Just to get this out of the way immediately, I obviously took a backwards K in my prediction of a so-so T.O. performance this week. Three things though. First, the stats couldn't account for T.O. having 2 catches for 120 yards and a touchdown on plays where he blatantly committed an offensive pass interference that was not called. Second, and perhaps I had an influence on this, 67% of those of us who voted on the preview poll thought that T.O. would have less than 100 receiving yards, and only 9% correctly predicted that he would have over 150. Finally, T.O. still has a negative DYAR (-7; ranked 65^th) and a lopsided expected yards discrepancy (-133) even after the second best yardage game of his career. In fact, his expected yards discrepancy per game actually got worse, dropping from -8.6 to -12.1. So I guess what I'm saying here is, "Yeah. I was wrong, but I wasn't as wrong as you think." Sunday's performance by T.O. was totally unexpected based on the stats, and therein lies a major limitation of statistics: It is good at predicting "typical" performance, but not so good at predicting "atypical" performance.

Now, with that out of the way, I'd like to focus on what most 49er fans have been focusing on since Sunday, and I don't mean the choice between roasting and deep frying the Thanksgiving poultry. I'm talking about the atrocious performance of the 49er offense in the red zone against the Cowboys. Most of the blame over the past 3 days has been centered around Mike Martz's play-calling...you know...the pass-run-pass tendency that even I picked up on a couple of weeks ago. Well, there's a dirty little secret, borne out by the stats, that tells me that Martz may not be as much of an offensive genius as most NFL fans think he is.

IN THE RED (ZONE)

We all know the legend of Mike Martz. He turned a guy with "bag boy" and "Arena League player" on his resume into a Super-Bowl-winning, multiple-MVP quarterback. He was the ringmaster of "The Greatest Show on Turf." Hell, he even gilded Jon "The Interception Machine" Kitna's right arm. What's become obvious over the years, though, is that his offense is bred for easy situations. Versus a defensive genius (See Bill Belichick), or when the pressure is on (See Super Bowl XXXVI), however, his offense can be amazingly inefficient. It's great at racking up yardage, but it's not so great at succeeding in the situations that most impact the outcome of an NFL game. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the red zone.

Below is a chart showing the efficiency of Martz-led offenses both overall (black line) and in the red zone (red line):

*Martz only coached the Rams offense for 5 games during the 2005 season.

After the jump, I'll explain the chart, explain why talent hasn't been as important as you think, compare the red zone stats with other field zones, and see how the 49ers did in their SVW situations...

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As bad as the St. Louis Rams have been so far, one bright spot has been the play of rookie wide receiver Donnie Avery.  Avery has has 25 receptions for 392 yards and two touchdowns.  While Torry Holt has more receptions, Avery's YPC of 15.7 shows he's developing into a big play threat for the Rams.

Given the secondary concerns in San Francisco, one has to wonder how the 49ers will play Avery.  Maiocco projected a Walt Harris-Donnie Avery matchup in his key matchups.  Over at Turf Show Times, VanRam thinks Avery's emergence would dictate Nate Clements covering him all day long.  Obviously Maiocco probably knows a little more than our Rams blogger.  However, one has to consider whether Nate Clements should be the guy covering Avery.  As Maiocco put it:

Others might focus on the Nate Clements-Torry Holt matchup, but Avery is more like the kind of receiver who has given the 49ers problems this season. He's young and he's fast. Can anyone in the 49ers' secondary match up with him? We shall see. Avery leads the Rams in receiving yards. He has 25 receptions for 392 yards for a 15.7 average. If Bulger gets time to thrown, Avery has the potential to pop a big play.

Given how much Walt Harris has struggled, wouldn't you want your #1 corner covering the biggest threat?  Given how much Torry Holt has struggled this year, maybe it's time to give him a little less respect in coverage and pin Harris on him?  I think you go with Clements on Avery and let the two veterans Harris and Holt see who has something left in the tank. 

One other thing to consider is that we might actually have a coach willing to make adjustments.  So, you could start Clements on Avery and depending on how the rest of the secondary is doing, adjust accordingly.  There are numerous options, and one plus to being a struggling team is that you can try a little bit of everything to see what works.  Should make for a fun matchup to watch, who ever it is that is covering him.