Washington Football Team: Key numbers from Week 8 loss as struggles continue

The Bad: Washington’s Offense Continues to Fall Apart in the Red Zone

6: Over the last two weeks, Washington has gotten into the red zone six times. SIX TIMES! Yet, it finished with a grand total of ZERO POINTS! Last week, Washington went 0-for-4 in the red zone and those struggles continued against the Broncos as the team went 0-for-2 in the red zone.

11: Washington has averaged the second-fewest points per game over its last three games, with just 11 points per game. The only team that has less, the Houston Texans. Not good company to be in.

4X: Ron Rivera isn’t in the best company as this is only the fourth time since 1970 where Washington has scored under 13 points for more than three games in a row (h/t @dandalyonsports). The first was in 1993 with first-year coach, Richie Petitbon. His coaching career ended at the conclusion of that season. The second was in 2001 with Marty Schottenheimer at the helm. He was also fired at the end of that season. The third was Jim Zorn in 2008, and although he wasn’t fired at the end of the season, he only lasted one more season before being fired.

15: Denver hadn’t held a lead in 15 quarters until it took a 3-0 lead against Washington in the second quarter. Washington was able to tie it 3-3 but was never able to take a lead during the rest of the game.

3.3: Taylor Heinicke threw two interceptions against the Broncos and now has twice as many interceptions as touchdowns in the last four games. Heincke is throwing interceptions on 3.3% of his throws, which is fifth-worst in the NFL behind Zack Wilson, Justin Fields, Davis Mills, and Joe Burrow. Interestingly enough, three of those five are rookies, and Burrow and Heinicke also don’t have too many games under their belt.

3, 23: Terry McLaurin finished with three receptions and 23 yards. That’s not how you win a game for Washington. In the two games that Washington has won this year, McLaurin finished with 14 receptions for 107 yards and a touchdown and 13 receptions for 123 yards and two touchdowns. Feed Terry the ball, that should be simple enough for Scott Turner.

56.52%: Washington has the worst third-down defense in the NFL, allowing opponents to convert on 56.52% of their attempts, which is over five percent worse than the second-worst team, the Dolphins. Washington’s offense also has the sixth-lowest third-down conversion percentage so the team has struggled on both sides of the ball.

1/3: Chris Blewitt went 1-for-3 on his field-goal attempts against the Broncos. Although he made a 52-yarder, he had his other two field goals blocked. Well, one was a block, and the other hit his offensive lineman in the head. Blewitt has made just 40% of his field-goal attempts so far this season, while former kicker, Dustin Hopkins had made 90% of his kicks over his past 10 games. If Rivera was trying to send a message to the team, it backfired, unless the message was supposed to be, “I don’t know what the heck I’m doing.”

Overall, the fanbase is growing weary of hearing the same thing repeated over and over after every game.

After the loss to the Packers, coach Rivera said, “We still have 10 games left to play, obviously, and anything can happen if you take them one at a time. What I’m hoping for and looking for is for us to start playing consistent football, better football.”

The team definitely played “consistent football,” only scoring 10 points again and stalling in the red zone, but it definitely wasn’t “better football.” After the loss to the Broncos, Rivera stuck with his talking points, saying, “We still have 9 (games) left to play. We’ll see what happens.”

The good news for Washington is they won’t be losing a game this upcoming weekend. The bad news, coming out of the bye week, Washington has a meeting with Tom Brady and last year’s Super Bowl champions. But don’t worry because after that, we still have eight games left to play, right?