Field position
Field position is one of the canards that Dom Capers used to sell his players when he coached expansion teams at Carolina and Houston, and still preaches as defensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins. So did Bill Cowher, coach of the 2005 champion Pittsburgh Steelers.
In 1996, Capers' second season with the expansion Panthers, Carolina had the league's best average starting position after receiving kickoffs, and its defense had the second best position in the league after kicking off. Those numbers translated to an 8.6-yard differential for every pair of kickoffs; more than a quarter of the time, Panthers' opponents started inside their own 20 following a kickoff, twice the league average.
Multiply that through an entire season, and you get a lot of so-called hidden yardage.
That wasn't the only reason, but clearly it was one of them, that, in their second season in the league, Carolina compiled a 12-4 record and reached the NFC Championship Game. That same year, the New York Jets had the worst field position differential after kickoffs -- minus-5.7 yards. The Jets finished 1-15.
Cowher, a former special teams coach, understands the concept.
"I didn't look at (kickoff return) average," Cowher said. "I just look at starting position. It's an indication of how long a field are you creating when you kick off, and how short a field are you creating when you return it?"
