Cam Skattebo — Week 3: Twenty Carries, Sixty Yards

Nothing to nothing, 10 oh seven left in the first quarter, third and seven at the New York 32. Jameis Winston threw deep left to Cam Skattebo, 29 yards in the air, and he was tackled at the Tennessee 38 after 30. +3.0 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and 10.7 points of win probability, the chance of winning the game after the play against before it. It was the largest win-probability gain on any pass or run by either team, and the best Giants play by expected points. The drive ended in the first of New York's four field goals.

The line: 20 carries, 60 yards, no touchdown, three first downs, six of the 20 successful, −5.3 expected points on the carries, the lowest figure for any runner in the game; four targets, three catches, 40 yards. The carries went one, −1, three, two, −3, three, four, −7, four, −2, one, five, eight, 10, one, 13, seven, six, four, one. 13 before halftime for 18 yards, seven after for 42. The −7 was first and five at the Tennessee five in the second quarter, a direct snap around right end back to the 12, and the Giants kicked a 27-yard field goal three snaps later. The third quarter started better: 10 yards up the middle on the first snap, a fumble that went out of bounds with New York keeping it, and later 13 to the Tennessee nine and seven to the two. From the two the drive went backward — a no-gain run of his wiped out by an illegal shift, a holding call, an incompletion — and his six-yard run on third and 17 set up a 30-yard field goal. Three of his carries do not count: 11 yards on the first possession and six in the second quarter, both wiped out by holding, and the no-gain at the two. The other catches were seven on third and 18 from the New York six, short of the line, and three on second and 14 in the third quarter.

Skattebo took 20 of the Giants' 31 designed runs; Najee Harris had nine for 52 yards, Darnell Mooney and Tyrone Tracy one each. Tony Pollard's 74 yards on 17 carries were the most on the ground in the game. Skattebo's four targets were third on the team behind Malik Nabers's six and Isaiah Likely's five. 23 touches, a hundred yards.

Back in June the preview put Skattebo on the watchlist: a top-10 back per game across eight rookie games before a fractured and dislocated ankle, with his availability and explosiveness the first things to watch. Week 1 was 18 carries, 81 yards and a touchdown with no targets. Week 2 was 12 carries for 36 four catches. Sunday was the heaviest workload of the three, 20 carries, and tied with Week 2 for the least efficient, three yards a carry, with the 30-yard catch as his longest gain. Three games: 50 carries, a hundred 77 yards, seven catches. The leg has held up through three straight weeks of lead-back volume; the burst the preview asked about has not shown up on the ground, where his longest run in three games is 13. New York is home to the Cardinals on Sunday the fourth.

_Data via nflverse._