AFC West Updates

[blueman]

The problem is here is going from The Offense Could Do Better, which any offense can of course, to The Offense Was the Reason for not making playoffs. I don’t know how anyone watched all of the games and did not see the Defense was the greater problem

Offense Points Scored - 5th in league
Defense Points Allowed - 29th in league

Blaming an Offense for not being 100% perfect every single possession, which no offense in the history of football has ever been, while the Defense is 4th worst in points allowed is myopia that has to be intentional. It is amazing that our Offense was good enough to win 9 games with the 4th worst points allowed.

Points Allowed
32 was 3-14
31 3-13-1
30 7-10
(Insert LAC here)
28 3-14
27 4-13
…
Points Scored
#1 12-5
#2 13-4
#3 11-6
#4 12-5
(Insert LAC here)
#6 10-7
…

Anyone catching the correlations here vs wins? I hope the ranting ends soon and the smart guys here offer intelligent football analysis again.

Stats? I love stats! Yes indeed, our defense was bad last year, of course that affected our record, yep. Just wish our offense had something like a killer instinct to close out close games when they actually have the chance to. Other teams do it (to us! lol), there were definitely a couple Ws left on the field by the offense, not sure how anybody watching the games (and not just reading stat lines) could think otherwise. FGs and pick 6s in the 4th quarter when it’s close don’t win a lot of games (obviously, and yes the defense being a walkover late doesn’t help either, but neither precludes the other, right? Both were happening, and a couple of late TDs would have likely made the difference in a couple of those close games, IMHO).

[Lefty2SLO]

Stats? I love stats! Yes indeed, our defense was bad last year, of course that affected our record, yep. Just wish our offense had something like a killer instinct to close out close games when they actually have the chance to. Other teams do it (to us! lol), there were definitely a couple Ws left on the field by the offense, not sure how anybody watching the games (and not just reading stat lines) could think otherwise. FGs and pick 6s in the 4th quarter when it’s close don’t win a lot of games (obviously, and yes the defense being a walkover late doesn’t help either, but neither precludes the other, right? Both were happening, and a couple of late TDs would have likely made the difference in a couple of those close games, IMHO).

Other teams closed us out last year because our defense was epically bad - particularly in the 4th quarter. Not hard to show a 'killer instinct' when you're clubbing baby seals.

[Lefty2SLO]

Other teams closed us out last year because our defense was epically bad - particularly in the 4th quarter. Not hard to show a 'killer instinct' when you're clubbing baby seals.

I can't imagine how ugly it would be if the chargers offense last year could have gone against the chargers defense at the end of games. It would NOT have been pretty. They would have looked pretty killer.

[chargeroo]

Here's a link to the 1963 AFL championship win.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d4eutJZOSg

[sonorajim]

Stats? I love stats! Yes indeed, our defense was bad last year, of course that affected our record, yep. Just wish our offense had something like a killer instinct to close out close games when they actually have the chance to. Other teams do it (to us! lol), there were definitely a couple Ws left on the field by the offense, not sure how anybody watching the games (and not just reading stat lines) could think otherwise. FGs and pick 6s in the 4th quarter when it’s close don’t win a lot of games (obviously, and yes the defense being a walkover late doesn’t help either, but neither precludes the other, right? Both were happening, and a couple of late TDs would have likely made the difference in a couple of those close games, IMHO).

Other teams closed out wins against us by scoring against our 29th ranked D and made it look easy because it was. Unfortunately we didn't play any teams that were worse on D than us. Beating everyone with last second TDs is better than losing. Better yet, severely restrict opponent scoring, avoid the need.

[sonorajim]

Here's a link to the 1963 AFL championship win.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d4eutJZOSg

Going to that game was one of many things I could have done & did not, darn it.
Just wasn't a Chargers fan yet. Thanks for the reminder anyway.

[blueman]

Other teams closed out wins against us by scoring against our 29th ranked D and made it look easy because it was. Unfortunately we didn't play any teams that were worse on D than us. Beating everyone with last second TDs is better than losing. Better yet, severely restrict opponent scoring, avoid the need.

Totally agree.

But…what happens when we play a top offense, the game is close all around, the D puts us in position to score, and we don’t? Only asking cuz it happened as often as not, and it looks like the only big addition to our O is gonna be a rookie OG. I want to believe, but I also don’t buy Schofield as the reason we lost games late, as poor as he played overall.

The D needed a historic makeover, and got it. The O needs to take the next step, whatever it is, I dunno, the last ten minutes of football we played was like the season in a micro prism, good and bad. And we couldn’t beat the Raiders (whom many predict to be in the AFCW cellar this year). Unless the new D is so damn good every game is like Hulk smash, we will face shootouts, likely six in our own division. Really hoping the new D doesn’t give up those winning drives, and Herbie and co. capitalize. It’s a long road to the SB, let’s play the games.

EDIT: thank effing god TT re-signed MWill, he made the winning play in the most of those late game Ws for us. Very happy he’s back, provides some hope.

[richpjr]

Totally agree.

But…what happens when we play a top offense, the game is close all around, the D puts us in position to score, and we don’t? Only asking cuz it happened as often as not, and it looks like the only big addition to our O is gonna be a rookie OG. I want to believe, but I also don’t buy Schofield as the reason we lost games late, as poor as he played overall.

The D needed a historic makeover, and got it. The O needs to take the next step, whatever it is, I dunno, the last ten minutes of football we played was like the season in a micro prism, good and bad. And we couldn’t beat the Raiders (whom many predict to be in the AFCW cellar this year). Unless the new D is so damn good every game is like Hulk smash, we will face shootouts, likely six in our own division. Really hoping the new D doesn’t give up those winning drives, and Herbie and co. capitalize. It’s a long road to the SB, let’s play the games.

EDIT: thank effing god TT re-signed MWill, he made the winning play in the most of those late game Ws for us. Very happy he’s back, provides some hope.

I'll say it again - we lost the Raider game by them kicking a fg, not scoring a TD. It does not matter whether you score a TD, fg or hold the other team as long as you have more points at the end of the game than the other team does. Yes a TD would have won on our last 2 drives, but a fg would have won if our D stopped them. They didn't, resulting in a team loss. I'm not sure why the O is getting so much blame here when there was plenty to go around in virtually ever game.

Having said that, the offense should be better being in the second year of a system (first time for Herbert since high school) and upgrades at TE and RG. RT still worries me with memories of Norton completely overmatched in that last game...

[Maniaque 6]

I. Spiller could be in the mix too.

[Boltjolt]

Totally agree.

But…what happens when we play a top offense, the game is close all around, the D puts us in position to score, and we don’t? Only asking cuz it happened as often as not, and it looks like the only big addition to our O is gonna be a rookie OG. I want to believe, but I also don’t buy Schofield as the reason we lost games late, as poor as he played overall.

The D needed a historic makeover, and got it. The O needs to take the next step, whatever it is, I dunno, the last ten minutes of football we played was like the season in a micro prism, good and bad. And we couldn’t beat the Raiders (whom many predict to be in the AFCW cellar this year). Unless the new D is so damn good every game is like Hulk smash, we will face shootouts, likely six in our own division. Really hoping the new D doesn’t give up those winning drives, and Herbie and co. capitalize. It’s a long road to the SB, let’s play the games.

EDIT: thank effing god TT re-signed MWill, he made the winning play in the most of those late game Ws for us. Very happy he’s back, provides some hope.

OG is huge since the right side was weak. Salyer couldhopefully be better depth and in time maybe work his way into a starter.

And how about letting Cook go and his turn the wrong way for 2 INTs , one for a pic 6 and his team leading drops? Adding Everett instead is an upgrade. Thats big imo. Another RB who should be better than Kelly and Roundtree is another element and Palmer with a year under his belt should be better for us too. He was coming on late.

We made some upgrades on O but clearly the D needed a refresh.

[blueman]

I'll say it again - we lost the Raider game by them kicking a fg, not scoring a TD. It does not matter whether you score a TD, fg or hold the other team as long as you have more points at the end of the game than the other team does. Yes a TD would have won on our last 2 drives, but a fg would have won if our D stopped them. They didn't, resulting in a team loss. I'm not sure why the O is getting so much blame here when there was plenty to go around in virtually ever game.

Having said that, the offense should be better being in the second year of a system (first time for Herbert since high school) and upgrades at TE and RG. RT still worries me with memories of Norton completely overmatched in that last game...

Not about the O getting so much blame, just their fair share, as you say plenty to go around.

Also, we absolutely did not lose that Raider game until they kicked the last FG, which would’ve been moot if our final scoring drive had ended in six, cuz game over. Kicking a FG to tie it in OT lost that game, and after our terrible, sucky D somehow miraculously held LV to 3 when they first had the ball. If that’s not the definition of the D giving the O a chance to win it after everything else good and bad and the chips are down, don’t know what is. If we had scored a TD on our last drive and won the game, our D would’ve gotten a wee bit more love. Our O too.

[Maniaque 6]

Not about the O getting so much blame, just their fair share, as you say plenty to go around.

Also, we absolutely did not lose that Raider game until they kicked the last FG, which would’ve been moot if our final scoring drive had ended in six, cuz game over. Kicking a FG to tie it in OT lost that game, and after our terrible, sucky D somehow miraculously held LV to 3 when they first had the ball. If that’s not the definition of the D giving the O a chance to win it after everything else good and bad and the chips are down, don’t know what is. If we had scored a TD on our last drive and won the game, our D would’ve gotten a wee bit more love. Our O too.

Do you blame MW ? On his last catch, he could have tried to beat the DB for the TD.