A Comparison of Two First Rounders

Recently, Knowshon Moreno has taken a lot of heat.  His lack of big play ability seems to be the main target to these criticisms.  All of these criticisms inspired me to compare Knowshon's stats in his 2nd year with those of LaDainian Tomlinson.  I also took into account the number of years of experience both players' offensive lines had.

Rushing Stats--LaDainian Tomlinson

Games    16

Attempts    372

Yards    1,683

Yds/Game    105.2

Avg    4.5

TD    14

Rushing Stats--Knowshon Moreno

Games    13

Attempts    182

Yards    779

Yds/Game    59.9

Avg    4.3

TD    5

Just looking at the rushing stats between the two, three categories jumped out at me:  attempts, average, and touchdowns.  Tomlinson, in his second year, had twice as many touches as Knowshon did.  Twice as many!  I think that if it ever appeared as if Moreno had disappeared from the game, this would be the reason why.  When a running back plays 13 games and only gets 182 touches, that certainly isn't his fault.  As we know, the offensive line was young and trying to find their chemistry; we had a coach that liked to throw the football, for more than half the year.  Add these two components together and there you have it--a 1st round running back, in his 2nd year that only got 182 rushes this year.

The next stat that jumped out at me was the averages.  Despite Moreno's limited rushing attempts, he still managed to keep his average yds/carry just two tenths below Tomlinson's.  If he was having that much success running the ball, why wouldn't we keep feeding the rock?  This is obviously the part where the playcalling comes into play as well. 

Finally, the touchdowns.  This is very concerning to me, but then again, I guess that was what LenDale White was for.  Then he went down and it was up to Laurence Maroney.  However, when a team is in the red zone, running the football becomes extremely important.  There is a smaller amount of space for WRs to run their routes, therefore, the end zone and the sidelines are acting like a 12th defender.  If you run the ball, you take that 12th man out of the equation.  The lack of Moreno's rushing touchdowns could be a result of two components: despite the 12th man in the red zone, Denver still wanted to pass the ball OR we couldn't run the football in the red zone because teams can put extra defenders on the line to defend the run (using the 12th man to their advantage).  I think it was a combination of the two.  Once Denver got up against the extra defensive lineman, it was tougher to run the ball, so in effect, we were forced to pass.  This would definitely account for Moreno's lack of touchdowns.

Offensive Line Experience--San Diego Chargers

RT    Vaughn Parker    8 yrs

RG    Toniu Fonoti    0 yrs

C    Jason Ball    0 yrs

LG    Bob Hallen    4 yrs

LT    Damion McIntosh    2 yrs

Total years of experience: 14 years

Offensive Line Experience--Denver Broncos

RT    Ryan Harris    3 yrs

RG    Chris Kuper    4 yrs

C    J.D. Walton    0 yrs

LG    Zane Beadles    0 yrs   

LT    Ryan Clady    2 yrs

Total years of experience: 9 years

So between the two offensive lines, the Chargers had the edge by 5 years of experience.  However, both teams had two rookies on their lines.  The biggest difference though, is that the Chargers's most experienced lineman had 8 years of experience while Denver's had 4 years.  It will be interesting to see how our offensive line holds up next year and whether or not the new head coach is going to bring a power or zone blocking scheme.

Conclusions

I think that Knowshon Moreno had a frustrating 2010-2011 season, not because he did not perform well, but because he wasn't given enough opportunities to make plays.  If he was given more attempts, his numbers would have increased and Denver could have won a few more games.  I do however, think that we need to draft another RB to spell Moreno because I think that our backfield lacks speed.

Whoever the new coach is, I also hope that they retain LenDale White, or if they don't, at least acquire a power back and get some sort of backfield together that looks like the Wisconsin Badgers's backfield.  Acquiring two backs that can share the load with Moreno, I believe, could do wonders for this team and for whoever the quarterback is...be it Tebow or Andrew Luck (darn, almost made it through the post without mentioning either one).  If the new staff wants to keep Lance Ball, I would not have a problem with that, because he seems to have good skills for the position.  I still think we need one more RB, so that Moreno can stay off the inactive list along with the other backs.  With a three-back system and an offensive line that will gain another year of experience, I think that this team will have no troubles running the football next year.