Good News, Bad News: Patriots Offensive Totals Through 5 Games
(PHOTO: Raj Mehta - USA TODAY Sports) 🕑 Read Time: 3 minutes
Posted Under: 2018 Patriots Regular Season
(PHOTO: Raj Mehta - USA TODAY Sports) 🕑 Read Time: 3 minutes
New England Patriots > Patriots Blog
(PHOTO: Raj Mehta - USA TODAY Sports) Some interesting numbers after five weeks for the Patriots offense, with a different take on some stats after comparing some totals at this point last season.
Here’s a little good news, bad news after looking things over:
Bad News: Rob Gronkowski doesn’t have a red zone reception so far through five games on just one target.
Good News: Gronkowski had just one red zone reception (a touchdown) in 2017 on six targets at this point, so he’s not far off from where he was last season in that regard.
Bad News: The Patriots have 443 fewer total receiving yards so far than they had at this time last year.
Good News: They have more red zone receiving yards (114yds) than they had at this point last season (107yds).
Bad News: The Patriots have fewer receiving first downs (63) than they had at this point last season (79).
Good News: They actually have one more receiving touchdown (12) than they had at this point last season (11).
 Gronk currently leads the Patriots in receiving yards. (USA TODAY Images) |
Bad News: The Patriots have just two receivers with 200+ yards receiving, with only Gronkowski eclipsing the 300+ plateau. Last season at this point, the Patriots had five receivers with 200+ yards, including two who were over 300. Gronkowski (318yds) and former Patriots wideout Brandin Cooks (379) were the two with those totals.
Good News: This season the Patriots have 11 receivers with double-digit yardage totals compared to 10 last season. Not exactly a huge positive, but a positive nonetheless.
Bad News: The Patriots have just two receiving plays of 30+ yards so far this season compared to eight at this point last season.
Good News: None…that isn’t good. However, both of those plays occurred in each of the last two games (Patterson’s 55-yd TD against the Dolphins, and Josh Gordon’s terrific 34-yd touchdown Thursday night against Indy) so hopefully, it’s a sign of things to come.
Good News: Tom Brady has thrown for more second-half touchdowns (5) than he had at this point last season (3).
Bad News: Four of his six interceptions so far this season have all come in the second half. He hadn’t thrown any in the second half at this point in 2017.
Good News: For the most part, the Patriots offense has done a good job of staying out of long-yardage situations on offense, especially on 3rd down. At this point last season they had already faced 3rd-and-10 seven times compared to just four this season, along with having been up against 3rd-and-over-10 yards twelve times compared to just eight this season.
Bad News: They’re 0-for-4 converting on those 3rd-and-10 attempts while converting just 2-of-8 on 3rd-and-over-10. Again, obviously, not great news but that should also hopefully improve moving forward.
Bad News: Through four games, Tom Brady was just 15-of-30 (50%) for 143-yards with 1 TD and 2 INTs in the first quarter, compared to 33-of-49 (67%) for 433-yards and 4 TDs last season.
Good News: After the Colts game, where he was 12-of-13 for 105-yards and 1 TD, Brady’s first quarter completion percentage jumped to 63% with his totals now sitting at 27-of-43 for 248yds, 2TDs, 2INTs. Players who helped raise that stat last Thursday night include James White (4/4 38yds), Julian Edelman (3/4 28yds), Corradelle Patterson (2/2 11yds, 1TD) and Rob Gronkowski (1/1 19yds). This improvement has been key as the Patriots have scored 10 of their current season total of 19 first-quarter points over the last two games.
Good News: Dwayne Allen actually has a reception through five games, which is certainly better than the 0-for-6 total he carried through the same number of games last season.
Bad News: That one catch went for a 4-yard loss.
LEFTOVERS:
– Sony Michel is ahead of last year’s leader at this point, Mike Gillislee, with Michel carrying the football 67 times for 294-yards along with 2 touchdowns while averaging 4.4 yards-per-carry. That’s better than Gillislee’s 69 rushes for 246 yards, which was an average of 3.6 yards. However, Gillislee also led all rushers at the time with four touchdowns.
– At this point last season, Chris Hogan had 23 receptions for 288 yards and a team-leading 5 touchdowns. So far this year Hogan has just 11 receptions for 143-yards and 2 touchdowns, just one reception ahead of newcomer Corradelle Patterson (10 catches, 10yds, and 2TDs). With Gordon and Edelman potentially taking the focus off of him, Hogan’s production should hopefully improve.
– One final related stat for Hogan, he had five red zone receptions at this point last season, with four touchdowns after being targeted nine times. He’s been targeted just once thus far in 2018, which was a 7-yard touchdown.
– It’s hard to believe that James White didn’t have a touchdown reception at this point last season, but so far in 2018 he already has a team-best 4 touchdowns. He also leads the team in receptions so far with 32 receptions for 270-yards. He also led the team at this point last year with 29-catches for 230 yards, ahead of Hogan (23) and Amendola (23), followed by Gronkowski (20) and Cooks (18), who rounded out the top 5 in that category.
– Tom Brady has 8 red zone touchdowns so far, which is actually one better than the 7 he had at this point last season. White (4), Phillip Dorsett (2), Hogan (1) and Patterson (1) are the ones who get the credit for that total. Last season it was Hogan (4), Danny Amendola (1), Rex Burkhead (1) and Rob Gronkowski (1) who each accounted for that total.
For a more detailed look at much more sortable stats, view our Stats Page:
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