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Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - msqueri - 10-06-2024

1. That was awful. Yesterday should have been a winnable game in which we at least belonged on the field but instead it was a hopeless and boring game, yet another in a string of Saturdays on the Farm being the least fun place to watch football in America. We all know the ample legitimate excuses for why this rebuild is on a glacial pace but that doesn't make it any less disappointing when we get run out of our own building by an ok team. Losing by 24 to Virginia Tech is the worst anybody, including Marshall and Old Dominion, have done against the Hokies. I had hoped we were beyond the worst results of last year (USC, Sacramento State, UCLA, Oregon State) but yesterday showed we still have a very low floor. We all want to believe in the rebuild but the last two weeks have not been encouraging. We are scuffling right now. Our games this season have been befitting the #97, #54, #28, #107, and #162 teams in the nation, and all of that amounts to Sagarin currently having us as the #94 team. Considering all that returned for Stanford from last year's team and that there is scant reason to think recruiting or transfers will transform the roster anytime soon, we need to see much more from this team the rest of the way to have confidence this staff is on the right track.

2. As Taylor said after the game, we got outplayed in all three phases and each part of our team had a role in this not being a good game. If we're keeping track, though, this kept the streak going of the defense doing better than the offense, which has been the case in each FBS game this season. On offense we had one point per non-garbage drive, making the #51 points per drive defense look like the #6 points per drive defense while on defense we gave up 3.5 points per non-garbage drive, making the #49 points per drive offense look like the #12 points per drive offense. Similarly, this was the worst any offense has done against the Hokies on a yards per play basis, almost a yard per play worse than Marshall and over 1.5 yards per play worse than Old Dominion, Vanderbilt, and Rutgers. The defense also struggled but at least did better on a yards per play basis than Vanderbilt and it was the second best yards per play defense we've had against an FBS opponent (though that shouldn't impress given Virginia Tech having the worst offense we've faced outside Cal Poly).

3. In the search for some silver lining, the defense appears to have a coherent theory of the case and positive year-to-year trajectory while it's obvious the offense is trying to scratch and claw in the daunting face of possibly the worst QB room in Power Four football. Despite all the frustrations, one can still see the faint outlines of Taylor's theory for how this eventually turns around. In the meantime, we remain a very lightly penalized team and there is still no reason to doubt the team's grit. In the vein of Taylor trying to make lemonade out of lemons, something I was not necessarily expecting is that we are 17th in the nation in time of possession. My hypothesis is Taylor knows we still suck and is shortening the game compared to what he normally tries to do on offense. We only had 66 plays yesterday and haven't had more than 73 in a game yet this season. Last season we averaged 69.83 plays per game and this year it is 68.4. As a reminder, those are both closer to Shaw's Stanford career median of 66 than to Taylor teams at Sacramento State, which averaged 73.9 plays per game and had a median of 76.5 (though clock rules play some role in this too). I think the bottom line is this is still not Taylor's offense. Hard to have Taylor's offense without a quarterback.

4. Want to know how pathetic our passing offense has been this season? Yesterday was our best passer rating and yards per attempt against an FBS opponent this season (though the volume was down because we don't trust Lamson to throw as much as Daniels). We did better than Old Dominion and Marshall chucking the pigskin, but that's a very low bar. And before we try to look at the run game as much of a silver lining, consider that we had the lowest yards per carry we've had this season and the worst anybody other than Rutgers has done against Virginia Tech. The sobering reality is that we have yet to face a top 80 yards per carry run defense (Hokies the best yet at #85) and are about to face massively tougher challenges for our run game. It would have been nice to continue to build confidence against the weak run defenses we've been facing but we came up short. If I had to spin a bad afternoon on The Farm, though, our run game might be one of the places to do it on the grounds it was a relatively tougher run defense challenge, we were doing it without Daniels, we were confident enough in backs to give them marginally more run than Lamson (21 carries to 19), and all backs had 4.3+ yards per carry. This wasn't a disaster, unlike a lot of other things yesterday. I think we can tell ourselves the run game is making progress. Next week will be a test and the following week against SMU will probably make our run game look hapless, but on a super crappy offense the run game is the less crappy part.

5. If run game vs. pass game on offense is Land of the Blind Where The One-Eyed Man Is King, run game vs. pass game on defense may genuinely be in the Land of Silver Linings. Bobby April's defense kept the streak going of doing well relative to opponent quality in run defense. We did over a yard per carry better than the Hokie average and the best anybody other than Vanderbilt has done, with Vandy being the only other opponent that also kept that good back with the name worthy of Star Wars or Dune from breaking 100 yards. Evidence continues to mount that we have a legit run defense, now 26th on a yards per carry basis. Unfortunately for our competitiveness in this game, the pass defense fell apart and had a very bad outing in a game that should have been an opportunity to build some confidence after a string of tough QBs. Yesterday was the worst we've done in passer rating rating or yards per attempt against any QB, and Drones is not the passer Hoover, McCord, and Klubnik are, as evidenced by that being far and away the best he's done this year in most respects (he had more total yardage against Vandy but last night was more efficient). Hey, at least it wasn't a career day for Drones.

6. The least original yet most true thing I can say is that we don't have a QB and that is killing the team. Yesterday threw cold water all over anybody (I'd include myself here) hoping that a good offseason made Lamson a different QB. He was 86th of 95 QBs nationally in Total QBR this week, a middling result by his career standards. He's had six games in which we've relied on him at QB (20+ action snaps) and this game, as horrible as it was (see 86th of 95), was the third best of his six (he was 56th of 132 against Arizona, 87th of 112 against Oregon, 125th of 132 against USC, 126th of 130 against Oregon State, and 120th of 124 against Sacramento State). We know who Lamson is and it's not FBS-level and not even close to Power Four level. Most alarming to me is that the two best games he's played were both in September of last year, so yesterday is unfortunately more evidence to add to Daniels' body of work that our QBs are not improving under Taylor's tutelage. This may be the biggest red flag about Taylor. There is no reason supposedly smart, hard-working QBs with a year and a half of coaching by this staff and among the most returning production of any offense in the nation and facing a decent but not fearsome schedule should not be improving. Maybe Brown comes back in a few weeks and things look totally different to reward Taylor's patience, but we have reasons for real concern this room is on the right track. By the way, a minor thing that has been haunting me every Sunday morning watching the post-game press conferences: it strikes me as cruel that Taylor is having Daniels and Lamson be the spokespeople for the team when their play is plainly the biggest thing holding the team back. The Daniels' press conferences have been tough but highly composed but the Lamson one yesterday was tough to watch, to no fault of him on the short list of most heartbreaking and pitiful Stanford athlete interviews of all time. Is Taylor trying to send a message that the QB leads the team through thick and thin? Cruelly holding them accountable for poor performance? Literally not having it occur to him that there are leaders on a team other than the QB? We have players playing well this season - specifically, Wright, Sinclair, Bernadel, and Ford (though obviously Ford couldn't/shouldn't have come out yesterday post-injury) - why not have them address the media?

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - msqueri - 10-06-2024

7. Speaking of Ford, I love that guy and am so sad/irritated he got potentially seriously hurt at the end of garbage time yesterday. Taylor addressed this head-on in the press conference and made a case that we are at the stage of the rebuild where we have to fight whistle to whistle. I can buy that but it's frustrating and Taylor owns the results. I don't blame Taylor for Ford's injury but Taylor is rightfully fair game for criticism and in any case is going to have to live with the usage decisions he makes, like he has had to with the QB injuries. I fully get the point about sending a message to the team of battling to the finish but I think it is certainly a missed opportunity to have seven minutes and 28 seconds of garbage time, two full offensive drives, and not get any action for Myles Jackson, Ryan Butler (hurt?), or Jackson Harris (what is going on?). I would not pull the starting line or indeed most of the starters for garbage time, but odd to not at least pull Lamson. As some of us said before the game, not playing Jackson in such a situation likely indicates Jackson is dead to Taylor and will never be a factor. In terms of offensive player performance, it again sucks that our offensive MVP got hurt, potentially very seriously. Still waiting on the advent of the Mosley era to unlock the passing game and it is hard to overstate how disappointing Ayomanor has been, with this probably his most disappointing game yet in terms of drops and body language. I hope he turns it around to leave a much better taste in his/our mouths for his probable. last season of college football (I don't buy transfer speculation since as a Canadian he's mostly screwed out of NIL money and I don't buy that the NFL will be fooled by this season such that they shy away from drafting him in the first several rounds) [Moving the chains (first down) leader board: Ford (5), Lamson (5), Ayomanor (2), Mosley (2), Roush (2), Cisse, Davis] On the offensive line, props to House for getting better every week (I am starting to join our coaches in great excitement for what the future holds), Pale for being probably our best lineman in general with Rogers out and McLaughlin benched, and Leyrer for playing ok when Rogers got hurt and Maikkula had to slide inside. Still not buying McLaughlin being benched for Baklenko is good for the team but the more the season goes on at this level of play the more rationale there is for a developmental approach playing for the future. But the big story is the possibility Rogers' career is over. Really hope not. If so, we have transitioned fully to a super young line playing for the future.

8. The defense didn't have as many players step up as we've seen in other games this year. I count seven players with multiple successful box score plays (Sinclair, Tafiti, Bernadel, Wright, Edwards, Leigber, Rowell), and a chunk of those were in garbage time. Defense-wide, only one sack and four tackles for loss is disappointing against an offense that gives up over two sacks and 6.5 tackles for loss per game, not to mention that it's never ideal when you don't get a turnover. There were a few who stepped up big time though. I'd be remiss not to start in recognizing easily a career game for Tafiti. He filled up the stat sheet like crazy with tackles for loss, a sack, and a forced fumble, plus the sack forced a punt (though it looked like Staples - emerging as a very helpful situational pass rusher - was the key on that play. We have never seen anything like this in Tafiti's career and if this is a sign of things to come it's big. And yet he arguably was outshined (or at least equally shined) by linebacker play, where I view Sinclair and Bernadel as they key to the run defense and competing with Wright for this season's team MVP. Sinclair's sheer number of successful plays was brobdingnagian (wonder how many Stanford players have had more in the last half decade), nine that I count (albeit three in garbage time). Sinclair almost had a spectacular pass breakup on the biggest play of the game, the 55 yard touchdown that made it 21-0 instead of Stanford having the ball down two scores with almost the entire second half remaining, but alas Sinclair's finger tips were just out of reach and we were burned by the misfortune of having Edwards and Leigber as our safeties. Bernadel's game was better than the box score thought as it should have credited him rather than Bryce Farrell with a half tackle for loss, to go with several run defenses. Wright tackled well and had a big pass breakup but did not have his best game, definitely some plays that hurt (first touchdown was his man plus he cost us four points in garbage time on the running into the kicker. Bailey's snaps have declined every game this season and his seven snaps yesterday and is effectively not playing, his lowest total outside of the one snap Washington game. It makes me sad but also frustrated to see how much worse Edwards is playing than last year. Safeties are a liability and I didn't feel going into the season that they necessarily had to be.
9. Not my favorite Flintoft game to be honest, with net punts of 32 yards to the 12 (shows up as inside the 20 but slightly disappointing), 41 yards to the 18 (shows up inside the 20 but I'd call this straight up bad, especially as 10 yards there could have stung if it made the difference on a half-end field goal), 48 to the 22 when accounting for the block in the back penalty (can't complain about the net and it was a weird play with the big return called back for penalty, kind of hard to judge), and 40 to the 40 (big meh). He's an asset but I'm hoping in future years for more booming punts and hang time. Feel like we have a very competent punter rather than a weapon. Kenney missed his only attempt, a 53 yarder, which is not a gimme but we can probably cool it with the Karty comparisons now. What stuck in my craw from that miss was less the miss itself and more the play before of Lamson taking the sack on the first drive when it was already a substantial field goal. Can't do that, bad moment that probably cost us three points to start the game. Bachmeier's 28 yard kick return, which turned out even better with the personal foul on Virginia Tech, and 29 yard kick return were only his second and third of the season and were helpful. If he can do that consistently it would be an asset. He also had a good punt return called back for a block in the back, though of course the block in the back may have been why it was a good punt return. Given how putrid Bachmeier has been as a receiver, including in this game, it feels weird to award a game ball, but my process is my process and he stood out on special teams.

10. Game balls: Micah Ford, Tristan Sinclair, Tiger Bachmeier, Mark D'Onofrio
11. I never had any hope we would win at Notre Dame next week so am not necessarily more pessimistic heading into that game than I would have otherwise been, but these two weeks feel a bit like using up our mulligans. I am going to really be questioning the state of the rebuild if we continue to scuffle, which in terms of the scoreboard would be losing by 3+ scores. Optimism we know what we're doing should take another hit if this is as uncompetitive as Clemson and Virginia Tech were. That being said, Notre Dame and SMU back-to-back is by far the hardest two week stretch of our season, among the hardest any team in the nation faces outside of the SEC this year, so if we can get a bit more healthy without being competitive the next two weeks I will still be curious to see what we can do in any easier stretch run, especially as we may have a new more hopeful QB by then.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - martyup - 10-06-2024

I'm worried that our team will be so frustrated that they give up on Taylor.  When that happens, players start playing for themselves rather than the team.  IMO, such attitudes in players is what has kept USC from winning more games over the years.  It also sends talented players running for the transfer portal.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - CardinalSagehen - 10-06-2024

As always, great notes.

Regarding #7, the Ford injury was a gut punch, but our best players (especially freshmen) need more practice, more experience completing drives, and more confidence. Ford carried the ball 11 times yesterday, which is not a lot. I have no problem with anyone and everyone being on the field until the bitter end.

As for Ford, I was starting to think of him as our most promising offensive player and one of the cornerstones of our future success. The injury looks terrible -- I will be surprised if it's not season-ending.  We can hope for an ankle sprain, but from my perspective, it seemed much worse and more like an Achilles tendon or a lower-leg bone fracture. The timing is particularly terrible because he could have redshirted before this game.

By contrast, while I didn't see what happened to Rogers from the stands, I did see him walking off the field to the locker room. He was walking a little slowly but not with any massive limp. Maybe others saw or know more than I do. It bums me out when guys get injured on their last play, such as Trenton Irwin, Bryce Love, or Mike Mitchell. But from a football standpoint, I'm much less concerned that Rogers played his last down for the Cardinal than that Ford may have experienced a major career-limiting injury. 

Regarding #6, our QB plight, I think it's important to remember that nobody ever expected these two guys to be good P4 QBs.  Daniels and Lamson were both mid 3* QBs with even weaker recruiting profiles on 247 than the much-maligned Ari Patu. TT has not been able to coach them up, but I don't consider this to be damning because most guys, through no fault of their own, simply don't have the juice to be successful at this very high level. Also note that Elijah Brown (92 rating, 11th best QB in 2023) and Bear Bachmeier (90 rating, 20th best in 2024) are much better regarded than any other QBs on our current roster. 

If we really want to win, Lifetime Cardinal needs to set aside some major dollars to retain Elijah and (to a much lesser degree, in my opinion) Bear and/or lure an attractive QB from the portal.  I'm super interested in seeing Elijah for at least the last three games so that we know what we've got and can make the right off-season decisions.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - needle - 10-06-2024

Stanford was never going to be competitive against Va. Tech w/Lamson at QB, so don't get too pessimistic over this one game.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - msqueri - 10-06-2024

I think all of us watching have an intuitive sense that QB is what is most holding this team back and that with competent QB play things would look a lot different. I think it's pretty much impossible to quantify this or to have too developed of a sense of what we're missing and what the team's ceiling could be with good QB play, and your guesses are as good as mine. But because it's the topic du mois, I thought it might be interesting to ruminate on it a bit.



I don't know how to isolate non-QB play from QB play in assessing teams and establishing salient comparisons. For now I'll just look at PFF and see if I can observe anything interesting based on teams that grade somewhat similarly to us aside from the problems with QB. I will start with the 20 Power Four teams with PFF grades most similar to ours on defense: BYU, Iowa State, Rutgers, Colorado, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Pitt, UCF, Georgia, Utah, Cal, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, NC State, Clemson, Wisconsin, TCU, Cincinnati, USC, Arizona State. [Funny who our two twins in defensive PFF grading are.....Cal and Virginia Tech] Then the next most important cut for the field I can think of is to try to find reasonably comparable teams in terms of offensive line play. I will remove Wisconsin, Georgia, BYU, Clemson, Arizona State, and Clemson on the grounds they are far too good at pass blocking to be comparable to us, and then remove Rutgers, Iowa State, Cal, Kentucky, and USC on the converse grounds that they are so much worse than us at pass blocking as to not be comparable. This is where the comparison breaks down, as among the remaining teams none grade as poorly as we do in run blocking. But there are four that grade poorly in run blocking so I will view as our most comparable teams: Pitt, Virginia Tech, Colorado, and TCU. How interesting that among the dozens of power teams the four most comparable to us include two teams we've played in our first four power conference games of the season and that in both of those games the difference between our QB and theirs was an obvious differentiator.



For what it's worth, in the grades I did not use to winnow the field, we rank near the bottom among this cohort (Stanford, Pitt, Virginia Tech, Colorado, and TCU) in both receiving and running grades, so it's probably too facile to say that any difference between these teams is solely due to the QB play. Nonetheless, I'd make the case these might be as close as we can get to five comparables for us to compare/isolate the QB variable. [If ignoring receiving and running grades undermines my analysis at all, one factor that cuts in the opposite direction is we have the top special teams grade among this cohort.....I think it's fair to focus on QB as a much differentiator between these teams.]



So, without further ado, here is how Stanford and our most comparable peers rank in Sagarin the Total QBR ranking of QB1 listed parenthetically:



29) Colorado (44)

35) Virginia Tech (55)

36) Pitt (56)

57) TCU (20)

94) Stanford (120)



TCU kind of having a weird season and got nuked in algorithms, understandably, after the massive egg they laid Friday night. But by and large this tells a story - get a thoroughly mediocre QB like Kyron Drones or Eli Holstein and Stanford could maybe be a top 40 team. Considering the caveats I mentioned above about receiving and running grades and that our run blocking grade is lower than these other four, perhaps something like a top 65-70 team is the right expectation/adjustment for a hypothetical 2024 Stanford With a QB.



How hard is it to have a Drones/Holstein-like QB? The four Stanford QBs in this most mediocre of ranges historically have been 2005 Trent Edwards, 2008 Tavita Pritchard, 2012 Josh Nunes, and 2021 Tanner McKee. Just think, put Pritchard or Nunes on this team and it's respectable. I guess that's encouraging. It really should not be hard for Taylor to get Brown or Bachmeier to be that level of QB. If they're better, maybe one day we can actually be good. So much depends on being able to break through our QB crap of 2022 McKee, 2023 Daniels, and 2024 Daniels/Lamson. Our kingdom for a mediocre QB.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - CardinalSagehen - 10-06-2024

(10-06-2024, 01:31 PM)needle Wrote:  Stanford was never going to be competitive against Va. Tech w/Lamson at QB, so don't get too pessimistic over this one game.

I would agree, except that Daniels has not been much better, if at all. He certainly has a stronger arm and a higher ceiling (theoretically), but the results on the field have not been there. The explosive plays have not been there. The big off-schedule plays and completions to non-primary receivers have not been there. The whole QB position is the problem right now, as msqueri's post underscores.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - Goose - 10-06-2024

As always a thought-provoking analysis. I agree with the vast majority of it. A few thoughts/questions below.

Quote:3. My hypothesis is Taylor knows we still suck and is shortening the game compared to what he normally tries to do on offense. We only had 66 plays yesterday and haven't had more than 73 in a game yet this season. Last season we averaged 69.83 plays per game and this year it is 68.4. As a reminder, those are both closer to Shaw's Stanford career median of 66 than to Taylor teams at Sacramento State, which averaged 73.9 plays per game and had a median of 76.5 (though clock rules play some role in this too). I think the bottom line is this is still not Taylor's offense. Hard to have Taylor's offense without a quarterback.
I had notice it too. Yesterday both teams were playing "slow", but TT seems perfectly fine with doing that this entire year. It is almost "Shaw like". I wonder if TT actually has a "preferred style of play", or in so far as he does he is professional enough and skilled enough to adapt his strategy and focus to the players he has? At Sac State it was one thing because he had the players to do that thing. At Stanford it has been of necessity another thing. I actually hope TT is fine being a "jack of all offenses" because IMO for the foreseeable future Stanford is gong to need "flexibility". We aren't going to be able to recruit/attract exactly the players we want. Adapting to get the best players possible and using them optimally even if they don't "fit the mold" is going to be a necessity. Thoughts?
Quote:4. I think we can tell ourselves the run game is making progress. Next week will be a test and the following week against SMU will probably make our run game look hapless, but on a super crappy offense the run game is the less crappy part.
Agree, especially the "less crappy" part. I am somewhat less sure how much we improved over last year, but at least this year we are actually running the ball as if we expect it to work. Last year we basically gave up on it. That in and of itself is "better". We will see what happens against a "good" run defense. We will know much more about how far we are away in the run game after a couple of weeks.
Quote:6.There is no reason supposedly smart, hard-working QBs with a year and a half of coaching by this staff and among the most returning production of any offense in the nation and facing a decent but not fearsome schedule should not be improving.
FWIW the same argument could be made about Jack West or Fred Buckley. IMO coaching of QBs is somewhat overrated. There are some things you can teach, but accuracy and decision making under pressure don't seem to be among them. Also, getting the most out of what you have may not be nearly enough if you don't have much. I can't blame TT for the lack of improvement. There are plenty of college QBs that spend their entire career attempting to learn field vision and never do. The "trick" is to find the recruits that have the essentials that can't be taught. Then coach them up on what can. Maybe Brown is is one of the guys that "has it". We all hope so.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - Goose - 10-09-2024

(10-06-2024, 02:23 PM)msqueri Wrote:  I think all of us watching have an intuitive sense that QB is what is most holding this team back and that with competent QB play things would look a lot different. I think it's pretty much impossible to quantify this or to have too developed of a sense of what we're missing and what the team's ceiling could be with good QB play, and your guesses are as good as mine. But because it's the topic du mois, I thought it might be interesting to ruminate on it a bit.

I don't know how to isolate non-QB play from QB play in assessing teams and establishing salient comparisons. For now I'll just look at PFF and see if I can observe anything interesting based on teams that grade somewhat similarly to us aside from the problems with QB.
Kudos to you for attempting to quantify what effect an upgrade to "average" in our QB play might have. I totally agree that nobody knows how to deconvolve QB performance from total team performance.  PFF attempts to do that but like all deconvolutions it is at best a noisy and often unstable process.

Quote:<snip>
But by and large this tells a story - get a thoroughly mediocre QB like Kyron Drones or Eli Holstein and Stanford could maybe be a top 40 team. Considering the caveats I mentioned above about receiving and running grades and that our run blocking grade is lower than these other four, perhaps something like a top 65-70 team is the right expectation/adjustment for a hypothetical 2024 Stanford With a QB.
I like your approach and analysis. In the main I like both the theory and the "feel" of the result. However I would change the phraseology a bit. IMO the hypothetical new Stanford QB would need to achieve an "average" PFF to have the expected outcome. The concept of an "average QB" (and "average" PFF) is not an inherent attribute of the QB. It is an attribute of that QB playing on a particular team at a particular time. This relates to the caveats you referred to above as well as (IMO) a lot of other considerations. Ideally, PFF could account for all those factors, but empirically it doesn't.

Quote:How hard is it to have a Drones/Holstein-like QB? The four Stanford QBs in this most mediocre of ranges historically have been 2005 Trent Edwards, 2008 Tavita Pritchard, 2012 Josh Nunes, and 2021 Tanner McKee. Just think, put Pritchard or Nunes on this team and it's respectable. I guess that's encouraging. It really should not be hard for Taylor to get Brown or Bachmeier to be that level of QB. If they're better, maybe one day we can actually be good. So much depends on being able to break through our QB crap of 2022 McKee, 2023 Daniels, and 2024 Daniels/Lamson. Our kingdom for a mediocre QB.
Interesting examples and IMO quite enlightening. We do have some subsequent data on these QBs. Trent Edwards was drafted in the 3rd round. He played in the NFL and started a few games as the #1 QB. He played 5 years in the NFL, mostly as a back-up. His career at Stanford was marred by injuries that limited his play, but he was still "good enough" to get drafted and play in the NFL.

You regard McKee as average in 2021 and as crap in 2022. Indeed McKee's PFF was much worse in 2022 than 2021. The PFF in 2022 dropped even more alarmingly near the end of the season. So which is it? Did McKee radically change in 2022, or did his circumstances? Arguably it was both, but IMO https://firstroundmock.com/2023/01/draft-stock-of-qb-tanner-mckee-gets-sacked/ describes the situation. Both Jones and Peat, who helped take some of the pressure off McKee, were gone in 2022. Their unforced departure was notable at the time. Stanford consequently had no running game. They adopted the crazy Slow-Mesh RPO that never worked. McKee got beat up. At best he isn't all that mobile. Absent any alternative strategy available for Stanford  the defense came after McKee and his sack rate skyrocketed. On top of that, the second bad year in a row coupled with somewhat acrimonious departures had really depressed team chemistry. Nobody was happy. I think this argues heavily that the drop in PFF wasn't driven by McKee but rather by the team's other "issues". PFF couldn't separate the two. Despite his drop in draft stock McKee was drafted by the Eagles in the 6th round and is in his second year of the NFL. He is yet to play in a game but seems well established with the Eagles.

The NFL doesn't draft "average" college QBs and certainly doesn't keep such players around, even if they get a look as a UDFA. These two QBs were clearly much better than average no matter what their PFF in college may say. Drones/Holstein are not going to have that opportunity. It also shows that even having an "above average" QB will not inevitably yield a "respectable" team if 0.500 is defined as respectable. McKee won 3 games twice. Edwards won 5 games one year and was hurt a lot. The exact "fit" between the QB's skills (whatever they may be), his teammate's skills, and the coach's use of these skills matters. Stanford has had a some skilled QBs that have overall losing records. Elway was 20-23, not even 0.500.

FWIW I do agree that Pritchard was overall an "average" QB. Stanford won 4 games in 2007 and 5 in 2008. Nunes is harder to classify. He played 9 games in 2012. Hard to conclude much about him with that sample size. It was an unusual situation.

So, what would happen with Pritchard on the current team? Pritchard wasn't a statue but also wasn't a "running QB". He had real problems when pressured. He was unquestionably a much more accurate passer than Daniels. IMO he would be good for 2 more wins with a wide standard deviation. His contribution would be heavily dependent on how he was used in the passing game and to what extent Stanford has a running game with him at QB. Pritchard didn't have a cannon, so the "throw it up and hope" approach we sometimes see from TT with Daniels won't work. OTOH if the receiver got "open", either by separation or geometric advantage, Pritchard could put the ball where it needed to be. Keeping him upright would be the issue.

One big intangible is team morale. Once a team decides it isn't good and won't get better because of inherent limitations (at QB or elsewhere) it is hard to generate belief and enthusiasm. OTOH if the team thinks it can "succeed" it can play "over its head" sometimes. Pritchard definitely provided that, at least for awhile. Let's see what Brown can do and how it all fits together. The whole may be greater than the sum of the parts if we are fortunate.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - old spanish trail - 10-09-2024

And, Edwards would have been much better if he'd had anything approaching an OL. He had no time to get a pass off, and eventually suffered a bad leg injury.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - msqueri - 10-10-2024

Even after getting brutalized year after year in college (far beyond what any other QB aside from contemporary Ostrander ever experienced) and becoming so shell-shocked that he infamously became Captain Checkdown with the Bills, based on Weighted Career Approximate Value Edwards is tied with Dils as the fifth best NFL QB in Stanford history (behind only Elway, Brodie, Plunkett, and Luck, though Mills looks assured of passing Edwards). I think it is possible that if Edwards had been born six or ten years earlier or later we could have talked about him among our Mount Rushmore of quarterbacks. People misunderstand my grouping of Edwards, Pritchard, Nunes, and McKee if you think I was comparing their inherent quality as QBs. I was comparing the quality of their play, specifically 2005 Edwards, 2008 Pritchard, 2012 Nunes, and 2021 McKee, for which we have a quite good/insightful/comprehensive external metric for evaluating QB performance over time. I am fully cognizant that the three of these QBs who played multiple years had other years of different quality QB play (in all three cases considerably worse) and I agree that supporting cast and other circumstances played a role in that. The point of this exercise was to get a window into the level of QB play needed/reasonably expected/etc. Anyway, lots of smart comments I agree with, just didn’t want to leave the impression I think Edwards = Nunes or something.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - BostonCard - 10-10-2024

I think the point others are making is that the evaluations of all those quarterbacks as having had similar seasons shows the limitations of PFF in being able to isolate QB play from everything else.  Stick 2005 Trent Edwards into the 2012 team and he has a season comparable or better than 2012 Hogan.  Stick 2021's McKee into the 2008 team and his season looks a lot better than Pritchard's.

What PFF purports to do is impossible.  No amount of trying to evaluate the individual contribution of each player to a play can fully account for the fact that no player can truly be evaluated in a vacuum.  So, you have to take PFF's ratings with a little bit of a grain of salt.

Now, that's not to say that PFF ratings aren't useful, and that they aren't better than raw stats.  I think they provide a valuable service, and that they have the right idea.  The fact that you can't perfectly isolate an individual player doesn't mean that doing your best to separate individual contributions isn't worth trying.  I just wouldn't go so far as saying that, adjusted for the quality of team around them, the 2005 Edwards season, 2008 Pritchard season, 2012 Nunes season and 2021 McKee seasons are indicative of average QB play, or that inserting each of those QBs into the current team would produce an equivalent outcome.  I think Edwards and McKee, given the rest of today's teams, would produce much better QB season than Daniels; Pritchard would probably be a little bit better, and I am not convinced that if you put Nunes in there the results at the position would be any better (and given his lack of mobility, are maybe worse).

BC

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - old spanish trail - 10-10-2024

(10-10-2024, 05:15 AM)msqueri Wrote:  Even after getting brutalized year after year in college (far beyond what any other QB aside from contemporary Ostrander ever experienced) and becoming so shell-shocked that he infamously became Captain Checkdown with the Bills, based on Weighted Career Approximate Value Edwards is tied with Dils as the fifth best NFL QB in Stanford history (behind only Elway, Brodie, Plunkett, and Luck, though Mills looks assured of passing Edwards). I think it is possible that if Edwards had been born six or ten years earlier or later we could have talked about him among our Mount Rushmore of quarterbacks. People misunderstand my grouping of Edwards, Pritchard, Nunes, and McKee if you think I was comparing their inherent quality as QBs. I was comparing the quality of their play, specifically 2005 Edwards, 2008 Pritchard, 2012 Nunes, and 2021 McKee, for which we have a quite good/insightful/comprehensive external metric for evaluating QB performance over time. I am fully cognizant that the three of these QBs who played multiple years had other years of different quality QB play (in all three cases considerably worse) and I agree that supporting cast and other circumstances played a role in that. The point of this exercise was to get a window into the level of QB play needed/reasonably expected/etc. Anyway, lots of smart comments I agree with, just didn’t want to leave the impression I think Edwards = Nunes or something.

Righto. Really appreciate your Sunday analyses.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - Goose - 10-10-2024

(10-10-2024, 10:50 AM)BostonCard Wrote:  I think the point others are making is that the evaluations of all those quarterbacks as having had similar seasons shows the limitations of PFF in being able to isolate QB play from everything else.  Stick 2005 Trent Edwards into the 2012 team and he has a season comparable or better than 2012 Hogan.
Agree.
Quote: Stick 2021's McKee into the 2008 team and his season looks a lot better than Pritchard's.
I would agree "better", but I am not sure it would be "a lot" better. Pritchard's mobility was important in surviving. McKee doesn't have that and the pass protection wasn't good. It is a test that can't be performed so speculation is "fun" :-).

Quote:What PFF purports to do is impossible.  No amount of trying to evaluate the individual contribution of each player to a play can fully account for the fact that no player can truly be evaluated in a vacuum.  So, you have to take PFF's ratings with a little bit of a grain of salt.

Now, that's not to say that PFF ratings aren't useful, and that they aren't better than raw stats.  I think they provide a valuable service, and that they have the right idea.  The fact that you can't perfectly isolate an individual player doesn't mean that doing your best to separate individual contributions isn't worth trying.  I just wouldn't go so far as saying that, adjusted for the quality of team around them, the 2005 Edwards season, 2008 Pritchard season, 2012 Nunes season and 2021 McKee seasons are indicative of average QB play, or that inserting each of those QBs into the current team would produce an equivalent outcome.  I think Edwards and McKee, given the rest of today's teams, would produce much better QB season than Daniels; Pritchard would probably be a little bit better, and I am not convinced that if you put Nunes in there the results at the position would be any better (and given his lack of mobility, are maybe worse).

BC
Agree with almost all of this. My only quibble is that what our current team can bring to the table in terms of pass protection for a QB that doesn't run a lot is unknown. The changes in the defensive strategy by our opponents may also make a big difference. The other issue is that our receivers haven't shown a lot in terms of getting separation. That makes it much more difficult to estimate the benefit of having a more accurate passer. There are definitely completions to be had that we now do not get, and there may be even more available if TT changes the emphasis/strategy.

I am interested in what Brown can do, because that hopefully is a prospective experiment we can actually do (as opposed to counterfactual speculation :-). However, the effect of an above-average QB in the W-L column may not be as dramatic as some expect. Msqueri's examples are very nice because they demonstrate that pretty clearly. OTOH we won't know until we try. Sometimes teams "just work" when the "missing piece" arrives.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - d4cohn - 10-10-2024

(10-10-2024, 04:04 PM)Goose Wrote:   Sometimes teams "just work" when the "missing piece" arrives.

Like the 2012 team with Kevin Hogan.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - msqueri - 10-10-2024

Hard to take BC’s point seriously, to be honest, since it totally conflates Total QBR and PFF, very different things.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - Goose - 10-10-2024

(10-10-2024, 08:44 PM)msqueri Wrote:  Hard to take BC’s point seriously, to be honest, since it totally conflates Total QBR and PFF, very different things.
Could you expand on that a bit? As far as I can tell, BC didn't reference Total QBR at all in his post.

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - BostonCard - 10-10-2024

You responded to Goose whose post was predicated on PFF:

Quote:You regard McKee as average in 2021 and as crap in 2022. Indeed McKee's PFF was much worse in 2022 than 2021. The PFF in 2022 dropped even more alarmingly near the end of the season. So which is it? Did McKee radically change in 2022, or did his circumstances? Arguably it was both…

You’ve probably forgotten more about PFF than I will ever know, so if you think that the system is better than I’ve given it credit for, I would be happy to hear it. But I do think that Goose is correct here and that circumstances matter.

To wit, imagine two QBs who if you surround with equal, balanced talent (decent pass blocking, decent receivers, etc.) would score equally well (by total QBR, PFF, or whatever system you want. However, the QBs have different relative strengths. QB1 has a strong, accurate arm, but has poor pocket presence and limited mobility. QB2’s arm is weaker and less accurate, but he has good pocket presence and is good scrambling.

Now, imagine that they are on a team with a poor offensive line that doesn’t do a great job run blocking but has a great receiving corps that can create lots of separation. Under those circumstances, QB1 might struggle because they are constantly under pressure, get sacked a lot or panic and throw it away so he can’t take advantage of his team’s receiving advantage. On the other hand, QB2’s better mobility buys him time while he is under pressure, and because he is throwing to receivers who can get wide open, his poor accuracy is not the end of the world.

On the other hand, put each of those QBs on a team with a good offensive line that can keep the pocket clean, but receivers who struggle to get open. QB1 does well in this team, because his lack of mobility is not a brobdingnagian handicap, and his better accuracy means he can put the ball into tight windows, and his strong arm means that given enough time, he can throw it downfield well. On the other hand, QB2 might struggle, as his erratic arm means that he won’t be able to “throw his receivers open” and may get intercepted by well-covered receivers. His ability to scramble or pocket awareness doesn’t help him as much since his OL prevents him from being pressured all that much.

BC

RE: Sunday morning thoughts - Virginia Tech - needle - 10-11-2024

Briefly:

1.) Overall, this is an exercise in futlity, for reasons best articulated by Goose.

2.) The most interesting question is: Because Ashton Daniels is the same person as in 2023, and because his play (so far) has been worse than 2023, is that an indictment on TT?

3.) PFF ranks Patrick Mahomes 11th so far this season among all NFL QBs, which, imo, is a very fair rating given his less than sterling 1:1 ratio of TDs to interceptions. I'm going to go ahead and link this to my Question No. 2, and say: Let's wait a few more games to see where these analytical ratings end up before deciding that we know where the blame (or credit) lies for a disappointing (or pleasantly surprising) season. I believe Stanford has a real shot at pulling the upset against a ND team that has a really banged up offensive line.