by Vince Verhei

The linked article focuses on Arizona's new aggressive look on defense, and how San Francisco's defense limited the Cardinals to a never-ending series of checkdowns to Tim Hightower. Hightower finished with 12 catches for 121 yards, both career highs, but was it really a good day for him?

The short answer is yes; Hightower caught those 12 passes on 14 targets, with just two incompletions, and his receiving DVOA for the day was 54.2%. He produced five first downs. But looking at his targets one by one, The picture is not so rosy.

Only half those plays met our criteria for Successful Plays (40 percent of yards needed on first down, 60 percent on second down, 100 percent on third and fourth down). Looking closer at the numbers, Hightower was much better on first down (80 percent Success Rate) than on third or fourth downs (29 percent Success Rate). Hightower has good hands and works well in space; it might be in Arizona's best interests to keep him involved as a receiver on first downs.

Posted by: Vince Verhei on 15 Sep 2009

10 comments, Last at 18 Sep 2009, 7:56am by bubqr