Question about the defense

[One Shot]

So I was thinking about the Redskins defense today, and crying to myself in my room about how it has been exploited just about every game of the season. Obviously a drastic change since the past two seasons, when it was the defense who did the exploiting. But then I wondered about something, does anyone know their statistics for 1st and 2nd down?

The reason i ask this is that if the defense has held them to 3rd and long very often, which it seems like it has, then that means that its doing its job on 1st and 2nd down and are playing well for those downs. But of course, 3rd down is crucial because once the opposing offense converts, it preserves the drive and once the offense caps it off with a TD, they would have driven 60 or 70 yards, which obviously adds significant amount to the YPG average.

So really my question is, is the defense stuffing them on 1st and 2nd down but allowing tons of long 3rd down completions, or are they allowing 3 or more yards per down?

[kevin11]

No, our defense sucks...We give up 3rd downs of 3 & 20......Yeah

In the cowboys game, they were faced with 3rd and 3 and below.