the ones being "obtuse" deliberately are the ones refusing to hear anything other than MY GOD YOU'RE A GENIUS!!!
You know, I would have settled for not being called stupid.
(not implying it was you; I honestly don't remember all who did)
i've already said they have different styles. you're now arguing preference over benefit. you're pretty much saying you'd rather see an RB get 4-5 yards a carry and never really do the "home run" thing. you're taking ONE players TALENT and removing it to say ANOTHER player is better than now handicapped player.
Again, this is an incorrect understanding of my analysis. I'm not trying to be condescending. I wrote it. I know exactly what its premise is. And I assure you, the conclusion you reach about what it serves to do... is wrong. Just wrong. I'm happy to explain it more precisely again:
First off, I handicapped
BOTH players in exactly the same way. Okay?
I went through the game-by-game stats and simply subtracted their one longest run from each week they played, both backs. Just their one longest run per-game, in order to isolate
the rest of their runs statistically --in order to give me an idea of what their production looked like the vast majority of the time, because "big-plays" can skew what a player's full performance was really like.
An example:
WEEK 13, 2017, the Fiesta Bowl, Penn State wins 35-28:
Saquon Barkley goes
18-
carries,
137-
yards,
2 TDs,
7.6 YPC
FANTASTIC "game",
right?
Well, wait a sec. Because when you delve deeper into the stats, you learn that Barkley --early 2nd-quarter-- reeled off a 92-yard TD run. Listen, don't get me wrong, it's a
beautiful run and Barkley's sheer freakish ability is displayed in vivid color for all the world to see. He's incredible.
So,
what did he do for the rest of that Bowl game??
Well, outside of that one run, Saquon laid down a--
17-
carry,
45-
yard,
2.6 YPC performance.
--in Penn State's biggest game of the season.
Yes, yes, yes, I agree, that was an incredible play! But, on a day of
79 offensive plays for Penn State, to give your team more than 67% percent of your rushing contributions on only
1 of them --is at least worth examination.
I think we all, even average football fans, understand how important the running game is in football, to controlling the clock, to tiring a defense, to preventing turnovers; things that pretty much all football dudes understand are extremely helpful to winning games. No, it's not the only way to win a football game. But it is an essential formula and history has proven that teams tend not to win as many games the further they stray from that blueprint.
See the Seattle Seahawks for evidence of this, who basically destroyed a potential empire by, on the freaking goal-line, taking the keys out of Beastmode's hands & turning them over to Russell Wilson. It has been a Wilson-centric offense ever since then, and regardless how good he is, the Seahawks haven't been the same ever since --even before their defense collapsed.
I totally get, because it's obvious, what an athletic freak and all-around playmaker Saquon Barkley is. But as I did from studying his film and his statistics in college, I am left with an impression of this back following his rookie season in the NFL that makes me question whether he will ever be the kind of bell-cow runner with which a team can dominate on the ground, down-by-down, not only on the occasionally breathtaking play.
--and no matter how good Saquon is at making those explosive-plays, statistically speaking they are rare. Remember, I subtracted just one per-game & it revealed that on 94% of Barkley's carries, his season average was
3.19 YPC.
That's
not a great average to have on such a large percentage of the production you offer your team; and I would be saying that about literally
any running back in that scenario. This is not some grudge against Saquon. Hell, I like the cat!
But I also like closer examinations of players than just watching a highlight-reel and going "wow!"
So Barkley reeled off a sensational 92-yard TD in the Fiesta Bowl.
Here's what all the rest of his runs looked like that day:
1st run of the game,
12-
yards.
... lemme just stop right here real quick: So in the 1st-quarter, Saquon had a
12-
yarder. In the 2nd-quarter, Saquon had a
92-
yarder. On just those two runs, one per-quarter before halftime, Saquon had put up 104 of the 137-yards he would produce on the ground that day (76% of his total); meaning that for the entire rest of the game, Barkley produced
16-
carries for
2.06 yards-per-carry --
2nd run of the game,
NO-
yards.
3rd run of the game,
8-
yards.
4th run of the game,
1-
yard.
5th run of the game,
2-
yards,
TD.
6th run of the game,
92-
yards,
TD.
7th run of the game,
1-
yard.
8th run of the game,
8-
yards.
9th run of the game,
2-
yards.
10th run of the game,
5-
yards.
11th run of the game,
loss of
4-
yards.
12th run of the game,
3-
yards.
13th run of the game,
loss of
4-
yards.
14th run of the game,
4-
yards.
15th run of the game,
3-
yards.
16th run of the game,
1-
yard.
17th run of the game,
1-
yard.
18th run of the game,
1-
yard.
So the breakdown of Barkley's run-groupings is:
2 runs for a
loss of
4-
yards.
1 run for
NO-
yards.
5 runs for
1-
yard.
2 runs for
2-
yards.
2 runs for
3-
yards.
1 run for
4-
yards.
1 run for
5-
yards.
2 runs for
8-
yards.
1 run for
12-
yards.
1 run for
92-
yards.
So
6 runs out of
18-
carries on the day produced
129-of-the-
137-
yards Barkley put up --over
94% of his rushing contributions on just
33% of his carries, meaning that
67% of the time when they handed him the ball --Saquon gave his team
8-
yards.
Eight.
Yards. Almost
70% of the time they handed him the ball.
--in the biggest game of the season & the last game of his collegiate career.
Please believe me when I tell you that this evaluation is not meant to insult Saquon Barkley. Rather, it's meant to 'assess' him in a more comprehensive way than a final stat-line can convey. What kind of back IS he? How does he contribute to his team?? WHO is this player???
My assessment is that he is a big-play specialist who struggles to provide
consistent production for his offense. Not based on this one game, but by the fact that
most of his games go this way --right up on through his first season as a professional football player. Again,
94% of the time Barkley put up
3.19 yards-per-carry for the Giants in 2018.
This does not mean I'm saying he's not a phenomenal & valuable player that any team would love to have. I think this guy
could go to the Hall-of-Fame one day. My only quest here is to understand Saquon's identity more intimately. Because not all Hall-of-Famers are created equal!
For instance, Ezekiel Elliott is a player I feel has Hall-of-Fame potential. But if he gets in, it'll be by displaying a completely different skill-set than Saquon Barkley. For close to an apples-to-apples comparison of this, let me break down Ohio State's Bowl game to contrast how Zeke contributes to
his offense:
WEEK 14, 2014, the Sugar Bowl, Ohio State wins 42-35:
Ezekiel Elliott goes
20-
carries,
230-
yards,
2 TDs,
11.5 YPC
Here's what all his runs looked like that day --
(now this is against the
Alabama defense, mind you, not Washington State)
1st run of the day,
4-
yards.
2nd run of the day,
54-
yards.
3rd run of the day,
17-
yards.
4th run of the day,
11-
yards.
5th run of the day,
2-
yards.
6th run of the day,
12-
yards.
7th run of the day,
9-
yards.
8th run of the day,
2-
yards.
9th run of the day,
1-
yard.
10th run of the day,
loss of
1-
yard.
11th run of the day,
3-
yards.
12th run fo the day,
3-
yards.
13th run of the day,
7-
yards.
14th run of the day,
4-
yards.
15th run of the day,
7-
yards.
16th run of the day,
2-
yards.
17th run of the day,
2-
yards.
18th run of the day,
2-
yards.
19th run of the day,
4-
yards.
20th run of the day,
85-
yards.
So the breakdown of Elliott's run-groupings is:
1 run for a
loss of
1-
yard.
1 run for
1-
yard.
5 runs for
2-
yards.
2 runs for
3-
yards.
3 runs for
4-
yards.
2 runs for
7-
yards.
1 run for
9-
yards.
1 run for
11-
yards.
1 run for
12-
yards.
1 run for
17-
yards.
1 run for
54-
yards.
1 run for
85-
yards.
So
11 runs out of
20-
carries on the day produced
214-of-the-
230-
yards Elliott put up that day --meaning Zeke averaged
19.45 yards-per-carry across
55% of his carries, in the biggest game of the season, against the best defense in football. Over half the time they handed him the ball, Ezekiel gave his team big-time production; a mixture of big-plays and
consistent chunks of mid-tier yardage.
My analysis of these facts leads me to believe that, while still possessing big-play ability, Zeke is a more consistent contributor to a dominant ground-game than Saquon Barkley; and the breadth of that analysis spans dozens of games like these. Repeatedly, Zeke and Saquon reveal themselves to be the kind of players their respective Bowl performances demonstrate.
Saquon is a big-play specialist who struggles to produce consistently.
Ezekiel specializes in consistent production with big-play ability.
Isolating their average production by subtracting their most explosive plays is useful in ascertaining that evaluation. In fact, it's almost impossible
without doing so on a statistical level. When we take away Zeke & Saquon's biggest single runs from those Bowl games, their stats wind up looking like this:
Saquon --
17-
carries for
45-
yards @
2.64 yards-per-carry
Ezekiel --
19-
carries for
145-
yards @
7.63 yards-per-carry
If we then additionally subtract their second-longest run from the day (12-yards for Barkley & 54-yards for Zeke), their stats wind up:
Saquon --
16-
carries for
33-
yards @
2.06 yards-per-carry
Ezekiel --
18-
carries for
91-
yards @
5.05 yards-per-carry
The difference is really quite evident. When you subtract Barkley's two longest runs (
92 &
12-
yards), it reveals that he averaged
barely over
2 yards-per-carry on the remaining
88% of his handoffs. Conversely, when you take away Elliott's two longest runs (
85 &
54, 139-yards subtracted from his total), Zeke
still averaged over
5 yards-per-carry on the remaining
90% of his runs!
That's what you call
consistency.
Zeke demonstrates it.
Saquon does not.
--and yes, it's my opinion that 'consistency' is more conducive to winning football games than the occasional big-play, with lackluster production on the vast bulk of every other opportunity --especially, as in Zeke's case, when you contribute
both.
if you like zeke, great. go appreciate him on the field and be glad we have him as a cowboy. but i simply don't see the need to get all butthurt that another team also has a star rb in our division.
I'm not butt-hurt about it at all, especially because we have the
better one.
