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FWIW...This is from K.C. Joyner, thru Vela's blog, about Romo. Vela's part is in blue, the rest is Joyner.
K.C. Joyner has been a good friend to this site. He offered us his analyses before he joined ESPN.com and continues to be generous with his work.
Today, he sent me the entire write up for the Cowboys from Scientific Football 2007, his latest annual which breaks down players with his original performance metrics. K.C. and the boys at Football Outsiders are well on their way to transforming the way we look at football, in the same way Bill James and his sabermetic diaspora have remade the way we look at baseball.
I’ll be excerpting pieces from K.C.’s book the next week. It’s on sale at his site — www.TheFootballScientist.com — and is also available on Amazon.com starting today. K.C. will also join me in the coming days for a podcast. If you have specific questions about the Cowboys of the NFL you want him to address, post them in the thread.
Today, we begin with selections from SF 2007’s profile of Tony Romo:
In the four years that I’ve been doing this, I have come to the conclusion that one of the most difficult parts of the passing game for a young quarterback to master is the medium pass depth level.
The reason the medium pass level is the hardest is due to the routes that are run at that level: deep in, deep out, comeback and skinny post. The deep in and skinny post routes are typically being run through a lot of traffic, often between the zones of a defense, which makes them very hard to complete and fraught with danger. The deep out and comeback routes aren’t thrown in traffic but they do have to be thrown a long distance and are in the air for such a long time that an inaccurate pass can lead to a pass being defensed or intercepted.
Given the difficulties of throwing at the medium level, it makes Romo’s performance on medium passes last year that much more impressive. He had the highest success percentage and 2nd highest YPA at that depth level…
…that wasn’t the only area where Romo excelled. He was 13th in bad decision percentage (versus 3rd from last for Bledsoe). Romo’s missed pass percentages were also top?notch, as he placed 2nd in the league (versus 36th for Bledsoe)…
…the metrics say he was a dominant quarterback last year, but the scouting notes told another story, at least over the long haul. After the week 11 game against the Colts, my notes said, “At some level, and this is damn early to say this, [Romo] looks a lot like Tom Brady but with a bit more mobility”.
After the week 17 debacle against Detroit, the notes said, “Romo [is] doing a terrible job on the run today. If his first read gets taken away, he looks a lot like what Ben [Roethlisberger] did his first year, [when he] just looks around downfield and isn’t quite certain what to do with [the ball]. I think teams are taking things away from him that he used to have in the beginning, maybe rushing less and dropping to coverage more to see if he can read coverages…”
I’ve said before that whenever the metrics and the scouting notes disagree on a player, I usually go with the metrics because history has shown me they are the best tiebreaker. All of Romo’s metrics were so overwhelmingly good when taken as a whole that I simply can’t be that down on him, no matter how the season ended for Dallas…
…even if he has a 10-15% dropoff from his 2006 season, he’ll likely be a top 10 quarterback in 2007.
I want to address K.C.’s intermediate metrics on Romo. When I watched him this past weekend in San Antonio, Romo was automatic on the deep outs, the deep comebacks and on intermediate crossing routes. In other words, there’s no sign of regression in this strength of his game.
K.C. Joyner has been a good friend to this site. He offered us his analyses before he joined ESPN.com and continues to be generous with his work.
Today, he sent me the entire write up for the Cowboys from Scientific Football 2007, his latest annual which breaks down players with his original performance metrics. K.C. and the boys at Football Outsiders are well on their way to transforming the way we look at football, in the same way Bill James and his sabermetic diaspora have remade the way we look at baseball.
I’ll be excerpting pieces from K.C.’s book the next week. It’s on sale at his site — www.TheFootballScientist.com — and is also available on Amazon.com starting today. K.C. will also join me in the coming days for a podcast. If you have specific questions about the Cowboys of the NFL you want him to address, post them in the thread.
Today, we begin with selections from SF 2007’s profile of Tony Romo:
In the four years that I’ve been doing this, I have come to the conclusion that one of the most difficult parts of the passing game for a young quarterback to master is the medium pass depth level.
The reason the medium pass level is the hardest is due to the routes that are run at that level: deep in, deep out, comeback and skinny post. The deep in and skinny post routes are typically being run through a lot of traffic, often between the zones of a defense, which makes them very hard to complete and fraught with danger. The deep out and comeback routes aren’t thrown in traffic but they do have to be thrown a long distance and are in the air for such a long time that an inaccurate pass can lead to a pass being defensed or intercepted.
Given the difficulties of throwing at the medium level, it makes Romo’s performance on medium passes last year that much more impressive. He had the highest success percentage and 2nd highest YPA at that depth level…
…that wasn’t the only area where Romo excelled. He was 13th in bad decision percentage (versus 3rd from last for Bledsoe). Romo’s missed pass percentages were also top?notch, as he placed 2nd in the league (versus 36th for Bledsoe)…
…the metrics say he was a dominant quarterback last year, but the scouting notes told another story, at least over the long haul. After the week 11 game against the Colts, my notes said, “At some level, and this is damn early to say this, [Romo] looks a lot like Tom Brady but with a bit more mobility”.
After the week 17 debacle against Detroit, the notes said, “Romo [is] doing a terrible job on the run today. If his first read gets taken away, he looks a lot like what Ben [Roethlisberger] did his first year, [when he] just looks around downfield and isn’t quite certain what to do with [the ball]. I think teams are taking things away from him that he used to have in the beginning, maybe rushing less and dropping to coverage more to see if he can read coverages…”
I’ve said before that whenever the metrics and the scouting notes disagree on a player, I usually go with the metrics because history has shown me they are the best tiebreaker. All of Romo’s metrics were so overwhelmingly good when taken as a whole that I simply can’t be that down on him, no matter how the season ended for Dallas…
…even if he has a 10-15% dropoff from his 2006 season, he’ll likely be a top 10 quarterback in 2007.
I want to address K.C.’s intermediate metrics on Romo. When I watched him this past weekend in San Antonio, Romo was automatic on the deep outs, the deep comebacks and on intermediate crossing routes. In other words, there’s no sign of regression in this strength of his game.
