Kick-off and Punt Coverage, Worst Since 1949 & 1989

[red]

the bitch of it is, we don't even use those rules to our advantage

crosby has more then enough leg to kick it deep into the endzone, or out of the back of the endzone. yet we're one of the teams that chooses to be cute and kick the ball high and to the goal line, forcing the other team to bring it out so we can stop them short of the 20

problem is, we rarely stop a team short of the 20

we would have been much better off letting mason kick deep and just let teams start at the 20

why wouldn't you try and limit the amount of returns when your coverage units are massive liabilities?

who's call is that? is that slocum or m3?

[PaCkFan_n_MD]

Exactly why I was yelling at the TV when Hester was killing us this year. I wish we would do more of that too

[channtheman]

Slocum will get that fixed.

[Guiness]

Slocum will get that fixed.

QF...QF? Quoted for something, not sure what!

[Freak Out]

Wow, I knew it was bad, especially the kick-off coverage, but this surprised me:

If that type of performance doesn't get someone fired I don't know what will. Unbelievable.

[HarveyWallbangers]

According to Football Outsiders DVOA rankings, it looks like our punt coverage was actually in the top 10 in the league. Our kickoff coverage was 4th worst in the league for KOR avg and 3rd worst according to DVOA. However, we had the second most kickoffs returned in the league. It just seemed like this year that kickoff return average was up with the new rules, so if you had the second most returns against you, it would seem to skew the DVOA stats--especially in a division that includes the top two in kickoff return yardage and two of the top five in kickoff return average (Patterson, Hester). It seemed like we were okay in punt coverage and bad (but not historically bad) in kickoff coverage. I do think injuries affected the coverage teams.

[HarveyWallbangers]

We did well against Hester in kickoff coverage (~23 yards/return), but his two punt returns netted big yardage (~30 yards/return).

[Patler]

You're right if you are talking about total yardage, but not averages which is what Palter presented. For example, say team A returns 20 punts for an 8 yard average and team B returns 40 punts also for an 8 yard average. Then say the next return for each team (number 21 of team A and number 41 for team B) was a 60yard return. The new average for team A is 10.5 yard average and team B's new average is 9.3 yard average.

The team with fewer opportunities to return punts will have its average affected more by a few big returns.

Well, you can also argue that with fewer returns the chance of giving up a long return is less, and the impact of a mishandled kick resulting in an inordinately short return is greater with fewer returns.

An average is an average, and so long as the sample size is significant the comparison has merit. If they gave up one long return in 20 opportunities, if they had been given 40 opportunities they probably would have given up 2 long returns and the average stayed about the same. After all, they didn't suck just a couple times, they sucked most of the year.


With respect to the new rules for kickoffs, for what its worth, in 1948, Packer opponents returned only 22 kickoffs for 611 yards. (27.8 yard average). One was returned for a TD (I don't know the length). In 2013, the Packers covered 61 returns. If a team was disadvantaged by a small sample size, it was the team in 1948, not this year. You might have to go back even further to find kick coverage worse than 2013.

Besides, with how prolific scoring has become, even with the new kickoff rules, the Packers are covering more KO returns now than the teams until the mid '90s or so. The difference in the number of returns caused by the rule change is not that significant.

[Bretsky]

It must be the injuries....seriously...Patler's stats back up what I've been seeing as a bad trend

I don't get how one can defend the guy....and MM...............well...........pull head out of hole.............

[red]

According to Football Outsiders DVOA rankings, it looks like our punt coverage was actually in the top 10 in the league. Our kickoff coverage was 4th worst in the league for KOR avg and 3rd worst according to DVOA. However, we had the second most kickoffs returned in the league. It just seemed like this year that kickoff return average was up with the new rules, so if you had the second most returns against you, it would seem to skew the DVOA stats--especially in a division that includes the top two in kickoff return yardage and two of the top five in kickoff return average (Patterson, Hester). It seemed like we were okay in punt coverage and bad (but not historically bad) in kickoff coverage. I do think injuries affected the coverage teams.

i don't know what the hell DVOA stands for, but going off of cold hard stats, we gave up on average 13.1 yards per punt return. which based on average per return ranks us at #29 of of 32 team, 4th from last

thats gotta be some really goofy math to somehow take that number and turn it into a number that somehow ranks us in the top 10 for punt coverage units

its funny looking up the stats, the next worst team average wise, the giants (13.6), gave up 3 punt returns for td's, we gave up none. in fact our longest return against us was 49. so there were no big giant returns to help skew those numbers. we were just consistently bad

[PaCkFan_n_MD]

Well, you can also argue that with fewer returns the chance of giving up a long return is less, and the impact of a mishandled kick resulting in an inordinately short return is greater with fewer returns.

An average is an average, and so long as the sample size is significant the comparison has merit. If they gave up one long return in 20 opportunities, if they had been given 40 opportunities they probably would have given up 2 long returns and the average stayed about the same. After all, they didn't suck just a couple times, they sucked most of the year.


With respect to the new rules for kickoffs, for what its worth, in 1948, Packer opponents returned only 22 kickoffs for 611 yards. (27.8 yard average). One was returned for a TD (I don't know the length). In 2013, the Packers covered 61 returns. If a team was disadvantaged by a small sample size, it was the team in 1948, not this year. You might have to go back even further to find kick coverage worse than 2013.

Besides, with how prolific scoring has become, even with the new kickoff rules, the Packers are covering more KO returns now than the teams until the mid '90s or so. The difference in the number of returns caused by the rule change is not that significant.

Not sure were you find all those stats, but I would love to see the number of kicks covered spread out over the last 20-30 years. 61 kicks covered this year doesn't mean much to me because I'm not sure how many kicks were normally covered before the rule changes compared to now. Another thing I wonder is a lot of kicks are taken out from 5 yards deep into the end zone. Maybe that's also why I don't feel like its as bad as it sounds. I wonder what the opponents average starting field position was compared to years past?

[Carolina_Packer]

The general theme is set. We suck at taking on blockers and making tackles both on ST and Defense. I have said it 20 times if I have said it once...we need to change the way we practice (and it will help with the injuries as well).

By saying we, do you mean Green Bay or NFL teams collectively? Did your point have to do with the reduction in the amount of practice under the new CBA, or the way the Packers currently conduct their practices? If the former, then wouldn't that affect all teams in a similar way?

Green Bay needs good, tough football players who take coaching well, are assignment sure, and aren't treated as a second-tier marginal type of players on the team, and find guys who take pride in being on special teams. That said, you can't change all the players on special teams and start over, so it would be far more practical to fire the coordinator. They clearly need another messenger.

[bobblehead]

By saying we, do you mean Green Bay or NFL teams collectively? Did your point have to do with the reduction in the amount of practice under the new CBA, or the way the Packers currently conduct their practices? If the former, then wouldn't that affect all teams in a similar way?

Green Bay needs good, tough football players who take coaching well, are assignment sure, and aren't treated as a second-tier marginal type of players on the team, and find guys who take pride in being on special teams. That said, you can't change all the players on special teams and start over, so it would be far more practical to fire the coordinator. They clearly need another messenger.

I meant green bay, and i think that MM and the CBA form a horrendous storm of non contact.

[HarveyWallbangers]

i don't know what the hell DVOA stands for, but going off of cold hard stats, we gave up on average 13.1 yards per punt return. which based on average per return ranks us at #29 of of 32 team, 4th from last

thats gotta be some really goofy math to somehow take that number and turn it into a number that somehow ranks us in the top 10 for punt coverage units

its funny looking up the stats, the next worst team average wise, the giants (13.6), gave up 3 punt returns for td's, we gave up none. in fact our longest return against us was 49. so there were no big giant returns to help skew those numbers. we were just consistently bad

Might have to do with the fact that only 20 punts were returned against us--which happened to be 3rd fewest in the NFL behind San Diego and Chicago. The league average seems to be around the mid to upper 30s. And that number only includes 5 that were touchbacks out of 64 punts. About 1/3 were fair caught and about 1/3 were downed inside the 20 (I'm assuming most of those were not returned).

When there are so few returns, a couple of big ones can really change the stats. Kind of like a backup RB with few touches can have an impressive yards/carry based off busting a long run or two.

Our punting net average was around league average.

[Patler]

Not sure were you find all those stats, but I would love to see the number of kicks covered spread out over the last 20-30 years. 61 kicks covered this year doesn't mean much to me because I'm not sure how many kicks were normally covered before the rule changes compared to now. Another thing I wonder is a lot of kicks are taken out from 5 yards deep into the end zone. Maybe that's also why I don't feel like its as bad as it sounds. I wonder what the opponents average starting field position was compared to years past?

Annual stats are available on several sites. I often go to http://www.pro-football-reference.com becasue they have a nice simple format.

Immediately before the rule change, generally the Packers covered 70-80 returns each year. If you go to pre-1995 the league was more defensive, with fewer scores and fewer kickoffs. The further back you go, you have fewer games/year and even fewer kickoffs.