Kings of the Desert: Examining Arizona’s Revamped Offense
No offense west of Cleveland has dynasty owners more excited than the one in Arizona. Let’s look by the numbers at the team’s 2018 results, then overlay Kliff Kingsbury and the new offensive additions to get smart about 2019 and beyond.
2018
We know that the Arizona Cardinals’ offense was bad in 2018, but just how bad was it?
They were last in the NFL in the following categories. Some were the worst the league has seen in eight to 11 years.
“Per drive” statistics reinforce the story. The Cards were also dead last in:
Arizona averaged 1.09 points per every offensive drive in 2018 while the NFL average was an even 2.0 points – a full 45% off the league average and 12% worse than the 31st ranked team (Jacksonville; 1.24).
One last look at the offense:
The team ran only 902 plays (31st) in 2018. The numbers suggest that it was not due to pace but, rather, due to an inability to generate first downs, convert third downs or produce on a per-play basis, either rushing or passing. This is important as we look at Kliff Kingsbury, and we will come back to this point.
Let’s quickly transition to the Cardinals defense to get a view of the whole team that struggled to a league worst 3-13 record.
They were roughly bottom third in most categories except a decent result for average yards surrendered per drive. Altogether not awful but let’s stick with the defense and complete the story.
The defense was just below average on a per drive basis, but the number of plays and drives it faced was near the most in the league. The offense could not hold or move the ball, and through turnovers and lack of first downs, it forced the defense into facing nearly the most drives in the league.
The conclusion is that the offense is more to blame than the defense for 2018.
Enter Kliff Kingsbury
The former Texas Tech head coach is the NFL’s latest young, offensive minded head coach hire. Much has been made of his career 35-40 record in seven years as a collegiate head coach, but here we focus on his offensive performance.
As we did with the Cardinals, we start with a high level look at Texas Tech’s offensive ranks during Kingsbury’s tenure (2013-2018). Ranks are of 130 teams as of 2018.
Kingsbury’s teams finished top ten in total yards in four of his six years, and never lower than 16th. Point production lagged a bit but still managed two top five national finishes, with all but one year within the top 50.
Breaking it down between rush and pass yards shows a clear distinction.
Texas Tech finished within the top ten nationally in pass yards per game every year under Kingsbury, and only once within the top 50 (three times outside the top 100) for rushing.
Now let’s look at volume. Here are the team’s national ranks in total plays per game, rushing plays per game and pass plays per game.
Such a clear difference – a near nation-leading volume of plays heavily favoring the pass.
To recap, Kliff Kingsbury’s college offenses consistently achieved near-national best results by running lots of plays and attempting more passes than just a handful of other teams.
Let’s go deeper.
Footballoutsiders.com produces advanced statistics analyzing offensive efficiency and explosiveness.
Efficiency is measured by success rate (gaining 50% of necessary yardage on first down, 70% on second down, 100% on third and fourth down).
Its explosiveness measure figures out the equivalent point value of every yard line (based on the expected number of points an offense could expect to score from that yard line) and, therefore, every play of a given game. Explosiveness is thereby separated from efficiency to see if a team is more methodical and efficient or routinely gets its yards with big chunk plays (further methodology is discussed here).
We know that the Texas Tech offenses were productive. But how were they composed?
The short answer is that the teams were consistently more efficient than explosive, and more efficient passing than rushing. The supporting data follows for reference.
What does this all mean for the new Arizona Cardinals?
Conclusion: 2019 and Forward
Expect Kliff Kingsbury’s Cardinals to use tempo to run a high volume of plays. When the offense fully learns the system, it should be among the NFL’s leaders in plays per game. However, we should expect growing pains and time to learn with a 22-year-old rookie quarterback, a receiving corps that is very young (with one member much older) and a poor offensive line.
Expect the Cardinals to emphasize the pass. From 2013-2018, Texas Tech had a 41% / 59% run to pass split.
The team invested heavily in offensive weapons in the 2019 NFL Draft but did not address its offensive line, which ranked dead last in 2018 according to Pro Football Focus. Arizona should mitigate this with quick passes and fast tempo.
Overall, this is extremely positive news for the individual Cardinals offensive players in dynasty.
Quarterback
For reference, I wrote at length about former Cardinals quarterback Josh Rosen.
Kyler Murray has a very promising prospect profile. He is the most efficient college quarterback, as measured by career adjusted yards per attempt, to be drafted in the top half of round one in the last ten years (see my full analysis here).
An expectation of production is already being priced in to Murray’s cost. He is QB8 between Carson Wentz and Jared Goff in DLF May ADP.
Data from DLF’s Data Analytics Tool
Running Back
David Johnson’s poor 2018 season has been widely scrutinized, yet he still produced a top ten positional finish, rushing for 258-941-7 and receiving 50-446-3. The versatile 27 year old back is a hot off-season buy-low candidate with good reason. His ADP is at its lowest point in three years.
This optimism is warranted given the expectation of higher volume and improved usage. Not only were Johnson’s targets cut almost in half from 2016 (recall he missed nearly all of 2017 due to injury), but his average depth of target was a fraction of its historical value.
No Kingsbury running back ever finished better than fourth (Deandre Washington, 2014 and 2015) in team receptions in six seasons. His lead back still managed a respectable average receiving line of 30-272-1 across those years.
One should expect Kingsbury to recognize the special receiving talent he has in Johnson. And while the historical Texas Tech pass distribution is a potential concern for running back usage, it is a positive for the wide receivers.
Wide Receiver
At 35 years old, Larry Fitzgerald managed to lead the Cardinals across receiving categories (112 targets, 69-734-6) in 2017. This year brings an influx of new talent. With a round 13 ADP (WR75) he is worth a bridge flyer.
This team points to the future. Christian Kirk turned 22 during his rookie season, when he was second among receivers with a 43-590-3 line in just twelve games (seven starts). Despite a promising campaign, his ADP has actually fallen by 17 spots since January and now sits just nine spots ahead of new teammate Hakeem Butler (I talk more about Kirk as an off-season buy in this article).
To frame Kirk’s value differently, compare his rookie output to that of DJ Moore.
It compares favorably despite playing in four fewer games, yet their values have moved in different directions after the season.
Arizona used a second round pick on Andy Isabella, a prospect with a compelling profile. With his production, athleticism, ADP and situation, I love Isabella as a top off-season value. He seems a wonderful fit for the new offense.
#DraftTwitter loved Hakeem Butler before the NFL Draft and he has retained much of his value despite falling to day three. His size and skill set are unique to this group and this offense should support multiple viable receivers. Wideouts were at least the top three pass catchers in each of Kingsbury’s six years at Texas Tech (except 2013, his first). I put Butler squarely as the third option in dynasty among this group when factoring in overall prospect profile.
Tight End
In 2013, Kingsbury’s first at Texas Tech, future second round NFL pick Jace Amaro led the Red Raiders in receiving with a gaudy 106-1352-7 stat line. After that, however, the position was not featured.
Ricky Seals-Jones went undrafted but finished third in targets for Arizona last year. At an ADP of 229 he is a low cost flyer in the unlikely hope of an Amaro-esque one year role. His 47.4% career catch rate, 25th percentile athletic profile, lack of college production and draft profile, however, suggest little upside.
Arizona signed 30 year old Charles Clay to a one year, $2 million contract. With an ADP at TE40 he is nearly free and has five TE2 seasons under his belt. He is an unsexy pick, but is the Arizona tight end I would select as an end of bench streamer or filler.
Thank you for reading. How do you see the new Arizona Cardinals offense? Is Murray already overvalued or appropriately valued? Which veteran and rookie are most set to benefit?
Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and find me on Twitter at @threedownhack.
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