Ben Roethlisberger By The Numbers, Good News For Jags
By Luke Sims
The Jacksonville Jaguars are going to have a rough time slowing down the Ben Roethlisberger and the Pittsburgh Steelers when they come to town on Sunday.
Fortunately the good folks at FOX Sports found a silver lining when looking at the numbers for Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger. Per an article from Jay Clemons:
"The Steelers visit the Jags on Sunday, and through the years, the state of Florida has been kind to Ben Roethlisberger, who owns a 5-1 lifetime record inside the Sunshine State borders, including a last-gasp victory over the Arizona Cardinals in Super Bowl XLIII.But from a fantasy perspective, Big Ben holds only modest averages when playing the Dolphins, Bucs or Jaguars on the road … or for a neutral-site Super Bowl: 239 passing yards and 1.8 touchdowns."
While Big Ben does tend to win in Florida (a 5-1 record is certainly nothing to scoff at), the “fantasy perspective” that Clemons highlights is also important for the Jaguars in a very much real world perspective.
If the Jaguars were to hold Roethlisberger to his modest average of just 239 yards and 1.8 touchdowns, it would be the best outing by the Jaguars defense so far this season. The Jaguars have not allowed less than 258 yards passing so far this season and that was agains the Washington Redskins sans Robert Griffin III in a monstrous 41-10 loss. However, the Redskins were able to rack up the most rushing yards the Jags have allowed this season, 191.
Over the last two weeks the Jaguars have allowed 386 and 365 yards through the air to the Indianapolis Colts and San Deigo Chargers, respectively. Bringing that down to around 240 yards would be a major accomplishment for a defense that doesn’t show any signs of being able to limit an opposing quarterback. Maybe, just maybe they won’t have to if Roethlisberger sticks to his career average in the state of Florida.