Alright, this is clearly not something I can do every week, but it was fun and very informative to do it once. I was intrigued by the Seahawks 11/19 3rd down conversion rate last night, and wanted to break down more about what got them there. I charted every play they ran on 3rd down (although I only found 17 plays, not 19), including personnel groupings to see what was working and what was not.
Some clear tendencies emerged. Here are a few things off the top:
– Knapp only called run plays on three of 17 third downs, and one of the three turned into a pass when Matt bobbled the snap.
– The running back was sent out into a pattern on 9 of 14 pass plays, blocked 4 times, and had a fake run once
– We used 3 WRs 14/17 times
– A TE was in for all but four plays
– Motion was only used three times, and I believe all by TEs
– Knapp’s favorite personnel grouping was 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 RB. He used this 12/17 times.
– Hawks were 4/5 on 3rd and 3 or less. The one non-conversion was Forsett’s drop for a potential huge gain on a wheel route
– Hawks were 5/7 on 3rd and 4-7 yds
– Hawks were 1/5 on 3rd and 8+
– Hass was 5/9, Wallace was 5/7, Teel was 0/1
I’ll try to find some time later this week to break down some formations I saw him use multiple times, including my favorite one that has four receivers bunched close to the line.
Here’s the spreadsheet with the breakdown. Let me know if you see other patterns I missed.