Monday, November 11, 2019

Monday Morning Sentimonies: Impressive Regular Season


We now know our opponents for the West Final and in a surprising turn of events it’s the Bombers. Bo Levi Mitchell was out there handing out turnovers like he was trying to promote a new bakery, which warmed my heart. While I certainly have lots to say about the upcoming playoff game, I’m going to save it for later in the week.

Today I want to spend a bit of time reflecting on how good of a regular season we had. As I’ve done now a couple times this year, I compiled some stats comparing the 2019 Riders to the 2018 ones.

After 18
2018
2019
Difference
% Change
Wins
12
13
+1

Offense
Points
450
487
+37
+8%
Offensive TDs
25
44
+19
+76%
Passing Yards
3971
4769
+798
+20%
Rushing Yards
2014
2030
+16
+1%
Sacks allowed
27
37
+10
+37%
Turnovers
35
25
-10
-29%
Defense
Points allowed
444
386
-58
-13%
Passing Yds allowed
4425
4119
-306
-7%
Rushing Yds allowed
1655
1667
+12
+1%
Sacks
45
56
+11
+24%
Turnovers
41
33
-8
-20%
Special Teams
Punt Return Avg
11.9
9.0
-2.9
-24%
Opponent Punt Ret Avg
9.2
15.1
+5.9
+64%
Kickoff return avg
25.3
25.4
+0.1
+0%
Opponent Kickoff Ret Avg
20
17.5
-2.5
-13%
Net punt avg
33.4
35.4
+2.0
+6%
Penalties
137
185
+48
+35%
Players Dressed
71
67
-4
-6%

A couple things jump out for me. First and foremost is the 13 wins. Many of you (myself included) have never seen a 13 win season. Seasons with 13 loses I’m familiar with but not wins. Hasn’t happened in since 1970 and is only the 3rd time ever. I’ll also remind this comes despite a 1-3 start. Expectations were lowered when Dickenson and Shivers took over for Chris Jones but fortunately they didn’t buy into that.

Offensively, touchdowns were up 76%... that is not a typo. Scoring was up slightly but the source was very different. Instead of relying on the D and Lauther, we actually just had an offense that did it’s job. Go figure. The number that stands out here for me is turnovers. They were way down. That’s one of the things that has most impressed me about Fajardo is that he’s smart with the ball. Just 8 INTs and one of those came on a 2 point convert. For comparison, Collaros threw 9 last season and did not play even close to a full season. Some will point to sacks being up as a negative but that’s more a product of running plays that could conceivably result in a sack rather than running exclusively hitch screens and runs up the middle. For all the criticisms against McAdoo (and I have had many) he deserves credit for what he did this season. He’s a very bi-polar OC. When he has a QB he trusts (like Fajardo and Reilly) things look good. When he clearly loathes his QB (Bridge) his playbook becomes so limited it could fit on a post-it note.

Defense is what really stands out for me. Many (myself included) assumed the loss of Jones would negatively affect our D. Turns out Jason Shivers had other ideas. Less points allowed, less yards allowed, more sacks, overall a less explosive but more solid defense. Turnovers were down but if you track them over the course of the season, the trend is encouraging.
First 6 games: 4 turnovers
Middle 6 games: 11 turnovers
Last 6 games: 18 turnovers

For comparison we had 10 turnovers in the final 6 games of 2018. Turns out Shivers picked up a thing or two from all those years working under Jones.

Special Teams was a curiously the one area that struggled… under a Head Coach who is a noted Special Teams expert. Lauther had an off year (even before his final game performance). I still trust him for a money kick come playoffs but he didn’t have a great regular season. Kickoff returns were great. Punting… well let’s not rehash my obviously anti-Saskatchewan views on our punter. I mean his is a West All-star so clearly its me that’s wrong about things. I apologize.

So let’s appreciate what an amazing season we’ve had so far. Who would have known that Jones bolting and Collaros getting KO’ed would have us falling upwards.

Now, let’s start getting pumped for the West Final. We are 60 minutes of football away from a return to the Grey Cup and all that stands in our way is the much hated Bombers.

2 comments:

Thomas J Gunther said...

Super troubling is the 35% increase in penalties. I can just see this killing us in the playoffs.

Rider Prophet said...

Yeah that one stands out as a negative trend that I don't like.

Both us and Edmonton were 1 and 2 in penalties this season. That will be something that could potentially bite both next week.