CFL Scoring on the lowest pace since 1979

[WestCoastJoe]

http://www.leaderpost.com/sports/footba ... story.html

CFL on pace for lowest-scoring season since '70s | Video

League scoring average lowest since 1979

By Rob Vanstone, The Leader-PostSeptember 3, 2014

Saskatchewan Roughriders slotback Weston Dressler (#7) is tackled by numberous Winnipeg Blue Bombers during the Labour Day Classic game held at Mosaic Stadium on Sunday.

Photograph by: Michael Bell, Regina Leader-Post

The Canadian Football League is on pace for its lowest-scoring season since 1979.

Why are defences so dominant in 2014?

"I don't know," Saskatchewan Roughriders quarterback Darian Durant says. "I think each year, it's a different side of the ball that takes the forefront."

The numbers bear that out. In 2013, nary a word was heard about a lack of offence as an average of 52.4 points per game were scored.

This season, however, the average has dipped to 45.27 at the midway point. The CFL has not had a comparable figure since 1985, when the average was 45.36. If the numbers stay constant, the CFL will reach its lowest scoring total since it dipped to 40.2 points per game 34 seasons ago.

In 1985, Richie Hall was in his third year as a CFL defensive back with the Calgary Stampeders. He played for nine seasons, spending the final four with Saskatchewan.

As one who is also a veteran defensive co-ordinator, Hall is eminently qualified to discuss the changes in the game over an extended period.

"They say that everything goes in a full loop," says Hall, the Roughriders defensive co-ordinator. "What they're doing now, they might have done 40 years ago, but eventually it comes back.

"When I played, it was a two-back league and four receivers. Then it went to the wide-open (style) and now in some ways they're resorting back to it as far as, offensively, playing with a tight end - maybe not the big tight ends that they had, but the body types.

"It's just evolution. Offences always get ahead. Defences catch up and get ahead a little bit, and then the offences kind of change. " An average of 51.6 points per game were scored during Hall's rookie season. Two years later, the figure dipped to the aforementioned 45.36 figure.

By 1991, the average had skyrocketed to an eye-popping 64.2. That year, Hall was a member of a Roughriders team that set enduring franchise records for points scored (606) and points against (710).

The defensive total - still the highest in CFL history - is especially noteworthy. The Roughriders allowed an average of 39.4 points per game that year.

At that time, offence was in vogue across the league, with quarterbacks Doug Flutie, Kent Austin, Matt Dunigan and Tracy Ham leading teams up and down the field. With Flutie at the controls, Calgary established a league record for points scored (698) during the 1994 season. The six highest single-season point totals of all time were recorded during a period that spanned 1990 to 1997.

"Will they ever put up those numbers again? I don't know," Hall says. "I just hope that if I'm still in the league, it's not against one of our teams defensively. " But, lately, that is not the nature of CFL offences. The pendulum has shifted away from wide-open passing attacks to a run-oriented attack - an evolution that has been dictated, at least to an extent, by defensive configurations.

"When we put in an extra offensive lineman and teams want to keep (defensive backs) on the field to stop the pass, that's the time to run the ball," Durant says.

"Defensive backs from down south, they're not used to playing in the box. They're not used to taking on blocks and doing different things of that nature, so when it's their time to do that, they're not ready.

"When an offensive lineman gets his hands on a guy who he outweighs by 100 pounds, it makes the run game that much easier ." The success of that approach is underlined by the fact the league is lacking a dominant receiver. This, too, may be cyclical.

"There's an evolution and a changing of the guard because there's a lot of young receivers," Hall points out. "At some point in time, the Milt Stegalls and Geroy Simons, they can't play forever and someone's got to carry their torch. "

[WestCoastJoe]

"I don't know," Saskatchewan Roughriders quarterback Darian Durant says. "I think each year, it's a different side of the ball that takes the forefront."

The numbers bear that out. In 2013, nary a word was heard about a lack of offence as an average of 52.4 points per game were scored.

This season, however, the average has dipped to 45.27 at the midway point. The CFL has not had a comparable figure since 1985, when the average was 45.36. If the numbers stay constant, the CFL will reach its lowest scoring total since it dipped to 40.2 points per game 34 seasons ago.

"They say that everything goes in a full loop," says Hall, the Roughriders defensive co-ordinator. "What they're doing now, they might have done 40 years ago, but eventually it comes back.

"When I played, it was a two-back league and four receivers. Then it went to the wide-open (style) and now in some ways they're resorting back to it as far as, offensively, playing with a tight end - maybe not the big tight ends that they had, but the body types.

"It's just evolution. Offences always get ahead. Defences catch up and get ahead a little bit, and then the offences kind of change. " An average of 51.6 points per game were scored during Hall's rookie season. Two years later, the figure dipped to the aforementioned 45.36 figure.

By 1991, the average had skyrocketed to an eye-popping 64.2. That year, Hall was a member of a Roughriders team that set enduring franchise records for points scored (606) and points against (710).

The defensive total - still the highest in CFL history - is especially noteworthy. The Roughriders allowed an average of 39.4 points per game that year.

At that time, offence was in vogue across the league, with quarterbacks Doug Flutie, Kent Austin, Matt Dunigan and Tracy Ham leading teams up and down the field. With Flutie at the controls, Calgary established a league record for points scored (698) during the 1994 season. The six highest single-season point totals of all time were recorded during a period that spanned 1990 to 1997.

"When we put in an extra offensive lineman and teams want to keep (defensive backs) on the field to stop the pass, that's the time to run the ball," Durant says.

I agree that it is circular. Offences adapt. Defences adapt. Around it goes. As soon as something different is tried, with success, other teams copy it. And then the other side of the ball starts to adjust.

Running games with two or even three backs. Lou Harris, Monroe Eley, Johnny Musso. Big tight ends. Power game. Defences load the box. Bigger, faster linebackers. Zone blitz. Bigger corners.

Then along comes the spread offence. Emtpy backfields. The passing game racks up the points. Teams adopt the offence. Defences start to adjust. More blitzing. Tighter coverage. Stunts. Overloads. DL changing positions. Faster LBs. Tweeners. Getting the best athletes on defence. Defences gambling and "cheating". And the defence starts to dominate. Hello. That is where we are now.

So offences have to ...

Run the ball down the throats of the defence, with huge blockers, strong RBs.

Throw long. Make the D play it straight. No cheating.

Stretch the field to the sideline.

Tight ends. OL as extra blocker.

O must gamble more. Be ready for the blitz. Quick passes to the vacated areas.

Search high and low for game breakers.

Multi-dimensional QBs. Pass or run.

On and on it goes.

The best teams, with the best coaches, lead the evolution. And vice versa. The more poorly coached teams trail, and adapt much slower, and lose more games. Hello ...

Who seems to be leading the parade? Hufnagel. Trestman when he was here. Chris Jones. Chamblin maybe. And IMO Milanovich and Austin, although it does not show this year, as of yet, for various reasons.

[notahomer]

All good points WCJ, seems like that to me too (circular, adapting etc...)

One thing not mentioned in the article is things like officiating. How/when penalties are called CAN have an impact on scoring too, IMO. In this league in particular, a holding call on first down puts your team in a hole whereby you are probably punting. In a weird kinda way, I think our three down ball may actually end up to higher scoring. I don't have any stats to back these mumblings, just intuition. I don't need highscoring games in order to watch but it may end up turning some off. That being said, games where the two teams combined almost break 100 points are the games I end up remembering for awhile....

[KnowItAll]

I don't see that one td less per game between two teams is anything to make a big deal about.

[Rammer]

I don't see that one td less per game between two teams is anything to make a big deal about.

You don't KnowItAll?

[KnowItAll]

I don't see that one td less per game between two teams is anything to make a big deal about.

You don't KnowItAll?

ouch..no one ever said that to me before.


Its possible....naahhh

So, tell me what I don't know that's relevant to this topic.

go ahead, I dare ya

[Rammer]

I don't see that one td less per game between two teams is anything to make a big deal about.

You don't KnowItAll?

ouch..no one ever said that to me before.


Its possible....naahhh

So, tell me what I don't know that's relevant to this topic.

go ahead, I dare ya

Can you tell me why the Defences are dominating to the point of allowing one less TD, or two FG's and a rouge per game?

[sj-roc]

The six highest single-season point totals of all time were recorded during a period that spanned 1990 to 1997.

So the phase of the game — offence — that supposedly sells the tickets, as the saying goes, had its most success in an era when the league was on perhaps the most shaky financial footing of its entire history. Kind of ironic.

[KnowItAll]

ouch..no one ever said that to me before.


Its possible....naahhh

So, tell me what I don't know that's relevant to this topic.

go ahead, I dare ya

Can you tell me why the Defences are dominating to the point of allowing one less TD, or two FG's and a rouge per game?

each D is only allowing about 3.5 less pts a game. don't call that dominating.

[sj-roc]

Of course, any comparison of offensive efficacy across different eras should control for scoring from defences and special teams (e.g., TDs on interceptions, fumbles, MFG/kick/punt returns, blocked kicks). If defences are truly dominant they will probably chip in a few scores of their own and tilt things even more out of whack. I don't have any hard data but I suspect there's more scoring on D today than in 1979, and with roster growth in the last 35 years affording use of more return specialists I'd be shocked if there weren't more ST scoring nowadays.

[JohnHenry]

Can you tell me why the Defences are dominating to the point of allowing one less TD, or two FG's and a rouge per game?

One factor could be CFL teams which stack most of their imports on defence, which tend to dominate the more "National" offences. According to the latest depth charts here is the starting defensive ratio (Imports + Nationals):

Lions: 11-1
Stamps: 11-1
Sask: 11-1
Mont: 11-1
Esks: 9-3
Wpg: 9-3
Argos: 9-3
Ham: 8-4

It seems the teams with the best defences have the most import starters. Coupled with 4 Designated Import situational players who can freshly replace any import on the field, has led to stifling defences over the past couple seasons.

One easy remedy would be to mandate that all teams must start no fewer than 3 Nationals on offence and defence.

Then rather than teams drafting bottom-of-the-barrel OL every year, they would draft more DL, LB and DB, good players who are being overlooked and not drafted, with teams trying to bolster their offensive depth instead. This would result in an overall improvement in the quality of National players in the league.

With a minimum of 3 Canadian starters on defence, that should even the playing field and might give the offences a glimmer of hope and a fraction of a second extra to get the play off.

[Sir Purrcival]

I think I am going to go a bit with the penalties and challenges.

The way I see it, there are penalties being called now that didn't exist or were substantively different 20 years ago. Many of these penalties are of the major variety. Horse collar tackles, Roughing the passer (hit to the head) and so on. Major penalties are occurring much more regularly it seems. 1 of those can most definitely kill a drive. We also have much less flow to the game with all the challenges. When a team is moving the ball, challenges to this call or that seem to stop the game in its tracks for several minutes thus giving the D more time to rest between plays, collect themselves when they are getting marched on and also disrupting the flow of the offenses. I particularly don't like the challenges for PI. A play is done then you have to wait and see if a team is going to throw yet another challenge flag before moving on to the next issue.

Now obviously this is being overly simplistic and one dimensional but the games certainly seem to lack some flow. I hope that it come back because I find it hard to watch some of the games that we have been served up (especially this year). The scores have been much more NFL than CFL and it seems we are doing well if we get 1 really good game out of 4 played on a weekend.

[TheLionKing]

This season has seen less high scoring games that what we've become accustomed to. As JohnHenry has pointed out, teams have loaded up their defence with International players but I don't think there is a need to legislate the number of Nationals on offence and defence...yet.

[Ravi]

Of course, any comparison of offensive efficacy across different eras should control for scoring from defences and special teams (e.g., TDs on interceptions, fumbles, MFG/kick/punt returns, blocked kicks). If defences are truly dominant they will probably chip in a few scores of their own and tilt things even more out of whack. I don't have any hard data but I suspect there's more scoring on D today than in 1979, and with roster growth in the last 35 years affording use of more return specialists I'd be shocked if there weren't more ST scoring nowadays.

I was only half paying attention but TSN's Kate McKenna said this past weekend that defensive scoring was up something like 66% over last season. Does anyone recall the exact figure that she mentioned? Anyway, that is further indication as to just how much defences are dominating this year. There doesn't seem to be a bad defence in the league this year either.

[ducepot]

Way too many FLAGS killing offensive plays and momentum has resulted in lower scores