Dead Zone of the NFL Season Thread

[joemcrugby]

Thought that I’d create a catch-all thread for this dead month of the NFL calendar as we await the opening of training camp.

First post: Happy Birthday, LT!!

Don’t know what is happening, but the link isn’t showing? 🤷‍♂️

[joemcrugby]

Jun 23, 2019 12:40:41 GMT -7 joemcrugby said:

Thought that I’d create a catch-all thread for this dead month of the NFL calendar as we await the opening of training camp.

First post: Happy Birthday, LT!!

Don’t know what is happening, but the link isn’t showing? 🤷‍♂️

Here’s the Facebook link to the LT package:

[joemcrugby]

[totallybolted]

Hope we see another 31 rushing TD's and 7 PR/KR for TD's this year.

[frozendisc]

Jun 24, 2019 16:39:39 GMT -7 totallybolted said:

Hope we see another 31 rushing TD's and 7 PR/KR for TD's this year.

TD's from ST's efforts are so nice.......

[joemcrugby]

A blast from the past: a GREAT hit by MJD on Merriman, and MJD tells Daniel Jeremiah how they set Shawne up on the play!

[joemcrugby]

At least it wasn’t the Chargers (knocking on the wood that is my skull)!!

[xenos]

Love them or hate them, you can't deny that Pro Football Focus is interesting to say the least. Even if their rankings don't always make sense

profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/06/17/pro-football-focus-nfl-analytics-fmia-guest/

PFF findings that are surprising, useful

By Eric Eager, Data Scientist

The opportunity to study football with math is one we try to approach with humility, because many results run contrary to what we’ve believed for generations and many findings are merely steps toward the truth instead of complete proof. We have a unique data set that includes PFF grading for every player on every play, and our first question, like the first question of most people, was whether the grading was actually useful.

PFF grading is not only far more stable (meaning consistent from season to season or week to week) than traditional metrics like passer rating or yards per carry, but is also more predictive should you care about figuring out who might win before the game is played. While many point to the inherent subjectivity of our grading, it’s important to realize not only are all stats subjective in some way, but that subjectivity doesn’t matter if they satisfy the two criteria mentioned above.

Here then are some of our findings that are the most surprising and useful to football fans and teams alike:

To predict quarterback play, look at how he performs when he’s in a clean pocket, not when he’s under pressure

Pressure is indeed important, and it affects every quarterback negatively. However, we find out very little about how good a quarterback is by looking at his pressured drop-backs. Indeed, we found that quarterback play (however you measure it) from a clean, un-pressured pocket tells you the most about quarterback play.

This makes some sense intuitively. Pressure happens in many ways—via the blitz (with compromised coverage), with a four-man rush (with good coverage on the back end) or some combination of the two. Pressure sometimes succeeds (often not the quarterback’s fault) and sometimes doesn’t. In this situation, you’re judging context more than you’re judging the quarterback.

It’s important to remember that quarterbacks spend about 70 percent of their drop-backs kept clean from pressure, which is why a quarterback like Ben Roethlisberger can be more than viable despite a passer rating under pressure below 70.0 in each of the past four seasons. By comparison, his passer rating in a clean pocket has been above 100.0 in each of those years.
Browns quarterback Baker Mayfield. (Getty Images)

From a clean pocket, we get to see the signal-caller get a fair shake, and we can ask questions like “Is he accurate enough?’’ or “Does he make sound decisions?” without muddying the surrounding circumstances. Effective play from clean pockets was a huge reason for PFF standing firmly on the side of Baker Mayfield’s potential in 2018 and Kyler Murray’s in 2019, because we’ve gotten to see them succeed in those circumstances at the college level where others have failed.

Coverage is more important than pass rush, all else being equal

Analytics have a way of upsetting your sensibilities and upending some preconceived notions. Growing up, we’ve been conditioned to believe that pass rush is critical. And for good reason—pressure reduces passer rating substantially (by about 30 points) and nearly halves a team’s yards per play average. And we can see from the broadcast angle when pressure affects a quarterback. Because passing is so important, good pass-rushers have been the highest-paid members of most NFL’s defenses.

However, we found that not only does pass coverage (as measured by PFF grades) explain team success better than pass-rushing, but predicts it better as well. This helps explain why the winningest team in the league (New England) has used its only two big-name defensive free-agent signings on cornerbacks over the past decade (Stephon Gilmore and Darrelle Revis), and why defensive end Trey Flowers is currently a Detroit Lion. One need only to go back to last year’s playoffs to see how the quick passing game of today’s NFL mitigates even the strongest pass rush, with the Patriots racking up 78 points en route to the Super Bowl despite facing the vaunted pass rushers on the Chargers and Chiefs.

The caveat to this finding? As a trait, coverage tends to be less stable year to year. The upshot? Invest a lot into coverage, so that some subset of five or six of these players give you an elite group.

If you’re going to invest in a pass rusher, prioritize his pressure rate, not his sack rate

Sacks are important and worth about two points for a defense. They usually end drives and often force turnovers. They are the ultimate goal of all pass rushers and rightly the most valuable non-turnover play for a defender.

But if you want to know how good a pass rusher is, and how good he’ll likely be the following season, look at his pressure rate. We at PFF define a pressure as a sack, a hit or a hurry on a quarterback, with the best pass rushers able to generate a pressure on 15 to 20 percent of their pass-rush snaps. For a pass rusher with 500 pass rushes during a season, you’re talking about 75 or so plays, versus just 10 sacks.

Generally speaking, “finishing” pressure with a sack isn’t really a trait a pass rusher possesses per se. If you want to predict a player or team’s sack total one year, use his or its pressure rates from the previous season. A 20 percent decline in a player’s sack total from 10 to eight, for example, is mostly noise. But a 20 percent dip in a player’s pressure rate from 50 to 40 is less so. Process over results.

[totallybolted]

Sooo… your saying TT needed to draft OL?

[chargerfreak]

Jun 23, 2019 14:27:59 GMT -7 joemcrugby said:

Jun 23, 2019 12:40:41 GMT -7 joemcrugby said:

Thought that I’d create a catch-all thread for this dead month of the NFL calendar as we await the opening of training camp.

First post: Happy Birthday, LT!!

Don’t know what is happening, but the link isn’t showing? 🤷‍♂️

Here’s the Facebook link to the LT package:

His Link Package ?! Wow. Post Double Reported to the Goalie. 

[chargerfreak]

OH I HATE THE DEAD SEASON !!! Very spooky !!!!

What if we get hurt carrying luggage !!!!!!!!!

What if we do kids charity and start slapping them around like Tyreek Hill of KC !!!!!!!

What if Robert Kraft takes us on a massage field trip !!!!

SO much can happen in the dead season ! Me scared.

[joemcrugby]

Classic!!

[xenos]

Jun 25, 2019 19:57:57 GMT -7 totallybolted said:

Sooo… your saying TT needed to draft OL?

Don't be ridiculous. He should have drafted a corner

[joemcrugby]

[sonorajim]

Jun 26, 2019 18:40:31 GMT -7 xenos said:

Jun 25, 2019 19:57:57 GMT -7 totallybolted said:

Sooo… your saying TT needed to draft OL?

Don't be ridiculous. He should have drafted a corner

You mean safeties don't count in pass defense ?