4th In The League In Special Teams!?!

To this point in the season, I have been underwhelmed by our special teams play. Football Outsiders, on the other hand, seems to disagree. The Eagles are ranked #4 in the NFL in Special Teams by DVOA. #4!!

That means that either we have misjudged the special teams; everybody in the league is as frustrating to watch on special teams as we are; or the things that are most frustrating are not being adequately captured by FO.

I think the truth is that a little of all three are at issue here.

In the table below, I show the ranking of the Eagles by DVOA in each of the five primary special teams categories. For comparison purposes, I also show the six teams that the Eagles have faced this year.

 

Focusing on the Eagles' row, note that other than two categories, they are above average, but not by a lot: FG/XP, Kick and Punt. The coverage teams have been just ok, and David Akers is an average kicker at this point in his career. All that is probably right. Yes, we harp on the negatives of these units (Akers managed to miss two of five 40 yard kicks against Oakland, Rocca had the temerity to shank one against Washington, we failed to tackle Rock Cartwright when we had the chance on that one kickoff) but the truth is that on the whole, these units have been pretty solid. The Punt unit has had the advantage of going against only one Punt Ret unit in the top half of the league, and the kickoff unit is split 50/50 with good and bad Kick Ret units.

The return teams are at opposite ends of the spectrum. DeSean Jackson has been consistently outstanding on punt returns, so it isn't too surprising that he has helped us to be second in the league. Who knows, if he didn't celebrate his touchdowns with such vigor and let Maclin on the field to return punts, maybe we'd even be #1. Further, notice that four of the six Punt units that the team has faced are in the top half of the league.

The kick return unit has been our biggest sore spot. We have only broken off one of 40+ yards, and that is well below the rate at which Ellis Hobbs and Quintin Demps did so last year. And it isn't like we are facing elite Kick units -- four of the six teams we have faced are in the bottom half of the league. And quite frankly, going off of memory, most of the frustrating STs penalties that I can remember have been on kick returns.

Now, on the topic of penalties, I think STs penalties are the most frustrating element for fans. And rightly so. I think that part of the problem is the transition to the new blocking rules with the elimination of the wedge. This would be a league-wide problem, though, and I can't get a sense of how many STs flags are being thrown this year league-wide. If anyone has that data, let me know. However, from what I have seen from other teams, everybody seems to be drawing STs flags.

Further, it isn't clear to me how, if at all, DVOA for Special Teams takes penalties into account. So it could be that this is an unquantified element, I don't know. You'd think if it were unquantified, doing so would drag us way down. But as I said, I have no benchmark.

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Now, onto this week's production points tables. The numbers are quite strange, to be honest. It seems that the coaching staff thought that this was, by far, the best STs performance of the year. That isn't my recollection of the game. Here is the summary by week, or plays and points per play:

 

Huge explosion in points this week. I can't explain it. Could be errors in entry, though they appear to be uniform across players, could be historical adjustments showing up this week, I don't know. Or it could simply be that the coaches thought we were really good this week. I didn't see that, but I am not a coach - it is hard to know what is really happening based on the small view you get on a tv screen.

Here are the points per player:

 

Some observations:

• Huge weeks by Sean Jones and Eldra Buckley at 36. Before this week, Jones had the highest total of the year at 30.
• Rocca got a lot of points in a week that didn't seem that strong to me. Yes, he had a short field to work with a lot, but he didn't do anything that spectacular and he had a bunch of shanks. On one hand, the Redskins only generated 10 return yards against him on 8 punts, which says that the kicks were put in a place where the coverage teams could (and did) make plays. On the other hand, the Redskins have been struggling a great deal on punt returns all season.
• Jason Avant had his best game of the year. Maybe he has been saving the energy that he would have been spending on catching the ball on offense and used it on special teams.
• Quintin Demps is driving me nuts. Dumb penalties, and in general, he should be a lot better, IMHO.

Our Special Teams Were Better ... But What About Akers?

Perhaps the best thing about the poor officiating yesterday was that our special teams made it through a whole game without getting flagged. Amazing! That alone made it the best special teams performance of the year.

However, after the game, David Akers took a lot of flak. He missed two FGs out of five that he attempted, and those six points obviously would have made a difference. Now, I am sure if he had been kind enough to stick around after the game to talk to reporters, he would have said that he wants to and feels that he should make 'em all. He would agree with the criticism.

But the reality is that nobody makes them all. Akers didn't miss 19 yard attempts, he missed from 43 and 47 yards, and hit from 43, 45 and 45. That's five attempts from 40-49 yards. Leaguewide, kickers have made 70% of their kicks from that distance this year, so the average kicker would be expected to make either 3 of 5 (60%) or 4 of 5 (80%) of his kicks from that distance. And that's what Akers did. He has now made 5-of-7 for the season from 40-49 yards, or 71%, and that puts him at 68-of-100 for his career from that distance. On Sunday, he did what he should have been expected to do given what was asked of him.

Bottom line for me: Akers is an average kicker and in my opinion, he has been for a while now. His days of being elite probably ended about the time of his injury in 2005. There are clearly better players out there, but we could also do a lot worse, and finding a new kicker who would be better is far easier said than done (check out Tampa Bay). Average doesn't mean replacement caliber. It means middle of the NFL.

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Now, on to the rest of the special teams. I didn't have any post for last week, so this covers both week 5 and week 6. First, the teams' best two weeks in terms of grading were the last two:

 
The best player over the past two weeks? Saverio Rocca. That's right, the big Aussie cleaned up in the report card department in week 6. Among coverage guys, Eldra Buckley was the big star. Moise Fokou shows why he is active and Joe Mays is not, and Sean Jones worked hard to show why he should not be deactivated again like he was in week 1.

 
Note that this table puts players with 4 or fewer points combined over weeks 5 and 6 into "All Others". This includes Leonard Weaver and Juqua Parker, who were major contributors in the first three weeks.

Mays Missing On Special Teams

Apparently, Joe Mays is a linebacker who doesn't play special teams. That is a rare variety of LB, and one that, frankly, I am suspicious of. Last year, despite dressing for two games, he wasn't asked to play. This week, he dressed for the first time and again wasn't asked to play. It isn't like we can't use him; we are lining up two starting LBs on STs right now. You have to wonder if he will dress when (ok, if) everyone gets healthy. Heck, you have to wonder if he'd keep his roster spot if they find a veteran linebacker to add to the roster. That's not the player we thought we had prior to Stewart Bradley going down.

[EDIT: Just watched the STs plays for the game quickly. He did play a bit on kick coverage (not every play). But apparently not well enough to get any love from the coaching staff -- or the Eagles media relations folks screwed up the table, which is probably equally likely. He appears for the first time on the kickoff after we made it 14-0 at the end of the first quarter. He then appears for the first time on the punt return unit at the very end of the first half and comes dang close to a pair of blocks in the back. Generally, he doesn't have an impact, he is away from plays or late to them, etc. He gets called out by the announcers at the kickoff to start the second half, but he was piling on, not making a tackle. Closest I saw him come to making a play.]

Other Week 3 special teams observations:

• Brandon Gibson and Reggie Brown also did not play on special teams. Reggie isn't really a surprise. He hadn't been a real member of the STs before and there isn't really any need to start now. Gibson, on the other hand, is a guy that some thought would have an edge on Brown for the imaginary last roster spot because he might be able to contribute on STs. Apparently, not so much.
• With Tracy White replacing him in the nickel defense, Akeem Jordan's special teams role has expanded. Jordan was by far the best special teamer the Eagles had in 2007 and 2008, but that fact was obscured a bit because he was on the practice squad for the first part of 07 and was starting and had his STs role reduced the last part of 08. In short, an increased role is very good news for the special teams units, if not for the defense. Note, it was also nice to see that playing nickel LB didn't hurt White's performance on STs any.
• Akers got some love from the graders for putting all three second half kickoffs into the end zone, two of which were touchbacks.
• I got a good look at Sheldon Brown and Sean Jones jamming the other team's gunner on a couple of punts during the game. Jones in particular was just abusing his man.
• Eldra Buckley hasn't stood out to me on STs since the preseason (he only has one tackle credited to him), but he has been getting pretty solid marks from the staff throughout, and is currently second overall on the team in terms of points. He also is tied for fifth on the team in special teams blocks (14) and is second on the team in number of times being first downfield in coverage (4), so he is doing the dirty work that keeps players like him earning NFL paychecks.
• I agree with Derek: there was no way the Eagles should have fallen for the fake punt. And I saw an article on how the Eagles "only" drew 2 STs flags this week. The mental mistakes this year are hard to fathom. On KRs, I understand the flags somewhat, because the rules with the wedge have changed how those are blocked enough that more holding calls are an expected side effect as teams adjust. What is most baffling is the volume of penalties on the rest of the units.

And now the data. For discussions of what these production points are, see week 1 and week 2 posts.

Play breakdown (this week was all about punt returns and kickoff coverage):

Special Teams Production Points, week 3:

Hangtime And Distance Statistics For Sav Rocca

There is a man who posts regularly on the EMB who goes by the handle "FranklinFldEBUpper". Because that is a mouthful, I will call him "Frank" for the purposes of this post. Since 1988, Frank has kept track of the distance and hang time of every single punt in Eagles games, both by Eagles punters and by their opponents. He has been gracious enough to share his data with me.

Frank has provided me with punt-by-punt detail for the Rocca era -- 2007-2009 -- as well as aggregate season data for the years 1998-2009. The commentary that follows is mine, but the data is attributable to Frank's hard work.

First, a word on methodology. Frank measures the distance that a punt travels from the line of scrimmage to either the point where it lands, or the point where it is marked out of bounds, whichever came first. The determination of starting and ending point is done by Frank based on how the ball appears on his tv screen when he sits down with his stopwatch to time the punt, and as a result may not match the actual yard marker assigned by the NFL. This is especially true when the ball is between the hash marks. However, since we will be looking at how Eagle punters do relative to opponents, and will be using Frank's data exclusively, there is no reason to believe that one set of data will be biased relative to another.

There were a few instances (one or two a year) where it was impossible to properly analyze a punt since the TV coverage failed to show it, as they may have been showing a replay of the third down play at the time, or perhaps the punt was so good that the ball landed outside the view of the camera. In those instances, Frank was forced to simply omit the play entirely. Meanwhile there were a few instances where the hangtime had to be estimated. Sometimes he could actually hear the ball striking the ground (often on the sidelines) and based the hangtime on that. Sometimes it would be apparent that the ball landed in the end zone just beyond the return man and outside the range of the camera. In these instances, he used his best judgment. In cases where it was too difficult to tell, he would simply omit the play, as stated previously.

The aggregate-level data includes pooch punts (defined in the data as punts within 50 yards of the end zone) and free kicks, as well as punts that were scrubbed due to penalty. When I discuss the 2007-2009 results, however, I will remove all three of these categories, as I believe that they skew the results.

Frank has also started keeping track of kickoff hang time and distance this season. As such, there isn't any historical data to go off of, so the numbers presented will be for just 2009.

Historical Punting Statistics

The following chart compares the distance and hang time of punts by Eagles punters and punters from opposing teams from 1998 through 2008.

When looking at this chart, it helps to keep in mind the "eras" of Eagle punters: John Teltschik, 1988-mid 1989; Jeff Feagles, 1990-1993; Tom Hutton, 1995-1998; Sean Landeta, 1999-mid 2002; Dirk Johnson, 2003-2006; and Sav Rocca, 2007-present.

The chart shows a few things that I would have expected. First, Teltschik and Feagles were strong in terms of hang time (Teltschik's 1989 numbers were very similar to 1988 before he got hurt mid-year, and his replacements dragged the average down). Dirk Johnson was not good in terms of hang time. One thing I don't really know what to make of is the spike in opponents' hang time during the Hutton era, as his hang times were not that different from his predecessors.

I also note that both distance and hang time have been on an upward trend, improving by about 2 yards per punt with an extra 0.25 seconds of hang time. That improvement isn't that surprising, as we have seen a similar general improvement in the place kicking game.

Seasonality

It also shouldn't be surprising that the quality of the punt is partially a function of the weather and the season (and of course, whether the punt is indoors or outdoors). I have broken the data from the 2007-2008 regular seasons into months, removing indoor games, as well as pooches, penalties and free kicks, and averaged them.

As you can see, punting in September is a very good thing. The rest of the year is pretty neutral. The yardage is pretty level, and the hang time shows a somewhat surprising spike in December. Not sure what to make of that.

Here is the same chart, with Rocca and opponents graphed separately.

I have to admit, I was quite surprised to see that Rocca's best months (relative to his competition) were October and November. He always struggles with hang time, but that distance narrows in those months, and he seems to get far more distance on his punts than the competition. I had him pegged as a good weather punter. Now, it may be the case that he was so good in nice fall days that it obscures bad play on nasty fall days, but the aggregate data was not what I expected.

2009 Season

Because the data are seasonal, it shouldn't be surprising to learn that Rocca and opponents are both kicking above their averages through the first two games of 2009. It may surprise you to learn the degree to which they are doing so. First, one of my nerdy favorites, a scatter plot of Rocca's September punts (again, excluding pooches, penalties and free kicks) by year.

First, note how outstanding his hang time has been this year relative to prior years. Second, note that in 2009 he has 5 punts of 45 yards or longer. He had 5 in all of September 2007 of 45 yards or longer. He also had 5 in 2008 of that distance. So by those measures, this is the best start to his season of his career.

However, the punting conditions this year appear to have been ideal (or he is facing very good punters, or luck is in the punters' favor so far). Here is a table that shows % of punts traveling 45 or more yards, and % of punts with 4.5 seconds or more of hang time for both Rocca and opponents.

So while Rocca has been good, on the whole, relative to history, the other guy has been even better. Depending on your views of Jason Baker and Thomas Morstead, you can decide on whether that it is a high or low bar.

Another thing worth noting is the frustration over his "shanks" so far. To date, there have been just three punts (non-pooch) that traveled less than 45 yards:

• The second punt against Carolina when 37 yards in the air, and had a hang time of just 3.78 seconds. It was fair caught at the 15, so on a net basis wasn't bad. In terms of hang time, it is the worst of the year.
• The re-kick after the penalty in the first quarter of the New Orleans game was charted at just 34 yards in the air, but had an impressive 4.93 seconds of hang time. It went out of bounds at the New Orleans 47. Not great field position ... but not exactly a shank. 34 net yards isn't great, but given the hang time, even if it had landed in bounds, it was going to have to be fair caught. You can live with that, if that is your worst punt of the day. It wasn't the worst of the day, though.
• The last punt of the day, a 26 yarder in the 4th quarter, had just 4.22 seconds of hang time. Not great for September. This one was a true shank, and was clearly a terrible punt.

I guess my conclusion from the data is that Rocca seems to be consistently an average to below-average punter. He's off to a nice start so far this year quantitatively, but I suspect that those results are the result of favorable conditions rather than an improvement in skill. On the other hand, he hasn't done anything truly disastrous yet, with only one outright poor punt so far, and while his yardage might not always be knocking your socks off, his hang time has been very good, which can be just as important.

We'll track this during the season; hopefully, Rocca's start is more signal than noise. The truth is that I am not sure he gets another chance with the Eagles if he doesn't show improvement this year.

Kickoffs

On to kickoffs. As I noted earlier, Frank has only measured kickoffs for two games so far. I will quote his summary from the EMB:

On the season, Akers is now averaging the ball to the 98 with 3.81 hangtime, while opponents are averaging the ball to the 100 with 4.15 hangtime. That's two more yards with about three tenths more hangtime.

I do worry a little about Akers. It will be interesting to see this evolve through the season, as well, but leg strength is a critical thing for kickers, and age can sap it. Kickoffs can give us a leading indicator of how that leg strength is holding up. However, so far what we have is a very small sample size, so for now I think it is merely something to watch rather than something to worry about.

"Special" Teams: Week 2 Production

This was not a good week for special teams. I think we can all agree on that. The penalties alone were maddening. For this week's analysis, I will present two posts. Today's is a follow-on to last week's special teams production points post. Tomorrow (hopefully) I will present some analysis on distance and hang time for this season on punts and kickoffs in Eagles games, as recorded by one die-hard Eagle fan.

The first thing to keep in mind when looking at the production points awarded this week is that the number and type of plays that the Eagles participated in varied substantially from Week 1. As the table below shows, the Eagles had a lot more kick returns -- and a lot fewer kickoffs -- than the prior week. Note that there was also a free kick return this week that I excluded -- wasn't sure if that was included in production points or not. That would lower the points per play even further to 9.2.

The increase in kick returns will naturally impact guys solely on the return team, such as Victor Abiamiri. It will hurt guys who excel in coverage, such as Dimitri Patterson. Here are the individual results, sorted by week 2 output:

My general takeaways:

• Sean Jones did NOT like being deactivated (or taking a pay cut) last week. He just crushed it on special teams this week. While I pointed out last week that it is hard to compare these numbers across years, last year there weren't a lot of performances of 30 or more points in a week. Akeem Jordan had 4 before joining the starting lineup, Quintin Demps had 3, and Sean Considine and Tracy White each had 1. So this was an exceptional effort, a silver lining to a bad day.
• We missed Quintin Demps and Dimitri Patterson. Of course, Patterson played some, but the hand hindered him. Those two should be our top two coverage guys. Having them at 100% would have made a difference, I think.
• Quintin Mikell joined Sheldon Brown in playing special teams. It seems like we shouldn't have to be using starting DBs to play special teams, especially when guys who aren't starting like Ellis Hobbs and Joselio Hanson are contributing relatively little.
• As you can see, players can get negative points in a week. Apparently Daisher wasn't so cool with Jackson's decision making on punt returns this week.

Week 1 Special Teams Production

During the season, the Eagles provide weekly updates of "Special Teams Production Points". These points are a black box in terms of how they are awarded, and in fact, the methodology varies greatly from coach to coach. For example, it appears that Ted Daisher no longer awards points to linemen blocking for kicks -- something that John Harbaugh and Rory Segrest had done. He also breaks from Harbaugh and Segrest in that he awards points to return men -- last year, DeSean Jackson finished the year with zero; he got 18 this year in week 1. Finally, grading is quite subjective in general. Rory Segrest was a more generous grader than John Harbaugh. That doesn't mean his units or his players performed any better. All of which makes comparing STs points across seasons difficult to do.

All that said, one thing that a subjective grading system can tell us is who the coaching staff was impressed with from week to week, and who they were not impressed with, and who participated to any meaningful degree. And we get a way of comparing different players and their relative performance on units where most guys participating don't even appear on your tv screen for most of the play.

So, without further ado, here is the Week 1 Special Teams Production Points as copied out of the Eagles' weekly game release:

A few takeaways from this table:

• That's why Dimitri Patterson and Tracy White are on the team. These guys are top-notch special teams guys, and they performed as such on Sunday.
• Moise Fokou did a nice job. I think it is going to be very difficult deciding whether he or Mays is activated each week. Cointinuing to put in a strong effort on STs can make that decision easier. Mays didn't play STs last year even in the couple of games where he was active, so it isn't clear whether he is any good in this area or not.
• Quintin Demps was disappointing. Last year, he was one of the top performers on special teams. Clearly he was penalized for his stupid play on the punt, and he missed some of the game with an injury, so that hurt. The unit would really benefit from strong play from him this year -- he has the ability to be the best player on special teams.
• Sheldon Brown played a lot of special teams. I found that to be quite surprising while watching the game. I don't know if it was because Demps got hurt, but he usually isn't a big participant for this team. Last year he had 16 points all season. Juqua Parker also played a good deal -- he was always a very good special teamer for us before he became a starter, and one benefit of his demotion is that he is back on STs.
• Hank Baskett was nowhere to be found. He was 10th on the team last year with 9.2 points per game ... and scored just 1 point on Sunday. And now he's gone. The two facts are probably related. Alex Smith is another guy whom I would have expected to show up but didn't.

Guys That Don't Play Special Teams

- Posted by Sam -

This post is primarily motivated by the continued harping on the "difficulty" of keeping McNabb, Kolb and Vick active on game day. The theory is that if we keep Vick active, we will have to deactivate a special teams guy. Of course, nobody has actually asked if that is really the choice that will be made. So I did a little research.

On a roster, there are a lot of guys who don't play special teams (and by that, I mean coverage and blocking guys, not return specialists). Your 3-down players typically don't play special teams, though situational players do (for example, on the Eagles, the nickel corner and a LB who comes off the field in nickel situations both typically play STs). Veterans don't play special teams. Fat guys usually don't play special teams (backup DTs not named Klecko, for example, don't play at all, while OL not named Justice are usually asked to block on FGs and XPs) unless they are used in the wedge. Backup QBs don't play special teams, unless they are holders on kicks.

Last year I kept track of the Eagles' "Special Teams Production Points" by game. I confess, STs Points is a "black box" statistic, published by the team without any real explanation for how it is earned. However, it is clear that more points is better than less and zero points means you didn't do anything notable on special teams that game.

If 3-down players and QBs are excluded, then we get the following number of active players who didn't record a production point each week during the regular season.

Now, a few notes about that. Early in the year, there are  lot of guys who aren't playing -- or at least playing well -- on special teams. I will get into that more later. After the bye week, that number falls when Tracy White and Kyle Eckel are added to the team. Then, following the Cincinnati and Baltimore debacles, there is another level shift through to the end of the year. The one outlier that should be disregarded is the Washington game in Week 16. Very low scoring, and if you were on the kickoff or FG/XP team, you didn't get much of a chance to record any points. So that is a false spike.

More interesting is a look at the culprits:

Fat guys:

• Winston Justice: Did not record a point in 13 of his 14 active games. Anyone else remember the 14th?
• Darren Howard: Old DL.
• Trevor Laws: One of the two guys that started playing STs starting after the Cin/Balt meltdown. Though the cause was probably Nick Cole moving out of the wedge and into the starting offensive line.

Veterans:

• Lito Sheppard: Here's the other guy who didn't play STs until the season was on the line in the last five or six weeks.
• Correll Buckhalter: I'm being a little disingenuous in including Buck. He recorded 37 points on the season, but 26 of those were in two good weeks (2 and 9), so he was generally not much of a contributor. But he rarely was responsible for the zeros mentioned above. He would have a 1 or a 2.
• Reggie Brown: Recorded no special teams point at all in the entire year. In fact, Reggie has recorded 9 points in his entire career. Part of that is because he was a starter for much of that time. He didn't have that excuse last year, and certainly doesn't have it this year.
• LJ Smith: Early in the year, LJ was playing ... but playing hurt. They kept him off of STs during that time.
• Matt Schobel: Failing to record a point in 3 of the 7 games he was active, this is yet another reason this guy's continued presence on the team is baffling.

Young and Not Trusted -- Or Perhaps Incapable:

• Lorenzo Booker: Active weeks 1-9 and 13-14, Booker did squat on special teams. And it was the number one reason he stopped getting activated -- and will probably be a big reason he doesn't make the team this year.
• Tony Hunt: That's right, everyone, Tony Hunt was a disaster not just at RB and FB but on STs. He recorded 21 points (that is a lot) in week 1 ... and finished his Eagles career with 21 points. Which is why he still hasn't gotten an invite to try out for another NFL team, as far as I know.
• Joe Mays: This one was a bit perplexing. Mays was only activated for two games, but you'd think the coaches would have run him out on special teams. They didn't. No idea why.

Of the guys listed above, all of the veterans except Reggie Brown and Matt Schobel (for now) are gone. Hunt is gone, and Booker will likely follow, and Mays will play STs if he is active and not starting this year. The fat guys remain.

That means that there are actually a few openings for guys who won't play STs on the active roster. Figure that there are three. Likely candidates include:

• Jeremy Maclin: If the guy isn't returning kicks or punts, he almost certainly isn't going to be asked to play at all on special teams. Too young, and drafted too highly at a skill position for that job.
• LeSean McCoy: See Maclin, but without a chance of being a return specialist.
• Mike Vick: Quarterback. Much discussed.
• Leonard Weaver: It isn't that he can't play STs, I just can't find much evidence that he did in Seattle or has done so here in the preseason. If he doesn't play here, Thomas Tapeh may be due an apology from a certain coach.

And that's it, right? Therefore, I think that ultimately the main cost of activating three QBs will be at worst asking Leonard Weaver to play special teams. Which doesn't seem like that much of a cost to me. Certainly, we are talking about adding him to a roster with a lot less dead weight on special teams.

Wow, An ST Signing Worked

Since the end of last season, the Eagles have brought in a couple handfuls of guys who were supposed to help the special teams.  With only a couple partial exceptions, this hasn't really worked out. 

Thanks to the weekly ST production tracking of reader/commenter "shlynch," we know that Tank Daniels is the only "new guy" in the team's top ten most productive players.  And even he's a repeat visitor. 

Shlynch sent me the updated numbers after the last game, though, and folks, we finally have a winner.  Reserve linebacker -- the guy who won't be getting an Igglesblog Christmas present this year because he took Tony Hunt's roster spot -- made an immediate impact, putting up 35 production points in his first game with the Eagles.  That's the biggest number anyone's dropped all year (Akeem Jordan has a 33 and a 34). 

So it looks like the team may finally have found someone.

While we're on the topic of special teams, what's going on right now with Sav Rocca?  I don't think his kicking last week was a consistency issue.  It looked like a couple of times he saw the returner lined up pretty deep, so he actually took something off the ball, trying to make it un-fieldable.  So rather than, say, a 50 yard punt and eight yard return, he was going for just 42 yards, no return.

The thing is, it didn't really work.  The first punt came back 16 yards. 

Or maybe I'm overthinking this and Sav is still just inconsistent.  After all, that last punt (you know, the one that was "muffed") only traveled 34 yards.  And it was definitely catchable. 

Wonder what's up there.

Special Teams Production

Reader shlynch keeps a weekly tracking log of all special teams production points, as collected by the team's official game releases, which is why he's always so much better informed than the rest of us are on those return/coverage questions.

I've pulled a selection from this week's sheet, focusing on the top end of the production and taking out the starting offensive linemen who seem to get points just for standing there.  Here are the results through six weeks:

A few things jump out here:

1)  The signing of the new LB was taken as a shot across the bow of current special teams linebackers Akeem Jordan and Tank Daniels.  Maybe that's the case for Daniels, but Jordan seem to be pretty consistently near the top each week in terms of production.  Even Tank put up a big game this week.  I realize these are cumulative numbers -- so a guy playing in most phases during a week with a lot of special teams plays may have inflated numbers -- but still, Jordan at least seems to be doing fine.

2)  Compare the chart above to the year-end charts for 2007 and 2006:

Baskett and Avant have more of a role in the offense this year, but it's not so large that they can't run down the field 10 times a game.  Interesting to see that change from last year's two top contributors.

3)  Look down that first chart a bit to see who suddenly pops up in the sixth week.  Quintin Mikell seems to be back on special teams.  I thought Segrest told us at the beginning of the year that he'd have him more all season.  Maybe Johnson nixed that idea until things got a little ugly.

4)  I'm not sure how a punter gets -1 points, especially when he only punts twice and the second one pins the other team at the 12-yard-line.  They must have really hammered him for that short line drive he unleashed in the first. 

Talking Special Teams

Two poor performances in two weeks have really put the focus on the Eagles' special teams.  This is one of my favorite topics, so let's dig into it a bit.

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#1 -- For fans without access to game film -- i.e., all of us -- it is really, really hard to evaluate the performance of the special teams.

Obviously, we can see the results.  If you go an entire season without a kickoff return of longer than 35 yards, then clearly you have a problem.  But without access to game film, we really have no idea what that problem is, since we see three things on the average special teams play:  1) the snap, 2) the ball in the air, and 3) the tackle.  That cuts out the whole "run down field and try to make/beat blocks" phase.  Which is kind of the important part.

#2 -- Special teams performance is very much a "weakest link" type of thing.

If nine guys fulfill their assignments on a play, but one guy slips and misses his block, the returner is likely to get plastered.  (Same thing happens when everyone misses his block.)  That's yet another thing that makes it hard to evaluate preseason special teams, since the coaches could be rotating in a guy who won't be there in a couple weeks.

#3 -- It's simply not true that the problems began when John Harbaugh vacated the special teams coordinator role.

This seems to be a popular theme on the message boards right now, but it's just not true:

 

Eagles fans have been complaining about the special teams for at least two years now (in hindsight, calling 2005 a "disaster" is almost funny, given how much worse things have gotten since then). 

Heck, the Eagles conspiracy theorist in me even wondered if the Harbaugh's move away from special teams was really as voluntary as suggested.  (Not one of the brighter points I've ever made.)

The problems clearly began in 2005 and have worsened ever since.  They certainly bottomed out last year, but to lay all this at the feet of Segrest just isn't right -- especially because of points #1 and #2 above.

#4 -- Akers is clearly a concern, but...

The league's made field goal percentage on kicks of 40-to-49 yards was 76 percent.  Those aren't gimmes.  Missing a 45-yarder in the first preseason game doesn't mean he's done.  (Although one more...) 

The other thing to point out about Akers is that he seems to be absolutely bombing the ball off the tee this year.  Yes, the missed field goals can be killers, but if Akers can give us five bonus yards every time he kicks off, that's going to add up.

#5 -- It's a little strange to say that the Eagles weren't aware / didn't try to fix the problem.

Reid went so far as to call the performance on special teams last year "horrendous."  They knew there was a problem.  That's why they went out and drafted or signed:

• DeSean Jackson
• Quintin Demps
• Luke Lawton
• Rocky Boiman
• Dan Klecko
• Kris Wilson
• And ...... Lorenzo Booker (heh)

They've also gone out of their way to let the bubble guys know that special teams performance will be an important deciding factor in final cuts.  Finally, Segrest has talked about using standouts like Quintin Mikell more on STs during the regular season than he was able to last year.

The kick return situation is unnerving, particularly given what happened last year.  But if the problems don't get fixed, it won't be for lack of bodies.