ZWK's 2015 Prospect Analysis (1 Viewer)

[Biabreakable]

Sample size for Gurley is an issue because he only played a full season as a freshman in 2012. He missed 4 games due to his ankle injury in 2013, then he missed 4 games in 2014 due to his suspension and 3 more games because of the ACL injury.

So the sample size from 2014 is less than 50% of the possible games.

Draft Breakdown only has 7 games available and none of those games are from 2012 the only time Gurley played a full season.

 

[jurb26]

Sample size for Gurley is an issue because he only played a full season as a freshman in 2012. He missed 4 games due to his ankle injury in 2013, then he missed 4 games in 2014 due to his suspension and 3 more games because of the ACL injury.

So the sample size from 2014 is less than 50% of the possible games.

Draft Breakdown only has 7 games available and none of those games are from 2012 the only time Gurley played a full season.

I don't know why they would have no games from 2012. Seems bizzarre. I know I've said this before in other threads, the SEC title game vs. Bama that year is some of the most impressive stuff I've seen from a RB in a while. Especially the 3rd quarter. I know that game is available for full viewing on YouTube somewhere.

 

[Alex P Keaton]

top 4: Todd Gurley, Nick Chubb, Josh Robinson, and Tevin Coleman. I'm a little surprised to see Gurley there - he did pretty well in my elusiveness numbers but wasn't that close to the top. Not at all surprised about the other 3: Chubb & Robinson are the top 2 in my numbers (though in a small sample size), and Coleman was near the top in my numbers (and I'd expect him to do better in yards after contact than in my capped yards after contact metric, since he broke several long runs that included a broken tackle).

I don't know how you come up with your numbers, but Gurley breaks more tackles than any RB I can remember in recent years. Some games, it seemed he broke a tackle every time he touched the ball. I can't see any way he would not score well in this type of ranking.

It turns out that Gurley's 2 worst games, out of the 7 I've charted, were in 2013 (against Florida & Auburn - if you want to see Gurley doing a whole lot of nothing, watch the

If the Auburn game was one of his worst ever, I feel really good about Gurley as a prospect. He looks so fluid catching the ball and then turning upfield. Very impressive.

 

[ZWK]

If the Auburn game was one of his worst ever, I feel really good about Gurley as a prospect. He looks so fluid catching the ball and then turning upfield. Very impressive.

Out of the 7 games of his that I've charted, Gurley's 2013 game against Auburn was the worst in terms of yards after contact & broken tackles. I didn't attempt to track other aspects of his game, like his burst or how fluidly he caught the ball. And he has 23 other games that I haven't charted.

top 4: Todd Gurley, Nick Chubb, Josh Robinson, and Tevin Coleman. I'm a little surprised to see Gurley there - he did pretty well in my elusiveness numbers but wasn't that close to the top. Not at all surprised about the other 3: Chubb & Robinson are the top 2 in my numbers (though in a small sample size), and Coleman was near the top in my numbers (and I'd expect him to do better in yards after contact than in my capped yards after contact metric, since he broke several long runs that included a broken tackle).

I don't know how you come up with your numbers, but Gurley breaks more tackles than any RB I can remember in recent years. Some games, it seemed he broke a tackle every time he touched the ball. I can't see any way he would not score well in this type of ranking.

It turns out that Gurley's 2 worst games, out of the 7 I've charted, were in 2013 (against Florida & Auburn - if you want to see Gurley doing a whole lot of nothing, watch the

I do chart most of the games that I can find complete cutups of (at least for the top prospects), but there are some reasons for caution in choosing what games to include. I think that games against bad opponents are less informative than games against good opponents in assessing a RB's skills, and are liable to add noise to the numbers (so I usually skip games against non-FBS opponents, don't really mind the fact that I'm missing Gurley's 2014 game against Troy). I think that games from 2+ years ago are generally less informative than more recent games, since players develop over time (there's a case that could be made for throwing out Gurley's 2013 data and just judging him by the 2014 games - although that case is made weaker by the fact that he only played 6 games this year). And it can skew the data to pick out a game to include based on it being an unusually good game - I'm trying to get something like a representative sample of a player's performance, not to watch him at his best (there are highlight videos for that).

 

[jurb26]

If players change so much over time then why even bother charting guys like Chubb this year?

I'd disagree that guys change all that much. Maybe size, the build or some peripheral stuff changes. RBs don't really change their style, though. You see nearly all the stuff from Gurley in 2012 that makes people love him today. It's the very reason many have preached him as an elite prospect. That didn't just happen this past year. Is been discussed for 3 years, just like it is with Chubb now. Really, you just see more of it because he was actually healthy most the season. Guys can change but it seems rare and not likely to happen in college. More an adaptation to the NFL game. RB isn't a very complicated position where development is paramont.

 

[The Claymaker]

Looking at your 2014 thread, you have a ton of misses, so why is it worth spending the time to do this?

If these are the kind of posts we can expect from you, hopefully you don't stay long.

 

[imjackdupp]

Looking at your 2014 thread, you have a ton of misses, so why is it worth spending the time to do this?

So true, if only these guys got to play more than one year maybe they would have a chance to prove themselves.

I was kinda high on Abdullah until I saw those fumble numbers. Every 35 carries could prove an issue. Thanks for sharing.

 

[ZWK]

Looking at your 2014 thread, you have a ton of misses, so why is it worth spending the time to do this?

Because other people miss even more. Or at least in different ways.

If players change so much over time then why even bother charting guys like Chubb this year?

Impatience. If I could chart Chubb's 2016 games right now, I would do that.

Less glibly, I think that some college RBs develop more than others. Chubb looked like a finished product and an elite prospect as an 18-year-old true freshman. Other guys take more time.

An approach that I've tried with other RB stats is to count each player's last n seasons, where n is chosen separately for each RB in order to make him look the best (and there is either a minimum workload cutoff or a regression to the mean adjustment so that I don't overrate guys who looked good in a small sample size their last year). Ideally, I think that would be my standard approach for RB stats; unfortunately that's a moot point with elusiveness data since I have so little of it.

I was kinda high on Abdullah until I saw those fumble numbers. Every 35 carries could prove an issue. Thanks for sharing.

My pleasure. I think Abdullah is still my #4 RB in this class even with those fumbles, but they definitely are troubling.

 

[ZWK]

Here are my RB rankings, along with my pre-draft rankings for the 2014 & 2013 draft classes for context.

My rankings are roughly 80% number crunching and 20% my opinions.

The 80% that's number crunching includes things like what's in this spreadsheet. In decreasing order of importance:

Athleticism: 40 time, vertical, broad jump, and to a lesser extent the agility drills
Size: weight, and to a lesser extent BMI (low is bad) & height (tall is bad)
Elusiveness: yards after contact & broken tackles, from my tracking & Greg Peshek's
Production: long runs, short yardage/goalline success rate, receiving, and other stats
Age & Workload: younger is better, non-RB1 workload is negative

The 20% that's my opinions includes things like:

Manual adjustments: giving points for relevant things that aren't in the numbers (e.g., adjusting Abdullah down for bad pass blocking), or where the numbers seem misleading (e.g., adjusting Gurley up because his elite yards after contact per carry suggests that my Hard to Tackle Rating is underrating his elusiveness)
My impression: a 0-10 rating of how good a RB looked when I watched him play
Finger on the scale: adding (or subtracting) a small amount to a RB if the rankings that my number crunching creates look slightly off (mostly to reorder tightly packed players based on my guesses about who is a better prospect)

These things all get entered as numbers, and the result is basically a weighted sum which outputs a numerical rating for each player.

For the rankings below, I've put the 2013 & 2014 draft classes in the same order that I ranked them before their NFL draft (which I posted to the Shark Pool then), because it seemed most relevant to compare players at the same stage of the process. (This makes things slightly tricky, because I kept tinkering with the numbers after the draft and now the numbers that I have in my files don't quite match up with those rankings. So I've had to slightly fudge the numbers in order to put them back in the order that I posted, which is not ideal for the cross-year comparisons. If two players in different draft classes are close to each other & in the same tier, think of them as similarly rated - don't read too much into one being ahead of the other.)

Enough background; here are the rankings:

2013 Eddie Lacy

2015 Todd Gurley
2015 Melvin Gordon
2013 Christine Michael
2014 Carlos Hyde

2014 Lache Seastrunk
2015 Jay Ajayi
2014 Tre Mason
2013 Giovani Bernard
2015 Ameer Abdullah
2013 Knile Davis

2014 Jeremy Hill
2014 Jerick McKinnon

2013 Jonathan Franklin
2015 Duke Johnson
2015 Tevin Coleman
2014 Bishop Sankey
2013 Marcus Lattimore
2015 David Cobb
2015 David Johnson
2014 Stephen Houston
2014 Henry Josey
2013 Zac Stacy
2013 D.J. Harper
2013 Le'Veon Bell
2013 Cierre Wood
2013 Kenjon Barner
2013 Montee Ball
2013 Latavius Murray
2014 Isaiah Crowell
2014 Andre Williams
2014 Charles Sims
2014 Dri Archer

2014 Devonta Freeman
2015 Karlos Williams

2015 Cameron Artis-Payne
2015 Josh Robinson
2015 T.J. Yeldon
2015 Corey Grant
2014 David Fluellen
2013 Treavor Scales
2015 Jeremy Langford
2013 Michael Ford
2014 Robert Godhigh
2013 Matthew Tucker
2015 Mike Davis
2014 George Atkinson III
2014 Terrance West
2015 Michael Dyer
2014 Tim Cornett
2013 C.J. Anderson
2013 Andre Ellington
2014 James White
2014 De'Anthony Thomas
2014 Lorenzo Taliaferro

Rough labels for the tiers:

Guys I like a lot: Lacy through Hyde, including 2 RBs this year: Gurley & Gordon

Guys I like: Seastrunk through Davis, including 2 RBs this year: Ajayi & Abdullah

(Awkwardly between tiers: Hill & McKinnon)

Guys who have a decent chance: Franklin through Archer, including 4 RBs this year: Duke Johnson, Coleman, Cobb, and David Johnson

Guys I can't rule out: Freeman through Taliaferro, including 8 RBs this year: Williams, Artis-Payne, Robinson, Yeldon, Grant, Langford, Davis, Dyer

The last two tiers are pretty tightly packed, and the order within them for this year's RBs could easily change (especially for Coleman & Cobb, who have pro days to run at). RBs not listed (like Javorius Allen) probably didn't make that cut, unless they're non-FBS or didn't get many carries this year (in which case they might just be missing from my data set).

 

[jurb26]

How in the world could Bernard be ahead of Hill?

 

[ZWK]

How in the world could Bernard be ahead of Hill?

I liked Bernard in April 2013 more than I liked Hill in early May 2014.

 

[ptsteelers]

Sorry it has taken me this long to say this, ZWK ... Amazing stuff, my man. Truly.

 

[Concept Coop]

...the SEC title game vs. Bama that year is some of the most impressive stuff I've seen from a RB in a while.

 

[bicycle_seat_sniffer]

How in the world could Bernard be ahead of Hill?

He isnt revising his rankings based on nfl performance

 

[ZWK]

Looking at pretty basic QB stats (things like passer rating, or other simple QB efficiency stats which also account for running & sacks), Marcus Mariota (2013 & 2014), Jameis Winston (2013), and Bryce Petty (2013) have all had an excellent season, and Garrett Grayson (2014) & Blake Sims (2014) have each had a good season.

That is far from a guarantee that these 5 guys are actually good prospects, but it is a pretty strong reason to be skeptical of any other (FBS) QBs in this draft class (like Brett Hundley). College stats are basically a filters - it's rare for a QB to succeed in the NFL without having a statistically good to excellent season in college.

 

[ZWK]

Darren Page has an amazing breakdown of passing accuracy for a bunch of QB prospects based on a whole bunch of charting (even more detailed breakdowns here). (I should've looked for this sooner - he posted something similar last year.) Most of his stats are "completion percentage" on various types of throws, except drops are counted as completed passes and throwaways are counted as non-attempts.

I took Page's numbers and did some crunching, focusing on the more difficult throws. Here is how the QBs ranked in terms of accuracy on difficult throws - the number is something like completion percentage over average (average in this case is 52.0%, so Mariota's score of +8.3 means something like "Mariota completed 60.3% of these difficult passes"):

8.3 Marcus Mariota
4.5 Jameis Winston
2.1 Bryce Petty
1.7 Nick Marshall
0.9 Brett Hundley
0.9 Shane Carden
0.0 Garrett Grayson
-0.3 Blake Sims
-0.4 Bo Wallace
-2.8 Sean Mannion
-3.2 Brandon Bridge
-5.5 Taylor Kelly
-6.3 Cody Fajardo
-18.5 Anthony Boone

For the curious, the stats I included are:

6-15 yard passes (1x weight)

16-25 yard passes (2x weight)

26+ yard passes (2x weight)

6-15 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

16-25 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

3rd & 5-9 conversion rate (1x weight)

3rd & 10+ conversion rate (1x weight)

On the last 4 stats, I included both 2013 & 2014 data for Mariota, Winston, Petty, and Hundley (Page only did 2013 charting for those 4 QBs). The two 3rd down passing stats look at first down conversion rate, not completion percentage, with dropped passes counted as conversions if they happened past the sticks.

Unfortunately, Page used slightly different breakdowns for last year's draft class (last year he had cutoffs at 0, 10, and 20 yards past the line of scrimmage; this year he went with 5, 15, and 25) so it's hard to make direct comparisons with last year's crop.

The general pattern here is consistent with what's turning up in other places, including Greg Peshek's breakdowns & PFF's Mariota vs. Winston comparison (which I posted about here), so at this point that's how I'd rank them: Mariota #1, Winston #2, no one else looking that promising but I guess Petty at #3.

 

[jurb26]

Basing accuracy on completions is very shortsighted. There are levels of accuracy based on ball placement, arch and drive. You can throw a ball poorly but still complete it. Mariota is not nearly as accurate as Winston. On top of that, the fact that Marshall is ranking 4th would have me seriously rethinking this entire metric.

 

[ZWK]

For deep sleepers, look at John Harris - a 6'2 215 receiver who did not get a combine invite even though Texas's yards per pass attempt was more than twice as high when they were throwing to him than when they threw elsewhere (10.1 vs. 4.9 YPA).

John Harris has so little buzz that many of the reports from Texas's pro day don't even mention him, but apparently he had a solid 40 time around 4.5 (as you can see from what this guy wrote on the back of a napkin), benched 19 reps, and maybe did some other drills. This is the guy who accounted for 40% of Texas's receiving yards and 50% of their receiving TDs. Is there some sort of "Steve Johnson" rule where guys with boring names get less hype and fall in the draft?

Breshad Perriman is getting plenty of buzz for his (sub?) 4.3 40 at his pro day, and he also had an excellent 10'7" broad jump and an okay 36.5" vertical. Despite his high drop rate (now included in the numbers), that's enough to boost him more than a full tier in my ratings from where he was before, up to 6th. The top of my WR ratings now looks like this:

10.64 Amari Cooper

9.26 DeVante Parker

8.29 Kevin White

8.00 Sammie Coates

6.73 Devin Smith

6.02 Breshad Perriman

5.92 Tyler Lockett

5.40 Phillip Dorsett

5.15 Austin Hill

4.49 Nelson Agholor

 

[ZWK]

More QB numbers (to add to the ones I posted here and here): Ourlads has data on QB passing velociity for the QBs who threw at the combine, measured with a radar gun. They have Mariota clocked at 56 mph and Winston at 55 mph, both of which are solid numbers. Hundley & Petty each threw at 53 mph, which is on the slow side. Grayson didn't throw.

Bennett (60) threw the fastest, and Mannion (57), Bridge (57), and Fajardo (55) also had solid velocity. On the other end of the spectrum, Blake Sims (42) broke the record for slowest speed over the 8 years they've been measuring it, beating out Colt Brennan (44). Nick Marshall (50) demonstrated why he's moving to DB with the second slowest speed of this year's group.

For comparison, here are the passing speeds for QBs taken in the first 3 rounds since 2008 (who threw at the combine):

Brandon Weeden, Oklahoma State 59
Colin Kaepernick, Nevada 59
Ryan Mallett, Arkansas 58
Mark Sanchez, Southern Cal 57
Josh Freeman, Kansas State 57
Nick Foles, Arizona 57
Andy Dalton, TCU 56
Cam Newton, Auburn 56
Blake Bortles, Central Florida 56
Jimmy Garoppolo, Eastern Illinois 56
Colt McCoy, Texas (private workout) 56
Joe Flacco, Delaware 55
Geno Smith, West Virginia 55
Kevin O’Connell, San Diego St 55
Russell Wilson, Wisconsin 55
EJ Manuel, Florida State 54
Jake Locker, Washington 54
Brian Brohm, Louisville 53
Chad Henne, Michigan 53
Pat White, West Virginia 52
Christian Ponder, Florida St 51
Michael Glennon, North Carolina State 49

This makes 53mph look like a bit of a warning sign. Though it's worth noting that there's a small sample size for below-55mph QBs, and that this is a fairly bad group of QBs on the whole (in part because many of the better QBs didn't throw at the combine).

 

[cstu]

Though it's worth noting that there's a small sample size for below-55mph QBs

We're getting a pretty good sample size and still no QB has been successful long-term who threw below 55 mph:

Bryce Petty, Baylor 53Brett Hundley, UCLA 53

Shane Carden, East Carolina 52

Jerry Lovelocke, Prairie View A&M 51

Nick Marshall, Auburn 50

Blake Sims, Alabama 42
Tajh Boyd, Clemson 54
Bryn Renner, North Carolina 54
David Fales, San Jose State 53
AJ McCarron, Alabama 53
Dustin Vaughan, West Texas A&M 53
Connor Shaw, South Carolina 50
EJ Manuel, Florida State 54
Matthew Scott, Arizona 54
Landry Jones, Oklahoma 53
Collin Klein, Kansas State 52
Colby Cameron, Louisiana Tech 51
Marqueis Gray, Minnesota 51
Michael Glennon, North Carolina State 49
Patrick Witt, Yale 54
Darron Thomas, Oregon 53
Ryan Lindley, San Diego State 52
Kellen Moore, Boise State 52
Jacory Harris, Miami 50
Aaron Corp, Richmond 50
Nathan Enderle, Idaho 54
Jake Locker, Washington 54
TJ Yates, North Carolina 52
Christian Ponder, Florida St 51
Ricky Stanzi, Iowa 50
Tyrod Taylor, Va Tech 50
Max Hall, BYU 52
Tim Hiller, Western Michigan 52
Michael Kafka, Northwestern 52
Zac Robinson, Oklahoma St. 52
Jevan Snead, Mississippi 52
Sean Canfield, Oregon St. 51
Jarrett Brown, West Virginia 50
John Skelton, Fordham 50
Dan LeFevour, Central Michigan 49
Tony Pike, Cincinnati 49
Armanti Edwards, Appalachian St. 46.5
Tom Brandstetter, Fresno State 53
Cullen Harper, Clemson 53
Stephen McGee, Texas A & M 53
Graham Harrell, Texas Tech 52
Pat White, West Virginia 52
Brian Brohm, Louisville 53
Chad Henne, Michigan 53
Erik Ainge, Tennessee 52
John David Booty, Southern Cal 51
Matt Flynn, LSU 50
Josh Johnson, San Diego 49
Colt Brennan, Hawaii 44

 

[cstu]

It's interesting that 1 mph appears be make such a big difference, at least for QB's drafted in the 1st round. Maybe there is an absolute minimum of arm strength a QB needs to succeed. QB's drafted in the first 3 rounds in bold.

Jameis Winston, Florida State 55
Cody Fajardo, Nevada 55
Jordan Lynch, Northern Illinois 55
Geno Smith, West Virginia 55
Tyler Wilson, Arkansas 55
Russell Wilson, Wisconsin 55
Casey Keenum, Houston 55
Scott Tolzien, Wisconsin 55
Rhett Bomar, Sam Houston State 55
Joe Flacco, Delaware 55
Kevin O’Connell, San Diego St 55

 

[cstu]

Here's are the QB's who threw 56+ mph. QB's drafted in the first 3 rounds in bold.

Bryan Bennett, SE Louisiana 60

Sean Mannion, Oregon State 57

Brandon Bridge, South Alabama 57

Marcus Mariota, Oregon 56

Anthony Boone, Duke 56

Logan Thomas, Virginia Tech 60

Stephen Morris, Miami 59

Tom Savage, Pittsburgh 57

Blake Bortles, Central Florida 56

Jimmy Garoppolo, Eastern Illinois 56

Jeff Mathews, Cornell 56

Keith Wenning, Ball State 56

Tyler Bray, Tennessee 59

Zac Dysert, Miami (OH) 59

James Vandenberg, Iowa 57

Ryan Nassib, Syracuse 56

Bradley Sorensen, Southern Utah 56

Brandon Weeden, Oklahoma State 59

Kirk Cousins, Michigan State 59

Austin Davis, Southern Mississippi 58

Nick Foles, Arizona 57

Chandler Harnish, Northern Illinois 57

Jordan Jefferson, LSU 57

Colin Kaepernick, Nevada 59

Ryan Mallett, Arkansas 58

Patrick Devlin, Delaware 56

Andy Dalton, TCU 56

Cam Newton, Auburn 56

Levi Brown, Troy 56

Colt McCoy, Texas 56 (Did not throw at Combine. Throw was recorded at a private workout with a Radar Gun & Computer Chip in Ball.

John Wilson Parker, Alabama 58

Mike Reilly, Central Washington 58

Drew Willy, Buffalo 58

Mark Sanchez, Southern Cal 57

Josh Freeman, Kansas State 57

Chase Daniels, Missouri 57

Nate Davis, Ball State 56

Curtis Painter, Purdue 56

Paul Smith, Tulsa 57

 

[Xue]

I don't put much stock into these numbers. Cody Fajardo and Russell Wilson have the same arm strength? David Fales has the same arm strength as Brett Hundley? I don't think so. I'd also venture to say Nick Marshall actually has a great arm. He's not staying at QB because he's not that good.

 

[cstu]

I don't put much stock into these numbers. Cody Fajardo and Russell Wilson have the same arm strength? David Fales has the same arm strength as Brett Hundley? I don't think so. I'd also venture to say Nick Marshall actually has a great arm. He's not staying at QB because he's not that good.

We don't know what type of throws these measurements were taken on. Maybe they're shorter throws and guys like Fajardo and Fales have enough speed on those passes.

If I end up missing on Petty and Hundley because I gave too much weight to these numbers then so be it.

 

[ZWK]

It's interesting that 1 mph appears be make such a big difference, at least for QB's drafted in the 1st round. Maybe there is an absolute minimum of arm strength a QB needs to succeed. QB's drafted in the first 3 rounds in bold.

Jameis Winston, Florida State 55

Cody Fajardo, Nevada 55

Jordan Lynch, Northern Illinois 55

Geno Smith, West Virginia 55

Tyler Wilson, Arkansas 55

Russell Wilson, Wisconsin 55

Casey Keenum, Houston 55

Scott Tolzien, Wisconsin 55

Rhett Bomar, Sam Houston State 55

Joe Flacco, Delaware 55

Kevin O’Connell, San Diego St 55

The sample is large enough to see that there is some sign of a trend of slower-throwing QBs getting drafted later, and being less successful when they're drafted early. But it's not large enough to say that there is a sharp cutoff at 55 mph.

Look right below that alleged 55 mph cutoff: there are only 4 QBs drafted in the first 3 rounds who threw 53-54 mph. None of them have been successful. But out of the full set of 21 QBs drafted in the first 3 rounds, only 6 out of 21 (29%) have been at least moderately successful (including Dalton, Foles, Kaepernick, etc.). So, out of those four 53-54 mph throwers, there has only been 1 fewer successful QB than we'd expect. Not exactly overwhelming evidence that QBs with that level of arm strength are hopeless.

And given what we've seen from QBs like Manning in Denver and post-shoulder-injury Pennington, it does seem to be possible to have some success without a cannon.

This is another piece of evidence against being excited about Hundley, but I'm not going to remove him or Petty from my draft list just because of it.

 

[EastonBlues22]

I don't put much stock into these numbers. Cody Fajardo and Russell Wilson have the same arm strength? David Fales has the same arm strength as Brett Hundley? I don't think so. I'd also venture to say Nick Marshall actually has a great arm. He's not staying at QB because he's not that good.

We don't know what type of throws these measurements were taken on. Maybe they're shorter throws and guys like Fajardo and Fales have enough speed on those passes.

If I end up missing on Petty and Hundley because I gave too much weight to these numbers then so be it.

A QB with superior body mechanics might be able to narrow the velocity gap with a guy who has superior arm talent when he's free to step into a throw unimpeded.

The arm talent separates itself in game situations where that isn't possible. Have to go to the tape for that.

With that in mind, these numbers are probably not best for ranking "qualified" individuals against each other, but rather for eliminating individuals from consideration altogether. (i.e. If a guy can't generate "reasonable" velocity even in a non-contested situation, that's a bad sign for his chances of doing well in the NFL.)

 

[cstu]

It's interesting that 1 mph appears be make such a big difference, at least for QB's drafted in the 1st round. Maybe there is an absolute minimum of arm strength a QB needs to succeed. QB's drafted in the first 3 rounds in bold.

Jameis Winston, Florida State 55

Cody Fajardo, Nevada 55

Jordan Lynch, Northern Illinois 55

Geno Smith, West Virginia 55

Tyler Wilson, Arkansas 55

Russell Wilson, Wisconsin 55

Casey Keenum, Houston 55

Scott Tolzien, Wisconsin 55

Rhett Bomar, Sam Houston State 55

Joe Flacco, Delaware 55

Kevin O’Connell, San Diego St 55

The sample is large enough to see that there is some sign of a trend of slower-throwing QBs getting drafted later, and being less successful when they're drafted early. But it's not large enough to say that there is a sharp cutoff at 55 mph.

Look right below that alleged 55 mph cutoff: there are only 4 QBs drafted in the first 3 rounds who threw 53-54 mph. None of them have been successful. But out of the full set of 21 QBs drafted in the first 3 rounds, only 6 out of 21 (29%) have been at least moderately successful (including Dalton, Foles, Kaepernick, etc.). So, out of those four 53-54 mph throwers, there has only been 1 fewer successful QB than we'd expect. Not exactly overwhelming evidence that QBs with that level of arm strength are hopeless.

And given what we've seen from QBs like Manning in Denver and post-shoulder-injury Pennington, it does seem to be possible to have some success without a cannon.

This is another piece of evidence against being excited about Hundley, but I'm not going to remove him or Petty from my draft list just because of it.

I wouldn't call it a sharp cut off at 55, however, there have only been four QB's in the past 5 years who were drafted in the first 3 rounds who threw 54 mph or less (Manuel, Glennon, Locker, and Ponder).

Compare that to 3 out of the 8 QB's that threw 55 mph who were drafted in the first 3 rounds.

All that said, I did find Petty and Hundley's ball speed surprising.

 

[jurb26]

I really don't know why they even measure the throw speed at the combine. The guys aren't throwing for speed. Seeing things like Glennon at 49 and knowing he can throw the ball over 70 YDs is a direct reflection of how unreliable this measure is IMO.

 

[amicsta]

Perhaps this is ignorant of me, but I like Abdullah quite a bit even with the fumbles. We can fix ball security issues at the next level, but we can't teach his absurd agility metrics. I'm trying to keep this brief, but I think the athleticism is there and he is very decisive.

 

[Tau837]

 

[Xue]

Darren Page has an amazing breakdown of passing accuracy for a bunch of QB prospects based on a whole bunch of charting (even more detailed breakdowns here). (I should've looked for this sooner - he posted something similar last year.) Most of his stats are "completion percentage" on various types of throws, except drops are counted as completed passes and throwaways are counted as non-attempts.

I took Page's numbers and did some crunching, focusing on the more difficult throws. Here is how the QBs ranked in terms of accuracy on difficult throws - the number is something like completion percentage over average (average in this case is 52.0%, so Mariota's score of +8.3 means something like "Mariota completed 60.3% of these difficult passes"):

8.3 Marcus Mariota

4.5 Jameis Winston

2.1 Bryce Petty

1.7 Nick Marshall

0.9 Brett Hundley

0.9 Shane Carden

0.0 Garrett Grayson

-0.3 Blake Sims

-0.4 Bo Wallace

-2.8 Sean Mannion

-3.2 Brandon Bridge

-5.5 Taylor Kelly

-6.3 Cody Fajardo

-18.5 Anthony Boone

For the curious, the stats I included are:

6-15 yard passes (1x weight)

16-25 yard passes (2x weight)

26+ yard passes (2x weight)

6-15 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

16-25 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

3rd & 5-9 conversion rate (1x weight)

3rd & 10+ conversion rate (1x weight)

On the last 4 stats, I included both 2013 & 2014 data for Mariota, Winston, Petty, and Hundley (Page only did 2013 charting for those 4 QBs). The two 3rd down passing stats look at first down conversion rate, not completion percentage, with dropped passes counted as conversions if they happened past the sticks.

Unfortunately, Page used slightly different breakdowns for last year's draft class (last year he had cutoffs at 0, 10, and 20 yards past the line of scrimmage; this year he went with 5, 15, and 25) so it's hard to make direct comparisons with last year's crop.

The general pattern here is consistent with what's turning up in other places, including Greg Peshek's breakdowns & PFF's Mariota vs. Winston comparison (which I posted about here), so at this point that's how I'd rank them: Mariota #1, Winston #2, no one else looking that promising but I guess Petty at #3.

What's your analysis of Jake Waters based on traditional stats?

 

[ZWK]

Darren Page has an amazing breakdown of passing accuracy for a bunch of QB prospects based on a whole bunch of charting (even more detailed breakdowns here). (I should've looked for this sooner - he posted something similar last year.) Most of his stats are "completion percentage" on various types of throws, except drops are counted as completed passes and throwaways are counted as non-attempts.

I took Page's numbers and did some crunching, focusing on the more difficult throws. Here is how the QBs ranked in terms of accuracy on difficult throws - the number is something like completion percentage over average (average in this case is 52.0%, so Mariota's score of +8.3 means something like "Mariota completed 60.3% of these difficult passes"):

8.3 Marcus Mariota

4.5 Jameis Winston

2.1 Bryce Petty

1.7 Nick Marshall

0.9 Brett Hundley

0.9 Shane Carden

0.0 Garrett Grayson

-0.3 Blake Sims

-0.4 Bo Wallace

-2.8 Sean Mannion

-3.2 Brandon Bridge

-5.5 Taylor Kelly

-6.3 Cody Fajardo

-18.5 Anthony Boone

For the curious, the stats I included are:

6-15 yard passes (1x weight)

16-25 yard passes (2x weight)

26+ yard passes (2x weight)

6-15 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

16-25 yard passes outside the numbers (2x weight)

3rd & 5-9 conversion rate (1x weight)

3rd & 10+ conversion rate (1x weight)

On the last 4 stats, I included both 2013 & 2014 data for Mariota, Winston, Petty, and Hundley (Page only did 2013 charting for those 4 QBs). The two 3rd down passing stats look at first down conversion rate, not completion percentage, with dropped passes counted as conversions if they happened past the sticks.

Unfortunately, Page used slightly different breakdowns for last year's draft class (last year he had cutoffs at 0, 10, and 20 yards past the line of scrimmage; this year he went with 5, 15, and 25) so it's hard to make direct comparisons with last year's crop.

The general pattern here is consistent with what's turning up in other places, including Greg Peshek's breakdowns & PFF's Mariota vs. Winston comparison (which I posted about here), so at this point that's how I'd rank them: Mariota #1, Winston #2, no one else looking that promising but I guess Petty at #3.

What's your analysis of Jake Waters based on traditional stats?

Meh.

Ranking all 1080 college QB seasons of the past 10 years (min 200 att) by the efficiency stat that I threw together (which is sort of like PFR's adjusted net yards per attempt), Waters's best season ranks 153rd. Here's where the best season by each of this year's prospects ranks:

2 Mariota 2014

7 Winston 2013

9 Petty 2013

38 Grayson 2014

48 Sims 2014

137 Hundley 2013

153 Waters 2014

156 Fajardo 2012

293 Halliday 2014

337 Mannion 2013

768 Bridge 2014

For comparison, the best college season of various Pro Bowlers:

3 Wilson

8 Luck

10 Griffin

12 Young

14 Newton

19 Dalton

97 Stafford

283 Foles

462 Cutler

563 Ryan

And some other interesting QBs (mostly first rounders):

5 Bradford

15 Manziel

25 Kaepernick

32 Russell

43 Bortles

47 Bridgewater

50 Tebow

58 Leinart

64 Weeden

76 Carr

77 Sanchez

84 Quinn

132 Manuel

216 Freeman

225 Ponder

285 Tannehill

291 Gabbert

452 Locker

The stat that I used is just yards per attempt, counting rushing attempts as attempts, with rushing yards counted at 1.3x, completions given a +2 bonus, TDs (passing or rushing) given a +15 bonus, and INTs given a -25 penalty. But the exact details don't matter that much; you get a similar list if you just use the standard passing efficiency stat.

 

[JonB86]

Perhaps this is ignorant of me, but I like Abdullah quite a bit even with the fumbles. We can fix ball security issues at the next level, but we can't teach his absurd agility metrics. I'm trying to keep this brief, but I think the athleticism is there and he is very decisive.

I read someone somewhere the other day who broke down Abdullah's fumbles by year in college and by his junior and senior years he was fumbling at something like 1 per 60-70 carries, where as it was much higher in his Fr and So years! Could have been on here!

 

[Madden Curse]

Here are my RB rankings, along with my pre-draft rankings for the 2014 & 2013 draft classes for context.

My rankings are roughly 80% number crunching and 20% my opinions.

I just want to say that I really appreciate all the number crunching and analysis. This is great and useful stuff!

 

[ZWK]

In preparation for a dynasty draft, I watched a few videos on draftbreakdown of each of Winston, Mariota, and Hundley, and a game each of Petty & Grayson. I think I can see why most people have Winston 1st & Mariota 2nd. I was not impressed by Hundley. If I was drafting today, taking everything into account (stats, my impressions, what other people are saying), I think I'd rank them Winston, Mariota, (gap), Petty, Grayson, Hundley. Here's what I saw as the clearest weakness of each of the conventional top 3:

Hundley did not throw the ball well down the field. He underthrew a lot of passes, with both inaccuracy and a lack of zip, giving defenders a chance to make a play on the ball. Winston & Mariota both looked a lot better at this, putting the ball in a good spot and getting it there quickly (e.g., before the safety had time to close), and Petty & Grayson also had better accuracy than Hundley.

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws). Winston seemed better at moving around the pocket (stepping up or sliding over), staying in rhythm / focused downfield, and then throwing.

Winston made a bunch of terrible decisions about throwing to covered receivers, as if throwing the ball hard meant that a defender that was in position couldn't make a play on the ball. There were also some times when it looked like he just didn't see the underneath defender. As a Bears fan, it reminded me of Cutler, and Grossman before him.

I wish I could include links or counts, rather than just impressions, but I wasn't tracking anything systematically while I watched (not even the time in the video when I noticed these things).

It would be cool if someone recut the QB videos to break the clips down by type of play instead of by game. For example, if there was a video with every throw that Hundley made 10+ yards down the field (in the games that already have cutups), then you could get a good feel for his downfield throwing ability just by watching that one 5-10 minute video (rather than having to sit through several game videos which include a bunch of irrelevant throws). And you could easily go from his video of downfield throws to Mariota's, Winston's, Petty's, and Grayson's. Similarly, there could be a video of every play where the QB did not have a clean pocket (useful for seeing Mariota's struggles under pressure), a video of throws into a tight window, or a video of passes that a defender touched or defensed (useful for evaluating Winston's decision making). This could be the next level of Youtube scouting.

 

[ZWK]

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws). Winston seemed better at moving around the pocket (stepping up or sliding over), staying in rhythm / focused downfield, and then throwing.

CFF just released some data on this. Mariota was sacked on 23.0% of the plays where he was pressured, compared with 11.5% for Winston and 19.2% for the average of the 20 QBs that they shared data on. So Mariota was bad at it, but Winston stands out even more from the pack by being unusually good at dealing with pressure. Though when Mariota did succeed in getting a pass off despite the pressure, he was unusually accurate & good at avoiding interceptions.

Hundley was worse than Mariota under pressure, by all of these measures.

 

[cstu]

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws). Winston seemed better at moving around the pocket (stepping up or sliding over), staying in rhythm / focused downfield, and then throwing.

CFF just released some data on this. Mariota was sacked on 23.0% of the plays where he was pressured, compared with 11.5% for Winston and 19.2% for the average of the 20 QBs that they shared data on. So Mariota was bad at it, but Winston stands out even more from the pack by being unusually good at dealing with pressure. Though when Mariota did succeed in getting a pass off despite the pressure, he was unusually accurate & good at avoiding interceptions.

Hundley was worse than Mariota under pressure, by all of these measures.

Winston - good at getting the ball out before sacked but makes mistakes forcing the ball when he should take a sack (less sacks but more INTs).

Mariota - will hold the ball too long waiting for the perfect target (less INT's but more sacks) - Aaron Rodgers is guilty of this.

 

[cstu]

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws).

Take a look at Rodgers last college game.

 

[ZWK]

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws). Winston seemed better at moving around the pocket (stepping up or sliding over), staying in rhythm / focused downfield, and then throwing.

CFF just released some data on this. Mariota was sacked on 23.0% of the plays where he was pressured, compared with 11.5% for Winston and 19.2% for the average of the 20 QBs that they shared data on. So Mariota was bad at it, but Winston stands out even more from the pack by being unusually good at dealing with pressure. Though when Mariota did succeed in getting a pass off despite the pressure, he was unusually accurate & good at avoiding interceptions.

Hundley was worse than Mariota under pressure, by all of these measures.

Winston - good at getting the ball out before sacked but makes mistakes forcing the ball when he should take a sack (less sacks but more INTs).

Mariota - will hold the ball too long waiting for the perfect target (less INT's but more sacks) - Aaron Rodgers is guilty of this.

That wasn't my impression from watching them.

Winston's terrible decisions mostly didn't have that much to do with being pressured, although that did play a role in some of them (CFF's numbers agree - they only count 5 of his 18 INTs coming under pressure). A lot of the time he showed really good judgment in responding when he first felt pressure - sometimes throwing it away, sometimes taking off running down the field, sometimes moving around the pocket to buy time, sometimes making a pass - and usually leaving the impression that he'd made a good choice.

And Mariota didn't have a general problem of holding onto it too long - he usually made a pass before the pressure got near him (CFF's numbers agree - he was pressured on only 26.3% of his dropbacks, which was fewer than average). His problem came once he did start to feel pressure - then he often didn't know how to respond. Sometimes he would try to step up or slide around in the pocket, without realizing that another defender had a shot at the part of the pocket that he was moving to. Sometimes he would decide to take off towards the sideline, and for a couple seconds he wouldn't be able to do anything with the football while he was busy eluding defenders and escaping the pocket. Sometimes he would try to use a subtle move to elude the defender bearing down on him while keeping his eyes down the field, and it wouldn't be enough and the defender would sack him.

 

[cstu]

Winston's terrible decisions mostly didn't have that much to do with being pressured, although that did play a role in some of them (CFF's numbers agree - they only count 5 of his 18 INTs coming under pressure). A lot of the time he showed really good judgment in responding when he first felt pressure - sometimes throwing it away, sometimes taking off running down the field, sometimes moving around the pocket to buy time, sometimes making a pass - and usually leaving the impression that he'd made a good choice.

There are two types of plays I saw him throw most of his INT's on - throws where he had the time but didn't see the LB and throws where he had to move around in the pocket and tried too hard to make a play.

If you know of a site that has all of his INT's I'd love to see it.

 

[ZWK]

Mariota didn't seem to have that good a feel for pressure. When pressure got near him, he tended to go into elude-the-first-rusher mode, without a great sense for where there was safe space and where there were other defenders. While he was eluding defenders, he also became unable to pass the ball (or even throw it away). This led to a lot of sacks relative to pressures. Sometimes he stepped up in the pocket (with mixed results), sometimes he broke for the sidelines (when he succeeded in getting into space outside the pocket, he was able to make good throws). Winston seemed better at moving around the pocket (stepping up or sliding over), staying in rhythm / focused downfield, and then throwing.

CFF just released some data on this. Mariota was sacked on 23.0% of the plays where he was pressured, compared with 11.5% for Winston and 19.2% for the average of the 20 QBs that they shared data on. So Mariota was bad at it, but Winston stands out even more from the pack by being unusually good at dealing with pressure. Though when Mariota did succeed in getting a pass off despite the pressure, he was unusually accurate & good at avoiding interceptions.

Hundley was worse than Mariota under pressure, by all of these measures.

Winston - good at getting the ball out before sacked but makes mistakes forcing the ball when he should take a sack (less sacks but more INTs).

Mariota - will hold the ball too long waiting for the perfect target (less INT's but more sacks) - Aaron Rodgers is guilty of this.

That wasn't my impression from watching them.

Winston's terrible decisions mostly didn't have that much to do with being pressured, although that did play a role in some of them (CFF's numbers agree - they only count 5 of his 18 INTs coming under pressure). A lot of the time he showed really good judgment in responding when he first felt pressure - sometimes throwing it away, sometimes taking off running down the field, sometimes moving around the pocket to buy time, sometimes making a pass - and usually leaving the impression that he'd made a good choice.

And Mariota didn't have a general problem of holding onto it too long - he usually made a pass before the pressure got near him (CFF's numbers agree - he was pressured on only 26.3% of his dropbacks, which was fewer than average). His problem came once he did start to feel pressure - then he often didn't know how to respond. Sometimes he would try to step up or slide around in the pocket, without realizing that another defender had a shot at the part of the pocket that he was moving to. Sometimes he would decide to take off towards the sideline, and for a couple seconds he wouldn't be able to do anything with the football while he was busy eluding defenders and escaping the pocket. Sometimes he would try to use a subtle move to elude the defender bearing down on him while keeping his eyes down the field, and it wouldn't be enough and the defender would sack him.

Watching Mariota's game against Arizona, I count 14 plays where Mariota faced some pressure or didn't have a clean pocket - plays that required some awareness of his immediate surroundings and where he couldn't just keep his attention down the field.

4 plays where the pocket wasn't quite clean so he had to step up or move around a little before making a throw, and he did fine: 7:25, 8:18, 8:54, 9:38.

3 plays where he had a defender in front of him closing in, and he stood in there and made a pretty good throw: 5:25, 8:30, 8:42 (also required some movement in the pocket).

1 play where he successfully dealt with more substantial pressure, sliding away from it a couple times, resetting, and throwing: 7:32.

2 plays with bad decisions where he thought he had a running lane but he didn't: 0:11 (tackled for a loss), 5:45 (started forward, realized he didn't have a lane & backed off again, and freelanced - it looks like this would've turned out well if not for an ineligible lineman downfield)

1 bad play where he eluded the first defender by stepping up right into 3 other defenders: 9:20 (you could put part of the blame for this one on him holding the ball for too long in the first place).

3 bad plays where his primary problem was a lack of awareness of where defenders were once he started moving in the pocket: 2:59 (had a clean pocket with a 3 man rush, stepped up in the pocket without realizing that this gave the RDE a better angle at him & got sacked), 6:56 (stepped up and stood there too long while a defender came from behind for a strip sack), 10:34 (stepped up & headed right while a defender came from behind for a strip sack).

 

[ZWK]

Winston's terrible decisions mostly didn't have that much to do with being pressured, although that did play a role in some of them (CFF's numbers agree - they only count 5 of his 18 INTs coming under pressure). A lot of the time he showed really good judgment in responding when he first felt pressure - sometimes throwing it away, sometimes taking off running down the field, sometimes moving around the pocket to buy time, sometimes making a pass - and usually leaving the impression that he'd made a good choice.

There are two types of plays I saw him throw most of his INT's on - throws where he had the time but didn't see the LB and throws where he had to move around in the pocket and tried too hard to make a play.

If you know of a site that has all of his INT's I'd love to see it.

I don't have that site, unless you want the trollish answer.

But focusing just on Winston's game against Florida:

His incomplete & potentially interceptable pass at 0:08 is a bad throw due to pressure.

His INT at 0:20 is primarily a good play by the DB to beat the WR to the ball on the slant, plus he also had to get the ball out because pressure was coming.

His INT at 0:40 is a bad decision to throw into coverage (and a bad throw), without any pressure.

His INT at 1:26 is a bad read where he misreads the underneath defender, and probably a bad decision to throw into coverage even disregarding that one defender.

His defensed pass at 4:23 is some combination of a bad decision to throw into coverage and a bad throw somewhat behind the receiver.

His INT at 5:17 is another bad read where he doesn't notice or misreads the underneath defender.

 

[cstu]

Here's a few more.

 

[ZWK]

Here's a few more.

Some others:

Bad decision against Louisville, down the seam into double coverage.

Bad decision against Miami, threw it down the sideline when the safety was in position to come over and pick it off.

Pressure/bad decision against Louisville, threw it quickly because a blitz was coming to his TE who wasn't open (defender in great position to make a play on the ball).

Pressure/bad decision against Oklahoma State, running towards the sideline to elude pressure & threw it to a WR who wasn't open (defender in great position to make a play on the ball).

 

[EastonBlues22]

Here's a link to all 18 of Winston's interceptions this year. The interception links are to YT complete game videos tagged to take you to the desired play.

http://www.reddit.com/r/buccaneers/comments/2vu6u2/all_18_jameis_winston_interceptions_of_20142015/

 

[jurb26]

There had already been extensive study on Winston's Ints in the Winston thread. Why not just discuss it there? Or is that thread now completely trolled to the point that only speculatory rape guilt can be discussed?

 

[Biabreakable]

There had already been extensive study on Winston's Ints in the Winston thread. Why not just discuss it there? Or is that thread now completely trolled to the point that only speculatory rape guilt can be discussed?

I even tried to troll the trolling with an article (not even that well written article) that had a title comparing Winston with Big Ben.. as football players. But people will talk about what interests them.

This thread is awesome so don't mind bumping it at all.

 

[wildabeast49]

Isnt Coleman significantly smaller than all three of those rbs weighing in at 205 (and since he was not doing drills he should have been heavier than normal)? I dont see how they share a body type at all. That isnt to say I dont like Coleman ( I do in the right scheme) but using that as yor reasonings seems flawed.

 

[ZWK]

Football Outsiders and College Football Focus have both published their WR prospect rankings. They produce two of the four stats-based prospect rankings that I pay attention to (along with wdcrob's and my own), and have caused me to make some updates to the order that I'd draft WR prospects in.

Some of the more notable players: They both have Amari Cooper as the clear #1 (as do my numbers) and put Nelson Agholor in the top 5 (my numbers have him 10th). They are both pretty high on Jaelen Strong (8th & 4th), and to a lesser extent on Tyler Lockett, Devin Smith, and DeAndre Smelter. The most striking difference is on White & Parker. Football Outsiders are major outliers on White & Parker: they rate both of them as below average prospects, in part because their formula penalizes prospects who stayed in college after they were NFL draft eligible (they also don't pro-rate stats at all, so Parker is treated as if he had 43/855/5 in 13 games rather than in 6 games). CFF has them at 2 & 3, with Parker ahead of White (as do I).

Taking their numbers into account (as well as other recent buzz), I'm inclined adjust my rankings from a month ago to add a mini tier break among WRs after Cooper, move Agholor up (probably ahead of Lockett), and put Smelter on of my list of sleepers (probably ahead of Austin Hill & John Harris, who didn't get combine invites).

On methodology:

Football Outsiders' WR ratings, which they call Playmaker Score, come from a formula which is based on a regression of analysis of historical data. For WRs drafted since 1996, they found which variables (out of the ones that they have access to) predicted NFL success, and with what weights. This is a lot more rigorous than my approach, which is a clear advantage - they are systematically testing their guesses about which variables matter using historical data, and throwing out the variables that haven't been predictive. On the other hand, their approach has the disadvantage of forcing them to leave out any variable which we don't have 20 years of data on, so they can't include numbers like yards per target and drop rate (which I do include). There is also a risk of overfitting - when there are several similar variables that they could include, they choose the one which has historically been most predictive, whereas my approach is to include all of them averaged together somehow. For most players, it won't matter much difference (e.g. TDs per team passing attempt and percent of team's passing TDs are highly correlated), but for a few players it can make a big difference. (I think that this is basically what happened with their decision to not pro-rate data: the small sample of players who played a partial season have happened to do badly in the NFL, so the formula is more predictive of historical NFL success if you don't pro-rate.)

College Football Focus mostly bases their rankings on 2014 performance. They are most known for what they call "grades", which they create by watching every play for every game of every player, marking each play down as "good" "bad" or "neutral" according to some consistent standard which they don't publicize, and then counting up a player's total number of "good" plays and subtracting the number of "bad" plays. (They also count some plays as doubly or triply good/bad, and recenter their numbers to average 0). Their grades reward consistency and avoid rewarding players too much for easy/fluky plays which can inflate their standard stats, but I believe that they don't correct all that much for differences due to things like strength of schedule or scheme. CFF also track a bunch of other stats - yards per route run and drop rate are great stats to know (although unfortunately they don't share them for every player). Their prospect rankings seem to be based on their (stats-informed) opinions, rather than being calculated directly from their stats, and I don't know how much weight they gave to things like size, speed, and age.

The WR numbers that I've put together are still in this spreadsheet, and I've added color-coding (green=good, red=bad, whiter=averager) to make it easier to see at a glance.

 

[ptsteelers]

ZWK, that is sweet. Are you going to color code your RB's as well?