What happened on Washington’s third and short attempts?
Taking a closer look at what happened to Washington’s offense on its seven third and short attempts against the Seahawks.
During Washington’s win over the Seahawks on Monday night, one particular part of the offense held the team back from winning the game much more comfortably and caused much frustration from fans. Washington’s third and short offense felt like it really struggled and prevented Washington from sustaining drives and generating the points the performance merited. Many frustrations came from what appeared to be the same or at least very similar play calls in those situations, which resulted in the same failures over and over again.
In actuality, Washington faced seven plays of third and two or shorter. They converted four of those seven plays, but the first four attempts were all successful while the last three attempts all came later in the game and failed. So let’s take a closer look at each attempt to see what was called, what went right or wrong and if criticism of Scott Turner’s play-calling in those situations was fair.
Play 1
Situation: 11:04 remaining in first quarter, ball on Washington’s 36.
Down and distance: 3rd & 1
On this play, Washington appears to call a read-option run. On read-option plays, the quarterback reads the unblocked defender and decides to either hand the ball off to the running back or keep it and run himself based on how the defender reacts. It’s a very good short yardage play because it picks a single defender and puts him in a lose-lose situation and gives the defense very little time to recover before picking up the first down.
In this scenario, the defender steps inside to crash down on the run, which should tell Heinicke to keep the ball himself and run. However, Heinicke hands the ball off inside to Antonio Gibson. Only the team will know for certain if it is a true read-option play or just one designed to look that way, but the back side defensive end is left unblocked and quarterback appears to be reading him. It could be that Washington just wanted to fake the read-option look to sell the illusion of Heinicke keeping it and making the defensive end hold his position, but I’d guess it’s more likely that Heinicke was actually reading him.
Fortunately, whatever the call, Gibson takes the carry and immediately spins out of the grasp of the unblocked defender before powering through another tackle on his way to a seven-yard gain and a first down.
Result: Converted
Other notes: Read-option plays are always good calls in these situations as it’s very hard to prevent both the running back and the quarterback from gaining at least a yard or two on those types of plays. Heinicke might have gotten away with a bad read here because Gibson made a fantastic play, but the call was still a good one.
Play 2
Situation: 2:35 remaining in second quarter, ball at the 50.
Down and distance: 3rd & 1
This appears to be a very similar call, but with a bubble screen attached from the slot. Typically the bubble screen will be part of an RPO (run-pass option) that will either be a pre-snap read for the quarterback, where he can check the numbers over the bubble screen and throw it if the numbers are in his favor, or a post-snap read of a linebacker to that side to see if he’ll hold his position or try to fit the run quickly.
In this case, Washington leaves the defensive end unblocked again, suggesting the bubble screen was a pre-snap read for Heinicke and the Seahawks covered it with their alignment. Instead, Heinicke was likely reading the unblocked defensive end. The end holds his position a little more this time, though he still does crash down inside on the run. If it is a true read-option play for Heinicke, he probably should have kept it, but Gibson just about manages to pick up the needed yard on the carry inside.
Result: Converted
Other notes: This was just another version of the same call from before, with the added possibility of a bubble screen if the Seahawks didn’t have enough defenders out on the perimeter to cover it. Solid call, again tough to prevent small gains from a defensive point of view.
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