A LOOK AT WHAT THE PATRIOTS ARE DOING ON SHORT YARDAGE PLAYS

Way too many times this season, it's appeared to be a perfect time for a quarterback sneak and yet the Patriots run some play out of shotgun formation.  Not being able to stop wondering about what the Patriots have been doing in short yardage, I made a spreadsheet using all of this season's play by play data from ESPN.com. Since it wouldn't be useful, I pulled out all plays where Hoyer was under center.  Here are some of my findings.

BREAKDOWN BY SITUATION-  First up is a breakdown for the 5 situations I looked at.  If a play was blown dead because of a pre-snap penalty, it wasn't included either in running or passing columns.

2nd & 1 Details:  Penalties were false starts on Henry and Smith.

​3rd & 1 Details: One of the unsuccessful passing plays was an interception.  The penalty was a sack turned roughing the passer.

​3rd & 2 Details:  The successful penalty was a neutral zone infraction.  The two other penalties were for intentionally grounding and a false start from Onwenu.

4th & 1 Details:  The penalty was on Henry for a false start.

ALL 5 SITUATIONS-  The next table is a combination of the above 5 tables.  

Details:  Total running plays have a success rate of 70%.  Quarterback sneaks were successful 91% of the time, leaving other running plays as being successful only 62% of the time.  Passing plays were also successful 70 % of the time.  All plays from shotgun were successful 59% of the time.  I will breakdown the shotgun plays further down.  

& 1 SITUATIONS FROM ABOVE-

Details- Three false start penalties.  Successful running plays 79%.  Quarterback sneak success rate is 91%.  Running plays not including quarterback sneaks were successful 73% of the time.  Passing plays successful at a 57% clip.  Plays out of shotgun successful 42% of the time.

CLOSER LOOK AT SHOTGUN PLAYS-  

2nd & 1:

• Lined up 5 times
• 2/3 passing
• 1/1 run
• 1 penalty on Henry for a false start

2nd & 2: no plays from shotgun

3rd & 1:

• lined up 5 times
• 1/3 passing
• 1/2 run
• 1 interception

3rd & 2:

• lined up 11 times
• 7/8 passing
• 1/1 run
• sacked 1 time
• 1 intentional grounding
• 1 neutral zone infraction

4th & 1:

• lined up 2 times
• 0/1 passing
• penalty on Henry for a false start

Cumulative from shotgun:

• 10/15 (67%) success on passing plays
• 3/4 (75%) success on running plays

OFFENSIVE PLAYER SUCCESS RATE ON SHORT YARDAGE:

• Agholor 1/2
  
• Bolden 3/8
  
• Bourne 3/3
  
• Harris 13/17
  
• Harry 0/1
  
• Henry 0/2
  
• Jones 10/11
  
• Meyers 9/10
• Smith 1/2
• Stevenson 5/7
• Taylor 1/1
• White 2/2