PFF ranks Dak's accuracy

[percyhoward]

Swaim and Jarwin are likely not on the same level as the HOF TE they replaced but they proved themselves as capable at the least. Hurns and Gallup probably won't end up surpassing the all time team TD leader they replaced but they proved capable at the least. I think it could be argued that if a QB requires that level of talent to avoid such a significant dropoff some of the responsibility just might lay with the QB.

The first paragraph also addresses your question. The issues are not limited to the redzone. They are magnified in the redzone however.

The first paragraph is critical of Dak's accuracy, to be sure. It doesn't address the effects of the "accuracy" problem on the actual games though. That's what I'm trying to understand.

And while Witten was still a solid red zone threat in 2017, he was far from his prime, and certainly wasn't delivering on anything close to a HOF level at that point. And yet we ranked 7th in the red zone.

 

[ABQCOWBOY]

I appreciate the response. So you believe the QB is inaccurate, and that it's causing a problem with the offense that's gotten progressively worse over time.

NFL ranks
yards per drive
2016 5th
2017 10th
2018 games 1-7 22nd
2018 games 8-18 7th

TD per drive
2016 4th
2017 6th
2018 games 1-7 24th
2018 games 8-18 10th

3rd down conversion %, pass
2016 11th
2017 13th
2018 games 1-7 32nd
2018 games 8-18 9th

I don't think I said anything about progressively worse, per say. I do think that it limits our Offense but I could not say that it was becoming progressively worse, only because I had not done any research towards that point. However, what you post here is interesting. I was just basically making the comment about how I see our inability to run certain types of Offensive sets as impactful and trying to explain why I saw it as a problem, going forward.

Thank you for asking the question though and for posting this info. It's interesting. You can definitely see a trend here.

 

[Blackrain]

This ranking aligns with his stats pretty much throughout the season. Dak was ranked about 20th-24th the first part of the season and ended up about 15th or 16th with a stronger finish.

We have a QB who brings some very good intangible assets. He’s a gamer , leader and a winner. He’s just not a great passer . Inconsistent best describes him. It is what it is. It’s not breaking news.

Exactly , When you have a totally new group of receivers being shuffled in every play It leads to inconsistency along with your coach playing scared and not giving you any game experience in preseason with them . We were lucky Dak and Cooper hit it off so good and even then Cooper had to get Dak to go against what the OC was calling because it wasn't working .

Dak may not become Brady or Rogers but he can become a better passer and more consistent as he develops chemistry in the off season with his receivers . We should be thankful things turned out as well as it did considering the amount of preparation we made for the departure of Dez and Witten .

Lets throw a bunch of JAGs in with our young QB give them no game experience together and see what happens . LOLOL Thats preparing to FAIL fans and we were failing. Till somebody took the bull by the horns and made a stab at rectifying the mess with the Cooper trade.

 

[Brax]

According to Pro Football Focus in their QB Annual, Dak ranked 21st out of 35 QB in 2018 with 48.6% of his aimed attempts that were considered "accurate." It's important to note that PFF doesn't consider all catchable passes "accurate," but only those on which the receiver didn't have to extend his arms outside what they call the "frame" (the zone of his head and torso) to catch. If the receiver bent down, reached above the top of the helmet, or to either side out away from his body, they called that an "inaccurate catchable" pass. Any catchable pass that isn't caught is considered a drop by PFF, so there is a weird grey area there that includes so-called "inaccurate" passes that should be caught.

That distinction between "accurate" and "catchable" means a lot, because PFF ranked Prescott 9th out of 35 with 68.0% of his aimed attempts that were considered "catchable." So I guess you could either say Dak ranks in the bottom 15 (out of 35) or in the top 10, depending on what you think accuracy means. PFF's George Chahrouri, who put the QB annual together, says "It's nice to throw accurate passes, but it's terrible to throw uncatchable passes."

Whatever you think about PFF's terminology, they did watch every pass of all 35 QB, so this is probably as thorough an analysis and as objective a ranking as you're going to get without watching every pass of every QB yourself.

to all the Dak guys all of a sudden PFF is going to be crap, to all the Dak doubters PFF is now the number 1 authority.

 

[jrumann59]

To me, catchable means a lot more than accurate.

Catchable is great if all you want is to get the ball to a receiver on a 3rd and 7 and the receiver ran a 8 yard pattern. Accuracy is what you want for long gainers either over the top or patterns where your receiver is running away from defenders like a drag, post or slant.

 

[Future]

It's also pretty bad given that Dak was bottom 10 in air yards per attempt that he doesn't rank higher. If I'm not consistently throwing the ball down field I should be accurate AND throwing catchsble balls.

This kind of stuck out to me as well.

Plus, when he does throw down field, it's basically only go routes against man coverage (Gallup's only route, basically, lol). He's got the arm for it, but it's not like he's throwing deep crossers or anything consistently.

 

[Future]

I've said before that Dak "aims" to the side of the receiver away from the defender to minimize INTs.

Throwing to the opposite side of the defender is what a QB is....supposed to do. Reading the defender's leverage and throwing based on that is QB 101 in the NFL.

This is where there's a huge difference in opinion around Dak. I'll say that if a slant route is thrown to the wrong shoulder, it's inaccurate, whereas others say it's not. The overtime TD pass to Cooper against Philly is the perfect example of this. That ball was too high, too far inside, thrown too late, and thrown into a defender with inside leverage on a slant - that's a bad throw to me. Others' simply see it as at his chest and caught, so good throw.

 

[Future]

No, clearly you don’t understand. Dak was top 10 in throwing catchable balls. It requires some degree of accuracy to throw a catchable ball.

Dak has the arm talent to be accurate, but let's not forget how easy it is to throw "catchabel" balls in this offense. Nothing contested down the field, high rate of checkdowns. By design, this offense and Dak throw high % passes. Of course his catchable rate is going to be high.

He also never throws the ball away. Wonder how this number drops if you take away 15 sacks and add 15 throwaways that are uncatchable.

 

[sean10mm]

To be honest I didn't think much of PFF before or after this article. It's a bunch of amateurs playing at advanced statistics with a large dose of "Some dude on a couch making judgment calls they aren't qualified to do."

Like they graded Aaron Rodgers low on a game where he had like 5 TDs because his receivers got lots of yards after the catch... when a good QB has a huge role in creating yards after the catch by throwing with timing and accuracy. They regularly show a lack of basic football knowledge like that.

 

[northerncowboynation]

Oh look, another Prescott accuracy thread. Awesome

 

[glimmerman]

We have a healthy O-Line this year and Daks accuracy will suddenly look better.

 

[Future]

The first paragraph is critical of Dak's accuracy, to be sure. It doesn't address the effects of the "accuracy" problem on the actual games though. That's what I'm trying to understand.

Outside of any missed opportunities do to "bad" passes, the impact is simple...Schematically, there's an unblocked defender in the box and holistically, Dallas keeps games close because they aren't explosive early.

The physical accuracy issue for Dak is overblown though. The bigger issue is not seeing down the field. I put a fair amount of that on him, though the scheme certainly hasn't helped.

 

[northerncowboynation]

Dak has the arm talent to be accurate, but let's not forget how easy it is to throw "catchabel" balls in this offense. Nothing contested down the field, high rate of checkdowns. By design, this offense and Dak throw high % passes. Of course his catchable rate is going to be high.

He also never throws the ball away. Wonder how this number drops if you take away 15 sacks and add 15 throwaways that are uncatchable.

And please add, a few routes that take too much time to develop behind an O-line that was just all right when discussing accuracy. Accuracy from his arse? Accuracy under duress? Accuracy with a few seconds to wait for the routes to develop? Sheeeit, define accuracy when.....

 

[northerncowboynation]

According to Pro Football Focus in their QB Annual, Dak ranked 21st out of 35 QB in 2018 with 48.6% of his aimed attempts that were considered "accurate." It's important to note that PFF doesn't consider all catchable passes "accurate," but only those on which the receiver didn't have to extend his arms outside what they call the "frame" (the zone of his head and torso) to catch. If the receiver bent down, reached above the top of the helmet, or to either side out away from his body, they called that an "inaccurate catchable" pass. Any catchable pass that isn't caught is considered a drop by PFF, so there is a weird grey area there that includes so-called "inaccurate" passes that should be caught.

That distinction between "accurate" and "catchable" means a lot, because PFF ranked Prescott 9th out of 35 with 68.0% of his aimed attempts that were considered "catchable." So I guess you could either say Dak ranks in the bottom 15 (out of 35) or in the top 10, depending on what you think accuracy means. PFF's George Chahrouri, who put the QB annual together, says "It's nice to throw accurate passes, but it's terrible to throw uncatchable passes."

Whatever you think about PFF's terminology, they did watch every pass of all 35 QB, so this is probably as thorough an analysis and as objective a ranking as you're going to get without watching every pass of every QB yourself.

ahh, but what's it like to throw inaccurate but somewhat catchable passes. 10 feet off target yep, uncatchable. 5 feet off target, yep uncatchable. 1 foot over the head, depends on the receiver height and may be uncatchable if you're Beasley. Hit ya in the hands, face mask, shoulder pads, nah that was on T Will but not any longer

 

[CowboysFaninHouston]

to all the Dak guys all of a sudden PFF is going to be crap, to all the Dak doubters PFF is now the number 1 authority.

true that.....if they are citing PFF, then PFF ranked the cowboys OL as 11th best. so there shouldn't be any Dak excuses for OL being Dak's problem.

 

[CowboysFaninHouston]

And please add, a few routes that take too much time to develop behind an O-line that was just all right when discussing accuracy. Accuracy from his arse? Accuracy under duress? Accuracy with a few seconds to wait for the routes to develop? Sheeeit, define accuracy when.....

the OL was ranked 11th best by PFF..... not to shabby according to PFF

 

[northerncowboynation]

the OL was ranked 11th best by PFF..... not to shabby according to PFF

From top 5 to "not too shabby at 11'th" is pretty shabby. If you live in a shack it's fine. If you're used to caviar it ain't

 

[jterrell]

Swaim and Jarwin are likely not on the same level as the HOF TE they replaced but they proved themselves as capable at the least. Hurns and Gallup probably won't end up surpassing the all time team TD leader they replaced but they proved capable at the least. I think it could be argued that if a QB requires that level of talent to avoid such a significant dropoff some of the responsibility just might lay with the QB.

The first paragraph also addresses your question. The issues are not limited to the redzone. They are magnified in the redzone however.

By the same token said great WR was floundering in OAK w a 25m per year QB and was insanely good here upon arrival with no real practice time.
Is Dak simply that much more accurate than Carr???

Cooper out-performed guys who have been bad their entire career. Deonte Thompson (career high is 27 receptions), Allen Hurns(5 TD and 74 receptions in 2 seasons prior to arrival does not spell WR1) and Tavon Austin(13 recepts in 2017 and now 8 in 2018). It wasn't a shock to anyone that the Cowboys had a bottom 5 WR corps to open the season except perhaps themselves.
And those guys are all likely gone for 2019.
Gallup is a keeper but he was a rookie who had a very poor catch rate at under 50%.

The red zone stuff isn't complicated. The OL wasn't as good and we had no real red zone targets. The sad attempts to Rico detailed just how sorely they lacked a Red zone guy.
Once they got Cooper that improved as the TE were all of a sudden open.Plenty of analysis showed no one feared DAL outside single covering those guys and thus DAL felt compelled to trade for a guy that could beat single coverage in Cooper.

Arguing Dak was holding back the offense is simply brain dead. The offense added ONE legit WR and blossomed. The Giants with Odell sucked. WRs don't make plays by themserles.
The Dak/Cooper combo was what was effective.
NEITHER guy was effective last season prior to the trade.

 

[percyhoward]

I was just basically making the comment about how I see our inability to run certain types of offensive sets as impactful and trying to explain why I saw it as a problem, going forward.

So you think Dak's accuracy hasn't been a problem over the last three seasons, but you do see it as a problem going forward, if I understand correctly.

 

[percyhoward]

Outside of any missed opportunities do to "bad" passes, the impact is simple...Schematically, there's an unblocked defender in the box and holistically, Dallas keeps games close because they aren't explosive early.

You're saying Dak becomes more accurate later in games?