Good afternoon, Bolts fans! I'm back again for another edition in the Playbook Confidential series, this time with a breakdown from the third preseason game at Arizona. In case you didn't see my first story in this series, you can check it out here.
Much like in the first story, after the jump I will break down any playcalling patterns that I noticed as a result of the personnel that Norv used in the first half (and a little into the second) of the preseason game in which the starters get the majority of their preseason reps. I will also combine this week's numbers with last week's numbers just to see if any other patterns develop.
| Personnel | RB | TE | WR |
|---|---|---|---|
| 00 | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| 01 | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| 02 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| 10 | 1 | 0 | 4 |
| 11 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| 12 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| 13 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| 20 | 2 | 0 | 3 |
| 21 | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| 22 | 2 | 2 | 1 |
| 23 | 2 | 3 | 0 |
First Half
Okay, now to the first half of the game at Arizona, here are the numbers:
| Personnel | Run | Pass |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | ||
| 01 | ||
| 02 | ||
| 10 | ||
| 11 | 2 | 14 |
| 12 | 6 | 4 |
| 13 | ||
| 20 | ||
| 21 | 2 | 6 |
| 22 | 3 | 1 |
| 23 |
As you can see, once again the 11 personnel grouping continues to be quite pass heavy this week.
Something to note, however, is the manner in which Norv Turner sprinkled in the run plays in 11 personnel. His first 7 plays out of 11 personnel were all passes, then he called one run play which gained him 9 yards from Tolbert. He then called 6 more pass plays out of 11 personnel before returning to the run, which again resulted in a decent run of 7 yards.
It seems that opposing defensive coordinators began to key on the pass from the 11 personnel grouping, exposing them to the run. That's called using the pass to set up the run, folks. I think we are going to be seeing a lot of that this season.
This week also saw Norv run more from 1 RB sets than he ran from 2 RB sets...the opposite of what we saw the previous week.
Second Half
| Personnel | Run | Pass |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | ||
| 01 | ||
| 02 | ||
| 10 | ||
| 11 | 1 | 2 |
| 12 | ||
| 13 | ||
| 20 | ||
| 21 | 2 | 2 |
| 22 | 3 | |
| 23 |
As you can see, not a very large sample size from the second half while Rivers was still in the game, so we can't really make too many conclusions from this group. 22 personnel continues to be run heavy.
Game Total
| Personnel | Run | Pass |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | 0 | 0 |
| 01 | 0 | 0 |
| 02 | 0 | 0 |
| 10 | 0 | 0 |
| 11 | 3 (16%) | 16 (84%) |
| 12 | 6 (60%) | 4 (40%) |
| 13 | 0 | 0 |
| 20 | 0 | 0 |
| 21 | 4 (33%) | 8 (67%) |
| 22 | 6 (86%) | 1 (14%) |
| 23 | 0 | 0 |
Last week saw more passes than runs out of 21 personnel (5 to 4), although this week the balance was clearly skewed to the pass from that grouping. Running was spread fairly evenly between 1 RB and 2 RB sets this week as well.
Preseason games 2 & 3
| Personnel | Run | Pass |
|---|---|---|
| 00 | 0 | 0 |
| 01 | 0 | 0 |
| 02 | 0 | 0 |
| 10 | 0 | 0 |
| 11 | 4 (14%) | 24 (86%) |
| 12 | 8 (57%) | 6 (43%) |
| 13 | 0 | 0 |
| 20 | 0 | 0 |
| 21 | 7 (41%) | 10 (59%) |
| 22 | 8 (89%) | 1 (11%) |
| 23 | 0 | 0 |
The numbers above are only from plays in which Rivers and the first team were in the game for the last 2 preseason games. It is clear that 11 personnel tends to be pass heavy, and 22 personnel remains to be run heavy, as can be expected. 12 personnel and 21 personnel are fairly close to balanced, which is nice to see.
I am not reading too much more than that into the preseason results for these trends, and it will be interesting to see how they compare once the regular season starts.
Thanks for reading. In a day or two, Orz will follow up with an even more detailed breakdown using his system which goes through many more details than this one.