Completion Percentage

[Footman DCXLV]

For all the talk about how the first-team offense hasn't looked very good through the first two games, the one stat that's rarely talked about with Flacco is that his completion percentage is generally pretty low. Granted, a lot of that probably has to do with the fact that we've become a "big-play offense" in the passing game, meaning a lot of those passes are all or nothing. But, it's definitely something that can be improved, and would significantly help our offense from stalling, not to mention help our defense by tipping the time of possession battle just a little closer to our favor by completing some of those passes instead of stopping the clock with incompletions. 

 

All this being said, Flacco is a combined 14/18 through the first two games. There have been several drops, and there seems to be more emphasis on the running game, which hasn't been all that effective, which has led to a lot of stalled drives. Only four incompletions, and two of those were intercepted (either of which could have been avoided with a little more effort by Jacoby), meaning only two passes have hit the ground. One was a drop by Shiancoe against Atlanta. The other was an incompletion intended for Jacoby against Tampa Bay. If you want to exclude the interceptions, again, because better effort could have prevented them, you can say that's only one pass off the mark. Even if you want to include them, that's only three out of 18 passes this preseason that haven't found their target.

 

Obviously, the offense as a whole has some issues mostly centered around O-line continuity due to a new starting center and the unknowns at wide receiver. But, the high completion percentage, in spite of an overall lack of offensive production, is a bright spot that I haven't really seen mentioned yet. Again, it's not the most important thing, and we do have bigger issues to worry about, but it's something that could make a real difference once we do get those other issues sorted, if it can carry over into the regular season.

[PolishRifle]

I agree, that the higher comp. is nice, which means that the short passing game is coming along nicely, but in the first game against TB most of those were dump offs. Also, in the game against Atlanta, the Ravens had trouble converting downs, eventhough receivers were catching passes. So, what's the point in that?

 

It's all a bit of a mess right now, without someone with consistent hands, aside of Torrey and Ray ofcourse. I know, that many will critisize Joe's passes to Shiancoe, but those passes touched his hands, which, as far as I am concerned, means Joe did his part of the job, but Shiancoe couldn't make a play on it. All the time I thought to myself, that Pitta would've got it. -_-