Prescott's final season ranks (various metrics)

[HungryLion]

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.

You’re a good man too. I appreciate it. Have a great holiday. I’m looking forward to our families traditional pork and sauerkraut on New Year’s Day.

 

[America's Cowboy]

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.

Uhhh, wrong. Dez played pretty good under Dak in 2016. In 2017, Dez's injuries and lack of abilities due to age caught up to him. That's why he was cut by season's end.

 

[BoysForLife]

You’re a good man too. I appreciate it. Have a great holiday. I’m looking forward to our families traditional pork and sauerkraut on New Year’s Day.

You're a good guy....

But regarding the red, you are a poor judge of character. I'll take it though!!

 

[BoysForLife]

Uhhh, wrong. Dez played pretty good under Dak in 2016. In 2017, Dez's injuries and lack of abilities due to age caught up to him. That's why he was cut by season's end.

So a guy who by your description had a good and healthy 2016 (and an entire off season to get totally healthy and ready for camp) at age 29, suddenly just was too injured and too old to play anymore?

 

[Aven8]

So we now know that he can pass similar to Romo. But just like Romo, we need an offense built for him with a strong running game.

 

[CB61]

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.

You should ask Jerry to interview for the new analytics Department that apparently we don't have yet? LOL looks like he is a top 10 quarterback too bad it didn't translate two more wins in a playoff run and he's not all the blame for that whatsoever

 

[America's Cowboy]

So a guy who by your description had a good and healthy 2016 (and an entire off season to get totally healthy and ready for camp) at age 29, suddenly just was too injured and too old to play anymore?

For the record, I didn't like letting Dez go. I do believe certain players were tired of Dez's antics, but I don't believe Dak was one of them. We sure could have used Dez and his ability to fire up the team during games this year.

 

[Rockport]

Doesn’t fit your agenda huh.

 

[percyhoward]

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.

You creatively counted Dez's 18 snaps and one target in Philly in '16 as a "game," then just as artistically, you completely left out the playoffs both years.

2014 should read "613 yards 8 TD."
2016 should read "642 yards 8 TD."

If you have to doctor it that much, you probably didn't have a point to begin with.

 

[jterrell]

I understand what you are saying and that's part of coaching but I would also submit that if you are forced to spend considerable amounts of time with a starting NFL quarterback working on footwork and ball security, then you maybe don't have quite the quarterback that you need.

For all the time Kitna put into footwork and ball security, Dak still got off the hook on a lot of easy picks this year. He still regularly throws off his back foot.
Old habits tend to die hard.....

I always got the feeling that Linehan's gameplan and schemes were the reason he was axed rather than his inability/failure to develop Dak's mechanics better.

Every QB needs this stuff. Its muscle memory and even at Brady's age he does it for "upkeep".
Those drills are part of the deal and how you have a QB Coach and not do them is mind-boggling.
It's not even time-consuming. It's just repetition versus air/a coach.

Think fans and public got to Jerry about the game plans and they were conservative to a fault which may have been more a head coach thing tbh.

I've always preferred coaches who allow someone else to design some of the plays.
Really would've enjoyed it had say Kellen been allowed to call a single quarter and then they handed it over to a proven play caller.
I realize virtually no one does that but I think that makes life so much harder on defenses. Can't get a read on the OC that way.
Liked DAL having run game coordinator Callahan in place quite a lot but wouldn't want him calling plays for 4 quarters.

 

[BoysForLife]

You creatively counted Dez's 18 snaps and one target in Philly in '16 as a "game," then just as artistically, you completely left out the playoffs both years.

2014 should read "613 yards 8 TD."
2016 should read "642 yards 8 TD."

If you have to doctor it that much, you probably didn't have a point to begin with.

Didn't doctor anything.
comment was about the "last half of the season" being prolific and I merely looked up Pro Football reference and looked at the last 8 gamelogs for both years.
Playoffs honestly didn't even enter my mind.
So go ahead and factor in the last 8 reg season games and the playoff game from both of those years.

he still produced better in 14 "the last half of the season".

 

[CowboyRoy]

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.

These morons never cared about wins in the past. “Wins are a team stat”. Lol

All of a sudden, when we go 8-8 wins matter now. Lol

trolls can’t get out of their own way.

now it’s “stats don’t matter”.

 

[percyhoward]

You should ask Jerry to interview for the new analytics Department that apparently we don't have yet? LOL looks like he is a top 10 quarterback too bad it didn't translate two more wins in a playoff run and he's not all the blame for that whatsoever

I'm an old dog who is only recently seeing the light with these new metrics.

I've always looked at win correlation as the be-all, end-all. (Passer rating correlates to wins, passing yards does not, etc.) It's way past that now though. Now they know exactly what leads to wins in which situations, and to what degree. Within that, it's now possible to evaluate the evaluators to see how good they are at dividing up the credit or the blame for these numbers. SIS, Football Outsiders, and PFF are doing what they advertise right now. ESPN is not.

 

[Chuck 54]

If you don’t pay your QB and have stability there, the rest of the team doesn’t even matter.

 

[Kaiser]

season to get totally healthy and ready for camp) at age 29, suddenly just was too injured and too old to play anymore?

He was too old and injured to pay 15 Million for, without a doubt. And the fact no other NFL team would offer him much proved the point.

 

[conner01]

Dak is clearly in the 8-10 range of NFL QB’s. It’s clear. It’s obvious. Based on both film and watching the players, and the numbers themselves.

The only real argument is whether 8-10 is good enough to win a championship if he gets paid a lot of money.

I’ll add. Inconsistency is an issue. It would be better if he constantly played in the 8-10 range. Unfortunately he has streaks where he is top 5 and then streaks where he is like 20th. Which leads to overall 8-10.

The real question is with Dak say #10
Can you get better? Kinda hard to go out and get a top 10 QB
Can Dak get better? He was better this year than last year
Bottom line Dak is the best QB you actually have the option of signing
So you keep Dak or roll the dice on drafting a QB which is certainly no exact science

 

[CB61]

I'm an old dog who is only recently seeing the light with these new metrics.

I've always looked at win correlation as the be-all, end-all. (Passer rating correlates to wins, passing yards does not, etc.) It's way past that now though. Now they know exactly what leads to wins in which situations, and to what degree. Within that, it's now possible to evaluate the evaluators to see how good they are at dividing up the credit or the blame for these numbers. SIS, Football Outsiders, and PFF are doing what they advertise right now. ESPN is not.

Exactly I was dumbfounded when they came up with the qbr rating that's how old I am but you know as Innovative as the Cowboys were when they came into the league and especially with Tex Schramm still around he was part of that why he doesn't get the Cowboys to do more of that? I'm not sure exactly what that would entail but as far as the offense I see where it could help but then you actually have to get the coach to implement it?

 

[percyhoward]

he still produced better in 14 "the last half of the season".

Only if you count the 18-snap, 1-target appearance in the meaningless season-ender in Philly in '16 as a full game.

My only point is that there was no drop-off in 2016, so I'll gladly point out that we're splitting hairs.

 

[CalPolyTechnique]

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.

Feel free to provide the supporting data, or are you just treating your presumption as fact?

Even if the general premise was true, some player better or worse than others.

 

[percyhoward]

Exactly I was dumbfounded when they came up with the qbr rating that's how old I am but you know as Innovative as the Cowboys were when they came into the league and especially with Tex Schramm still around he was part of that why he doesn't get the Cowboys to do more of that? I'm not sure exactly what that would entail but as far as the offense I see where it could help but then you actually have to get the coach to implement it?

He doesn't have to be young, but if he's old, he'd better be up to date.