The guys over at Football Outsiders do a great job of analyzing stats, even while we're in the middle of this lockout.
Last week they starting going through various individual statistics for the 2010 season, and did a piece on which defensive players were best and worst at stopping the run.
They measured this by measuring their 'Run Stop Rate', the percentage at which they'd make the stop on any run play that is going in their direction.
Seeing as how the Redskins finished 31st in defense in 2010, it's hard to imagine seeing the names of any Redskin defenders under the 'best' column.
And unfortunately, the Redskins find themselves on the bad side of these metrics. The Redskins, according to these statistics, had two defenders who were among the worst run stoppers in the NFL in 2010.
Among the twelve worst Run Stop Rates for linebackers, inside backer Rocky McIntosh recorded a 53% Run Stop Rate on 55 plays, tied for sixth worst in the league last year.
Rocky certainly had his struggles last season, but the member of the Redskins defense who had perhaps the biggest tackling problem was free safety Kareem Moore, and that certainly showed up here.
Moore finished the season with a 24% Run Stop Rate on 37 plays, tied for worst in the league among defensive backs.
Ouch.
Granted, these statistics don't reveal anything new. They simply illustrate something we already had realized: The Redskins defense didn't exactly do well statistically last year, and there was some serious tackling problems at certain points of the season. Jim Haslett's crew failed to light it up in year one of the 3-4 defense, and the jury is obviously still out on how this will work out.
In other news, this lockout can't end soon enough.