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Defensive Stats That Matter

Posted by HenryJames on November 17th, 2009 under Football

Long story short. The Texas defensive coaches pay attention to certain stats not produced by Huckleberry. They’ve gotten better at those stats. The dilettantes at Pulling Teeth are totally incredulous that someone can hold Nick Florence to less than 400 yards passing and that people from Austin don’t want to visit Branson.

So let’s take a look at the (drum roll) 2009 Defensive Stats That Matter! and mock Missouri’s defensive futility in the process.

Team YPA 3rd Down % Red Zone % Points
2007 6.98 38.9% 77.7% 25.3
2008 6.87 34.97% 74% 18.77
2009 5.11 24.48% 79% 12.6

Seventh nationally in scoring, second in ypa, first in 3rd down ptc and a horrible 35th in red zone ptc. I’m cool with the red zone ptc because opponents have only gotten in the red zone 19 times and probably a third of those were due to the offense or special teams. Or because Texas Tech holds.

They may be somewhat skewed by not having to face Sam Bradford for more than a couple of drives(Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha!), Jermaine Gresham and Dez Bryant. But. Will Muschamp has done it despite losing three defensive linemen to the NFL, losing his starting MLB for the season and having at least three other starters miss time because of injuries.

And we’ll return between 7-8 starters along with a bunch of backups for next year.

Do we realize how good we’ve got it?

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23 Responses

  1. bduran said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 11:57 am

    I would bet that a disproportionate number of our opponents trips to the red zone occur in the fourth quarter, against third stringers. Didn’t Baylor convert something like 2 of 3 trips to the red zone? God we suck.

  2. Scipio Tex said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 11:57 am

    That trend line suggests that we will hold next year’s opponents to 5.2 points per game and a 9% 3rd down conversion rate. So we’ll go 11-2.

  3. BatesHorn said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 12:14 pm

    Although it’s a bit subjective, you’ve got to believe that some of those Red Zone scores are late game garbage touchdowns against back ups. I’d be interested to see what our Red Zone percent is with the starters in the game.

  4. BatesHorn said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 12:14 pm

    I haz copy posts!!!

  5. Huckleberry said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 12:40 pm

    WTF is ptc?

  6. randywatson said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 12:42 pm

    Our first team defense is giving up 6.8 per game — that factors out defensive and special teams scores and scores against backups in blowouts. Our defense and special teams are scoring 7.2 per game. Sick.

  7. dedfischer said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 1:02 pm

    You’re such a sissy.

  8. OldTimeHorn said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 1:10 pm

    “a horrible 35th in red zone ptc”

    Talk about a manufactured stat! Florida, with even fewer trips to the red zone and end zone allowed, is tied for 60th place. Dbl check and sure enough Florida also has a smotheringly low 3rd-down-conversion defense… drives are making it to their red zones at a remarkably low rate.

    Teams like Penn State and LSU allow many more trips into the red zone but are tougher to score on. Sure enough, they are more liberal about allowing opponents to convert on 3rd down and keep drives going.

    But then you’ve also got defenses like TCU, OU and Bama that keep people out of their red zone, and, should an opponent make it there, good luck scoring. I leave it to you to Sabermetricize this murky stat. (One hint: should FGs count the same as TDs? Check out #2 Iowa State.)

  9. Phenomenal Smith said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 2:51 pm

    There’s no need to get nasty. And, Nick Florence is a god.

  10. Mysterious Package said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 2:56 pm

    Good points on relativity. Florida, Bama, and TCU all have their scrubs in im sure. Its not just Texas thats getting dinged for having backups in…

  11. CloseToJumping said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 3:53 pm

    HenryJames–

    I do not appreciate your last sentence, at all.

  12. Bob from Accounting said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 4:07 pm

    Counting Jared Norton, we return 9 starters on defense. And having Eddie Jones take over one of the starting DE spots is as good as having 10 starters return.

    But that open DT spot next to Kheeston is still a big question mark. We are kinda f-cked.

  13. nordberg said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 4:21 pm

    “But that open DT spot next to Kheeston is still a big question mark. We are kinda f-cked.”

    Change “Kheeston” to “Houston” and that’s about all we heard this past offseason.

  14. CloseToJumping said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 4:43 pm

    I expect to see Bible playing a bunch next year. I don’t put a lot of weight on true Freshmen playing and contributing early, but that dude looks like a man among boys and he’s nasty. Maybe Howell and Mims contribute a lot as well. One thing I fully expect is that Muschamp will handle it in ways other coaches couldn’t.

  15. Confused and Dazed said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 5:04 pm

    Alex Okafor

  16. HenryJames said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 5:37 pm

    Bible has put on about 20 pounds, and he doesn’t look anything like the guy you see on junior film.

  17. Gonz said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 8:07 pm

    hj-

    good or bad?

  18. TKO said:

    November 17th, 2009 at 9:13 pm

    “hj- good or bad?”

    Good question. Can you elaborate, HenryJames?

  19. HenryJames said:

    November 18th, 2009 at 7:56 am

    Bad. He’s lost some of his quickness.

    Rivals has released some video of both Bible and Ashton Dorsey in the last week. Dorsey is the better player at this point.

  20. dick said:

    November 18th, 2009 at 10:35 am

    Mad Dog will change all that.

  21. jigglebilly said:

    November 18th, 2009 at 2:15 pm

    Reading that Mad Dog is going to slim someone up makes me chuckle.

  22. nordberg said:

    November 19th, 2009 at 2:02 pm

    “Mad Dog will change all that.”

    Yes, Dorsey will also gain 20 lbs of unnecesary weight.

  23. Barking Carnival — Blog — Measuring Success said:

    November 23rd, 2009 at 7:23 pm

    [...] football folks I am acquainted with tend to value defensive efficiency numbers such as 3rd down coversion percent, yards per play, red zone defense and points per game.  [...]

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