DISCLAIMER: This is not for everyone. It may not be for you. This is a statistical study of the Aggies offense with lots of numbers that may make your head tired if you are not up to it. Read it only if it is something that is of interest to you. If not, pick another thread.
Welcome to my season long journey of breaking down the 2014 Texas A&M offense.
I am an analytical person by nature and I enjoy football, so I thought why not combine two things I love and learn more about our Fightin Texas Aggies and how they generate such eye-popping numbers. This is an attempt to figure out the Aggie game plan and their objectives for the offense.
I want to make this clear that this is a hobby for me and I do not pretend to know everything. My goal is to provide the data and insert my thoughts, but I also would love input if you see something I missed. Bob Sturm of the The Ticket in Dallas inspired me (see his blog here: [url] http://sturminator.blogspot.com/[/url]. He has been tracking and analyzing the Dallas Cowboys for years (note: I am not a Cowboys fan but I appreciate his work).
Bob described why he does what he does better than I can:
So with that said, here we go. The chart below takes a simple look at the offensive data. The Aggies average starting field position was their own 26 yard line, and only one time did a drive start in Gamecock territory. We were right at a 60/40 pass:run ratio and we were fantastic on 1st and 3rd down. The Aggies gained 10+ yards on 14 first downs and converted 70% of third downs. You can see in the chart that the pass:run ratio was evenly balanced on 3rd and 4th down, leaving the defense guessing the entire game.
Data from Week 1
Next we will look at the various personnel packages the Aggies ran out against South Carolina. Again, I am going to defer to Mr. Strum to describe the personnel charts:
I also included a brief description of our formations since this is new to everyone.
Personnel Groups Descriptions
Personnel Groups
There are a lot of takeaways from the chart above. We began the game with Cam Clear and 3 WRs for the entire 1st drive and we marched right down the field, just like we were accustomed to seeing the past 2 years. Cam only saw the field for 2 plays in our second drive before he was out for the remainder of the game with an ankle injury. Fortunately the Aggies were able to substitute Ricky Seals-Jones into Cams spot when they ran out the Pistol formation with an H-Back. The production was still solid and we averaged almost 7 yards per carry when RSJ lined up as the H-Back. Look for this formation to grow in terms of wrinkles throughout the season. Although it doesnt appear that this formation was effective in the passing game, if you replay the game you will see 3 of our drops occurred out of this formation.
The next thing that stood out was that 2 formations dominated the majority of the play calling. 76 out of our 99 plays featured 1 RB and 4 WR, either set up in trips or with 2 WR on each side of the formation. I would tend think this number is skewed slightly due to Cam Clears injury, as he would have obviously played more had he stayed healthy. Lets hope he gets back soon. Nonetheless, these two formations were effective at dismantling the Gamecocks. The Aggies averaged slightly over 9 yards per pass attempt, which is ridiculous at any level. Its no wonder the Ol Ball Coach looked like he needed a stiff drink after the game.
The Aggies also ran a familiar trick play after a first down in the second quarter. They tried to catch South Carolina unprepared as we lined up with our tackles out wide with 2 receivers. Hill fired the ball to Noil but Noil slipped for no gain. If nothing else this will cause the opposing defenses to spend time scouting the formation during practice.
I dont think Im breaking any news saying the Aggie offense was utterly dominant. As an example, to end the game we lined up in Trips and ran the same draw play 6 of the last 7 plays to run the clock out. Hopefully Ill have .gifs and/or screen shots later this week to show more of how the game plan was executed.
Targets
The chart shows who Kenny targeted and how many passes each receiver and running back caught. This chart will provide more information as the season progresses and the numbers begin to accumulate. Of note, Malcolm Kennedy saw half of his 17 targets in the second quarter alone, where the Aggies began to put their foot down and run away with the game.
Red Zone Targets/Touches
This chart will attempt to show us who Sumlin and Spavital trust with the all-important touches inside the opponents 20 yard line. The ball was spread around extremely evenly with no receiver seeing more than 3 balls. Tra Carson and Trey Williams saw the majority of the goal line carries and combined for 4 touchdowns on the night.
So there you have it. The Aggie offense operated at maximum efficiency and answered any doubts that they would take a step back without Manziel. Going forward Ill add season totals to the above charts. If I can figure out how to make .gifs from YouTube I would like to incorporate some film as well. If anyone would like to volunteer to teach me, Ill see what I can do.
I hope you enjoyed this my look into the Aggie offense. It should be fun seeing the offense progress and incorporate new wrinkles into the offense.
Welcome to my season long journey of breaking down the 2014 Texas A&M offense.
I am an analytical person by nature and I enjoy football, so I thought why not combine two things I love and learn more about our Fightin Texas Aggies and how they generate such eye-popping numbers. This is an attempt to figure out the Aggie game plan and their objectives for the offense.
I want to make this clear that this is a hobby for me and I do not pretend to know everything. My goal is to provide the data and insert my thoughts, but I also would love input if you see something I missed. Bob Sturm of the The Ticket in Dallas inspired me (see his blog here: [url] http://sturminator.blogspot.com/[/url]. He has been tracking and analyzing the Dallas Cowboys for years (note: I am not a Cowboys fan but I appreciate his work).
Bob described why he does what he does better than I can:
quote:
This entire post will likely give you tired head. Heck, it pretty much did that to me as I put it together, but this year I want to take football dorkdom to an all new level. I am now obsessed with defining what a certain offense is all about and to do that, you must track personnel packages.
Why did certain strategies work? Why did other objectives just not make sense? Every game, I try to figure that out with data and video. So, hopefully those of you who enjoy football from a "chess game" perspective will really get into this.
So with that said, here we go. The chart below takes a simple look at the offensive data. The Aggies average starting field position was their own 26 yard line, and only one time did a drive start in Gamecock territory. We were right at a 60/40 pass:run ratio and we were fantastic on 1st and 3rd down. The Aggies gained 10+ yards on 14 first downs and converted 70% of third downs. You can see in the chart that the pass:run ratio was evenly balanced on 3rd and 4th down, leaving the defense guessing the entire game.
Data from Week 1
Next we will look at the various personnel packages the Aggies ran out against South Carolina. Again, I am going to defer to Mr. Strum to describe the personnel charts:
quote:
Below, please find the offense broken down by personnel groups.
For any of this to make sense, you have to know what all of the different packages mean. Basically, it is very simple. Every Offense in the world has 1 QB and 5 Offensive Linemen. Therefore, if 11 players are on the field, then that leaves 5 players who can join the QB in skill positions and the Offensive Coordinator has to choose how to deploy those 5. So, the groups are simple. "11" means 1 RB and 1 TE, so you add those 2 numbers together (1+1 = 2) and subtract that number from 5 to get how many WRs are on the field at the time. (11 will mean 3 WRs, of course).
I also included a brief description of our formations since this is new to everyone.
Personnel Groups Descriptions
Personnel Groups
There are a lot of takeaways from the chart above. We began the game with Cam Clear and 3 WRs for the entire 1st drive and we marched right down the field, just like we were accustomed to seeing the past 2 years. Cam only saw the field for 2 plays in our second drive before he was out for the remainder of the game with an ankle injury. Fortunately the Aggies were able to substitute Ricky Seals-Jones into Cams spot when they ran out the Pistol formation with an H-Back. The production was still solid and we averaged almost 7 yards per carry when RSJ lined up as the H-Back. Look for this formation to grow in terms of wrinkles throughout the season. Although it doesnt appear that this formation was effective in the passing game, if you replay the game you will see 3 of our drops occurred out of this formation.
The next thing that stood out was that 2 formations dominated the majority of the play calling. 76 out of our 99 plays featured 1 RB and 4 WR, either set up in trips or with 2 WR on each side of the formation. I would tend think this number is skewed slightly due to Cam Clears injury, as he would have obviously played more had he stayed healthy. Lets hope he gets back soon. Nonetheless, these two formations were effective at dismantling the Gamecocks. The Aggies averaged slightly over 9 yards per pass attempt, which is ridiculous at any level. Its no wonder the Ol Ball Coach looked like he needed a stiff drink after the game.
The Aggies also ran a familiar trick play after a first down in the second quarter. They tried to catch South Carolina unprepared as we lined up with our tackles out wide with 2 receivers. Hill fired the ball to Noil but Noil slipped for no gain. If nothing else this will cause the opposing defenses to spend time scouting the formation during practice.
I dont think Im breaking any news saying the Aggie offense was utterly dominant. As an example, to end the game we lined up in Trips and ran the same draw play 6 of the last 7 plays to run the clock out. Hopefully Ill have .gifs and/or screen shots later this week to show more of how the game plan was executed.
Targets
The chart shows who Kenny targeted and how many passes each receiver and running back caught. This chart will provide more information as the season progresses and the numbers begin to accumulate. Of note, Malcolm Kennedy saw half of his 17 targets in the second quarter alone, where the Aggies began to put their foot down and run away with the game.
Red Zone Targets/Touches
This chart will attempt to show us who Sumlin and Spavital trust with the all-important touches inside the opponents 20 yard line. The ball was spread around extremely evenly with no receiver seeing more than 3 balls. Tra Carson and Trey Williams saw the majority of the goal line carries and combined for 4 touchdowns on the night.
So there you have it. The Aggie offense operated at maximum efficiency and answered any doubts that they would take a step back without Manziel. Going forward Ill add season totals to the above charts. If I can figure out how to make .gifs from YouTube I would like to incorporate some film as well. If anyone would like to volunteer to teach me, Ill see what I can do.
I hope you enjoyed this my look into the Aggie offense. It should be fun seeing the offense progress and incorporate new wrinkles into the offense.
