Patriots cut safety Brandon Meriweather(merged jumbo thread)

[Betterthanmost]

Re: Anyone else glad that Meriweather is gone?

I though Merriweather was the difference between having a so so secondary and having a good secondary last year. he hit people who came across the middle of the zone, and he was the only DB willing to lay a guy out for crossing the middle. He wasn't a good cover guy, and he wasn't a good scheme guy, but he made a big difference last season. We will see if they return to the worst secondary in the NFL this year or is there somebody else willing to hit people who dare to split the zone in the middle of the field.

Wow, if he did that, then I shudder to think what we would have become without him last year, the Texans perhaps? Puh leease.....

 

[captain stone]

Re: Anyone else glad that Meriweather is gone?

Yes he certainly did. In my opinion (not knocking his overall play here like many others) Meriweather's dropped pick was actually easier than Samuel's dropped pick, b/c Samuel was trying to keep his feet in bounds too.

Then again, I have tried very hard to suppress those memories, so I may be rehashing it incorrectly. I certainly do remember Meriweather's chance at the INT though.

You remember correctly, though Stomper's miss came after A$ante's.
Under pressure, shEli threw a desperation lob that Stomper chased,
like Willie Mays in the '54 WS, except he let the ball go right through his arms.
I've always felt that Stomper's miss was an easier pick to make than A$ante's.

 

[Triumph]

HOLY CRAP this IS a jumbo thread!!

Meri was a 2 time pro bowler.

 

[eom]

so, I was just reading through the weekly profootballfocus round up of this week's games and came across this note:

One of the newest Bears, Brandon Meriweather (-4.1) struggled mightily as a deep safety. Steve Smith caught all four balls against him, for an average of 29.5 yards, including a 53 yard deep ball where Meriweather was late getting over. The other two passes thrown Meriweather’s way could have been first downs too, but were dropped. He did make one good hit on Smith, but needs to be more consistent as a tackler because he missed two tackles, one of which led to a first down on the ground

https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2011/10/05/re-focused-panthers-bears-week-4/

 

[Deus Irae]

so, I was just reading through the weekly profootballfocus

See, that's where the post stops being useful.

 

[BendButDontBreak37]

See, that's where the post stops being useful.

Not very familiar with them, so is pro football focus no good?

 

[BradyFTW!]

Not very familiar with them, so is pro football focus no good?

PFF is pretty useless, yeah.

 

[BendButDontBreak37]

PFF is pretty useless, yeah.

Gotcha, what about football outsiders? Is their stuff pretty reliable?

 

[Sciz]

Gotcha, what about football outsiders? Is their stuff pretty reliable?

I very much prefer them. They at least have some kind of prior football experience, rather than a bunch of guys in the UK with no experience doing anything related to football ever.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Gotcha, what about football outsiders? Is their stuff pretty reliable?

FO is great, I like them a lot. Pretty much my only issue with their stats comes from user error: people very frequently read them as saying things that they don't actually say. For example, we had a poster here trying to use DVOA and DYAR to argue that Danny Woodhead was better than Ray Rice. Still, not really FO's fault that some people can't read.

 

[Hael]

Most of our secondary releases have not done well on other teams. Sanders and Meriweather have given up important plays.

Amusingly the best of the bunch has been Wilhite. Who has played well!

 

[captain stone]

so, I was just reading through the weekly profootballfocus round up of this week's games and came across this note:

One of the newest Bears, Brandon Meriweather (-4.1) struggled mightily as a deep safety. Steve Smith caught all four balls against him, for an average of 29.5 yards, including a 53 yard deep ball where Meriweather was late getting over. The other two passes thrown Meriweather’s way could have been first downs too, but were dropped. He did make one good hit on Smith, but needs to be more consistent as a tackler because he missed two tackles, one of which led to a first down on the ground

https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2011/10/05/re-focused-panthers-bears-week-4/

After watching the replay of the game on the NFLN, I came to the same conclusion too.
Lots of "Jacked Up" hit attempts - some successful, others not; a couple of bad angles;
and very little of proper form tackling.
IOW the same old, same old Stomper: active, fearless, clueless.

But at least he was gen. near the ball & showed decent anticipation, a concept of which neither
of the Barf Bags of Barrett & Brown have ever shown to have even a rudimentary grasp.

 

[fester]

Not very familiar with them, so is pro football focus no good?

The short story on Pro Football Focus is that they are trying to grade using a very subjective system using only TV tape. They don't know player assignments, they don't know responsibilities, they don't know if a safety is late because he had opposite field coverage but the responsible CB got juked out of his jock strap so the safety is playing clean-up or whether the safety just got beat.

Then they inflate the precision of their guesses and call it "objective data".

The best example of this is their Quarterback rating system. They grade quarterbacks on the degree of difficulty of the throw. For instance a 10 yard pass into triple coverage is graded much higher than a check-down that also gains 10 yards because the check down is "easier" to complete. It may be an easier throw to make but it is also the much smarter, lower risk and higher percentage play. Every good coach in the league wants their QB to not routinely throw into triple coverage if there is a better option available. PFF's methodology rewards that negative behavior.

Moving onto your Football Outsiders question, their methodology is different in generating DVOA/DYAR statistics. Their method is all outcome based with no style points. In the scenario above a 10 yard pass into triple coverage and a 10 yard dump-off would be graded the same. The grade would be modified on situation (for instance a 10 yard pass on 3rd and 3 is much more valuable than a 14 yard pass on 3rd and 23). They then apply a whole lot of multi-level regression modelling to correct for opponents' strengths (more impressive to consistently gain first downs against the best defense than the worst etc).

Football Outsiders does a lot of scouting and game charting for cross-tabs and content creation for their website, but their core analytical component is results driven, not style and results driven as it is for Pro Football Focus. For instance a common Football Outsiders article will say " Hey Team XYZ has a really good DVOA against a 3-3-5 Big Nickel --- why? and here are a couple of representative plays that provide explanation...."

 

[Betterthanmost]

Reply Quote
Further indictment on Angelo's drafting, he's drafted about 8 safeties and none of them is good at football. I guess we know now why Merriweather was let go at NE. He is hideous.

LOL, they thought they were getting a pro bowler for free? He comes with baggage.

 

[PatsBoy12]

Most of our secondary releases have not done well on other teams. Sanders and Meriweather have given up important plays.

Amusingly the best of the bunch has been Wilhite. Who has played well!

That is pretty interesting that he is the one, statistically, that has played the best since leaving the Patriots.

 

[Patjew]

BM looked like crap last night.

 

[Simkin]

I'm glad every time I saw the Bears this year...

Poor angles, can't tackle, get owned by every WR/RB...

I cant understand how he lasted that long in NE.

 

[captain stone]

I'm glad every time I saw the Bears this year...

Poor angles, can't tackle, get owned by every WR/RB...

I cant understand how he lasted that long in NE...

...or why Bill even drafted him in the first place...

 

[Sciz]

...or why Bill even drafted him in the first place...

All the physical tools were there for him to be a great safety. He was just uncoachable. You can't necessarily see that predraft.

 

[upstater1]

That is pretty interesting that he is the one, statistically, that has played the best since leaving the Patriots.

Darius Butler has started the last two games for Carolina and done quite well.