[1491 words and ready to be graded]
Although the preseason doesn´t mean anything for the upcoming season, I wanted to take a closer look at the 4 preseason games from my new team, the London Royals. All data is taken from the Index. Per game I will evaluate the important team stats and the player specific stats for the QB and the RBs from the Royals. To cover all positions would be too much for this post.
At the end there will be averages of the stats from all 4 games and resulting conclusions.
Week 1: Royals @ Birddogs W 38-17
In the first game the Royals convincingly defeated Dallas in a duel between the two new expansion teams and the Jack brothers as starting QBs and top two picks of the draft.
Looking at the team stats, you can see two very different approaches from both teams going into the game. While Dallas had 40 passing and 26 rushing attempts, the Royals focused more on the run with 43 rushing, but only 19 passing attempts.
Despite losing with 21 points difference, the Birddogs had 5 more total yards and a little bit more time of posession. The run-heavy style of London led to 264 rushing yards, while only passing for 62. On the other hand, Dallas had 211 passing yards, but only rushed for 120 yards.
Before the game I thought that both teams would be focusing more on passing with their two awesome QBs. So it was a bit surprising that the Royals ran that often, but it seemed to work. While QB Colbie Jack averaged 5.2 yards on his 12 completions with two touchdowns and achieved a passer rating of 81.5, the three RBs from London averaged 6.1 yards and scored three times. Especially the long 74 yard run from Batista is worth noting. He was also the RB who scored all three touchdowns with only 9 attempts and had more than 10 yards rushing per attempt.
Week 2: Royals vs. Luchadores L 10-20
In the second game and the first game at home in London the Royals couldn´t carry on with their performance and suffered a loss against the Luchadores led by QB Waters.
Similar to the first week, London put their focus on the running game with 38 attempts, while only throwing the ball 14 times. On the other hand the Luchadores used a good mixture of running and passing with 34 attempts throwing the ball and 43 times rushing the ball.
Overall, Tijuana had 100 more total yards and possessed the ball for 35 minutes. A big part of the reason can be seen in the turnovers. The Royals turned the ball over 4 times with 3 lost fumbles in contrast to 2 turnovers from the Luchadores.
This week Jack only had a passer rating of 47.3, mainly because of his interception and not scoring. Apart from that, 9 completions from 14 attempts for 72 yards are good stats. In this game the RBs didn´t have that much impact averaging only 3.2 yards per rush. Skyline had most of the carries and also scored the only touchdown for London.
In this game the run-heavy style didn´t pay off and you got to ask why the OC didn´t try to put the game more on the shoulder of their QB.
Week 3: Royals @ Seawolves L 3-13
In the third game the Royals had to travel to Norfolk and continued the bad offensive performance from the second game by not scoring a single touchdown in this one. With only 13 attempts through the air and rushing the ball 46 times, the trend as a run-heavy team continued. On the other side the Seawolves followed a more balanced approach with 38 rushing and 31 passing attempts. They had possession of the ball for 32 minutes and turned the ball over 1 times per interception just like the Royals did. Norfolk also fumbled the ball two times, but both of them were recovered by the offense.
Again, Jack couldn´t put points on the board and threw an interception. He completed 9 of his 13 passes for 98 yards and a passer rating of 52.7.
Skyline got 35 carries in the game and averaged 3.8 yards.
Week 4: Royals vs. Buccaneers W 24-16
At the end of the preseason the Royals put their second win and the first win ever in London at the board. In this game the Royals scored a total of three touchdowns, all by rushing the ball. With their 44 running attempts the Royals reached 170 yards, additionally Jack threw the ball 16 times for 97 yards. In contrast the Buccaneers threw 30 times and carried the ball 36 times for a total of 377 yards. Although having over 100 yards more they lost the game, 2 interceptions vs. 1 from the Royals contributing hereby. But the penalties were the main deciding factor in this game. While the Royals played very disciplined and only had 3 penalties for 25 yards, Myrtle Beach was penalized 15 times for a total of 127 yards!
QB Jack from the Royals again didn´t find any target in the Red Zone this game, but threw a duck. He only completed half of his passes for 97 yards and a passer rating of 43.
Skyline averaged 3.9 yards on 38 attempts and scored 2 touchdowns, while Batista had 5 carries for 3.6 yards on average and 1 touchdown.
Conclusion
To evaluate the whole preseason here are some stats from all 4 preseason games averaged for the Royals and their respective opponent:
Although going 2-2 in their games, the Royals averaged nearly 100 yards less than their opponents. While the rushing yards are similar, the big difference comes with the passing yards. The reason for that big difference in yards through the air is the discrepancy between the attempts. The opponents had more than double the passing attempts compared to the Royals and therefore more than double the yards, too. Surprisingly the Royals scored more points per game with less yards. The turnover differential of the London Team was 0 with more interceptions caught, but more fumbles lost. Worth noting all three lost fumbles happened in the same game week 2 against the Luchadores. Penaltywise the average stats show that the Royals are a very disciplined team with only about 5 penalties per game and less than half the penalized yards from their respective opponents. The time of posession is on average a little more than 27 minutes. There was not one game in the preseason where London possessed the ball for longer than their opponents.
Now let´s take a look at the stats from star QB Colby Jack:
These stats show that Jack played a horrible preseason with only 2 touchdowns, 4 interceptions and a completion percentage from around 60 per cent leading to a passer rating of 57.8. The number 2 pick of this year´s draft didn´t even average 100 yards per game, which is very disappointing. In some plays he showed his potential, but overall he had many problems, which he needs to fix as soon as possible. If he can´t adjust to the DSFL and the Royal´s play style quickly, the season will be a very hard one for Jack and the team from London. There´s danger that Jack might be one of the biggest busts in DSFL´s history if he can´t step up his game. At least he was very good in handing over the ball to his running backs.
Last but not least the stats from the two RBs Skyline and Batista who had the majority of the carries:
You can see that Skyline had most of the workload and averaged over 138 yards per game. Surprsingly he only had three touchdowns and his longest run was about 17 yards. In contrast, Batista got much less carries, but could score one touchdown more, had a higher average per attempt and had an awesome 74 yard run against the Dallas Birddogs.
This leads to questions why Batista wasn´t used more. That´s a difficult question to answer without asking the GM, but conditional problems from Batista could be the case. His endurance is not the best and he should work on it, so he can used more.
Overall you can see that the team played a very run-heavy style and was succesfull on the ground. In the air there were some big problems with Jack heavily underperforming. That might be the reason the Royals ran that much in the preseason. But maybe it would have helped Jack to become more confident by having more attempts and putting up some more numbers on the board. He looked a bit nervous in most parts of his game and needs the experience of DSFL games quickly.
It will be very interesting to see if the London Royals can play to his full potential and if they change their passing ratio in the season. Jack had some high expectations and it´s now up to him to show why the Royals picked him at number two in the draft.
Although the preseason doesn´t mean anything for the upcoming season, I wanted to take a closer look at the 4 preseason games from my new team, the London Royals. All data is taken from the Index. Per game I will evaluate the important team stats and the player specific stats for the QB and the RBs from the Royals. To cover all positions would be too much for this post.
At the end there will be averages of the stats from all 4 games and resulting conclusions.
Week 1: Royals @ Birddogs W 38-17
In the first game the Royals convincingly defeated Dallas in a duel between the two new expansion teams and the Jack brothers as starting QBs and top two picks of the draft.
Looking at the team stats, you can see two very different approaches from both teams going into the game. While Dallas had 40 passing and 26 rushing attempts, the Royals focused more on the run with 43 rushing, but only 19 passing attempts.
Despite losing with 21 points difference, the Birddogs had 5 more total yards and a little bit more time of posession. The run-heavy style of London led to 264 rushing yards, while only passing for 62. On the other hand, Dallas had 211 passing yards, but only rushed for 120 yards.
Before the game I thought that both teams would be focusing more on passing with their two awesome QBs. So it was a bit surprising that the Royals ran that often, but it seemed to work. While QB Colbie Jack averaged 5.2 yards on his 12 completions with two touchdowns and achieved a passer rating of 81.5, the three RBs from London averaged 6.1 yards and scored three times. Especially the long 74 yard run from Batista is worth noting. He was also the RB who scored all three touchdowns with only 9 attempts and had more than 10 yards rushing per attempt.
Week 2: Royals vs. Luchadores L 10-20
In the second game and the first game at home in London the Royals couldn´t carry on with their performance and suffered a loss against the Luchadores led by QB Waters.
Similar to the first week, London put their focus on the running game with 38 attempts, while only throwing the ball 14 times. On the other hand the Luchadores used a good mixture of running and passing with 34 attempts throwing the ball and 43 times rushing the ball.
Overall, Tijuana had 100 more total yards and possessed the ball for 35 minutes. A big part of the reason can be seen in the turnovers. The Royals turned the ball over 4 times with 3 lost fumbles in contrast to 2 turnovers from the Luchadores.
This week Jack only had a passer rating of 47.3, mainly because of his interception and not scoring. Apart from that, 9 completions from 14 attempts for 72 yards are good stats. In this game the RBs didn´t have that much impact averaging only 3.2 yards per rush. Skyline had most of the carries and also scored the only touchdown for London.
In this game the run-heavy style didn´t pay off and you got to ask why the OC didn´t try to put the game more on the shoulder of their QB.
Week 3: Royals @ Seawolves L 3-13
In the third game the Royals had to travel to Norfolk and continued the bad offensive performance from the second game by not scoring a single touchdown in this one. With only 13 attempts through the air and rushing the ball 46 times, the trend as a run-heavy team continued. On the other side the Seawolves followed a more balanced approach with 38 rushing and 31 passing attempts. They had possession of the ball for 32 minutes and turned the ball over 1 times per interception just like the Royals did. Norfolk also fumbled the ball two times, but both of them were recovered by the offense.
Again, Jack couldn´t put points on the board and threw an interception. He completed 9 of his 13 passes for 98 yards and a passer rating of 52.7.
Skyline got 35 carries in the game and averaged 3.8 yards.
Week 4: Royals vs. Buccaneers W 24-16
At the end of the preseason the Royals put their second win and the first win ever in London at the board. In this game the Royals scored a total of three touchdowns, all by rushing the ball. With their 44 running attempts the Royals reached 170 yards, additionally Jack threw the ball 16 times for 97 yards. In contrast the Buccaneers threw 30 times and carried the ball 36 times for a total of 377 yards. Although having over 100 yards more they lost the game, 2 interceptions vs. 1 from the Royals contributing hereby. But the penalties were the main deciding factor in this game. While the Royals played very disciplined and only had 3 penalties for 25 yards, Myrtle Beach was penalized 15 times for a total of 127 yards!
QB Jack from the Royals again didn´t find any target in the Red Zone this game, but threw a duck. He only completed half of his passes for 97 yards and a passer rating of 43.
Skyline averaged 3.9 yards on 38 attempts and scored 2 touchdowns, while Batista had 5 carries for 3.6 yards on average and 1 touchdown.
Conclusion
To evaluate the whole preseason here are some stats from all 4 preseason games averaged for the Royals and their respective opponent:
Although going 2-2 in their games, the Royals averaged nearly 100 yards less than their opponents. While the rushing yards are similar, the big difference comes with the passing yards. The reason for that big difference in yards through the air is the discrepancy between the attempts. The opponents had more than double the passing attempts compared to the Royals and therefore more than double the yards, too. Surprisingly the Royals scored more points per game with less yards. The turnover differential of the London Team was 0 with more interceptions caught, but more fumbles lost. Worth noting all three lost fumbles happened in the same game week 2 against the Luchadores. Penaltywise the average stats show that the Royals are a very disciplined team with only about 5 penalties per game and less than half the penalized yards from their respective opponents. The time of posession is on average a little more than 27 minutes. There was not one game in the preseason where London possessed the ball for longer than their opponents.
Now let´s take a look at the stats from star QB Colby Jack:
These stats show that Jack played a horrible preseason with only 2 touchdowns, 4 interceptions and a completion percentage from around 60 per cent leading to a passer rating of 57.8. The number 2 pick of this year´s draft didn´t even average 100 yards per game, which is very disappointing. In some plays he showed his potential, but overall he had many problems, which he needs to fix as soon as possible. If he can´t adjust to the DSFL and the Royal´s play style quickly, the season will be a very hard one for Jack and the team from London. There´s danger that Jack might be one of the biggest busts in DSFL´s history if he can´t step up his game. At least he was very good in handing over the ball to his running backs.
Last but not least the stats from the two RBs Skyline and Batista who had the majority of the carries:
You can see that Skyline had most of the workload and averaged over 138 yards per game. Surprsingly he only had three touchdowns and his longest run was about 17 yards. In contrast, Batista got much less carries, but could score one touchdown more, had a higher average per attempt and had an awesome 74 yard run against the Dallas Birddogs.
This leads to questions why Batista wasn´t used more. That´s a difficult question to answer without asking the GM, but conditional problems from Batista could be the case. His endurance is not the best and he should work on it, so he can used more.
Overall you can see that the team played a very run-heavy style and was succesfull on the ground. In the air there were some big problems with Jack heavily underperforming. That might be the reason the Royals ran that much in the preseason. But maybe it would have helped Jack to become more confident by having more attempts and putting up some more numbers on the board. He looked a bit nervous in most parts of his game and needs the experience of DSFL games quickly.
It will be very interesting to see if the London Royals can play to his full potential and if they change their passing ratio in the season. Jack had some high expectations and it´s now up to him to show why the Royals picked him at number two in the draft.
[OPTION]===========================================
[OPTION]Regular Season Stats
[OPTION]S21 - LON - 12 GP | 30 Rec | 368 Yards | 3 TD
[OPTION]S22 - LON - 14 GP | 62 Rec | 797 Yards | 5 TD
[OPTION]S23 - BAL - 16 GP | 46 Rec | 696 Yards | 7 TD
[OPTION]S24 - BAL - 16 GP | 60 Rec | 1014 Yards | 8 TD
[OPTION]===========================================
[OPTION]Post Season Stats
[OPTION]S22 - LON - 2 GP | 9 Rec | 68 Yards | 0 TD
[OPTION]===========================================
[OPTION]Trophy Case/Achievements:
[OPTION]His first catch ever in the DSFL was a TD
[OPTION]His first catch ever in the NSFL was a TD
[OPTION]Longest Catch in London Royals' Franchise History (S21, Wk9)
[OPTION]Most receiving TDs in London Royals' Franchise History (S21)