Mason Rudolph vs. J.W. Walsh: Who’s Better in Short-Yardage Situations?

During Monday’s media availability, head coach Mike Gundy was asked about former Cowboy and current TCU graduate assistant J.W. Walsh and how his presence benefited Mason Rudolph.

“The fewer hits that all of the guys that play this position take, the better off whoever’s team they play for is going to be, in my opinion,” said Gundy. “J.W. was able to take a lot of physical contact off of Mason last year because of all of the third-and-short and goal line plays that he was in.”

“Now we’ve adjusted to our offense to where we’re not a very good third-and-short team and we’re a pretty average goal line team, but we’ve made a few changes and Mason has been included in that. You’ve seen him run the ball. He wants to run the ball more. I’m not really excited about him running the ball more, but when you get into a condensed area on the field numbers play a huge role in trying to score.”

Protecting Mason Rudolph has been a concern. That’s for sure. Though pretty elusive in the pocket in his own right,  Rudolph doesn’t have the wheels that Walsh did. This has also affected the amount of sacks Rudolph has taken.

In the above quote, Mike Gundy said, “Now we’ve adjusted to our offense to where we’re not a very good third-and-short team and we’re a pretty average goal line team…”.

After I heard this I wanted to look up just how bad the Cowboys have been on third-and-short this year and I was pretty surprised with what I found. The numbers below show Oklahoma State’s rushing attempts in third-down-and-short situations. Short is defined as 1-3 yards to go.

On rushing attempts on third down and short, the Cowboys actually lead the Big 12, averaging 7.62 yards per carry. That stat surprised me. What surprised me more is how much better this year’s team is than past year’s teams. They are 14/21 (66 percent) on third and shorts so far this year on the ground and were just 13/29 (45 percent) last year.

It seems Gundy’s concerns are actually a little misplaced here.

The best rusher from third-and-short (1-3 yards to go)? Mason Rudolph. Rudolph has five rushes in this range for an average of 7.6 per carry (Childs does have one attempt for 19 yards).

On passing attempts at the same down and yardage, the Cowboys are 60 percent (9/15). That’s down from last year’s 68.8 percent (11/16) and 2014’s surprising 100 percent (12/12).

But between the two quarterbacks, who was more efficient in these passing downs? Let’s take a look.

While Walsh was the short-yardage specialist, Mason Rudolph has been more effective when passing in those downs. And this year, he’s been very effective on the run, as well.

So while it may not seem like it from a personnel standpoint, this offense with Rudolph is actually pretty effective in short-yardage situations. OSU is converting third and shorts at a 61 percent clip against 47 percent last year. They still have some room for improvement in the red-zone, though.