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Factoid

New England Patriots

Patriots are kings of the 1-yard touchdown run

I posted the Mike Gillislee blurb the other day, and apologies for double dipping. But I believe he’s going to score a lot of touchdowns. A great offense, and I think he’s going to be the back they feature around the goal line.

Gillislee is their biggest back and has been a good short-yardage runner. That’s been established. But mostly it’s about the offense. The Patriots have probably the league’s best offense, and they’re not averse to ramming the ball down people’s throats. They’ve scored a league-high 90 rushing touchdowns over the last five years – 8 more than anyone else.

Some teams like to pass the ball near the goal line – Packers, Lions. But the Patriots tend to like to roll up the sleeves and punch people in the face in that part of the field.

Reviewing the numbers, I saw the Patriots had a league-high 18 running plays from the 1-yard line last year, helping LeGarrette Blount score a league-high 1-yard runs. That’s a big number, so I started looking into previous years. I made it back to 2012 before I found an offense with that many plays from the 1 – and it was also the Patriots.

New England, as it turns out, has run the ball at least 13 times in all but one of the last six years. The rest of the league combined has had only eight teams in the last six years run the ball that many times from the 1. That’s 8 out of a possible 248 teams (versus 5 out of 6 for New England).

MOST RUNNING PLAYS FROM THE 1-YARD LINE
YearTeamAttYardsAvgTD
2012New England190.0010
2016New England1810.5611
2011New England177.418
2011Atlanta168.508
2011Carolina156.408
2013New England145.367
2016Buffalo146.436
2012Houston146.437
2015New England131.087
2015New Orleans138.628
2016New Orleans135.387
2016Oakland136.467
2011San Francisco131.085

So if you total them all up, the Patriots have run the ball 91 times from the 1-yard line in the last six years. That’s 33 more than any other team. And they have scored 48 touchdowns on 1-yard runs – 13 more than anyone else.

So yes, I’m figuring Mike Gillislee will score a bunch of rushing touchdowns.

RUNNING PLAYS AT THE 1-YARD LINE (2011-16)
TeamAttYardsAvgTD
New England9128.3148
Atlanta5811.1923
Carolina5716.2835
Cincinnati5720.3530
Baltimore5710.1829
NY Giants5620.3633
New Orleans5523.4231
Detroit5225.4834
Philadelphia4920.4131
Denver4813.2729
Houston4816.3327
Oakland4819.4026
Chicago4719.4027
Arizona4612.2628
Pittsburgh4610.2224
San Francisco4420.4526
Jacksonville448.1819
Miami4312.2825
Buffalo4218.4320
Washington4118.4426
San Diego4013.3321
Dallas3812.3227
Minnesota3821.5524
NY Jets3819.5023
Cleveland387.1818
Tennessee3610.2821
Indianapolis3613.3618
Seattle356.1716
Rams338.2418
Green Bay3213.4120
Tampa Bay3110.3220
Kansas City277.2614

—Ian Allan

Fantasy Index