In the NFL you'd think of Reaching the Red Zone and Red Zone Performance as a pretty common indicator for how well your offense is performing.
There are many ways to reach the Red Zone.
An offensive, defensive or special teams player could be breaking away only to be caught at the 5, or the team could be on a 79 yard drive before they reach the Red Zone, either way, they are there
There is also no arguing that the teams who get there the most and have high conversion rate are the best teams in the League.
Let's take a look at the teams with the most red Zone Possessions per game.
In Order: The Top 10 Teams in Red Zone Possessions Are:
1) New Orleans (4.8)
2) New England (4.4)
3) Minnesota (4.4)
4) San Diego (4.1)
5) NY Giants (3.8)
6) Indy (3.6)
7) Atlanta (3.5)
8) Houston (3.5)
9) Arizona (3.5)
10) Cincy (3.4)
Off the top of my head and if I had to guess, I would say that these are probably the Top 10 Offenses in the NFL.
So, with that in mind let's look at Red Zone Performance for Oakland.
The team is still trying to score. It is like my Sophomore Year of High School. And also like my Sophomore Year, scoring is rare!
I am actually A-Mazed that a team which has reached the Red Zone, the least amount of times in the NFL (1.5 times a game), has 3 Victories, especially considering that they beat the Bengals and the Eagles.
Interestingly enough, the Raiders have converted 60% of the Red Zone Possessions in the past 3 games, compared to an average of 43% for the Season.
They also reached the Red Zone twice and scored once. Let us hope that it is a portend of things to come.
This post was brought to you by Comcast Red Zone