1st downs & 3rd down conversions & thoughts

[Millhouse]

Bengals are currently:

8th getting most First Downs overall (105 broken down below) (tied with 4 teams) . Dallas leads with 120, and leads in below stats too.
     - 24 rushing, 69 passing, 12 penalties
10th in 3rd down attempts (66)

28th in 3rd downs converted (20)

30th in 3rd down conv % (30.3%) , Dallas has 50%


There are quite a few discussions going around about the o-line, Zampese, missing Eifert etc. Here are some numbers that can be used for a lot of that talk right now. The way these numbers look to me, is that the offense can move the ball. We are 10th I believe in total yards, so they can move it at times. They are getting first downs more on 1st and 2nd down obviously as the numbers show. But once they get a 3rd down, they have been pretty dreadful. 

From my viewpoint, the bullseyes should be squarely on the o-line and Zampese in that order. Because until they improve a lot on 3rd downs, this team is definitely not going anywhere regardless of other impeding reasons.

[sixxfan26]

The only number that matters to most is actually a letter... and it's a W.

For instance, AD is currently, what? 3rd in the NFL for passing yards. But our team has a 2-3 record right now. And quite honestly, it has a crap-ton to do with the poor performance of the OL. How many times has Dalton been sacked this season already? Hurried? Hit? I'm amazed that his passing yards are so high since he only has like 1.5 seconds to get rid of the ball. And then, he can't find an open receiver because A) the receivers haven't had time to get separation, or B) the defense has already realized that AD is out of the pocket and on the run. 

Here's a number for ya: 90% would agree, the OL sucks right now.

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

They get -2 to 2 yards on 1st down rushing, then their success is dependent upon getting a completion on 2nd down for a good gain.

If they don't, they are stuck at 3rd and 8 or so, and the defense knows you have to pass, so they just pin their ears back and the OL sucks.

They can't improve on 3rd down until they improve their running game, which they often use on 1st down.

[bengalsturntup926]

We are back to the same problem, not getting good yardage on first down.

[Brownshoe]

The play calling is horrible and putting us in bad positions. We are constantly in 3rd and long and have to rely on the pass game to get us out of the hole. We can't run the ball well either because of the OL. With the combo of those two things are killing this offense. If we had either of those playing decent it would fix a lot. It just sucks we couldn't pick up a legit OC in the offseason.

[*bengalfan74*]

You nailed it:

O-line is horrible to say the least. They miss assignments, don't sustain blocks, and show little effort on many plays.

Then you have The Zam meister whom has no idea how to fix it and just slings plays against the wall and hopes something sticks.

As bad as the the defense has been gashed at times it's our offense that's in a world of hurt and Eifert (If he can avoid hurting his big toe this week) isn't going to change much !

I'm keeping fingers crossed the light will come on at end of season for MB. What else can we do ?