Prescott's final season ranks (various metrics)

[HungryLion]

Dez going to the Pro Bowl in 2016 was a product of the Cowboys 13-3 record.
his production went down precipitously the moment Dak became the starter.

you can argue that it was Dez losing his abilities and that's a debate we can have.
But the timing of his drop in production is not up for debate. IT's a fact of history.

I don't believe he all of a sudden couldn't play anymore. if you do, that's fine.

Dez was injured the first half of 2016. Dez then lit it up the second half of 2016 and in the line playoff game With Dak throwing him the ball.

 

[Brax]

Just play the bad teams and Dak is your QB sad some don't see the flip side.

 

[percyhoward]

8 TDs in 7 games isnt good in any shape or form.

It isn't, but those 7 games you've selected don't count any more or less than the other 9.

 

[WillieBeamen]

It isn't, but those 7 games you've selected don't count any more or less than the other 9.

In the playoffs, you do have to play good teams right?

 

[BoysForLife]

Dez made the Pro Bowl in Dak's first year because he had one of --if not the -- best second half of a season (among WR) after returning from injury.

I have heard from many people that Dez just "wasn't the same player" from 2016 on and that's the reason his production dropped. You seem to be saying that he had "the best second half of a season of any WR who was returning from an injury". I think we can safely conclude that you are saying his health was good. He was producing at a level that no other receiver in the league ever has, coming back from an injury. His health was good. We agree on that.

So, that said--
Dez's last 8 games in 2016 he had 514 yards receiving and 5 TD.

His last 8 games in 2014 he had 700 yards and 11 TD.

So even a healthy Dez, producing at near historic levels for a guy coming back from an injury, still wasn't producing anything near what he produced just 2 years earlier with a different QB.

And then, somehow, beginning in 2017, the bottom just fell out. For a guy who kept himself in incredible physical shape, he just simply couldn't get open anymore or catch passes anymore. Mere months after a historic comeback, he was unable to produce.

Sorry, not buying it. But it's an interesting argument, I'll give you that.

 

[America's Cowboy]

Here's the problem with this theory--
last year Dak's backers got Linehan run out of town on a rail because "SL's archaic gameplans and outdated offense" were hampering Dak's development production

Scott Linehan basically got the axe because he wasn't able to maximize Dak's "considerable talents". Poor Scott couldn't make an read option quarterback with horrific footwork, comparably bad throwing motion, and serious accuracy/timing issues look like Tom Brady. Therefore, he was shown the door.

Linehan was what we might refer to as one of the early Dak casualties.
Dez was another. Garrett is about to be another. Although a lot of JG's was self inflicted as well.

One of the dumbest posts I've read in a long time. DDS (Dak Derangement Syndrome) 100% to the core. No hope for you.

 

[Gameover]

Dez going to the Pro Bowl in 2016 was a product of the Cowboys 13-3 record.
his production went down precipitously the moment Dak became the starter.

you can argue that it was Dez losing his abilities and that's a debate we can have.
But the timing of his drop in production is not up for debate. IT's a fact of history.

I don't believe he all of a sudden couldn't play anymore. if you do, that's fine.

Dak threw for nearly 5,000 yards, let Dez ride. He clearly wasn’t missed. Coop had the best season of his career. Cobb bounced back and had a damn good season when many said he washed. Let Dez go. He will never play another down in the nfl.

 

[BoysForLife]

Dez was injured the first half of 2016. Dez then lit it up the second half of 2016 and in the line playoff game With Dak throwing him the ball.

all due respect, how does a guy who's injured the first half of the season start 13 games?

And if you are right, this seems to be supporting my point.
How does a guy who even by his own critics description, closed 2016 well, all of a sudden get less healthy and effective 7 months later at age 29?

Guy kept himself in incredible shape.
I would think another off season would have him primed to explode in 2017 after 6 more months to get totally healthy.
Instead, he dropped off the map. Along with the rest of the offense in 2017 (Beasley, etc)
Was Beasley hurt? His production dropped by almost 60% from 2016 to 2017.
Witten's dropped by nearly 20%.

Across the board, the only guy whose production went up from 2016 to 2017 was Brice Butler.
That's it. Everyone else dropped, most of them by large margins. WR production fell off the map almost across the board. Dez wasn't an outlier. He was the norm in 2017.

I guess maybe Dez, Cole, and Witten all forgot how to run routes and catch balls all at the same time?

Again--all due respect, I don't buy it. Appreciate and respect you brother, but this one doesn't make sense. Not all of those guys just lost their game at the exact same time. Something else seems to have happened.

 

[BoysForLife]

One of the dumbest posts I've read in a long time. DDS (Dak Derangement Syndrome) 100% to the core. No hope for you.

What reasoning or evidence would you apply to show why you disagree with my post?

 

[HungryLion]

all due respect, how does a guy who's injured the first half of the season start 13 games?

And if you are right, this seems to be supporting my point.
How does a guy who even by his own critics description, closed 2016 well, all of a sudden get less healthy and effective 7 months later at age 29?

Guy kept himself in incredible shape.
I would think another off season would have him primed to explode in 2017 after 6 more months to get totally healthy.
Instead, he dropped off the map. Along with the rest of the offense in 2017 (Beasley, etc)
Was Beasley hurt? His production dropped by almost 60% from 2016 to 2017.
Witten's dropped by nearly 20%.

Across the board, the only guy whose production went up from 2016 to 2017 was Brice Butler.
That's it. Everyone else dropped, most of them by large margins. WR production fell off the map almost across the board. Dez wasn't an outlier. He was the norm in 2017.

I guess maybe Dez, Cole, and Witten all forgot how to run routes and catch balls all at the same time?

Again--all due respect, I don't buy it. Appreciate and respect you brother, but this one doesn't make sense. Not all of those guys just lost their game at the exact same time. Something else seems to have happened.

Dez wasn’t 100% healthy when he came back after the injury either. Would be what I would say.

I still don’t see how Dez being cut is Dak’s fault. I didn’t want Dez cut. But let’s lay the blame where it belongs. The albatross that is the GM and the joke that is the head coach.


It’s too convenient to blame Dak for Dez being cut and gone.

 

[erod]

You do understand that all QBs over a large enough sample will play worse against the top 30% of the league than they do against the bottom 70%, right? This is not just football but any sport. The bad teams are bad for a reason.

All QBs in general play worse against good/great teams than they do against bad/terrible ones. This isn't rocket science.

But Dak didn't just play poorly. He played like a third-stringer in those games

 

[BoysForLife]

Dak threw for nearly 5,000 yards, let Dez ride. He clearly wasn’t missed. Coop had the best season of his career. Cobb bounced back and had a damn good season when many said he washed. Let Dez go. He will never play another down in the nfl.

That would be a valid argument if I was making the opinion that we should sign Dez now.
I was talking about how Dez basically fell off the map the minute Dak became the starter.

 

[erod]

Three games without scoring a touchdown.

There's a stat for ya.

 

[percyhoward]

In the playoffs, you do have to play good teams right?

I'm looking at all the available plays and trying to judge a season-long performance though. How your entire team (much less just your QB) performs in the playoffs is a different question. "Good teams" might mean "good-to-great offenses" that can have their way with your defense no matter what your QB does in the playoffs, and/or it might mean "great defenses."

Aikman had a 68.5 career passer rating against top 5 pass defenses until he dismantled the Packers and Bills in the playoffs at the end of his fifth season.

 

[HungryLion]

all due respect, how does a guy who's injured the first half of the season start 13 games?

And if you are right, this seems to be supporting my point.
How does a guy who even by his own critics description, closed 2016 well, all of a sudden get less healthy and effective 7 months later at age 29?

Guy kept himself in incredible shape.
I would think another off season would have him primed to explode in 2017 after 6 more months to get totally healthy.
Instead, he dropped off the map. Along with the rest of the offense in 2017 (Beasley, etc)
Was Beasley hurt? His production dropped by almost 60% from 2016 to 2017.
Witten's dropped by nearly 20%.

Across the board, the only guy whose production went up from 2016 to 2017 was Brice Butler.
That's it. Everyone else dropped, most of them by large margins. WR production fell off the map almost across the board. Dez wasn't an outlier. He was the norm in 2017.

I guess maybe Dez, Cole, and Witten all forgot how to run routes and catch balls all at the same time?

Again--all due respect, I don't buy it. Appreciate and respect you brother, but this one doesn't make sense. Not all of those guys just lost their game at the exact same time. Something else seems to have happened.

I would add. You had a young QB who was playing very poorly the second half of 2017. Very poorly.

But the geniuses we have running our front office and as coaches, decided to throw the baby out with the bath water.

 

[BoysForLife]

Dez wasn’t 100% healthy when he came back after the injury either. Would be what I would say.

I still don’t see how Dez being cut is Dak’s fault. I didn’t want Dez cut. But let’s lay the blame where it belongs. The albatross that is the GM and the joke that is the head coach.


It’s too convenient to blame Dak for Dez being cut and gone.

Fair enough, maybe he had to play himself back into shape. I'll listen to some of that, although I think it's probabably a bit overstated as Dez was an incredible physical specimen.

That said--that doesn't explain how the entire receiving corps dropped badly in 2017.

I think you are right, the GM and coach are to blame for cutting Dez but I am convinced that their reasoning or motivation was to protect Dak and his reputation. If you were on this forum back then (and I believe you were) people were posting incessantly about how Dez had lost it and Dak couldn't be expected to perform with a washed up bum like Dez as his #1 receiver.

That led to the receiver by committee disaster of early 2018 prior to the AC trade. Again, a terrible call by Jerry and Jason, no argument there.
But it all went back to Dez being cast in the role of "not Dak Friendly".

That's kind of what started his demise here in Dallas.

 

[HungryLion]

Fair enough, maybe he had to play himself back into shape. I'll listen to some of that, although I think it's probabably a bit overstated as Dez was an incredible physical specimen.

That said--that doesn't explain how the entire receiving corps dropped badly in 2017.

I think you are right, the GM and coach are to blame for cutting Dez but I am convinced that their reasoning or motivation was to protect Dak and his reputation. If you were on this forum back then (and I believe you were) people were posting incessantly about how Dez had lost it and Dak couldn't be expected to perform with a washed up bum like Dez as his #1 receiver.

That led to the receiver by committee disaster of early 2018 prior to the AC trade. Again, a terrible call by Jerry and Jason, no argument there.
But it all went back to Dez being cast in the role of "not Dak Friendly".

That's kind of what started his demise here in Dallas.

youre right. I was on the board. I wasn’t in the Cut Dez or blame Dez camp.

I blamed Chaz Green letting Dak get his brains beat in for Dak entering a slump. That’s not me absolute Dak by the way. He went through a slump though for sure.

But it’s important for the GM and head coach to make those judgments. Sadly the cowboys have been behind the 8 ball having Jones and Garrett in those roles.

 

[BoysForLife]

youre right. I was on the board. I wasn’t in the Cut Dez or blame Dez camp.

I blamed Chaz Green letting Dak get his brains beat in for Dak entering a slump. That’s not me absolute Dak by the way. He went through a slump though for sure.

But it’s important for the GM and head coach to make those judgments. Sadly the cowboys have been behind the 8 ball having Jones and Garrett in those roles.

A lot of truth in that last sentence, unfortunately.

 

[BoysForLife]

youre right. I was on the board. I wasn’t in the Cut Dez or blame Dez camp.

I blamed Chaz Green letting Dak get his brains beat in for Dak entering a slump. That’s not me absolute Dak by the way. He went through a slump though for sure.

But it’s important for the GM and head coach to make those judgments. Sadly the cowboys have been behind the 8 ball having Jones and Garrett in those roles.

And by the way--I agree with you about 50% of the time and disagree about 50% of the time it seems, but always enjoy the debate.
you are one of the contributors who is a joy to debate with regardless of where you stand on the topic at hand.

Keep up the good work. Happy new Year.

 

[Oh_Canada]

3rd in ESPN Total Adjusted EPA
4th in Total QBR (ESPN)
4th in Air Yards/Completion (PFR)
5th in DVOA
5th in ANY/A (Football Perspective)
5th in PFN OSM
6th in ANY/A (PFR)
7th in CPOE (Next Gen)
7th in EPA/play (Baldwin/NFLscrapR)
8th-lowest in Bad Throw %
9th in PFF offense grade
9th in On-Target %
10th in NFL passer rating
12th in CPOE (Baldwin/NFLscrapR)

NextGen's CPOE is based on target depth, receiver separation, and pressure on QB
Baldwin's CPOE is based on target depth only

FO hasn't updated DVOA yet, but I saw a twitter post (which I can't find now) with the final rankings that had Prescott 5th.

I generally left out things that are already included in other things (yards, completion percentage, yards per attempt, TD/INT ratio are all included in passer rating... adjusted completion percentage and average depth of target are already included in CPOE, etc.)

Depending on which source you want to believe, Prescott's receivers dropped 6.9% (PFF) of his catchable passes, which was the most in the NFL, or 5.7% (PFR) which was 5th-highest.

As for which stats are the best, it depends on how you measure that. Passer rating, ANY/A, and EPA all have strong win correlations, but don't concern themselves with how to divide credit/blame. Total QBR, PFF grade, and PFN's OSM all attempt to divide credit/blame.

The bottom line for objectivity and win correlation would be EPA/play, but there are other stats that predict future EPA better than EPA itself. Metrics with varying degrees of subjectivity (DVOA, PFF grade, and SIS Total Points) are even better at predicting future EPA because they include credit/blame considerations. (SIS doesn't have their 2019 total points in yet, but Dak has been Top 5-7 most of the season). Despite it's high correlation with wins, ESPN's Total QBR is not very good at predicting future EPA.

PFF's player grading system has evidently come a long way since they started. Based on my early experiences with them, my only involvement with PFF grades has been either to criticize them or tell people to ignore them. But PFF's grades' ability to predict future EPA better than EPA itself shows that there is an advantage to the subjectivity involved in assigning credit and blame, if you're doing it right. Based on the information below, I have to admit that the people at PFF know what they're doing.

Summary: You probably can't go wrong by taking Dak's average rank from the top 8 metrics you see below.

He's good.