Prescott's final season ranks (various metrics)

[BoysForLife]

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.

Except there was a drop off in 2016 in total production.
And for the record if you go back and reach the exchange that led to my posting those final 8 *regular season* games as a comparison, we were debating why Dez made the pro Bowl in 2016 despite his drop off in production.

I submitted that Dez made the pro Bowl despite his drop off due to the Cowboys 13-3 record.
the other gentleman I was debating with said it was because of his prolific 2nd half of the season. Which is why I posted the comparison of the last 8 games between 2014 an 2016.

Now then--stay with me here--why on earth would I include the playoffs in a discussion about why a player was selected to the Pro Bowl?
was 2016 a unique outlier wherein the pro bowl selections were announced after the Divisional round of the playoffs, unlike every other year in NFL history?

There was no "doctoring" and there is no "splitting of hairs".

Even if I indulge you and include the playoffs--here are Dez's 2014 numbers: 94 catches, 1406 yards, 16 TD.
2016: 59 catches, 928 yards, 10 TD.

Not even comparable. Literally a 40% drop in production almost across the board.
if that's "splitting hairs" I don't know what to tell you.

 

[BoysForLife]

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.

They assumed Dez's lack of production was due to age and injuries, because that was the common myth emanating from Dallas.

They didn't realize that it went a bit deeper than that.....

 

[black label]

 

[AtomicDog]

I don't understand all the Dak hate. He has done a lot for this team. Never missed a game, won 2 NFC East titles, won a playoff game. Has high passing ratings in general. All this and for very cheap. I think it was insulting to not sign him to a long term contract. I don't want to see him go. Who would you replace him with? At the very least franchise tag him next year. But even that I think is kind of insulting.

 

[zeke21]

Ran the same numbers for all other 2019 playoff QBs (Total season QB rating/vs playoff teams QB rating). Did not include Brees because he missed a large chunk of his teams games.

Wentz: 93.1 - 89.4
Wilson: 106.3 - 88.3
Cousins: 107.4 - 90.8
Rodgers: 95.4 - 105.2
Jimmy G: 102.0 - 108.6
Tannehill: 117.5 - 118.5
Allen: 85.3 - 72.7
Watson: 98.0 - 95.0
Brady: 88.0 - 75.3
Mahomes: 105.3 - 108.5
Lamar: 113.3 - 96.1

Dak: 99.7 - 84.7

Dak is clearly not some outlier. It is very common if not expected for QBs to post worse #s vs good teams than vs bad teams. Keep in mind this is a small sample size too with dramatic fluctuations for that reason.

yes but THAT much worse.. from your list (if I am reading it right).. wentz played at the same level irrespective of opponent. Wilson dropped off considerably (look at what he has to work with this year.. eek).. Rodgers, Jimmy, Mahomes and Tannehill all played better?!!

It looks like a list that confirms what I think actually.. I went the guys who play the same or BETTER against the good teams.. they are the guys you can rely on. I don't want a soft running QB who runs it up against weak teams. That spells disaster for me.

 

[Blue&Silver]

I was reading a bunch of crazy historical statistics about Carson Wentz by a Philadelphia reporter, and came across this one..

First four years: Wentz’s 97 touchdown passes are ninth-most in NFL history by a QB in his first four seasons. Of the 28 quarterbacks with at least 80 TD passes in their first four seasons, Wentz has the best interception ratio. The only QBs in history to average a TD at least every 20 attempts and an INT less than every 50 attempts are Rodgers, Wentz and Dak Prescott.

Prescott is simply not playing at the level he was drafted at. He's over performed.

 

[percyhoward]

Why on earth would I include the playoffs in a discussion about why a player was selected to the Pro Bowl?

Because you're trying to show a drop-off in production in 2016, and excluding the playoffs helps your argument. Dez was much better in the 2016 playoffs than the 2014 playoffs.

Including the entire season (which you're now doing) also helps your argument, since Dez was injured in early 2016.

What completely destroys your argument is to do what actually makes the most sense -- that is to count the games that actually counted when Dez was healthy in both seasons.

 

[Ranching]

OMG

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.

 

[Kaiser]

They assumed Dez's lack of production was due to age and injuries, because that was the common myth emanating from Dallas..

No, they said he dropped off because he always beat people physically and couldn't do it anymore. XWalker was here posting it in his game reviews in real time, and people (including me initially) said he was nuts. Then Will McClay said it after the season.

Then 31 other NFL GMs said it when they didn't offer him any real money as a free agent.

 

[BoysForLife]

Because you're trying to show a drop-off in production in 2016, and excluding the playoffs helps your argument. Dez was much better in the 2016 playoffs than the 2014 playoffs.

Including the entire season (which you're now doing) also helps your argument, since Dez was injured in early 2016.

What completely destroys your argument is to do what actually makes the most sense -- that is to count the games that actually counted when Dez was healthy in both seasons.

Right because by your subjective metric, only the games that Dez performed well in were the games that "counted"

Why look at a 40% drop in production when we can focus on one good playoff game (that we lost anyway)

 

[BoysForLife]

No, they said he dropped off because he always beat people physically and couldn't do it anymore. XWalker was here posting it in his game reviews in real time, and people (including me initially) said he was nuts. Then Will McClay said it after the season.

Then 31 other NFL GMs said it when they didn't offer him any real money as a free agent.

So why did the guy suddenly "physically" lose it at age 28?

Is that an age we typically see top performing athletes in incredible shape, suddenly disappear?

 

[IheartRomo]

yes but THAT much worse.. from your list (if I am reading it right).. wentz played at the same level irrespective of opponent. Wilson dropped off considerably (look at what he has to work with this year.. eek).. Rodgers, Jimmy, Mahomes and Tannehill all played better?!!

It looks like a list that confirms what I think actually.. I went the guys who play the same or BETTER against the good teams.. they are the guys you can rely on. I don't want a soft running QB who runs it up against weak teams. That spells disaster for me.

yes but THAT much worse.. from your list (if I am reading it right).. wentz played at the same level irrespective of opponent. Wilson dropped off considerably (look at what he has to work with this year.. eek).. Rodgers, Jimmy, Mahomes and Tannehill all played better?!!

It looks like a list that confirms what I think actually.. I went the guys who play the same or BETTER against the good teams.. they are the guys you can rely on. I don't want a soft running QB who runs it up against weak teams. That spells disaster for me.

these are extremely small sample sizes. Almost certain to draw incorrect conclusions from 4-5 games. Dak has years where he had a good rating vs playoff teams. And then he has other years (2017) that weren’t as good.

Point is that in general, as I very specifically said over a large sample (which this is not), QB ratings will be lower vs good teams than bad. Look at any QBs playoff rating vs career rating, it will always be lower with almost no exceptions. Why? Because the teams that QB is playing are well above the average regular season competition.

Again, not rocket science.

 

[JBond]

now go remove all the sub .500 matchup games and say use NE-PHilly ONLY late int he year.. lest see how that data pays off.. I like dak but last 5 of 6 games when it was all onte line , he got worse each game and the 2nd half of the Philly game where it was ours to win with wide open receivers and time int he pocket, he was horrible..he lost us the division and a playoff game with that one half of football.. take the rest out of the equation...

hes done this in stretches in 2017 and to begin 2018, Ill throw those out he had some team excuses BUT NE-PHilly he could have won more of those and really he was the problem..

I have not finalized my opinion on Dak, but those pretending a QB with an injured throwing shoulder will play like a healthy one need to shut their mouths because they appear ignorant.

 

[CWR]

I don't understand all the Dak hate. He has done a lot for this team. Never missed a game, won 2 NFC East titles, won a playoff game. Has high passing ratings in general. All this and for very cheap. I think it was insulting to not sign him to a long term contract. I don't want to see him go. Who would you replace him with? At the very least franchise tag him next year. But even that I think is kind of insulting.

You make some good points but we don't know what offers he received. It sounded like we attempted to reward Dak handsomely and he held out for more. After how Dak finished the year maybe the FO should be insulted?

 

[PAPPYDOG]

Dak's getting the Tony Romo treatment right now where he's getting blamed for wins and losses despite having excellent efficiency and production.

Tell us what Dak's QB talents are?
Curious what you have to say on the matter?

 

[percyhoward]

Right because by your subjective metric, only the games that Dez performed well in were the games that "counted"

It's not a metric, it's just a sample of consecutive full games. The last 8 from each season. You can't count 40 minutes of a game (week 17 in Philly) during which time Dez was sitting on the bench. The only reason to include that game is that you've already reached your conclusion, and you're trying to back it up with numbers.

If you want to count the 1st 20 minutes of that Philly game when he was on the field and was targeted once, then we can remove the first 20 minutes of the Steeler game (which the team was actually trying to win) from the front end, which costs Dez 49 yards. But let's do that:

Last 8 games
2014 -- 38 rec 613 yards 8 TD
2016 -- 40 rec 593 yards 8 TD

Previous games
2014 (first 10 games)
56 rec 793 yards 8 TD
2016 (first 6+ games)
19 rec 331 yards 2 TD

Not surprisingly, early in the 2014 season Dez was very productive when he was healthy and playing with a QB who was literally in the prime of his career. Early in the 2016 season, Dez wasn't so productive when he missed three games with an injury and was playing with a rookie QB who was making his first NFL starts.

But look at the last 8 games of each season, and you get a clear picture of how that all changed. Dez's 2016 production in the last 8 games is virtually the same as his 2014 production. There was no drop off. He made the Pro Bowl that year because he deserved to.

To sell your argument that Dez had a dropoff in 2016 because of the QB who was throwing it to him, you have to lump the two sets of games together. You have to try to hide the fact that the last 8 games of each season were almost identical.

 

[PAPPYDOG]

Three big games, New Orleans, New England, and Philadelphia. What did the offense do those crucial games?

That's your answer.

We Dak-Friendly baby!!