Football Outsiders unveils SackSEER statistic for projecting edge rushers

[BradyFTW!]

FOOTBALL OUTSIDERS: Innovative Statistics, Intelligent Analysis

Very cool read-up: given the Pats' needs, it's pretty interesting stuff. According to it, this is a pretty crappy year for edge rushers. It's projecting Jason Pierre-Paul to be a total flop, while Jerry Hughes projects to be the best of a pretty sub-par pass rusher class. FO is by far my favorite site for advanced statistics, and Aaron Schatz is pretty good at breaking this stuff down. Schatz explains it in some depth on the most recent BS Report, which is all about the NFL draft and includes Schatz and Mike Lombardi.

 

[jmt57]

FOOTBALL OUTSIDERS: Innovative Statistics, Intelligent Analysis | Introducing SackSEER

Interesting perspective resulting in placing Hughes, Morgan and Griffen ahead of Graham. Not exactly surprised to see Jean Pierre-Paul slip in rankings such as this; I felt USF opponents focused on stopping Selvie, which helped JPP quite a bit. Te'o-Neisham is obviously a talent but I'm not as sure about Eric Norwood.

 

[Box_O_Rocks]

FOOTBALL OUTSIDERS: Innovative Statistics, Intelligent Analysis | Introducing SackSEER

Interesting perspective resulting in placing Hughes, Morgan and Griffen ahead of Graham. Not exactly surprised to see Jean Pierre-Paul slip in rankings such as this; I felt USF opponents focused on stopping Selvie, which helped JPP quite a bit. Te'o-Neisham is obviously a talent but I'm not as sure about Eric Norwood.

I'd love Norwood, let's just get his weight up above 250 and give him some Bruschi time in film study.

 

[BostonPatriot]

Does this AMAZING new stat account for scheme, the talent level of teammates on your defense, coaching - etc.

As Belichick said, stats are for losers.

 

[Deus Irae]

Does this AMAZING new stat account for scheme, the talent level of teammates on your defense, coaching - etc.

As Belichick said, stats are for losers.

..... and like so many other sayings, that one gets misused more often than it gets used correctly.

 

[The Dynasty]

Does this AMAZING new stat account for scheme, the talent level of teammates on your defense, coaching - etc.

As Belichick said, stats are for losers.

100% agree. Based upon stats the Patriots were the 3rd best offensive team in the league last year, but we all know that wasn't the case.

 

[Ice_Ice_Brady]

I doubt Belichick would say that evaluative stats are for losers. Belichick was referring to individual statistics and milestones. You don't see a lot of Patriots mirroring the Colts by reaching "1500 yards" and "100 receptions" milestones before leaving the field during the last game of the season.

Now, I highly doubt that if a guy ran a 4.03 40-yard dash, Belichick would scoff that stats are irrelevant. These kinds of stats can be very relevant to evaluating talent. Stats about a guy's speed, quickness, vertical leap, etc. are probably the most important aspects of evaluation... those are looked at before digging deeper into character/risk issues.

I love football, am a hard-worker, could probably absorb the playbook quickly, and would be a good chemistry guy... but I won't be playing for the Patriots any time soon.

 

[patsfan-1982]

i agree that Jerry Hughes, will be the best pass rusher of them all.



Sergio Kindle, is a 8 sacks a year type guy but he brings more then just sacks IMO he is a every down OLB that can stop the run and do a ok job of covering TE's and RB's i hope the pats take him and norwood.

 

[patsfan-1982]

I doubt Belichick would say that evaluative stats are for losers. Belichick was referring to individual statistics and milestones. You don't see a lot of Patriots mirroring the Colts by reaching "1500 yards" and "100 receptions" milestones before leaving the field during the last game of the season.

Now, I highly doubt that if a guy ran a 4.03 40-yard dash, Belichick would scoff that stats are irrelevant. These kinds of stats can be very relevant to evaluating talent. Stats about a guy's speed, quickness, vertical leap, etc. are probably the most important aspects of evaluation... those are looked at before digging deeper into character/risk issues.

I love football, am a hard-worker, could probably absorb the playbook quickly, and would be a good chemistry guy... but I won't be playing for the Patriots any time soon.

i rember brady geting TD's #50 and moss geting TD #25 on the last game of a 16-0 season if ther. is a record to be gotten or a player can reach a milestone. BB will let them get it. stats are for loosers IMO means the last game you played means noting you can't take dose 30 points from last week into this week. thats what i think BB means by saying that.

 

[ALP]

i rember brady geting TD's #50 and moss geting TD #25 on the last game of a 16-0 season if ther. is a record to be gotten or a player can reach a milestone. BB will let them get it. stats are for loosers IMO means the last game you played means noting you can't take dose 30 points from last week into this week. thats what i think BB means by saying that.

that stat is not meaningless...that was a game we were losing at some point if i remember correctly, that TD pulled us away

its not like BB just let Brady bomb it for the stat, it was for the game

 

[Ice_Ice_Brady]

i rember brady geting TD's #50 and moss geting TD #25 on the last game of a 16-0 season if ther. is a record to be gotten or a player can reach a milestone. BB will let them get it. stats are for loosers IMO means the last game you played means noting you can't take dose 30 points from last week into this week. thats what i think BB means by saying that.

When you are trailing in a game you want to win, it's better to keep your best players in there. Even if the Patriots were pursuing individual records that year, that was a once-in-a-lifetime regular season. The NFL probably would have absolutely keeled over had they just hung it up and settled for 15-1; you might recall that the major broadcast networks were given rights to the game due to its historic importance... I think there's a huge difference between that and preserving "4500-yard" season streaks like the Colts do. The Patriots decide before the game if they are going to rest starters or play to win. They don't lollygag around to get footnotes in the history books and then immediately yank their players out.

 

[Deus Irae]

When you are trailing in a game you want to win, it's better to keep your best players in there. Even if the Patriots were pursuing individual records that year, that was a once-in-a-lifetime regular season. The NFL probably would have absolutely keeled over had they just hung it up and settled for 15-1; you might recall that the major broadcast networks were given rights to the game due to its historic importance... I think there's a huge difference between that and preserving "4500-yard" season streaks like the Colts do. The Patriots decide before the game if they are going to rest starters or play to win. They don't lollygag around to get footnotes in the history books and then immediately yank their players out.

Come on, now. The "bombs away" approach in the second half of the Miami game had nothing to do with needing to win the game.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Does this AMAZING new stat account for scheme, the talent level of teammates on your defense, coaching - etc.

As Belichick said, stats are for losers.

the funny thing is that Schatz mentions that the Pats are one of the three teams that are most adept at using these types of statistical measures for player evaluation. This kind of stuff is essentially what Ernie Adams does, as I understand it, and it makes sense. It's taking the lessons that we learned in Moneyball and moving them over to football: find the traits that correlate to success and carry a favorable market value, and you will get the most success for your payroll.

If you think that the Pats don't pay very close attention to this kind of stuff, then I'd really suggest that you actually read a book or listen to a relevant interview about the team, rather than misquoting the same snippet for the dozenth time. It doesn't mean what you think it does, and clearly you have no idea what context Belichick was speaking in. Your knowledge is seriously lacking.

 

[MoLewisrocks]

the funny thing is that Schatz mentions that the Pats are one of the three teams that are most adept at using these types of statistical measures for player evaluation. This kind of stuff is essentially what Ernie Adams does, as I understand it, and it makes sense. It's taking the lessons that we learned in Moneyball and moving them over to football: find the traits that correlate to success and carry a favorable market value, and you will get the most success for your payroll.

If you think that the Pats don't pay very close attention to this kind of stuff, then I'd really suggest that you actually read a book or listen to a relevant interview about the team, rather than misquoting the same snippet for the dozenth time. It doesn't mean what you think it does, and clearly you have no idea what context Belichick was speaking in. Your knowledge is seriously lacking.

As is so often the case, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

They do look at this stuff, but they also watch a lot of film here...for context. How a player plays is more significant than how he times and measures when he's been training for track and field like performance for 3 months. Last night I heard someone, may have been Lombardi, opining that this draft is difficult to predict because while generic scouts have always placed a premium on 4-3 fits defensively, this season 15 teams are drafting defensively for 3-4 fit. So a lot of grade projections may appear to go out the window and a lot of draft guru's may be mumbling about reaches...and slides. Ditto on offense where teams are looking for the next...Welker.

And a guy like Ernie uses stats and data to predict trends. With the rules increasingly favoring passing offense he might be seeing measurables trending in different directions based on the number of teams now running the 3-4 2 gap base as part of a multiple fronts scheme...with the value of fits for sub packages creeping closer to the value for pure base package fits.

Bill is on record saying that for the most part the Combine itself is a waste of valuable football training time. He likes the opportunity to get eyes on players and to get the basic medical evals covered. But he thinks the value placed on stats compiled in shorts and tshirts events players have trained for sometimes to their detriment is often misleading, which may be why his fan base isn't alone in struggling to predict what he will do on any given draft day... He probably feels the same way about these heavily scripted pro days, although the school ones tend to provide an opportunity to get eyes on players who were not invited to the combine.

Because of the nature of the game and scheme vs. baseball, stats will never be nearly as predictive in football as fans and observers want them to be.

 

[Wretch]

Statistics do not lie, statisticians misinterpret them or focus on limited or inappropriate data points that validate erroneous point of views. Also in an infinitely complex system it is impossible to predict anything with 100% certainty, see meteorology.

Without statistics analysis becomes an exercise in intuition which is just as invalid as relying on limited or erroneous data.

 

[JMarr]

]"Statistics do not lie, statisticians misinterpret them or focus on limited or inappropriate data points that validate erroneous point of views. Also in an infinitely complex system it is impossible to predict anything with 100% certainty, see meteorology.

Without statistics analysis becomes an exercise in intuition which is just as invalid as relying on limited or erroneous data."[/B]

Wow. Watch it H.A.L., someone's going to have to pull the plug on you.

 

[Wretch]

Wow. Watch it H.A.L., someone's going to have to pull the plug on you. [/Qoute]

Got a little carried away but I have been getting frustrated with the "my eyes tell me (Maroney sucks/BB can't draft/We should have traded for malcontent A or B/the sky is falling)" crowd lately regardless of how much evidence is presented to counter their claims.