mansquatch wrote:Jim, IMO the increase in PA in 2016 was a direct correlation to the terrible PF the team was producing over the same stretch. I suspect an interesting analysis to compare the 2016 team vs. the 2013 SEA club would be the amount of rushing snaps the two defenses faced. If I were to venture a guess, it would be that the 2016 Vikings saw quite a few more since they were constantly struggling against their own inept offense.
It's actually less. The 2016 Vikings faced 404 rushing attempts from their opponents. the 2013 Seahawks defense faced 422.
The main take away I get is that offensive production affects defensive performance far more than the opposite since offensive production most often results in points while defensive production most often results in possessions.
Generally speaking, I think the influence of one unit on the other is pretty equal. Obviously, when the offense is bad in a game where the defense plays well that hurts the defense more and vice versa. I just mean that, all things being equal, the offense and defense of a team exert a similar degree of influence over one another in the NFL.
In 2016 the vikings OL crippled the majority of our positions, significantly reducing the advantage we gained from our defense.
So shift this to our achilles heel in '16, the OL. TJ Clemmings AKA the Saboteur, hampered all by himself something like 40% of the drives he played on due to penalties and awful pass protection, 2016 That is a massive detriment to the team. I know guys are not that excited by Reif / Remmers, but they probably have the potential of reducing the OL sabotage by a massvie margin (over 50%) just by playing below average NFL football.
That should provide an improvement to our PF, which if you buy the above should also lead to an improvement in our Rush D and PA numbers.
I see your point but I'm not sure I can fully buy into it. I think the run defense had problems simply because the run defense has problems. I thought the PA numbers got worse after the bye because offenses figured out more effective ways to attack the defense, which had some clear areas of vulnerability. Now, if the offense can score more effectively next year, that certainly would take some pressure off the defense but I think the defense itself needs work if it's going to become the kind of elite unit that can carry the team to a championship, which seems to be what people are banking on...