by DeadRinger » Mon Jun 26, 2017 6:58 am
For those who think Crab wasn't getting targeted as much in the 2nd half of the season because they were feeding Coop, that ain't right.
First off all, Crab was targeted 145 times total last season, Cooper only 132.
And 70 of those targets to Crab came in the 2nd half of the season, compared to 75 in the first half.
So you tell me how a difference of 5 targets translates into 4 fewer TDs and 135 fewer yds?
And anyone who says that teams were double and triple-teaming Crab late in the year in order to force us to throw to Amari motherfucking Cooper one-on-one - the pro bowler who was top-40 on the top-100 players list, I'll fucking slap you. And not just because it makes absolutely NO sense, but because the stats say it's bullshit.
But unfortunately it's not just Crab. I've looked deeper into this and the truth is fucking bizarre. Cooper's numbers look actually worse than Crab's (except for TD production where he had 2 in the first half and 3 in the 2nd). Dominant in the first half, LESS THAN HALF the receiving yds in the 2nd half.
AND Coop's catch % fell from 66% in the first half to 58% in the 2nd. PLUS, he had 4 100-yd games in H1, and not a single one in H2. Not even CLOSE to a 100-yd game.
Now in Coop's case, I'm willing to believe that defenses were keying on him and contesting more passes. Unfortunately, Crabtree was on vacation and therefore unable to capitalize on the slack coverage he was seeing while Coop was getting mauled.
Carr had 440 fewer passing yds in the 2nd half (I used his per game average for week 16, when he was out, for the sake of consistency).
Our run game is the only fucking thing that remained consistent throughout the season., because the passing game reverted back to the bed and breakfast version.
Looking at everything in totality, I don't put as much on Crab as I did before, although I DO think he either gets tired, scared of taking more hits, or a bit lazy in the 2nd half.
I blame the vast majority of this shit on motherfucking MUSGRAVE and it was a brilliant move for JD to fire that piece of shit. YOU CANNOT FINISH WEAK IN THE NFL. The fact that we went 12-4 last season wasn't just lucky, it was a God-given miracle. We should have been 9-7. We had no business making the playoffs with this kind of crap going on.
BETTER be a playoff win in 2022.