QB prospect accuracy

[Khyber53]

Touchdowns vs interceptions is the stat that impresses me. Misses can be throw aways (which are smart) or drops or even attempts to just grab a pass interference play. 

Touchdowns and interceptions are pretty solid, though. 

It's interesting that the winner for 2021 in this was Bailey Zappe from WKU. He had 62 TDs to 11 INT and broke Joe Burrow's NCAA record for TDs and passing yardage (he threw for 5,967 yards with a 69.2% rate on 686 throws). 

Talk about undersung. Someone's going to pick him up way, way, way late in the draft and find a diamond in the rough.

[BurnNChinn]

Some more stats

[Waldo]

Now do it with an NFL ball...

[BrianS]

Forget about downfield stats and stuff.  Just look at accuracy period.  It's a huge indicator unless the team is running Air Raid or something silly.  (Yes, I'm looking at you Carson Strong.)

 

[GoobyPls]

8 hours ago, AU-panther said:

they aren't contradicting anything, different data points (years and yards)

look at a route tree and the yards at which most of those routes are run and you will see that each set of stats is representing a different subset of passes.

Over 20 yards will have a higher percentage of go routes then over 10 yards as the parameters, under that logic it's really no surprise to see Howell towards the top.

and btw did Simms chart the accuracy or was it just off the cuff opinion?

actually, he admits he doesn't know what the accuracy numbers are

Chris Simms’ 2022 NFL Draft QB Rankings: Why Matt Corral stands out from the pack - NBC Sports

It's always amusing when fans get so upset over stats that don't line up with their preconceived notions and agenda.  It's just one little piece of the puzzle.  Maybe Picket really has the least number of really uncatchable passes over 10 yards.  That doesn't necessarily mean he is overall the most accurate passer.  

What if they look at the % of passes that hit the receiver in stride?  Thats an entirely different stat, maybe Corral is more accurate in that regard.  

 

 

 

 

So if Simms puts in a chart it’s more fact base? It doesn’t matter whether his opinion is wrong as long as it’s charted.

The chart shows catchable over 20 for his career, which is the same thing as your chart but reversed. Like I said in my previous post they have charts on their own website that contradict themselves.

 

Again idk what the guy who charted this considers uncatchable or catchable, If a receiver makes an amazing play on the ball what did he “chart” it as.
 

Simms specifically said it doesn’t matter what the stats say Corral is clearly more accurate from a pure passing stand point. I tend to believe that.

[Panthers Rhule]

14 hours ago, LinvilleGorge said:

Now let's have a look at Pickett's other seasons. You know, when he was barely even mediocre.

I just love this argument. The "well he wasn't always as good as he is now" doesn't mean poo imo. All I care about is this question "is he any good now?" I hear very few people saying he wasn't good last season which is as close to now as you can get. 

[AU-panther]

1 hour ago, GoobyPls said:

So if Simms puts in a chart it’s more fact base? It doesn’t matter whether his opinion is wrong as long as it’s charted.

The chart shows catchable over 20 for his career, which is the same thing as your chart but reversed. Like I said in my previous post they have charts on their own website that contradict themselves.

 

Again idk what the guy who charted this considers uncatchable or catchable, If a receiver makes an amazing play on the ball what did he “chart” it as.
 

Simms specifically said it doesn’t matter what the stats say Corral is clearly more accurate from a pure passing stand point. I tend to believe that.

Its not the chart that makes the number valid, its actually tracking every throw, I seriously doubt he kept a running percentage in his head for each of the top prospects, just for Howell, Pickett, Correll and Willis that is over 4,000 attempts in their careers, and not only remember each completion/incompletion but also remember the depth of target.  What he did was make a general statement based on film study.

As far as  contradicting themselves we already went over this once, its different data points.  The charts I listed are 10 and 15 yards, yours is 20.

Is "catchable/uncatchable subjective"? Of course it is.  Your definition might be different than mine, and both of ours might be different then theirs.  What you hope for is they apply uniformly in their evaluation and at the end of the day you are really looking for is how each player compares relatively.

If you like simple stats that is fine.  Regular completion percentage is concrete, everyone will come up to the same number.  Either it was ruled a catch or it wasn't, but it can be a bit a misleading.  It doesn't tell you about depth of target.  You can add that, and that is also a concrete number, but what if you want to take it a step further.

How about accuracy?  Two QBs have have completion percentages fairly close but what if one hits their receiver in stride more often at that point you have to add a subjective aspect to your data, here again your definition of accurate pass might be different than mine, but what really matters is we judge all of the players under the same definition and at that point the ranking are similiar.

 

 

 

 

[AU-panther]

10 hours ago, kungfoodude said:

TBH, Simms is a far better judge of accuracy than PFF. I like PFF just fine but they aren't going to understand or easily be able to deduce things like ball placement, timing, throwing mechanics, etc.

Simms can much more easily deduce who is going to be an accurate thrower just because he has an extremely well trained eye. He's done it for decades. He's from a family that has done it.

Not to say PFF doesn't have value but when it comes to prospect evaluation, Simms is WAAAAAAY more qualified to make an evaluation than just taking a PFF stat. 

That really shouldn't be a controversial opinion for that matter. PFF is good at some things but prospect evaluation they are pretty awful at. You can't solely break down college prospects purely statistically. It doesn't work.

Those aren't evolutions that PFF listed those are stats based on their definition of uncatchable, nothing more or less.  They aren't saying which QB will turn out best in those graphs, all they are doing is showing the results of tracking every throw under the criteria of the graph that is listed.

I don't doubt Simms ability to evaluate which QB will turn out better, but I seriously doubt he actually knows the exact percentages for the ball placement of the 4000+ pass attempts of Howell, Willis, Pickett, and Correll.  Companies like PFF actually track every attempt.  Their definition of perfect ball placement might be different than Simm's but that doesn't change the fact they do it in a very thorough and scientific way. 

Also its entirely possible for both of them to be right.  Mayve from an overall picture Correll is the most accurate, when you take in to account all types of throws and all depth of targets, but that doesn't change that its possible for Pickett to have the least uncatchable balls in a certain yardage range.

Fans love to complain about stats but more times than not they are trying to read too much into them, or they don't understand them, or they just don't line up with the narrative that the fan wants to believe.

Everyone is trying to prove everyone wrong here but really the three graphs pretty much tell us what we all already think.  Picket is pretty accurate.  Correll is also pretty accurate.  In the first graph that Pickett is so high on Correll really isn't' that far behind.  Correll is actually ahead of Pickett in the graph that Gooby posted.  Howell seems to throw a really good deep ball and Willis seems to be behind in accuracy.    None of this is really earth shattering.

Although Willis is interesting in that on his deep passes his accuracy is behind the other guys but he is actually better than most as far as uncatchable throws.  That leads you to believe he might not make the perfect throw as often as some of the others but he doesn't' totally miss as often as the other guys.  Then you notice that if you look at the chart that includes all of the passes that are 10 yards or more his uncatchable goes up so that tells you somewhere in that 10-20 yard range he is struggling, which that is a different set of routes you are throwing.

 

[rippadonn]

6 hours ago, OldhamA said:

Unless he's going to grow a new leg before April it's still relevant. 

The leg is fine. It's been a year now. Just goes to show what kind of elite play and stats he can put up while limited. Just imagine what he could do now having healed up more.

Talk about moxy, his dad AND his doctor's told him to skip last season, he didn't and put up waaay better numbers than his peers.

That's a QB1

[panthers55]

17 hours ago, LinvilleGorge said:

Now let's have a look at Pickett's other seasons. You know, when he was barely even mediocre.

How many great seasons did Burrow have in college?  One. So he won't be good right using your logic.....

[LinvilleGorge]

57 minutes ago, panthers55 said:

How many great seasons did Burrow have in college?  One. So he won't be good right using your logic.....

Did Pitt move from an offense last seen when football was played in leather sheets to a high flying modern offense this past off-season?

People keep trying to make this comp happen but watching the players squashes it pretty hard.

[panthers55]

49 minutes ago, LinvilleGorge said:

Did Pitt move from an offense last seen when football was played in leather sheets to a high flying modern offense this past off-season?

People keep trying to make this comp happen but watching the players squashes it pretty hard.

Nor sure how this is relevant. Burrow wasn't good enough to be astarter until he gained the experience and was in an offense suited to his needs. Any quarterback can struggle with out a good system or supporting staff. Burrow is a prime example.

[Wolfcop]

Willis is awful appealing, but I have the feeling they will go with the player is currently the better QB: Pickett...IF they go QB that is. 

[kungfoodude]

3 hours ago, AU-panther said:

Those aren't evolutions that PFF listed those are stats based on their definition of uncatchable, nothing more or less.  They aren't saying which QB will turn out best in those graphs, all they are doing is showing the results of tracking every throw under the criteria of the graph that is listed.

I don't doubt Simms ability to evaluate which QB will turn out better, but I seriously doubt he actually knows the exact percentages for the ball placement of the 4000+ pass attempts of Howell, Willis, Pickett, and Correll.  Companies like PFF actually track every attempt.  Their definition of perfect ball placement might be different than Simm's but that doesn't change the fact they do it in a very thorough and scientific way. 

Also its entirely possible for both of them to be right.  Mayve from an overall picture Correll is the most accurate, when you take in to account all types of throws and all depth of targets, but that doesn't change that its possible for Pickett to have the least uncatchable balls in a certain yardage range.

Fans love to complain about stats but more times than not they are trying to read too much into them, or they don't understand them, or they just don't line up with the narrative that the fan wants to believe.

Everyone is trying to prove everyone wrong here but really the three graphs pretty much tell us what we all already think.  Picket is pretty accurate.  Correll is also pretty accurate.  In the first graph that Pickett is so high on Correll really isn't' that far behind.  Correll is actually ahead of Pickett in the graph that Gooby posted.  Howell seems to throw a really good deep ball and Willis seems to be behind in accuracy.    None of this is really earth shattering.

Although Willis is interesting in that on his deep passes his accuracy is behind the other guys but he is actually better than most as far as uncatchable throws.  That leads you to believe he might not make the perfect throw as often as some of the others but he doesn't' totally miss as often as the other guys.  Then you notice that if you look at the chart that includes all of the passes that are 10 yards or more his uncatchable goes up so that tells you somewhere in that 10-20 yard range he is struggling, which that is a different set of routes you are throwing.

 

I am a consistent PFF defender but they aren't doing science more "sciencey." Remember their metrics are based on human judges. The way they determine "catchable" and "uncatchable" is also likely to be imperfect.

It's a good stat but you sort of tried to put out articles that backed up this stat as a predictor of success that were just bad articles(mostly due to time since they had been posted and being proved wrong).

The stats themselves I have not a lot of issue with. I generally agree that accuracy is one of the more solid predictors of NFL success. But it doesn't really require digging that far into it, simple completion percentage is an accurate enough predictor.

I think they are likely a decent trend with a fairly wide margin for error. 

Interesting to see, regardless. 

Edited March 29, 2022 by kungfoodude