Hold On – Week 1 2022

September 15, 2022

By Noonefromtampa

Yes peeps, the Hold On weekly column analyzing the penalties from the prior game and well as season trends is back.

Penalty History

One of the things that Coach Ron Rivera promised when he arrived was to play smart football and to reduce mistakes.  Let’s compare Jay Gruden’s last season in 2019 with Rivera’s first two season.

2019 – 131 penalties committed, 106 accepted

2020 – 99 penalties committed, 88 accepted

2021 – 100 penalties committed, 82 accepted

As you can see, the Rivera coached teams commit significantly less penalties. The penalty rate is similar between 2020 and 2021 with a slight decrease in accepted penalties.

Over the course of a season, fewer mistakes work in the team’s favor to win more games.

Game Summary

Jacksonville – 13 accepted penalties for 90 yards, gave up 3 first downs via penalty

Washington – 6 accepted penalties (2 declined) for 63 yards, gave up 5 first downs via penalty

This is the summary of penalties committed by each team:

Penalty	Opponent	Washington	Grand Total
Defensive Holding	1	0	1
Defensive Offside	1	0	1
Defensive Pass Interference	0	2	2
False Start	2	0	2
Illegal Contact	0	2	2
Illegal Formation	1	0	1
Illegal Shift	1	0	1
Illegal Use of Hands	0	1	1
Intentional Grounding	2	0	2
Neutral Zone Infraction	2	0	2
Offensive Holding	1	0	1
Roughing the Passer	1	0	1
Too Many Men on Field	1	0	1
Unnecessary Roughness	0	1	1
Grand Total	13	6	19

Jacksonville committed a lot of mental mistake-type penalties such as false start, offsides, neutral zone infraction and too many men of the field. These are very indicative of a young team and a new coaching staff. I would classify Washington’s penalties as more technique penalties such as pass interference, illegal contact, and illegal use of hands. Both coaching staffs will be addressing the issues with their teams. In my opinion, the unnecessary roughness call on Darrick Forrest should have been called on the offensive player for lowering his head. Forrest tried to go low to make the tackle and Jamal Agnew initiated the helmet-to-helmet contact which cause the penalty to be called.

By Unit:

Team	Defense	Offense	Grand Total
Jacksonville	6	7	13
Washington	5	1	6
Grand Total	11	8	19

By Player:

Against	Player	Penalty	Accepted	Declined
Opponent	Offense	Illegal Formation	1	0
	Offense	Illegal Shift	1	0
	T. Lawrence	Intentional Grounding	2	0
	F. Oluokun	Defensive Holding	1	0
	T. Walker	Neutral Zone Infraction	1	0
	R. Robertson-Harris	Defensive Offside	1	0
	W. Little	False Start	1	0
	F. Fatukasi	Neutral Zone Infraction	1	0
	D. Smoot	Roughing the Passer	1	0
	C. Robinson	False Start	1	0
	Defense	Too Many Men on Field	1	0
	L. Fortner	Offensive Holding	1	0
Washington	K. Fuller	Defensive Pass Interference	1	0
	K. Fuller	Illegal Contact	1	0
	B. McCain	Defensive Pass Interference	1	0
	B. St-Juste	Defensive Holding	0	1
	D. Forrest	Unnecessary Roughness	1	0
	A. Newell	Illegal Use of Hands	1	0
	Offense	Illegal Use of Hands	0	1
	W. Jackson	Illegal Contact	1	0

Game Impactors

1. The biggest penalty was the neutral zone infraction on Folorunso Fatukasi which allowed the Commanders to run out the clock without giving the Jaguars another shot to win the game.
2. Several times, Jaguar penalties put them into third and long situations on which Washington was able to capitalize with a sack, incompletion or force a play short of the first down marker. This helped a team that struggled last year in third down situations.
3. The defensive holding call on Foyesade Oluokun at the beginning of Washington’s last touchdown drive gave the Commanders a first down and moved the ball out to the 10-yard line away from the goal line.

Wrap-up

The defensive backs will have to adjust to the emphasis on downfield illegal contact against receivers. From a penalty perspective, Washington held down making stupid or costly penalties in the game. The hope is that Washington can continue that trend during the rest of the season.

Next week, I will be adding in yearly summary totals to the column.