GT is tied for 25th in Red Zone Defense

InsideLB

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I was curious about this because we are ranked 122nd in team sacks and not suprisingly struggle mightily to get off the field on third down.

When the field compresses our defense APPEARS to be more effective. I capitalized 'appears' because luck certainly can skew this particular statistic. It will be interesting to keep an eye on as the season progresses and see if the trend holds as sample size increases.

Our D has had some short yardage stops/turnovers on downs so if I am an opponent and it's 4th and 1 I would view passing as a pretty reliable option.

What do you guys think?
 

Yaller Jacket

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ez is right. It is hard to pass when there isn't much field left to work with. Until the last two games we were pretty good run stoppers, and that combined with the tighter pass receiver coverage made us a good red zone defense. I don't know how much that had to do with PJ not being on the field, but the hope is we'll go back to stopping the run better and being a good red zone defense.
 
Boomergump

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As the field compresses, what is required of a defense plays more to our strengths. It is as simple as that. Our CBs are good tacklers and have short space quickness without great speed. Our LBs can tackle but they are slow too. With less ground to cover, slow defenses get better.
 

InsideLB

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Ok...it seems like your the point of your post was to confirm my suspicion in my original post that our red zone D may be less effective then the stats say it is.

But if red zone d ranking differentiates between fg and TD and your post is just talking about times when opponents came away with no points vs times they came away with points it seems like an apples and oranges comparison.

There is obvious value in holding someone to a FG.

Edited to say I think our D is bad and should be better. The bent of this post was merely to explore suckiness outside the redzone with perhaps less suckiness in the red zone. That's all. Not meant to support any agenda.
 
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AE 87

AE 87

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We are #60 in TD% (td/redzone appearance)
Pitt 4 app, 2td, 2fg
GS 4 app, 3td, 1fg
Duke 4 app, 4td
 

InsideLB

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That's very useful AE. It seems missed or blocked FGs are inflating our overall red zone rating.

What if anything do you conclude related to our redzone D vs outside the redzone? To me it seems like we are a signicantly below average defense outside the redzone and an average defense in the redzone. Neither of which are a great result (bend AND often break).

IMO the difference is salient enough to merit examination.
 
Vespidae

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Brian Connelly makes a solid case that Red Zone Defense is overrated for the reasons described above ... The O has less to field to work with and more often than not, converts to a running game.

He advocates looking at the <40 yd line. Teams should be able to score either a TD or a FG once they make it inside the 40 and can use all their offensive tools to "finish the drive".

I was tracking this earlier in the year and it seems to make a lot of sense.
 
AE 87

AE 87

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InsideLB said:
That's very useful AE. It seems missed or blocked FGs are inflating our overall red zone rating.

What if anything do you conclude related to our redzone D vs outside the redzone? To me it seems like we are a signicantly below average defense outside the redzone and an average defense in the redzone. Neither of which are a great result (bend AND often break).

IMO the difference is salient enough to merit examination.
Click to expand...

I pretty much agree with the logic of @Boomergump above, especially early on.

I think we did more good things more often on D thru the Miami game but have fallen off. Pitt has a really good Off, imo, and I fear we over reacted to that game and have fallen apart on D. We've gone from ave to awful.

Hopefully we get it back.
 
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