Official Game Thread - Commanders @ Lions

Slye was 12 of 12 for us last year on Field Goal attempts and 9 of 10 on Extra Point attempts. Beyond the miss today on an extra point, I am not too sure what substantial evidence there is suggesting that he is unreliable in the time he has spent in DC...

Ever since preseason, he's been showing signs of reverting back to the type of player that Carolina cut.
The evidence has been slight, but somehow it's incurring a strong gut feeling I have.
 
Missing extra points (that aren't blocked) at the NFL level is flat out unacceptable. These guys kick 50-100 of these a week.
 
Missing extra points (that aren't blocked) at the NFL level is flat out unacceptable. These guys kick 50-100 of these a week.

Exactly. We all crushed Hopkins for doing the same thing. Hopkins is doing just fine for the Chargers now. Kicking is a funny business, but you can't miss the gimmes.
 
I think it's fair to question Slye's miss, but on a day where every facet of our team blew it so badly. The defense, the offense, and special teams were all terrible it feels off to pick on the kicker. The offense did rally in the second half (which makes the first half even worse imo), the defense crapped itself whenever the Lions tried. The special teams blew returns, kicks, and couldn't even down a ball that they caught on the one. When absolutely everything goes wrong I figure you blame the everyone. Somehow, this team got to full of itself and too satisfied with their comeback win over the Jags. They just were not ready to play. Our D-Line should have torn their backups apart. Instead, their back up o line gashed our front seven over and over again. What I'm really curious about is whether those three and outs in the second half was the Lions taking their foot off the gas or if we played a different style of D and whether when we got close if we reverted back to a more conservative form that allowed them to score at will again.

Clearly, the D ain't working. It probably wouldn't change much, but I'd love Rivera to take over defensive play calling to see if it made a difference. I get that Rivera probably feels grateful to Del Rio for him carrying the load when Ron was undergoing cancer treatments, but JDR's defense has been pretty awful consistently... even that first year when it was statistically good.
 
You have two former linebackers making decisions and calling plays and neither have shown any inclination to fix the linebacker spot or it seems to even develop their high draft choice from last year.

Sean McVay played WR in college.
So why hasn't any teams caught onto that, and made it a trend by hiring former wide receivers as Head Coaches ? :D
 
This won't even matter to anyone in the org it should piss off. That's my issue with it.
 
This won't even matter to anyone in the org it should piss off. That's my issue with it.


agreed, whoever let those other designs get produced needs to be pissed off in ashburn with a poster of this hanging in their cubicle, or wherever they sit.


As a joe, I think it's pretty funny.
 
We took a licking on Sunday. Why should Monday be any different? :)
 
Going for 2 in that situation gives you a better statistical chance to win. It's a fairly new phenomenon by coaches with the introduction of analytics. Here is an article from a few years ago explaining it. But basically it breaks down to this:





I couldn't make the chat yesterday, but I bet there was a ton of discussion on this in real time. When I saw them going for it, the only thing I could think of was Riveria wanted to try to win in regulation and not play for a tie and overtime. If that is your goal, then it makes sense. Slye's miss just threw the whole calculation out the window because it necessitated the onside kick instead of kicking it deep and trying for a stop with 3 timeouts.
 
I couldn't make the chat yesterday, but I bet there was a ton of discussion on this in real time. When I saw them going for it, the only thing I could think of was Riveria wanted to try to win in regulation and not play for a tie and overtime. If that is your goal, then it makes sense. Slye's miss just threw the whole calculation out the window because it necessitated the onside kick instead of kicking it deep and trying for a stop with 3 timeouts.

It’s a better statistical advantage going for 2 there. Whether it’s the right decision or not is another matter. But it does give you an advantage. I will state though that the flaw in his logic is that it requires your defense to get a stop, which didn’t happen. The Slye missed XP just made it worse.

This scenario played out in the Falcons Rams game at 4 yesterday. The Falcons were down 14, scored to make it an 8 point game. They went for 2 and got it. Then they forced a Rams turnover and have the ball in great field position with a chance to take the lead with less than 3 minutes remaining in regulation. However the Falcons threw an INT in the end zone to thwart the comeback. But they played it the same way and were in prime position to upset the Rams.

The bottom line though is no matter strategy you take here, the team has to execute successfully to make it work. When they don’t, it opens you up to all kinds of criticism.
 
Going for two may give a statistical advantage with two generic teams playing each other, but that never happens. Sometimes coaches just overthink things. It's amazing how Rivera was working the percentages so intricately at the end there. It would have been nice for him to have paid attention as closely to what was going on in the first half.
 
The start of yesterday's game was so putrid that it made me do a bit of digging. Here is an awful stat for you. Make of it what you will...

Under Ron Rivera (regular/post-season), Washington has been losing at halftime 25 times out of 36 games. They have carried a lead into halftime only 11 times.

We have been outscored in the first half under Rivera 492 - 313.

We have scored 10 or fewer points in the first half under Rivera in 22 of 36 games.

They are going to soon start putting a picture of the Washington Commanders under the word "sleepwalking" in the dictionary.
 
My apologies if this got posted anywhere else, but I haven't run across it on the board. Not what you want to learn about on a Monday.

 
I think it's fair to question Slye's miss, but on a day where every facet of our team blew it so badly. The defense, the offense, and special teams were all terrible it feels off to pick on the kicker. The offense did rally in the second half (which makes the first half even worse imo), the defense crapped itself whenever the Lions tried. The special teams blew returns, kicks, and couldn't even down a ball that they caught on the one. When absolutely everything goes wrong I figure you blame the everyone. Somehow, this team got to full of itself and too satisfied with their comeback win over the Jags. They just were not ready to play. Our D-Line should have torn their backups apart. Instead, their back up o line gashed our front seven over and over again. What I'm really curious about is whether those three and outs in the second half was the Lions taking their foot off the gas or if we played a different style of D and whether when we got close if we reverted back to a more conservative form that allowed them to score at will again.

Clearly, the D ain't working. It probably wouldn't change much, but I'd love Rivera to take over defensive play calling to see if it made a difference. I get that Rivera probably feels grateful to Del Rio for him carrying the load when Ron was undergoing cancer treatments, but JDR's defense has been pretty awful consistently... even that first year when it was statistically good.

I thought it was ridiculous that everyone was calling for Hopkins to get cut last year, when the defense completely sucked ass most of the season. Every player on defense should have been fired before Hopkins.
 
Maybe
My apologies if this got posted anywhere else, but I haven't run across it on the board. Not what you want to learn about on a Monday.


And it was on a futile garbage time drive where the only explicable reason to keep on playing was Rivera trying to "save face" and not look like a quitter. But this is the cost.
 
I don’t understand what you are saying here SCP - are you saying we should have pulled starters because the game was out of reach?

Not everything is the coaches fault. Shit happens.
 
I don’t understand what you are saying here SCP - are you saying we should have pulled starters because the game was out of reach?

Not everything is the coaches fault. Shit happens.

Also, I believe we don't have an active, healthy, "true" backup at Center.
Pulling someone like Roullier with the backups we have, and keeping Wentz in the game, puts Wentz in greater danger of getting hurt
Larsen is still PUP.
I think the only other Center we have is Toth on the PS. So we probably either sign a new player, or switch a Guard to Center. And almost
definitely call up Toth again, at least as a backup. I know that Kel Varnsen will be happy about the Return of the Toth.
He's called up so many times, that Toth will be around here, until he's 'long in the toth'
 
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HA! Bring back the Toth! You know he’s getting called up now. Have to get that transaction counter up. He could be the key to the Super Bowl!
 
I gotta find out how to pronounce Toth.
Whether it's spoken like Cloth, or like Both.
Because then I can give him a good nickname, that rhymes or something
 

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