Bengals1181 Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 CINCINNATI -- By now, you probably are well aware of the Cincinnati Bengals' push to run the ball and to design their offense to thrive off physicality, not finesse. Head coach Marvin Lewis has spoken often about it. Offensive coordinator Hue Jackson has, too. Some Bengals players have also spoken out in support of the change in offensive philosophy, including most recently, new backup quarterback Jason Campbell. "I don't care how good you throw the football," Campbell said, "you still have to be able to run the football." While all of that ought to help balance the Bengals' offense and make the team more successful overall, there's still something I'm a little curious about. With plans for using their backs more extensively, how much will the Bengals use them in the passing game? If Jackson's time as an offensive coordinator is any indication, a physical offense features running backs who can catch, too. In his two seasons with the Oakland Raiders (he was the offensive coordinator in 2010 and the head coach in 2011), Jackson's running backs ranked seventh in the league in receptions, catching more than 90 passes both years. They combined to catch 93 in 2010 and had 90 in 2011. As the article linked above indicates, Campbell started at quarterback for Oakland both seasons. He and other Raiders quarterbacks spread those completions around to five tailbacks and fullbacks in each year. Cincinnati's starting quarterback, Andy Dalton, completed passes to only two of his running backs last season. BenJarvus Green-Ellis and Giovani Bernard combined to have just 60 receptions during the regular season. The year before, Green-Ellis and three others caught 37 passes. The Bengals' 60 running back receptions in 2013 ranked 24th in the league. When it came to passing to their receivers, though, they ranked ninth, completing 215 passes to their wideouts. Even with Bernard in their backfield, the Bengals were more apt than most other teams to let their passing game rely on A.J. Green and the rest of the Bengals' receivers. NFL teams in 2013 averaged 177 passes to receivers and 75 to running backs. That means backs across the league caught 29.8 percent of their team's passes last year, while Bengals backs caught only 21.8 percent of theirs. As the Bengals begin shifting to an offensive scheme that's designed to incorporate more runs and play actions than in recent years, they have good reason to modify their passing game. Teams typically counter prolific rushing attacks by stacking the line of scrimmage with so many defenders that a back's running lanes vanish. Occasional blitzes can negatively effect some running plays, as well as put pressure on the quarterback when in passing situations. The best way to overcome those blitzes are to get running backs and receivers involved in the passing game by throwing them screens or flares. As defenders sprint into the backfield, running backs running those routes can slip past the over-pursuit and catch balls that can put them into space where they can run untouched for several yards. When the back has the speed and elusiveness of Bernard, those gains can be even bigger.Darren McFadden, Michael Bush and Marcel Reece were all different runners for Jackson in Oakland, but made a habit of catching passes and generating big gains after them in 2010 and 2011. The time Jackson spent with those three seems proof enough that even for a team dedicated to running the ball -- the Raiders, by the way, finished second in rushing in 2010 -- a simple pass out of the backfield can be just as important. A Closer Look Comparing backfields (receptions and yards by Oakland/Cincinnati RBs) Year Catches Yds NFL catches rank NFL Yds rank Oakland 2010 93 1,053 7 1 Oakland 2011 90 915 7 3 Cincinnati 2013 60 536 24 18 Cincinnati 2014 ? ? ? ? http://espn.go.com/blog/cincinnati-bengals/post/_/id/6429/bengals-hue-jackson-giovani-bernard-passing-game Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alleycat Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 Cincinnati's starting quarterback, Andy Dalton, completed passes to only two of his running backs last season. BenJarvus Green-Ellis and Giovani Bernard combined to have just 60 receptions during the regular season. Now that's just funny. Combined? Gio had 56 of the 60 receptions. BJGE's lack of pass catching ability, coupled with Hue's predilection to throw to RB's is the biggest argument I see for some new blood getting some snaps. Those Raider screens were lethal. While we're on the subject of screens, Hue's presence and focus sheds some interesting light on the OL, and our recent moves there as well. Newhouse was seen as an ideal Zone Blocking guard when he came out because of his agility and nimble feet. Coupled with replacing the lead-footed whiff-master Cook at Center, IMO these things add up to suggesting that Hue is looking to re-mold the line to his liking. We've historically been one of the absolute screen teams in the league, which from my perspective has almost always been due to poor timing and execution (i.e. athleticism) by the O-Line. It might also help to consider these things when looking to prospects in the upcoming draft (e.g. Bitonio?) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
membengal Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 Now that's just funny. Combined? Gio had 56 of the 60 receptions. BJGE's lack of pass catching ability, coupled with Hue's predilection to throw to RB's is the biggest argument I see for some new blood getting some snaps. Those Raider screens were lethal. Gio and I combined for 56 catches this past season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 And this is why I doubt they draft Andre Williams. 10 career catches and none his senior year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HairOnFire Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 Gio and I combined for 56 catches this past season. Don't forget the dead guy. Gio, you, and a dead guy combined to catch 56 balls last season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
|Bunghole| Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 To be fair, condemning BJGE's "lack of pass catching ability" has to be viewed through the lens of "they never really threw him the ball". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Khatmandude Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 To be fair, condemning BJGE's "lack of pass catching ability" has to be viewed through the lens of "they never really threw him the ball". When they tried to, it bounced off his hands. The guy has no pass catching ability. He's actually a danger in teh passing game because the ball bounces off his hands so frequently, it's just begging to be picked off. Dalton doesn't need help throwing picks, he's pretty good at it already, so not sure BJGE is going to help very much if indeed he's in the plans to be more involved in the pass offense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EnglishBengal Posted March 22, 2014 Report Share Posted March 22, 2014 Carlos Hyde, Charles Sims, or Tyler Gaffney in the draft should be on Hue's agenda. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwing Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 Here is hoping AD, the OL and the RB's all thrive under Hue's system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HairOnFire Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 Carlos Hyde, Charles Sims, or Tyler Gaffney in the draft should be on Hue's agenda. FWIW a couple of days ago Casserly said the perfect compliment to Gio would be Jeremy Hill, who he has rated higher than Carlos Hyde. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alleycat Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 FWIW a couple of days ago Casserly said the perfect compliment to Gio would be Jeremy Hill, who he has rated higher than Carlos Hyde. I've been a big fan for a while, though he's supposed to have some "character issues," about which I've no idea. Gio's a pretty good character to mix with, though... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happyrid Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 It looks like the perfect draft to add a bigger RB with more speed and better pass catching ability than BJGE. There's so much depth at the position, particularly with those types of bigger runners. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HairOnFire Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 I've been a big fan for a while, though he's supposed to have some "character issues," about which I've no idea. He was involved in a fight outside a bar while on probation for having had sex with a minor. Probably why my draft guide said he compares to....Legarrett Blount. :lmao: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alleycat Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 He was involved in a fight outside a bar while on probation for having had sex with a minor. Probably why my draft guide said he compares to....Legarrett Blount. :lmao: Well Weston will be a fan, at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-GoBengals- Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 whats the point here? why does it matter WHO catches the ball within 5 yards of the LOS? didnt i show that the average length of the passes to gresham was under like 4 yards "downfield"? and we arent even talking about the sideline screens to Jones, hawkins, and green. THEN the passes to the RB's.. Seriously: Passes under 10 yards: 89 to left side of field 91 to right side of field 174 to the middle 354 passes under 10 yards. 83 of which were BEHIND the line of scrimmage... people are taking tidbits and snippets of info far too seriously. as if the short pass game isnt already 60% of the pass game(literally). and we are 32 of 86 on passes past 20 yards downfield.. 55 of 107 of passes 10-19 yards downfield... thats 45% completion% of passes past 10 yards... its pretty obvious the short passing game in a necessity with Dalton under center, it really has nothing to do with the RB... almost 20% of our passes are already behind the line of scrimmage. regardless of who they are intended for.. do we REALLY need MORE short passes? seems silly to continue to ignore the ginger elephant in the room.... the qb who cant throw good and do other things good, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happyrid Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 whats the point here? why does it matter WHO catches the ball within 5 yards of the LOS? didnt i show that the average length of the passes to gresham was under like 4 yards "downfield"? and we arent even talking about the sideline screens to Jones, hawkins, and green. THEN the passes to the RB's.. Seriously: Passes under 10 yards: 89 to left side of field 91 to right side of field 174 to the middle 354 passes under 10 yards. 83 of which were BEHIND the line of scrimmage... people are taking tidbits and snippets of info far too seriously. as if the short pass game isnt already 60% of the pass game(literally). and we are 32 of 86 on passes past 20 yards downfield.. 55 of 107 of passes 10-19 yards downfield... thats 45% completion% of passes past 10 yards... its pretty obvious the short passing game in a necessity with Dalton under center, it really has nothing to do with the RB... almost 20% of our passes are already behind the line of scrimmage. regardless of who they are intended for.. do we REALLY need MORE short passes? seems silly to continue to ignore the ginger elephant in the room.... the qb who cant throw good and do other things good, too. I actually think those downfield completion percentages stack up pretty well compared to NFL averages. The % goes down the further downfield for all QBs obviously... To me, Dalton's problem is almost exclusively the INTs. Just can't have so many and have them at such big moments. His accuracy (even downfield) was actually pretty good last season. As far as the total # of passes to the RBs, I think you make a great point. It doesn't really matter what position gets the catches and part of the reason the Raiders had so many is that they didn't have AJ Green, Marvin Jones, Jermaine Gresham, Tyler Eifert, etc. to throw to. It doesn't make sense to take the ball out of AJ's hands so that BJGE can pad his receiving totals... I think the strongest case I would make for a better receiving RB though is that when we switch RBs now, it takes away a lot of our playbook because BJGE can't execute everything at a decently high level. Since we don't have a ton of other needs, it makes sense to upgrade our #2 RB so we can keep the full offensive playbook in with both our top 2 RBs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bengals1181 Posted March 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 I actually think those downfield completion percentages stack up pretty well compared to NFL averages. The % goes down the further downfield for all QBs obviously... To me, Dalton's problem is almost exclusively the INTs. Just can't have so many and have them at such big moments. His accuracy (even downfield) was actually pretty good last season. As far as the total # of passes to the RBs, I think you make a great point. It doesn't really matter what position gets the catches and part of the reason the Raiders had so many is that they didn't have AJ Green, Marvin Jones, Jermaine Gresham, Tyler Eifert, etc. to throw to. It doesn't make sense to take the ball out of AJ's hands so that BJGE can pad his receiving totals... I think the strongest case I would make for a better receiving RB though is that when we switch RBs now, it takes away a lot of our playbook because BJGE can't execute everything at a decently high level. Since we don't have a ton of other needs, it makes sense to upgrade our #2 RB so we can keep the full offensive playbook in with both our top 2 RBs. they do, and Dalton's % of short passes is in line with all of the top QB's in the league, as has been demonstrated to Go on many of an occasion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alleycat Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 whats the point here? do we REALLY need MORE short passes? Where one guy like Gresham or Green run parallel to the LOS toward the sideline? No. We don't need more of those. And rather than blame Dalton, you can thank your lucky stars that Gruden is gone for that. (I get it, you're click-baiting for your site, but I'll act like you actually care about football for a minute). What you can't do in your little analysis is blame Dalton for what has been, on this team, for a decade, at least, horrendous execution of the screen game. The O-Line just hasn't gotten it done. That probably has something to do with Alexander's preference for big strong guys, who also happen to be guys who aren't that great in space (no one was worse at this than Cook, but he's happily been swept into the dust bin). I've addressed how Hue's already proving that he's looking for another breed of lineman elsewhere so I won't go further into that. However, what you'll notice when looking at Hue's stats is that he threw the ball to RB's almost TWICE as much as we did last year. That sounds like a lot, but it climbs to a lot more when you consider how little we threw it before Gio was here. Now, even you should agree that Gio Bernard is fucking revelation as both a pass receiver but especially with the ball in his hands in the open field. The body of work he provided as evidence last season is simply too overwhelming to dispute. So when a guy who already has proven success throwing the ball to RBs inherits Gio fucking Bernard and tells you he wants to emphasize that game, you should be jumping up and down for joy and banging pots and pans in the street. At least, if you were a Bengals fan. And why is a SUCCESSFUL short passing game -- as opposed to Gruden's schlock -- so useful? Especially when you are targeting your RB's out of the backfield - which is what Hue does - it stretches the Defense beyond it's limits. With the one of AJ or Marvin Jones stretching if over the top as well, that should leave plenty of holes to pick apart. This in term, will also help the running game (Jason Campbell broke it down pretty plainly in his PC, and you can trust what he says because he operated the offense we're talking about with serious efficiency, riding the Raider Offense under Hue from the 2nd worst 10th in one season - including 2nd in rushing). It's not that complicated. Well, for Gruden perhaps it was, but there was a guy who couldn't figure out to run it even 1 out of 4 times on a series beginning with 1st and 1. smh. If you'll remember, many of us were loudly complaining about why we weren't throwing to Gio MORE, not less. You say no more short passes. I say bring in another pass-catching RB to share the load with Gio and let's have more (provided we continue to transform the O-Line into one that can execute). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Khatmandude Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 whats the point here? why does it matter WHO catches the ball within 5 yards of the LOS? didnt i show that the average length of the passes to gresham was under like 4 yards "downfield"? and we arent even talking about the sideline screens to Jones, hawkins, and green. THEN the passes to the RB's.. Seriously: Passes under 10 yards: 89 to left side of field 91 to right side of field 174 to the middle 354 passes under 10 yards. 83 of which were BEHIND the line of scrimmage... people are taking tidbits and snippets of info far too seriously. as if the short pass game isnt already 60% of the pass game(literally). and we are 32 of 86 on passes past 20 yards downfield.. 55 of 107 of passes 10-19 yards downfield... thats 45% completion% of passes past 10 yards... its pretty obvious the short passing game in a necessity with Dalton under center, it really has nothing to do with the RB... almost 20% of our passes are already behind the line of scrimmage. regardless of who they are intended for.. do we REALLY need MORE short passes? seems silly to continue to ignore the ginger elephant in the room.... the qb who cant throw good and do other things good, too. Sure the pile of turds laying here smells bad....but LOOK OVER THERE...that pile smells worse so I'm happy with my pile. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HairOnFire Posted March 23, 2014 Report Share Posted March 23, 2014 whats the point here? I think the point is Jay Gruden admitted two years ago that he hadn't bothered including the RB position in any of the Bengals passing game packages. IMHO that's some seriously stupid shit even on a roster that didn't boast of having an airback like Gio. Defensive coverage often dictates where the ball is thrown and I think you're needlessly handicapping yourself if you junk a portion of your playbook simple because you lacked elite talent at certain positions. (Gruden said the team lacked the needed RB's and O lineman.) If you ask me adding Gio last season helped tremendously on this front, and losing Gruden this season will help even more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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