Offseason Primer Thread... or "On The Assumption That Santa Claus Isn't Real"

[Mr. Scot]

I'm not really a fan of Jonathan Cooper.

He's been a bust so far.

[Bronn]

6 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

I'm not really a fan of Jonathan Cooper.

He's been a bust so far.

That's one reason I like Warmack a little more than him. Plus Cooper's bound to get more money on the market.

[panthers55]

14 minutes ago, stbugs said:

First of all, I know you are a Shula supporter, so I read most of your posts knowing that bias. The bold is the perfect example.

Second, yes, it was field position/defense. We were #11 in total yards, #13 in yards per play and #1 in scoring. We were 0.6 ypp above #32 and 0.8 ypp from #1, so even though we were #13, we were closer to last in yards per play than first. The scoring was an outlier. We were efficient at scoring, but it's ridiculously naive to thing the #1 in INTs and #1 in fumbles recovered by the defense didn't help the offense score points.

Have you watched any of the games since the bye? The defense even with 3 new starters in the secondary and Luke out, has improved since the bye. The offense has gotten worse to the point where the announcers (including our radio guys) have all commented about our play calling not fooling the defense and that they haven't seen anything new. After the Super Bowl we've seen opponents say that we never changed anything and we ran what they expected. The San Diego game was a culmination of the D having a solid game and winning the game in spite of the offense trying to give it away yet again.

The offense and play calling have regressed from last year and the defense has been picking it up. Since the bye, the defense has been playing at a top 10 level. I posted it elsewhere, but aside from the Atlanta/NO#1 game (before the bye) where we had Bene, Williams and Sanchez as our CBs for the most part, our passing defense has been #11 and our run D has been great all year except for week 1 and Seattle.

You called me out for not having coached in the NFL saying I couldn't criticize the coaching and who they play, but I'd bet you have 0 GM experience so how can you criticize the GM or know that the coaching has been good enough?

So let's go point by point. How many players former or present have called out the coaches? How many have called out the GM. Exactly my point.

Secondly, the average starting field position for the league in 2015 was the 27 yard line while ours was the 30. So obviously starting field position wasn't that improved to account for our number 1 in points ranking.  If we had shorter fields you would expect our average yards per drive to be shorter than the league average and it was actually 2 yards longer. If turnovers were a factor than you would expect we would score more because we had extra drives and yet the league average was 185 drives and we had only 180. In fact the defense defended 195 drives. 

As for or the whole defense getting better and offense getting worse it is predictable. Look at Cam"s regression. It is totally the offensive line. We have a bottom five offensive line on a team which is predicated and built to run the ball. You become predictable when you are limited by personnel in what you can do on offense. When your run  game is poor because you can't run block, you become one dimensional. When you are working hard to teach basic fundamentals and build chemistry to a unit that changes weekly, it is hard to put in lots of creative new plays when you don't have the basics down. You instead simplify things to develop more consistency. Which is what the offense has had to do in order to compensate for losing Kalil and Oher and moving Remmers and Turner and starting Scott at right guard.

You don't have to be a GM to figure this out it should be obvious to even casual fans.

[My Goodness My Guinness]

Came here to post just to bump this thread above the sh*t Rainmaker just started. 

[My Goodness My Guinness]

LOL, let's keep this on track.

Chubb and Michel are staying in school, so that is two less RB prospects, definitely taking some depth out of the RBs. Chubb was a 2nd/3rd rounder and Michel was 3rd/4th. Walterfootball's 7th and 11th (I'm ignoring Jalen Hurd, shouldn't still be listed at 11 even if he has potential).

Oh wow I didn't hear about that actually...dang that stinks for us but it's probably smart for Chubb considering he would normally be a top 1-2 running-back in an average rb draft class


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[panthers55]

6 hours ago, stbugs said:

LOL, I love how you make 30 and 27 seem so close. I'm sure you saw that it was 30.53 and it was also #2 in the NFL. Funny how you can try and manipulate a number into thinking it isn't significant when we were #2 in starting position. You also throw the, hey we were 2 yards longer than average, yet that was only #12 in the NFL. We were a good offense, but we were definitely aided by having the #2 starting field position. That is just an average, which means we had enough great starting field positions to be over 10% better than average.

Amazing that you can't see the simple numbers that we were right around middle of the pack in offensive yards per play and we were #1 in scoring and then you can't put your mind around the fact that our defense was both #1 in interceptions and #1 in fumble recoveries, yet your average line of scrimmage is your argument against that.

Last year we were the #1 scoring offense because we were pretty efficient, but also because the defense created more turnovers than any other team. The defense got almost 2 and a half turnovers a game. That was 1 turnover a game more than the average team.

Here's another stat, in the regular season we scored 20 TDs and 13 FGs when we started on our own 40 all the way to starting on an opponent's 3 yard line. That does NOT include any defensive TDs, just offensive drives. I'm not saying we were a bad offensive team last year, but to say that an extra turnover a game didn't help us go from the #13 team in yards per play to the #1 scoring team is just ludicrous. You can see that in our 159 points with great field position. Short fields and returns got us 194 of our 500 points. Nah, had no impact.

You don't have to be a coach to figure out that this should be obvious as well. What was your NFL coaching experience again? You seem to not like challenges to Shula, but you sure can back him up a lot for the regression we've had this year and the almost laughing stock our play calling has gotten to be from the announcers. Oh, look a read option where the unblocked guy blew it up followed by another end around to Ted Ginn followed up by a 7 step drop on 3rd and 3 and lastly I guess will punt since we're out of FG range now.

A wall of text and you still didn't answer any of what I said except to make the point that 3 yards more in starting position went from average or 16 to 2nd. All that shows is that relative rankings are useless stats since a few yards can differentiate between high or low rankings.  And the whole we had 1 more turnover per game than average should by your logic have resulted in 16 more turnovers than average but it was only 5 more than average. And we lead in turnovers but we're tied for 13 in  total offensive drives  which suggests that turnovers didn't give us all the advantages you suggest. The reason we were number one in scoring was because we were number 1 in points per drive and that is the only dtat that matters since that is what created points. And that was because we were efficient in the red zone. Both indications of a good offense not an average or poor one.

thd funny thing is thst this is even a debate. Anyone who jnows football clearly praised our offense last year as one of the top 20 of all time. 

[iamhubby1]

Last year we were top of the league in Red Zone TDs, and efficiency. As well as Time Of Possession. We forced a poo ton of Turn Overs. We had a bunch of those time consuming 80 yard drives. And we led the league in scoring. As the Hillbilly in laws are fond of saying. Hot Dayum that's some good shtuff.

 

This year. Not so much.

[panthers55]

7 hours ago, stbugs said:

OK, you are just spewing gibberish at this point. Wow, the #1 scoring offense was #1 in points per drive? That's revolutionary. Our offense was solid and I never said it wasn't, but you are just being stubborn and not showing anything.

Let's start over and easier. So, in 2015, you are trying to tell me that 1 more turnover per game was actually only 5 more than average? Umm, we had 39 turnovers. Tampa Bay and Atlanta tied for 16th and 17th, i.e. dead center of the NFL. They had 23 turnovers. Hence, I said that  we had 16 more than average, not your 5. Arizona was 2nd with 33 turnovers, which is 6 less than us so I have no clue where you got we were 5 better than average.

Here's the link to turnovers: http://www.espn.com/nfl/statistics/team/_/stat/givetake/sort/takeTotal/year/2015

Next issue with your stats. We were 13th in total drives and you think that that means that being #1 in takeaways didn't help? Don't you think the fact that we were 27th in passing attempts per game, 1st in rushing attempts per game and 4th in time of possession was a reason why we weren't top of the charts in number of drives?

Again, short version. We were #11 in offensive yards per game and #13 in yards per play. I still don't understand how you can't get that us being #1 in interceptions and #1 in fumble recoveries, hence good field position (hey, you gave us the #2 in the NFL in starting position stat) helped a team that was #13 in yards per play to be the #1 scoring team. Last point was that with short fields (anywhere from our 40 to the opponent's 3) and returns, we scored 194 points out of 500.

Also, top 20 of all time? Seeing as how we were 11th in yards per game, you must be talking about points. We scored 500 points. Just look at the last 5 years. There are 5 teams who scored than 500 and 4 teams that scored only 19 points of us. Sorry, but top 20 of all time when 9 other offenses in the last 5 years scored almost as much or way more (Denver scored 606)? Maybe someone posted that or maybe 500 points gets us into the top 20, but yardage/yards per play we're not even close to top 20. Therein lies the rub and my points that we had a very good offense aided by having the most turnovers in the NFL, a team that was better than average in yards turned into the #1 scoring offense.

I think I'm out on this discussion now. I don't think I could be more clear and I don't think I can prove out my position with stats any better.

It seems every discussion is an apple and oranges  comparison. You argue yards, I argue points. You argue field position and turnovers and I argue offensive drive opportunities and starting field position. I argue we lead the league in points and had a top 20 offense all time and you.mrntion is wasn't nearly as good as Denver which had the best all time.  

The reality is we are both right in what we said but neither of us acknowledges the other and just argues more stats. So here is your Christmas gift. 

Turnovers helped us have as many drives as the average team, in fact we had 5 more and it brought us up to the top 10 in.opportunities. I ccount opportunities as a function of how many shots did we have to score.  And then how many points did we score in the opportunities we had. Obviously we were best in the league.

So we agree. We had a very good offense that was efficient and made the most of our opportunities. That is exactly what I have said all along despite all the bunnytrails and red herring stats that were discussed.

 

[panthers55]

12 hours ago, stbugs said:

Works for me. I always said we were efficient, no doubt. My main point was that we weren't an unstoppable offense. Looking at all the top scoring offenses the past 5 years, they were all top in yards per play. We were middle of the pack so being #1 in turnovers played a big part in scoring TDs instead of FGs or punts.


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Wish you said that first and avoided the bunny trails and red herring ststs about yards and turnovers when points as a function of opportunities or efficiency is the only stat that matters. Points for versus points against. Every game has always been won or lost taking only those stats into account. Anything else is speculative and open to argument.

[Cyberjag]

Bronn, really nice post.  Not sure that we'll replace Shula, because losing the line has really limited us.  And of course, the turnovers have gone the other way since last year, which makes the entire team look worse. 

From what I've read, the main differences between Adams and Peppers is that Peppers is an athletic freak while Adams is more of a high-character locker room guy who's a huge student of the games and can call out plays and assignments like a seasoned pro.  If that's the case, I think that Adams will me much, much higher on Gettleman's draft board, and very well could be our pick even if Fournette is available.

Another thing where I think you may have missed is the later round offensive linemen.  I can easily see Gettleman making a few of the FA moves on the line that you're suggesting, but based on his draft history I bet he grabs a few in the second and third days of the draft.  I could envision a guy like Garrett Bolles or Roderick Johnson going in the second, although I'm not sure Bolles has declared

[Bronn]

23 hours ago, Cyberjag said:

Bronn, really nice post.  Not sure that we'll replace Shula, because losing the line has really limited us.  And of course, the turnovers have gone the other way since last year, which makes the entire team look worse. 

From what I've read, the main differences between Adams and Peppers is that Peppers is an athletic freak while Adams is more of a high-character locker room guy who's a huge student of the games and can call out plays and assignments like a seasoned pro.  If that's the case, I think that Adams will me much, much higher on Gettleman's draft board, and very well could be our pick even if Fournette is available.

Another thing where I think you may have missed is the later round offensive linemen.  I can easily see Gettleman making a few of the FA moves on the line that you're suggesting, but based on his draft history I bet he grabs a few in the second and third days of the draft.  I could envision a guy like Garrett Bolles or Roderick Johnson going in the second, although I'm not sure Bolles has declared

Oh I certainly think we'll grab at least one guard or tackle in the later rounds of the draft. I just didn't do a lot of research on the prospects yet because I think we'll be better served covering immediate needs at those positions through free agency.

[Bronn]

Bump because it is more relevant now and I feel like some people need to read some of this. Obviously, some things like Royce Freeman returning to Oregon will alter this a bit, but yeah...

[tiger7_88]

38 minutes ago, Bronn said:

Bump because it is more relevant now and I feel like some people need to read some of this. Obviously, some things like Royce Freeman returning to Oregon will alter this a bit, but yeah...

Admit it, you just bumped to get stbugs and panthers55 started again!  :P

[Bronn]

4 minutes ago, tiger7_88 said:

Admit it, you just bumped to get stbugs and panthers55 started again!  :P