Hold On – Week 7

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October 27, 2023

By Noonefromtampa

Through week 7 of games, 1,325 penalties have been enforced in 106 games yielding an average of 6.25 penalties per team per game. Washington had been called for 42 penalties across 7 games for an average of 6 penalties per game which is almost 1 penalty per game under the league average. They are 16th in the league, tied with Cleveland for most penalties.

The top 5 penalized team across the league are:

  1. San Francisco – 50
  2. Indianapolis – 48
  3. Arizona – 48
  4. Denver – 48
  5. New England – 47

The top 5 penalty calls across the league are:

  1. False Start, 256 times
  2. Offensive Holding, 248 times
  3. Defensive Pass Interference, 120 times
  4. Defensive Holding, 77 times
  5. Unnecessary Roughness, 70 times

As of week 6, unnecessary roughness is being called 10.5% more over the 2022 season when looking at the count per game stat. This is about half of the rate of last week, so either players have gotten the message or officials are not focusing enforcement on this as much.

Week 5 Summary

New York Giants – 4 accepted penalties (1 declined) for 40 yards, gave up 1 first down via penalty

Washington – 10 accepted penalties (1 declined) for 75 yards, gave up 2 first downs via penalty

Thoughts

On top of the pass protection issues, Washington still commits a lot of penalties, which put the team in first and 15, first and 20, or second and 20 situations. That puts the offense into more must-pass downs which lets the defensive ignore the run and go to full quarterback pressure mode.

This week Head Coach Ron Rivera accepted an offensive holding penalty against the Giants at the Washington 2 yard line. This backed the Giants up to the 12 yard line and they scored on a throw to Darren Waller. The defense was playing well at that point, so forcing them to decide on a field goal attempt or forcing a turnover on downs seemed more reasonable by declining the penalty. Backing the Giants up gave them more room to throw the ball and resulted in an excellent throw by Tyrod Taylor to Waller.

For the true penalty geeks, this game saw the first offsetting penalties of the season.

This is the summary of penalties committed by each team:

By Penalty:

Penalty New York Giants Washington Grand Total
Defensive Holding 1 0 1
Delay of Game 0 1 1
False Start 0 4 4
Illegal Contact 0 1 1
Intentional Grounding 0 1 1
Offensive Holding 2 2 4
Unnecessary Roughness 1 1 2
Grand Total 4 10 14

By Unit:

Team Defense Offense ST Grand Total
New York Giants 2 2 0 4
Washington 1 8 1 10
Grand Total 3 10 1 14

By Player:

Against Player Penalty Accepted Declined Offset
New York Giants X. McKinney Unnecessary Roughness 1 0 0
B. McCain Offensive Holding 0 0 1
D. Banks Defensive Holding 1 0 0
J. Pugh Offensive Holding 1 0 0
M. Glowinski Offensive Holding 1 0 0
Washington C. Leno False Start 2 0 0
Offensive Holding 0 1 0
T. Castro-Fields Offensive Holding 1 0 0
Player Out of Bounds on Kick 0 0 1
A. Wylie False Start 1 0 0
Unnecessary Roughness 1 0 0
S. Cosmi False Start 1 0 0
Offense Delay of Game 1 0 0
J. Davis Illegal Contact 1 0 0
S. Howell Intentional Grounding 1 0 0
S. Charles Offensive Holding 1 0 0

Season Total:

Player Accepted Declined Offset
A. Wylie 4 1 0
C. Leno 3 1 0
J. Davis 3 0 0
C. Young 3 0 0
B. St-Juste 2 1 0
N. Gates 2 1 0
Offense 2 1 0
J. Bates 2 0 0
S. Charles 2 0 0
S. Cosmi 2 0 0
M. Sweat 1 1 0
K. Fuller 1 1 0
T. Castro-Fields 1 0 1
D. Johnson 1 0 0
D. Mayo 1 0 0
D. Brown 1 0 0
S. Howell 1 0 0
Defense 1 0 0
E. Forbes 1 0 0
B. Pringle 1 0 0
J. Dotson 1 0 0
C. Barton 1 0 0
L. Thomas 1 0 0
J. Martin 1 0 0
C. Holmes 1 0 0
D. Payne 1 0 0
K. Curl 0 1 0
J. Smith-Williams 0 1 0

Sources: nfl.com, nflpenalties.com