Dave's Verse

For most of this season I've been complaining about how the Dolphins have called plays. My eyeball test was telling me that they were running the ball way too much on 1st down, which was having the effect of not gaining many yards (even good running teams gain less per rush than bad passing teams gain per pass), thus making it harder to make a first down on 2nd and 3rd down. Not wanting to rely just on my eyeballs, I kept track of the playcalling vs Seattle. Here is the rundown: 1st down: 18 runs 10 passes 2nd down: 6 runs 11 passes 3rd down: 3 runs 7 passes You can see the big disparity on 1st down, which obviously has a direct effect on what you do on the next two downs. We ran the ball better against Seattle than we have since the first week or two of the season. But even then, we are in the bottom half of the league in yards gained per rush. So on average, when we run the ball on 1st down we are leaving Tannehill with about 7 yards to gain on the next two downs. I don...

That's not a question I thought I'd be pondering coming into this season. The consensus was the opposite, that Bess and Hartline would make up one of the worst receiving corps in the league after we traded Brandon Marshall. But that hasn't been the case. Let's look at their standard stats. Hartline: 29 catches 514 yards 17.7 yards per catch 1 TD Bess: 22 catches 346 yards 15.7 yards per catch 0 TD Hartline is leading the league in yards and Bess is 19th. Hartline is 8th in YPC and Bess is 18th. They aren't catching many TDs. But they are really racking up the yards, and with a rookie QB throwing them the ball. So by standard stats they are doing very well. The advanced stats show them in even better light. Bess leads all WRs in win probability added . Hartline is 16th. This is significant because win probability is telling us how much a player is helping his team win. Brian Burke explains it here . Long story short, Bess is ranked so high because he catches...