Blount has Highest YPC in Pats Franchise History (min 400 carries)

[SlowGettingUp]

Here is some discussion of era-adjusted YPC - Jamaal Charles, Jim Brown and Barry Sanders are the standouts:

Career Leaders In Yards Per Carry (Era-Adjusted)

 

[Pats2000]

something something, hes a bum, something something, inconsistent, something something lets sign some street free agent that has never been on the team.

What i saw on sunday was a dude getting hit a lot in the backfield. thats not an RB issue, thats an Oline issue.

I think Blunt is crazy good, after 5 steps. He needs 5 steps to build a head of steam. Once he's there, he makes people miss, he's fast, he is nimble, he can cut it back. But
those first 5 steps are some of the slowest steps I've ever seen out of a running back, lol

 

[convertedpatsfan]

That's surprising considering how many times he's stopped behind the line

I guess I wonder how people come to these conclusions. I mean, every back gets stopped in the backfield sometimes, but how many times do you have to see it before you think this is true? Have you compared it to others in the league? How does one reach this conclusion?

FWIW, Football Outsiders came up with a stat called "success rate" for RBs. This doesn't measure the talent of a back or his explosiveness or anything like that. All it measures is how effective they are at getting certain % of yardage per down to keep an offense "on track" for a first down. And in this regard, Blount has been great. Here are his rankings while with NE:

2013: 3
2014: 19 (breakdown between Pittsburgh/NE not available)
2015: 6

For context, DeMarco Murray's fantastic 2013 season with the Cowboys where he was credited with keeping the offense on track throughout had him finish 5th in success rate, 2 spots behind Blount.

Now how many times is he stopped behind the line? Let's look at his 165 carries from last year, not his best year but seems to be the year everyone started turning on him.

In 165 carries, he had 10 carries for minus yardage, or 6% of his carries. Another 9 went for 0 yards so if you want to group those in, he's around 11.5% not gaining yards.

Compare that to Dion Lewis, who had much smaller sample sizes. He had 4 carries with negative yards (8%) and 2 more with 0 yards (12.2%) out of 49 carries.

For some additional context, Thomas Rawls finished 1st in success rate last season. He ran the ball 9 times for lost yardage (6%) and 9 times for no gain (12.1%) out of 148 carries.

Again, we are not talking about the best backs in football. We are simply looking at the incorrect statements that he is caught behind the line a lot. Maybe in a vacuum where you only watch those few plays, but compared to the rest of the league, he's actually been really good about not losing yardage consistently despite playing behind a banged-up offensive line and without fullback Develin.

You can say he's slow. You can even say he's not good. Those are subjective opinions. But saying he's caught in the backfield so many times is just wrong. He's well above league average in that regard.

 

[A Defiant Goose]

Huh. You get one statistic pointed out and suddenly half the fan base doesn't think he sucks. It's too late for the Blountwagon, you guys aren't invited

 

[mosey threetupu]

Woa....

I watched my first game in 1982.

Never, ever heard of Cumar as a nickname for C-Mart.

We had seasons tix from mid 80's until they pushed us all the way up at Gillette and I've never heard Cumar.

 

[RobertWeathers]

We had seasons tix from mid 80's until they pushed us all the way up at Gillette and I've never heard Cumar.

I call Patricia 'Blackbeard' and Goodell "Goody" and I think I'm the only one.

 

[neuronet]

you know how average works right, well those games against the Colts certainly sky rocket his avg

Would be interested to see median

 

[mosey threetupu]

I call Patricia 'Blackbeard' and Goodell "Goody" and I think I'm the only one.

As long as you don't piss on the bleachers.

 

[Mack Herron]

Remembering a former Patriot and HOF RB. Best I've seen.

Why Did Curtis Martin Leave Patriots For Jets? Robert Kraft, Bill Parcells Explain

 

[SlowGettingUp]

FWIW, Football Outsiders came up with a stat called "success rate" for RBs. This doesn't measure the talent of a back or his explosiveness or anything like that. All it measures is how effective they are at getting certain % of yardage per down to keep an offense "on track" for a first down. And in this regard, Blount has been great.

The following article provides some excellent perspective. Basically Blount has been very good on first down but terrible on all other downs. He's also been a lot better in the fourth quarter and when the weather turns cold.

LeGarrette Blount struggles in September, but dominates in December

 

[Tasco]

He's fun to watch when he gets going, the 3&11 conversion against the Cardinals was a beauty...he shook Peterson out of his shoes.
To the eye he seems just inconsistend from game to game, sometimes even from play to play.

 

[convertedpatsfan]

The following article provides some excellent perspective. Basically Blount has been very good on first down but terrible on all other downs. He's also been a lot better in the fourth quarter and when the weather turns cold.

LeGarrette Blount struggles in September, but dominates in December

To be clear, I'm not advocating for Blount for the Patriots HOF. I'm simply pointing out that people who make claims about him getting stopped in the backfield all the time are wrong. He's a lot better than many people here think.

Having said that much, some of those points in that article are pretty fair, although there's some noisy data attributable to some small sample sizes, and it also states things like he's above average (the horror) and that the efficiency of the line may be impacting his numbers.

Speaking of which, I think the author really hides that sample size issue. In terms of plays per down, Blount isn't on the field much for 3rd down, and so here's a break down of number of rushes per down we're evaluating:

2013: 92/51/9/1
2014: 42/10/8
2015: 98/54/12/1
Totals: 232/115/29/2

The "conclusion" on 3rd/4th down is based on 31 carries.

I also think there's a ton of "noisy" data with Blount. I do think he depends on the line more than others because it takes so long for him to get up to speed. I didn't look at all of his years, but I had last year's data already loaded in a spreadsheet I could quickly run a pivot table on, and found the EPA differential for 2015 to be the opposite. He struggled on 1st down, but his 2nd down numbers were quite high, again probably due to small sample sizes.

Oddly, Dion Lewis and Brandon Bolden also had lower 1st down EPA numbers than 2nd. Lewis had higher 3rd down EPA numbers based on 3 carries so let's not read too much into that.

But yeah, Blount is not a great back and he definitely has issues. But even this critical article concludes he's above average, and he's certainly nowhere near as bad as some of the haters think.

 

[Tuck]

Remembering a former Patriot and HOF RB. Best I've seen.

Why Did Curtis Martin Leave Patriots For Jets? Robert Kraft, Bill Parcells Explain

Best I've seen too. You could tell he was headed for the HOF from the get go.

 

[Mack Herron]

Best I've seen too. You could tell he was headed for the HOF from the get go.

He was special. Which is one reason it hurt so much when he left to break records for the Jets. I certainly do not begrudge any player taking the best contract he can get, so nothing but admiration for Martin. But as a Pats fan, this was the worst FA loss, no? For what might have been.

 

[Wheelman]

The frustrating thing with Blount is when he dances around trying to look for a hole, because that very rarely amounts to anything since Blount's acceleration is his problem. He is very dependent on the offensive line creating some form of hole at the line of scrimmage. But once he gets past the LOS he is a pretty good RB.

This right here! I don't know wtf that article is talking about. The gripe with Blount is him acting like a small back behind the line of scrimmage and tippy toeing and losing the speed that makes him so dangerous. Hurdling and making people miss when he gets going is cool. Act like a small back there, just not at the line of scrimmage. Sure sometimes he hits gold doing that, but it makes him very very inconsistent. That's my problem with him, I want to see positive yardage on every run to help the pass game.

 

[Uptown]

I guess I wonder how people come to these conclusions. I mean, every back gets stopped in the backfield sometimes, but how many times do you have to see it before you think this is true? Have you compared it to others in the league? How does one reach this conclusion?

FWIW, Football Outsiders came up with a stat called "success rate" for RBs. This doesn't measure the talent of a back or his explosiveness or anything like that. All it measures is how effective they are at getting certain % of yardage per down to keep an offense "on track" for a first down. And in this regard, Blount has been great. Here are his rankings while with NE:

2013: 3
2014: 19 (breakdown between Pittsburgh/NE not available)
2015: 6

For context, DeMarco Murray's fantastic 2013 season with the Cowboys where he was credited with keeping the offense on track throughout had him finish 5th in success rate, 2 spots behind Blount.

Now how many times is he stopped behind the line? Let's look at his 165 carries from last year, not his best year but seems to be the year everyone started turning on him.

In 165 carries, he had 10 carries for minus yardage, or 6% of his carries. Another 9 went for 0 yards so if you want to group those in, he's around 11.5% not gaining yards.

Compare that to Dion Lewis, who had much smaller sample sizes. He had 4 carries with negative yards (8%) and 2 more with 0 yards (12.2%) out of 49 carries.

For some additional context, Thomas Rawls finished 1st in success rate last season. He ran the ball 9 times for lost yardage (6%) and 9 times for no gain (12.1%) out of 148 carries.

Again, we are not talking about the best backs in football. We are simply looking at the incorrect statements that he is caught behind the line a lot. Maybe in a vacuum where you only watch those few plays, but compared to the rest of the league, he's actually been really good about not losing yardage consistently despite playing behind a banged-up offensive line and without fullback Develin.

You can say he's slow. You can even say he's not good. Those are subjective opinions. But saying he's caught in the backfield so many times is just wrong. He's well above league average in that regard.

Did you mean Murray's fantastic 2014 season?

 

[Wheelman]

Vereen averaged 4 YPC? WTF.

Probably from all the draw plays on 3rd and long.

 

[convertedpatsfan]

Did you mean Murray's fantastic 2014 season?

Yes, sorry. Murray's big season was 2014, and he finished 3rd that year while Blount struggled between Pittsburgh and NE and finished 19th. The previous season in 2013, Murray ran for 1,000+ yards and finished 6th to Blount's 3rd, but that wasn't Murray's big year.

 

[Mack Herron]

What's the over/under on # games till Sankey is activated?

 

[Deus Irae]

I want to see positive yardage on every run to help the pass game.

No back in history has given that.