Penalties
Of course, a player committing penalties is a problem! But as with the relationship between completion percentage and yards allowed, we should be able to establish a tradeoff between penalties and literally everything else Trevon Diggs does well.
Earlier in the season, Connor Williams had a pretty significant penalty problem. He was significantly outpacing his penalty numbers from previous years in a year where his pass-blocking efficiency was amongst the top ten guards in the NFL. Some, as did the Cowboys coaching staff and front office, believed the answer to this was benching him for Connor McGovern.
Unsurprisingly, if you choose a consistently worse player to start the residual effect of that move is likely worse all-around production. All of a sudden, people didn’t seem to mind Wiliams’ penalties because he wasn’t allowing pressures or sacks at the rate of McGovern. I don’t believe that holding penalties are overrated in the value we assign them, but it was pretty obvious from the beginning that with Williams, he was getting the short end of the stick.
So back to Monson…
"It’s a smaller point, but Diggs also leads the league in penalties among cornerbacks, with two more than anybody else. Seven of his 11 penalties have been in coverage, with two more coming courtesy of clumsy hand placement when jamming receivers at the line. These are plays that don’t appear in coverage statistics, but Diggs has given up 11 first downs due to penalties, most of which have been some form of sloppy coverage technique or overly aggressive play. Only two corners have allowed more first downs this season than Diggs, and he jumps both of them if we factor in penalties."
Once again, penalties are a problem! But the information Monson conveniently neglected to tell you was the Pro-Bowl cornerback has been responsible for one penalty over the last seven weeks! That means the other 10 penalties happened over the first eight weeks of the season, a span where he recorded two games without penalties.
Penalties suck but so does writing about a problem that isn’t a problem anymore… Also, since we’re keeping tabs on these things Jalen Ramsey has nine penalties this season with seven coming over the last seven weeks.
*shrugs shoulders*