Being successful in the red zone often makes the difference in whether NFL teams find a way to win games, especially in a league where one-score games frequently occur.
In Week 6, 11 of the 14 games were decided by one score, and one other game was within one score in the fourth quarter. Four of the one-score results were by three points and one by two. The latter game was the Arizona Cardinals 18-16 victory over the Los Angeles Rams, in which six field goals by kicker Chad Ryland were enough to win.
But that won’t happen very often, especially when five trips to the red zone don’t produce a touchdown.
On a side note, it’s odd that the NFL counts every time a team advances inside the 20-yard line as a red-zone trip, no matter what the down is for
the first play. On one of the Cardinals' official red-zone opportunities, a third-and-seven play from the Rams' 27-yard line gained eight yards, resulting in fourth-and-6 at the 19. If that play was stopped at the 20, it wouldn’t have counted.
It was a no-brainer to kick the field goal in that situation, but it’s strange that it counts against the red-zone numbers even though there were no scrimmage plays in that situation.
Still, there were four legit chances that came up empty, except for the three points.
When head coach Mike LaFleur was asked Monday about the issues in the game, he said, “Yes, we weren’t efficient in our runs at all down there. Have to do a better job of scheming some stuff up right there, but I thought we had great efficiency from the 20 to 20 all day. I don’t think, I mean we did. It’s just when we got inside the 20, obviously we know that’s not sustainable.
“We can’t kick six field goals and expect to win football games, but I think those are — I don’t want to call them easy fixes because there are no easy fixes - but we’ll clean that up.”
Then asked if tighter windows and short fields contribute to the difficulty in those situations, he said, “When you can use the back-end line as kind of the 12th defender, it takes 75 percent of your offense out for every team because you’re not going to be working as much play-action and stuff like that. You don’t have as much space. But again, I don’t want to say it really hasn’t been a problem this year.
“I think going into the game, we were 13th in the red zone or something like that, which is not great. We want to be No. 1 for obvious reasons. We’re going to take a step back from that ranking now going 0-for-5, but I know our guys know ways that we can get this figured out.”
Entering the game, the Cardinals were actually 16th in the league with a 61.1 percent touchdown rate, scoring six points on 11-of-18 tries. Those 18 trips were tied for eighth in the league with four other teams and the 11 touchdowns ranked ninth.
The “step back” as LaFleur called it has them now 11-for-23 (47.8 percent) and ranked 27th. They did move up to a tie for fourth in red-zone trips with three other teams, but the 11 touchdowns has them tied for 17th with four other teams.
Thanks to the 10 field goals they have put on the board (the most in the NFL), the Cardinals are ninth in scoring percentage at 91.3.
Meanwhile, a detailed look at what happened on the four red-zone trips where there were offensive plays from scrimmage, bears out what LaFleur said, although the passing game also wasn’t productive.
The Cardinals had 14 plays from inside the 20 and totaled only 14 yards. From the running backs, Tyler Allgeier had four carries for only three yards and Bam Knight totaled one yard on three attempts.
Quarterback Jacoby Brissett attempted seven passes with only three completions for 10 yards. Wide receiver Kendrick Bourne had one reception for eight yards, which came on third-and-6 from the 16-yard line. Tight end Trey McBride caught two passes for two yards.
Of the 14 plays, four went for negative yardage: minus-five and minus-two for Allgeier, minus-three for Knight and minus-two for McBride. Two of the negative plays came on the final red-zone field goal in the fourth quarter when a touchdown would have provided the Cardinals with a two-score lead. On first-and-goal from the eight, Knight ran for four yards, but he then lost three yards on second down and McBride’s minus-two came on third-and-goal from the seven.
On third down, the Cardinals were 1-for-5 in the red zone, but they were 4-for-10 on all other third downs in the game.
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This article originally appeared on Cards Wire: Arizona Cardinals took a step back from the red zone in win over Rams
