had on Sunday night against the Chargers, put him over the 50 carry mark finally. I have compiled a list of most of the current starting running backs in the league and compiled their stats of each ones first 50 carries for a quick comparison of where Mendenhall ranks. Of the 28 backs I have listed, Mendenhall ranks #10. Surprisingly he is ahead of the pace of superstars LaDanian Tomlinson and Adrian Peterson at the same point in their careers. This numbers still do not take in situational football like down and distance and short yardage like goal Read more [...]

Here is an excel file through week 5 of how the Steelers rank both offensively and defensively against the rest of the NFL.
http://www.steelersdepot.com/steelers-downloads/Steelers_Week_5_Rankings.xls