Metrics Showed Where Adam Gase Failed To Live Up To Cutting-Edge Offense Hype

[BROOKLYN JET]

https://wfan.radio.com/blogs/steve-lichtenstein/metrics-showed-gase-failed-to-live-up-to-cutting-edge-hype

Lichtenstein: Metrics Showed Where Adam Gase Failed To Live Up To Cutting-Edge Offense Hype

STEVE LICHTENSTEIN

JANUARY 14, 2020 - 2:03 PM

 

If you’re a Jets fan who hasn’t given up watching NFL football after suffering through New York’s wasted 7-9 season, you probably noticed that these playoff games look like a different sport than what the Jets were playing. The talent on display over the weekend in the Divisional Round—namely the speed and the execution of the offenses—was far beyond Gang Green’s capabilities this past season.

Still, even if Jets general manager Joe Douglas stuns us by bringing aboard an influx of skilled offensive players, including linemen, this offseason, how many of you feel confident that coach Adam Gase would know what to do with them? 

By now it’s obvious that owner Christopher Johnson had zero evidence beyond Peyton Manning’s hearsay to back up his claim when he crowed that Gase “coaches to where football is going” upon his hiring.

I warned you about the false hype in a post last offseason that detailed how Gase was just as conservative, and sometimes more so, in his three seasons at the helm in Miami than the Jets bumbling prior coach Todd Bowles.     

 

(Photo by Mark Brown/Getty Images)

 

A Jets fan who goes by the Twitter handle @DrewfromJersey had a fabulous take on Gang Green’s offensive incompetence during the 2019 season.  Drew opined that the best thing to happen over 17 weeks that saw the Jets place dead last in yards gained and 31st in points scored (only because New York’s six non-offensive touchdowns bumped them over Washington) was that quarterback Sam Darnold took the initiative after a Week 8 loss in Jacksonville to confront Gase about his garbage playbook. During the Jets’ 6-2 run to close the season, they were far less inept, ranking 16th in the league in points per game.

Now, I’m sure Darnold approached the subject with more respect.  Gase even praised his 22-year old sophomore QB for providing feedback.

Still, Gase has a long way to go before he can call himself a master of the modern game, never mind the future.  For the following analysis, I’m going to ignore the three games that Darnold missed last season due to mononucleosis.  They never happened.  For these purposes, Luke Falk might as well be the secret identity of a DC Comics character.    

With that caveat in mind, here are two areas of modern football where Gase’s offense fell behind the curve:

1) Play-action

The results are in—adding play-action to a call generally adds on average about two yards per pass attempt, per ProFootballFocus.com.  Of the 34 QBS with at least 50 dropbacks, only five had negative differentials in yards-per-attempt between play-action versus straight dropbacks.  Only two (Lamar Jackson and Mason Rudolph) were worse by more than half a yard using play-action.

 

Mark Konezny-USA TODAY Sports

 

Darnold was 2.2 yards per attempt better when using play-action.  You’d think Gase would have had more of those calls on his chart from the onset given how heavily he was feeding running back Le’Veon Bell at the time.    

You’d be incorrect.  Only 19.4% of Darnold’s dropbacks in the Jets’ first eight games were off play-action.  That rate ranked 30th among 34 QBs with at least 30 play-action pass dropbacks.  All nine of his interceptions in that span occurred following straight dropbacks.   

In the season’s second half, however, Darnold’s play-action rate rose to 27.3%, the 13th-highest in the league, despite playing the entire time with ligament damage in his left thumb that may have hindered his ballhandling abilities.

Gase still has room to install more play-action schemes.  Not including Jackson’s ridiculous 59 pass attempts, with only six using play-action, as his Ravens were getting routed by the Titans, the other seven QBs over the weekend totaled 207 throws, with 30.4% coming off play-action.  In the aggregate, play-action netted about 1.6 more yards than straight dropbacks.

A modern football coach should be well aware of this.    

2) Second-and-long runs

I don’t think anything frustrated Jets fans more than all the times when Gase would virtually give up on a series after a negative play on first down.  An incompletion, sack, run stuff, or penalty would send Gase turtling. 

The Jets handed off on 49-of-108 (45%) second downs of ten or more this season, per SharpFoootballStats.com. Only the Ravens — by far the most dominant rushing team in the league — and the Vikings ran more often. Again, I’m ignoring the Falk games, where Gase and everyone watching preferred that he kept the clock running.

 

Billie Weiss/Getty Images

 

Since opponents pretty much figured out that the ball was going in Bell’s hands on those snaps, the Jets averaged only 3.2 yards per carry on second-and-long rushing attempts, well below the 4.3 yards per carry league average for those situations.

Unfortunately, this strategy was not adjusted in the second half of the season. To the contrary, it got worse, with handoffs on 52% of second-and-longs in the last eight games. The success rate on those runs was similarly miserable, with the Jets gaining a measly 3.1 yards per carry.

Gase would likely point to the scoreboards in those contests as proof that he knew what he was doing. According to modern metrics, however, that won’t be sustainable when the Jets face heavier competition next season.    

Darnold’s got to get in Gase’s ear about that.

[THE BARON]

Metrics ??? Hell, you don't need metrics to see that Gase is not up to the task.  All you need is the "eye test".  It was painfully obvious... 

[BROOKLYN JET]

3 minutes ago, THE BARON said:

Metrics ??? Hell, you don't need metrics to see that Gase is not up to the task.  All you need is the "eye test".  It was painfully obvious... 

Just in case your eyes were buggin out...

 

[#27TheDominator]

He is ignoring those Luke Falk games, but isn't he still including them in his "metrics?"  They were 16th in scoring over the 2nd half.  I don't think that is proving drewfromjersey's point considering the personnel.  

[kdels62]

One of my favorite things is when someone uses metrics to seem more intelligent but clearly has no idea how to analyze statistics nor contextualize those numbers in a meaningful way. Once you add in the quoting of “drewfromjersey” you have the death of journalism.

[jetstream23]

Quote

During the Jets’ 6-2 run to close the season, they were far less inept, ranking 16th in the league in points per game.

That's a positive.

Quote

Since opponents pretty much figured out that the ball was going in Bell’s hands on those snaps, the Jets averaged only 3.2 yards per carry on second-and-long rushing attempts, well below the 4.3 yards per carry league average for those situations.

Unfortunately, this strategy was not adjusted in the second half of the season. To the contrary, it got worse, with handoffs on 52% of second-and-longs in the last eight games. The success rate on those runs was similarly miserable, with the Jets gaining a measly 3.1 yards per carry.

So the diminishing success rate of running on 2nd and long coinciding with the team going 6-2 over the final 8 games and ranking 16th in points scored means what?  That stats are more important that W's?

I get the sense this guy would write something like....

Quote

As the team entered the playoffs and opponents knew the limitations of the passing game Tennessee's passing yardage per game plummeted to an average of 80 yards per game (you read that correctly).  During the team's 2-0 run in the playoffs the miserable Titans have ranked dead last in NFL passing.

Listen, I don't know if Gase is good, horrible or somewhere in between.  There was a lot of "noise in the data" as they say.  Mono, a poor roster (even before injuries), a horrible OLine, and then injuries make the evaluation complicated.  It's even more complicated by the fact the Jets had one of the NFL's toughest schedules to start the year and one of the easiest to finish the year.  In that regard they largely performed as expected.  (Maybe if they beat Cincy but had lost to Dallas people would say the Jets performed almost exactly as you thought they would, and that not blowing that missed-kick-ridden Week 1 game to Buffalo puts them at 8-8 for the year)

On the negative side we still have a team lead by Adam Gase that ranks last or almost last in most of the important statistical categories on offense.  On the positive side we can't foresee the Jets having a roster any worse than last year, Darnold gets another season in the same offensive system for the first time in 4 years (USC, Jeremy Bates, Adam Gase...), and the Jets finished the year on a positive trajectory finishing just inside the top half of the NFL in points per game scored over their final 8.  Darnold is still a pup...the dude is younger than Joe Burrow for crying out loud.  He's only going to get better.

We can all have hunches, leanings, opinions about how Gase, Darnold and company will perform in Year 2 but nobody can really speak with any true conviction about it yet.  It's simply a guess or belief.

[Jet Nut]

20 minutes ago, THE BARON said:

Metrics ??? Hell, you don't need metrics to see that Gase is not up to the task.  All you need is the "eye test".  It was painfully obvious... 

Or if you actually keep deep diving into numbers that are curved by 4 games of play without your QB, with that OL and treating the Jets like they were on equal footing with the rest of the league.

[Warfish]

Metrics do not support Gase.

So people rely on "feelings" to feel good about Gase, and utilize a litany of woulda, shoulda, coulda, cherry picking, but but's excuse making, scapegoating, and other selective readings to project Gase's worst-in-NFL offenses the past few years (and dead worst in 2019) into something hopeful.  If only, if only, if only.  If only Gase had X, he would be a success.

I have doubts about Sam, but remain hopeful about him.

I do not have hope in Gase.  If he produces a top 10 offense in 2020, he'll have certainly shown me wrong, but his resume just doesn't support that being the outcome.

[Dcat]

23 minutes ago, THE BARON said:

Metrics ??? Hell, you don't need metrics to see that Gase is not up to the task.  All you need is the "eye test".  It was painfully obvious... 

His play calling has been downright terrible.  It's been bad.  Really bad.  

[rangerous]

you can't run play action if you can't sell the run.  with bell at 3.2 ypc it's hard to see why anyone would be afraid of the jet run game.  so much of what this guy says lands right at the feet of oline play.

[Bleedin Green]

12 minutes ago, jetstream23 said:

That's a positive.

So the diminishing success rate of running on 2nd and long coinciding with the team going 6-2 over the final 8 games and ranking 16th in points scored means what?  That stats are more important that W's?

I get the sense this guy would write something like....

Listen, I don't know if Gase is good, horrible or somewhere in between.  There was a lot of "noise in the data" as they say.  Mono, a poor roster (even before injuries), a horrible OLine, and then injuries make the evaluation complicated.  It's even more complicated by the fact the Jets had one of the NFL's toughest schedules to start the year and one of the easiest to finish the year.  In that regard they largely performed as expected.  (Maybe if they beat Cincy but had lost to Dallas people would say the Jets performed almost exactly as you thought they would, and that not blowing that missed-kick-ridden Week 1 game to Buffalo puts them at 8-8 for the year)

On the negative side we still have a team lead by Adam Gase that ranks last or almost last in most of the important statistical categories on offense.  On the positive side we can't foresee the Jets having a roster any worse than last year, Darnold gets another season in the same offensive system for the first time in 4 years (USC, Jeremy Bates, Adam Gase...), and the Jets finished the year on a positive trajectory finishing just inside the top half of the NFL in points per game scored over their final 8.  Darnold is still a pup...the dude is younger than Joe Burrow for crying out loud.  He's only going to get better.

We can all have hunches, leanings, opinions about how Gase, Darnold and company will perform in Year 2 but nobody can really speak with any true conviction about it yet.  It's simply a guess or belief.

While I certainly get your overall points here, I think the "noise in the data" excuse loses a lot of its merit when that needs to be attributed to the poor performance in every year of his professional coaching career, with the sole exception of when he had Peyton Manning playing/calling plays at the line.

He's obviously getting at least one more year around here, so I'll certainly be rooting for him, but there is a pretty significant amount of evidence to suggest there's unfortunately little reason for optimism.

[Patriot Killa]

17 minutes ago, Warfish said:

Metrics do not support Gase.

So people rely on "feelings" to feel good about Gase, and utilize a litany of woulda, shoulda, coulda, cherry picking, but but's excuse making, scapegoating, and other selective readings to project Gase's worst-in-NFL offenses the past few years (and dead worst in 2019) into something hopeful.  If only, if only, if only.  If only Gase had X, he would be a success.

I have doubts about Sam, but remain hopeful about him.

I do not have hope in Gase.  If he produces a top 10 offense in 2020, he'll have certainly shown me wrong, but his resume just doesn't support that being the outcome.

Thank you!

can we just fire this bum. We’re really about to waste another year of Darnold’s rookie contract on someone who can’t help Darnold to begin with, much less help himself.

[Warfish]

16 minutes ago, Bleedin Green said:

I think the "noise in the data" excuse loses a lot of its merit when that needs to be attributed to the poor performance in every year of his professional coaching career, with the sole exception of when he had Peyton Manning playing/calling plays at the line.

He's obviously getting at least one more year around here, so I'll certainly be rooting for him, but there is a pretty significant amount of evidence to suggest there's unfortunately little reason for optimism.

Well said.

[#27TheDominator]

28 minutes ago, Bleedin Green said:

While I certainly get your overall points here, I think the "noise in the data" excuse loses a lot of its merit when that needs to be attributed to the poor performance in every year of his professional coaching career, with the sole exception of when he had Peyton Manning playing/calling plays at the line.

He's obviously getting at least one more year around here, so I'll certainly be rooting for him, but there is a pretty significant amount of evidence to suggest there's unfortunately little reason for optimism.

Absolutely.  Thing is, there is no reason to be so down on the guy now, if you weren't last off-season.

[jetstream23]

1 hour ago, Bleedin Green said:

While I certainly get your overall points here, I think the "noise in the data" excuse loses a lot of its merit when that needs to be attributed to the poor performance in every year of his professional coaching career, with the sole exception of when he had Peyton Manning playing/calling plays at the line.

He's obviously getting at least one more year around here, so I'll certainly be rooting for him, but there is a pretty significant amount of evidence to suggest there's unfortunately little reason for optimism.

Well, and when he took the Dolphins to the playoffs, but I understand your point.

 

[Beerfish]

I don't need metrics or analyts to tell me gase stinks

[T0mShane]

2 hours ago, BROOKLYN JET said:

A Jets fan who goes by the Twitter handle @DrewfromJersey had a fabulous take on Gang Green’s offensive incompetence during the 2019 season.  Drew opined that the best thing to happen over 17 weeks that saw the Jets place dead last in yards gained and 31st in points scored (only because New York’s six non-offensive touchdowns bumped them over Washington) was that quarterback Sam Darnold took the initiative after a Week 8 loss in Jacksonville to confront Gase about his garbage playbook

Wow metrics

[New York Mick]

That was a wanted study. It’s like the study Princeton did where women effect men’s ability to think. 

[SAR I]

6 + 2 = 8

SAR I

[Warfish]

8 minutes ago, SAR I said:

6 + 2 = 8

SAR I

What does 21+24+25+31+32 add up to?

I only ask cause, you know, you're so good at math.

[jetsons]

If gase Fails to show Significant Improvement in the Offense this season he MUST BE FIRED.... he was brought in mainly for this & Teaching Sam & he will be held accountable for Both.

[NYJ1]

The "EYE TEST" when it comes to Gase tells me one thing....

He simply did NOT have talent to work with. That's a fact.

Then, I come to the realization that the talent situation is so bad that, NO ONE, not just Gase, could be successful coaching this team. Not even a young Bill Parcells. 

So ultimately no one knows if Gase is a good HC. Everything on this site is merely one's opinion. Not even my own opinion matters.

What must happen is the GM must start doing his job.

[jetsons]

59 minutes ago, NYJ1 said:

The "EYE TEST" when it comes to Gase tells me one thing....

He simply did NOT have talent to work with. That's a fact.

Then, I come to the realization that the talent situation is so bad that, NO ONE, not just Gase, could be successful coaching this team. Not even a young Bill Parcells. 

So ultimately no one knows if Gase is a good HC. Everything on this site is merely one's opinion. Not even my own opinion matters.

What must happen is the GM must start doing his job.

That's untrue... The jets have an Above Average QB, RB & WR... granted the oline stinks but that still should not have them ranked 2nd to Last in offense.

[Losmeister]

are we crowing anbout 2 yards per PA pass attempt?

[CTM]

4 hours ago, BROOKLYN JET said:

Unfortunately, this strategy was not adjusted in the second half of the season. To the contrary, it got worse, with handoffs on 52% of second-and-longs in the last eight games. The success rate on those runs was similarly miserable, with the Jets gaining a measly 3.1 yards per carry.

So per earlier in the article, where Darnold heroically took on the role of OC in addition to elite QB*, this increase in handoffs of 2nd and long is really Darnolds fault ? 

*if not for skank gurlz, poor coaching, incompetent online, weaks wr's and slow bell (except when we like him to critisize gase)

[jbone]

6 minutes ago, jetsons said:

That's untrue... The jets have an Above Average QB, RB & WR... granted the oline stinks but that still should not have them ranked 2nd to Last in offense.

What metric is Sam above average? Not even trying to be a smart a$$ here. Legitimately curious as to what you’re basing this on.

[CTM]

1 minute ago, jbone said:

What metric is Sam above average? Not even trying to be a smart a$$ here. Legitimately curious as to what you’re basing this on.

Eye test metric brah

[BROOKLYN JET]

3 minutes ago, CTM said:

So per earlier in the article, where Darnold heroically took on the role of OC in addition to elite QB*, this increase in handoffs of 2nd and long is really Darnolds fault ? 

*if not for skank girls, poor coaching, incomptent online, weaks wr's and slow bell (except when we like him to critisize gase)

No*

*because spleen

[Jetsfan80]

So he's not coaching to where the game is going?

[BROOKLYN JET]

2 hours ago, T0mShane said:

Wow metrics

@T0mfromBrooklyn opined

[BROOKLYN JET]

3 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

So he's not coaching to where the game is going?

Who Gase or Darnold?

[Long Island Leprechaun]

4 hours ago, Warfish said:

Metrics do not support Gase.

So people rely on "feelings" to feel good about Gase, and utilize a litany of woulda, shoulda, coulda, cherry picking, but but's excuse making, scapegoating, and other selective readings to project Gase's worst-in-NFL offenses the past few years (and dead worst in 2019) into something hopeful.  If only, if only, if only.  If only Gase had X, he would be a success.

I have doubts about Sam, but remain hopeful about him.

I do not have hope in Gase.  If he produces a top 10 offense in 2020, he'll have certainly shown me wrong, but his resume just doesn't support that being the outcome.

Jesus. John Bell Hood? He was truly a lousy general -- legs or no legs.

[FidelioJet]

Gase stinks!

[slats]

The automatic runs on 2nd & long were probably the most frustrating aspect of Gase’s play-calling for me. He talks like he loves Sam, he’s gotta trust him on that down. The runs clearly were not working. 

[SAR I]

1 hour ago, jetsons said:

If gase Fails to show Significant Improvement in the Offense this season he MUST BE FIRED.... he was brought in mainly for this & Teaching Sam & he will be held accountable for Both.

Wrong.

Douglas and Gase are here to build STABILITY.  That's the most important thing.  Fix the culture, stick with the same playbook for 4 years, give this 22 year old quarterback a comfortable and dependable base to build upon.

Adam Gase is your head coach for the next 3 years.  Nothing is going to change that.  Accept it.  Or root for the Packers.  They have nice uniforms.

SAR I