Go For It – And Get YAC! – JoeBucsFan.com – Tampa Bay Bucs Blog, Buccaneers News

Surprising stats.

If we are to learn something from recent NFL success, it’s smart to look at trends.

Over at CBS, Chris Trapasso decided to look at playoff teams from the past two seasons. One of their trends is that aggressive teams do well. Adding to that, yards after catch (YAC) is critical.

The Bengals and Chiefs finished third and fourth, respectively, in first-down pass rate during the regular season. Eight of the 14 playoff teams were in the top 10 in first-down pass rate and first-down pass rate in one-score game scenarios. If the NFL is a copycat league, other teams need to mimic what the best teams are doing, and one of those things is passing it more frequently than they run it on first down, even if the game is close.

And YAC is here to stay for a while. The Chiefs finished with the most total YAC during the regular season. The 49ers had the best YAC-per-reception average. The Chiefs were second in that category, while the Eagles were fifth and Bengals were 11th despite Ja’Marr Chase missing four contests.

Believe it or not, but the Bucs have two players in the top-20 in YAC. The first may surprise you. The Bucs’ leader in YAC was Playoff Lenny. It’s true. He was fifth in the NFL in YAC, per NBC Sports, with 582.

(Pro-Football-Reference.com has Playoff Lenny with 563 yards of YAC last year, his career high. Playoff Lenny. He had 7.7 yards of YAC per catch.)

Also in the top-20 is Chris Godwin. And Joe believes Godwin likely got most of his YAC in the second half of the season as he grew healthier. Godwin, per NBC Sports, had 535 YAC.

(Pro-Football-Reference.com has Godwin with 527 yards of YAC, averaging 5.1 yards of YAC a catch.)

But yeah, the Bucs could use another receiver who is both quick and can get YAC.