Point Blank – November 8, 2016
What a “Bettor Better Know” – NFL #9
With all NFL teams now having reached at least the mid-point of their schedules the 2016 season has plenty of results to attach weight to. Yet many of those numbers bring confusion rather than clarity, which is going to make the remainder of the season a challenge for the betting markets, and create opportunities for those that can adjust properly, and don’t get their feet stuck in what could be drying cement.
We’ve got a lot of teams to sort through today so that again calls for the jukebox to help out with some background, and on this morning it is time to step away from sports for a moment – let’s press the button to bring the proper release for the 2016 US Election cycle to finally be over, a most undignified episode for our nation. Back when a market projection was made in early August it was Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem” that was brought forward the most appropriate way to maintain sanity through the proceedings, and now that it is over I can think of nothing better than Cohen’s “Hallelujah” to bring it full circle. It is a song that he may still be writing, several new verses having made their way into the mix through the years, and should I ever get asked for my opinion of the best song ever written the answer is an easy one. This is from the Montreal Jazz Festival in 2008 -
Maybe there’s a God above
But all I’ve ever learned from love
Is how to shoot at someone
Who outdrew you
And if you have lived well enough to have that phrasing be meaningful, you have had a good run.
Item: Setting a Power Rating for the Steelers is not easy*
Sub-Item: * and neither is Power Rating the Ravens
There isn’t a better place to begin in terms of contrasting What Has Been to the projection of What Will Be than the Steelers. They began the season #2 on my power ratings, and #1 for a lot of other folks, and are now sitting squarely at 4-4, with the corresponding statistics of an average team. The individual games are largely a jumbled mess to sort through, wins vs. Washington and Kansas City that were far better than they should have been; losses to Philadelphia and Miami far worse than they should have been; and Sunday’s ugly slogfest (no, not slugfest) vs. the Ravens so very difficult to chart. The Bills, Chargers, Saints and Cowboys all produced more first downs individually than those two offenses could manage, and in fact that Saints even generated more yards.
There has been one major running theme across the Steeler season – injuries/suspensions. They have had at least one game without a key cog at QB, RB, WR, OL, DL, LB and DB, and continuity naturally becomes a problem. Ben Roethlisberger came back a week too early vs. the Ravens, and Marcus Gilbert and Markus Wheaten did not play despite showing improvements in their status at practice during the week. Ryan Shazier has returned at LB but now Jarvis Jones is ??? for this week, as is Maurkice Pouncey in the middle of the OL.
Are there reasons for optimism? Yes, because a lot of what went wrong vs. Baltimore can be fixed – Roethlisberger and the offense will get back into a rhythm with more work, and some of what was just pure sloppiness can be cleaned up. That offense contributed three false starts penalties, two illegal formations, and a delay of game.
I’ve downgraded the Steelers from where I had them, yet will also peg them a few shelves higher than purely statistical methods will show. That is where basic handicapping judgment takes over – for as much as we would like to be able to rely on statistics when there is a half-season’s worth, I don’t believe the Pittsburgh numbers bring proper predictive value.
And then there are the Ravens. This was their opportunity to show the work of Marty Mornhinweg in terms of tweaking the offense, a bye week allowing for adjustments to be made. That offense was dreadful – take away the 95-yard TD from Joe Flacco to Mike Wallace, on a slant pass merely designed to get a first down, and the count was 179 yards at 2.8 per snap. I can only give small credit to the Steeler defense for that. The Ravens indeed tried to run more, with Terrence West and Kenneth Dixon getting 24 carries, but those plays only produced 34 yards.
For some ugly perspective, at the Baltimore midway point Joe Flacco has a 76.0 Passer Rating. Directly above him are Case Keenum and Blake Bortles. Like Pittsburgh, I came in rating the Ravens higher than I have them now. But unlike the Steelers, I don’t see the upside fro the Ravens offense. This simply may be who they are.
And speaking of offenses being who they are, a different guy calling plays did not make any difference in Minnesota, perhaps because there is little difference that can be made.
Item: Understanding just how bad the Vikings running game is
Yes it is 2016 and the league is in an era in which the passing game is the catalyst, but if your OL and RB groups can’t even bring the pretense of being successful overland, an offense collapses. The average NFL team is getting 4.2 yards per rush attempt this season; the Vikings are only managing 2.7. Where can you go from there?
Let’s set some perspective by looking at how far below league average the worst team has been over the past five seasons
Team NFL
2016 Vikings 2.7 4.2
2015 Chargers 3.5 4.1
2014 Cardinals 3.3 4.2
2013 Ravens 3.1 4.2
2012 Cardinals 3.4 4.3
2011 Giants 3.5 4.3
Get the picture? The gap between the Minnesota production and the rest of the league is a difficult one to work around, and the Vikings have to find a way despite a weak OL, and a group of complimentary guys at RB but no true lead player.
The problems of that OL show up in another area as well – Sam Bradford threw 40 passes vs. the Lions, and only 15 were more than five yards beyond the line of scrimmage. How about eight WR screens in one game? Which naturally brings the Catch 22 of football – you have to throw the ball downfield to loosen up the defense and get some running room, but unless the defense first respects the run, they can stay back in coverage and take away passing lanes. And when an OL is also struggling to pass block, finding time in the pocket is not easy.
There may not be a fix here.
Item: Bryce Treggs may mean more to Philadelphia than his resume calls for
You will notice over time here a slow and steady approach when it comes to grading so many aspects of football because it simply takes time to sort through some of the intricacies involved, and that has been the case with Carson Wentz and the Eagles offense.
It would have been easy to have an early knee-jerk reaction that praised Wentz for his poise in not making mistakes. Then it began to appear more and more as though a conservative offensive approach was also a factor in that. One could even fault Doug Pederson for being too conservative in the second half of the loss to Dallas last week. But now that a half-season of games have been played it is easier to develop a better storyline – Wentz does have some maturity, but has much of the conservatism been the forced result of not having a true #1 WR?
Nelson Agholor was a first-round draft pick in 2015 that is looking more like a complimentary player than a lead guy (only one reception of more than 25 yards). Jordan Matthews can be effective in the red zone because of his size, but is also a complimentary type. Josh Huff got released last week, but had not contributed much. Was it a case of not throwing the ball down the field because there simply wasn’t a deep threat?
We may see a change in that now, as Bryce Treggs enters the picture. There was nothing earth shaking when the Eagles signed him last week; Treggs was not drafted this past spring, and was cut by the 49ers after a free agent try. He may not be a special talent but he does bring something that the Eagles lacked – he can run a sub 4.4 in the 40.
So let’s take this from Wentz to heart - "Any time you've got a speedster like that, it can change what a defense has to prepare for. And so it will be interesting to see how we use him going forward. Anytime you get a speedster it can change the dynamic.”
Treggs was only on the field for 15 snaps vs. the Giants, but caught two passes for 69 yards. That isn’t just fine print in the box score, but rather something that could lead to the Philly playbook being opened up a bit. It is not that treggs is a great overall talent, but simply something that had not been a part of the equation to this stage.
Item: Cody Kessler may mean less to Cleveland than his resume calls for (and it does not call for much)
One of the topics discussed deep into the weekend thread was getting into exactly why Hue Jackson decided to start Kessler at QB vs. the Cowboys, and will have him running the offense again this week. This was not what one would usually hear from a HC, no stamp of “I am putting him out there because it gives us the best chance to win.” Instead Jackson was rather blunt that it was an audition to see how much upside Kessler has, and whether the Browns would go into next year’s draft looking for a QB.
The problem is that Kessler does have a low ceiling, lacking the arm strength to have a major NFL career. But the job is his at least through Thursday’s game against Baltimore. As for the inability to stretch the defense, here is how Jackson breaks it down - “Obviously it is not giving us a chance to score more points, because sometimes I think those plays have been there to be made. Whether it’s the quarterback or whether it’s the receiver, whether it’s the protection, we all have a hand in that, and we can all do better. So I’m not just going to lay it at Cody’s feet. Obviously, he’s got to improve in some areas, but I think our receivers have got to improve, I think our protection has got to improve, and we’ve just got to improve overall as an offensive football team.”
The Browns are another team that is difficult to attach a Power Rating to because they are not only a mess, with a roster resembling an expansion team, but apparently are already in a mode of building towards the future, rather than just trying to play the best they can on a given week.
Want a bizarre example from a different direction? How ready were they to work LB Jamie Collins into the rotation after he was acquired from the Patriots? All 73 plays, that is how ready. Why he was on the field in the fourth quarter when the Cowboys were just grinding out the clock does not make a whole lot of football sense, but many things coming from the Browns the rest of the way likely won’t.
Item: Is the Oakland defense finally “getting it”
The Raiders are 7-2, possessing the third best record in the NFL, and while a lot of that has been rather fluky, some nail-biter wins on the road that didn’t have to happen, there was an entirely different flow on Sunday night. This was not Derek Carr and his WRs making just enough plays to get over the hump; it was a thorough thumping of the Broncos at the line of scrimmage. Oakland won the battle of he ground games 218-33, nearly doubling Denver per rush attempt (5.1 vs. 2.8). And it does raise a valuable question now as to whether what had been an under-achieving defense is now making the pieces fit,
After nine games the Raiders are still dead last in yards per play allowed at 6.9. You are not supposed to get a 7-2 out of that, which will leave a lot of skeptics in the marketplace. But over the past three games the allowance has been 5.3, and that means a deeper look is needed. There is an intriguing upside because the starting lineup includes five first-round draft picks and three players taken in the second round, a seemingly major supply of talent. Included among those talents is Khalil Mack, who had been a disappointment through the early part of the season, but as the folks at Pro Football Focus have noted, has really picked up his game.
Let’s go to Jack Del Rio - “We’ve got good people, and we’re learning how to trust each other a little more and more. We should continue to grow. Really, it’s gotten better, but honestly it still has a ways to go, and it will get better. … As we gain that confidence and belief in each other, I think we’ll play faster and faster.”
And from CB D.J. Hayden, one of those first-rounders – “I feel like we’re coming on and the sky’s the limit for the secondary and we’re going to get better and better every week.”
Much like the Steelers in today’s lead, grading the Oakland defense is not easy – some of the numbers are simply terrible. But the shrewd handicapper might need to be nimble with those charts, and ready to make quick adjustments.
And for this week there may be another difference in a different mode, likely bringing less to the table than the abilities their numbers will show…
Item: What now, for the Seattle defense
The Seahawks defense has been a prime topic here each of the last two weeks because of the major workload that has been thrown at them, and how they have managed to gut through most of it. Now let’s make it three weeks.
Plays Minutes
Cardinals 90 46:21
Saints 72 36:12
Bills 82 40:17
Total 244 122:50
Avg 193 90:00
Seattle defenders have been on the field for 51 more plays than would be the norm for a three-game cycle, more than two full possessions per game, and 32:50 of added clock time. They managed to hold up rather well, only allowing five TDs, and two of them came on short drives after a turnover and a blocked punt. But it isn’t just about measuring the quality of the performance at this stage, but rather what the toll of thus cycle may mean going forward.
Here is how K. J. Wright defined it afterwards – “Just empty. Our bodies are empty. We just keep finding a way.” There is something to be said for that in terms of the character of the team, and Wright went on to say “We preach grit all the time.” But even for a team with a lot of pride, grit has its limitations. So let’s go to work…
In the Sights, Sunday NFL…
Time to get out into the marketplace and do some shopping – I get #274 New England (8:30 Eastern) working at -7, and between now and kickoff will be searching for enough of that to get locked in.
There isn’t a worse place in the NFL that the Seahawks could be playing this week, given the fatigue the defense has to fight through, the practice week shortened not just by having played on Monday night, but also the time that will be lost to travel, the long flight plus the three hours lost in the time zone transition. And they just happen to catch the Patriots physically fresh off of their bye week.
It won’t just be the physical freshness for New England, but the fact that in what has been a most unusual season for Tom Brady, he gets the benefit of added time working with the first team offense, something he did not get all that much of back in training camp. With so many weapons available it is an attack with one of the highest ceilings I have charted in years, and now it means some likely added wrinkles that the Seattle defense will not have seen on film.
The Seahawks do bring that grit and will not go down without a fight, but in this setting I expect the Patriots to be able to build a margin into double figures. Let’s set the “go” price at -7 -115 or better for now, with plenty of time to be in the marketplace looking for it.
Vegas: Monday with the Review Journal NFL box score page
Monday called for a quick lunch through an extremely busy cycle, Monday night being geared for some political discussion with a visitor in from out of town. And fortunately I don’t have to venture far to get to Fat Choy, and the work of Sheridan Su, another of those success stories that has been a running theme this football season.
Su has a particular knack for combining Asian influences with North American comfort food, and while folks like him have made that an accepted part of contemporary dining, not all that long ago it wasn’t that way. He may know this as well as anyone, working his way up from a food truck beginning, and even selling his “bao” out of a beauty shop for a while. So one of the treats on a visit to Fat Choy is a mural depicting the winding road that has been traveled on the way to Su’s current success –
The folks at the Eureka Casino wanted to elevate their food program, but also did not want to go too far away from what their regulars want. Su brought the ideal blending of concepts, while also being able to utilize that space to stretch out when he wants to – like the annual Chinese New Year celebration. There have been three so far, and I have yet to miss one.
The success has led Sheridan and his wife Jenny to open a place even closer to their culinary roots, Flock & Fowl, specializing in Hainan Chicken Rice. It would make the Monday rotation except they are closed that day, and be prepared if you do go – there will usually be a wait for a table between 11:30 – 12:30, so early or later is better.
Monday was all about bao, the Asian equivalent of a sandwich, the steamed fluffy exterior the ideal way to showcase a variety of spice combinations. Fat Choy specializes in pork belly and roasted duck bao, the latter the Monday choice, with their own hoisin sauce that brings the combinations together. Be warned that a side of fries brings a mound of them, not a handful, and is better shared than consumed solo.
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