Bret Bielema Says Talks To Coach Phins Broke Down In 2012 Because Of Russell Wilson

I can't believe some are trying to downgrade Wilson. I haven't read through this whole thread, but that is crazy. He has elite skills. I think I made a thread about him leading up to that draft. Try to find some footage of him at Wisconsin. The guy was amazing. He clearly had great NFL potential. He had a great, accurate long ball. He made great decisions. His movement is in that compact and more rounded and fluid type of movement rather than a Tanne type, who is more of a straight line type of runner. It's those little circular type of movements around the pocket that make Wilson great. Rodgers has similar movement skills when in the pocket. I believe there was a pretty wide consensus that he has great skills and potential. The only doubts and knocks on him were regarding his height. I actually think the height thing can be a problem, but only way down the road. I think it can possibly be a problem when you are older and you inevitably lose some of that physical speed, etc, and you have to rely on staying more in the pocket and becoming more of a pocket guy in general. I think then the height can possibly be a problem then, but that's a long time away.

 

Perhaps on a superficial level, but we're better than that in terms of our capacity for analysis of the individual player.

 

If you look at RW's passer rating vs the opponent QB's rating, the only trend I see is that when RW's passer rating is low, there is low variance in the opponent QB's passer rating, while when RW's rating is high there is greater variance (but the same mean, approx.) in opponent QB's passer rating. That's for 2014 only. Don't have the stats for previous seasons because I'm just slowly adding to the database during leisure hours.

On a side note, I think it's kind of tautological when people say passer rating is a good "predictor" of who wins the game. I mean one component of passer rating is TD's! It's like saying how well does the score predict the score haha.

 

The stats he put up this year were good enough to be the 14th ranked QB in the league.

 

More highly regarded =/= highly regarded. Nobody thinks Trent Dilfer was a good QB.

 

YPA differential is just as good, and it involves no TDs. Passing efficiency only.

 

SO many of these arguments carry along this implication that it's impossible to evaluate players directly and therefore we have to find these methods of indirectly evaluating them based on things that are subject to a billion other factors. I don't get it.

There's this assumption that Tannehill could have played EXACTLY the way he did in 2013 and 2014 but if the defense had won them 12 games in either of those years instead of 8 games then he'd be mentioned every bit as much as Russell Wilson. And I don't understand that because it would mean nobody's really capable of evaluating performance directly.

But it can be done. It's not rocket science. You don't see Alex Smith's name mentioned in the same breath as Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees and now Russell Wilson. Hell you rarely see Alex Smith's name mentioned with the likes of Joe Flacco, Tony Romo, Ben Roethlisberger, Phil Rivers, Andrew Luck, Matt Ryan, etc.

Yet he won a sh-t ton of games in San Francisco and even continued to win a bunch of games (11 in 2013 and 9 in 2014) in Kansas City.

So evidently people are capable of evaluating players directly.

 

OK, just ran that. YPA for RW vs YPA for opponent QB's in 2014. With the exception of the very best YPA games for RW, there's no trend in opponent YPA. For the very best YPA for RW, opponent QB's have slightly lower YPA, but with such a small sample, I wouldn't argue it's a real trend or not.

 

Total Yards - 11th
Completions - 5th
Completion Percentage - 5th
YPA - 28th
TDs - tied for 12th
Ints - tied for 13th
YPG - 15th

So, it's nice to say he was "14th in the league", but in several areas he was top 5. He was also better than Wilson in a bunch of those categories,

 

People seem to be "stuck" in that way when players are still relatively inexperienced, and their team environments are characterized by something outside the norm.

Where people seem to cross the line is when they appear to have achieved some certainty in thinking that a player would or wouldn't be doing X if he were in some other environment. When there is no objective support for that contention, or when the available evidence even argues against it (like when Russell Wilson plays no differently when his defense plays poorly, or when Ryan Tannehill plays no better when his defense plays well), then it just smacks of a personal bias.

 

The only one of those that is a measure of efficiency is YPA. Nobody cites passing completions as a metric that is indicative of ability.

 

It breaks down to a very simple dialogue.

Person A: Russell Wilson is awesome because he plays really well and both the film and stats show it.
Person B: But Russell Wilson wouldn't have won all these games without such a great defense.
Person A: That's great, but I didn't say Russell Wilson is awesome because he won all those games.
Person B: ....

 

Yes? No?

 

Well then there's the other version, too, where "Person B" says "Russell Wilson is awesome [individually] because of his defense."

And the converse of that is "Chad Henne would be awesome if he had a number-one receiver."

 

That's the thing. I at least understand it if someone is saying that Russell Wilson performs well because of the defense putting him into favorable situations. That leads to further discourse and debate, for example, about how well Russell Wilson performs when he's behind in the scoreboard...which would be the natural counter to that argument provided Russell Wilson actually IS good when down in the score (which he is).

What I don't understand is continuing to tilt at people (who exist?) who evidently believe Russell Wilson is elite solely because his team wins.

 

Wilson doesn't always play well. He has really bad games. His defense tends to keep him in those games. So, I guess when he has a rating below 90, but his defense and run game keep the games within one score, that is meaningless to you?

 

No, I do not agree. How many times must I write that I believe the knowing his defense is dominant allows him the freedom to play loose, while the knowledge of Tannehill's defense frequently folding causes him to play tight and forced all the time.

 

It isn't meaningless to me in terms of how the Seahawks function as a team, but it's meaningless to me in terms of how Wilson functions individually.

 

So the fact that he plays no differently individually when his defense plays poorly is meaningless to you?

 

I'm actually saying both things. I believe that Wilson performs well because of his defense and run game keeping him in favorable situations. I've showed that several times. I also believe that many people think Wilson is elite because of the wins and Super Bowl appearances.

 

And what happens in terms of his individual play when they put him in unfavorable situations? Anything different?

 

The running game surrounding Wilson isn't any better than the one that surrounds Tannehill.

 

...especially if you consider the contribution to the Seahawks' running game of Wilson himself.

 

You can keep asking me the same question, but I'm not going to answer any differently. If his defense plays poorly, and Wilson doesn't up his play, what does that say to you? Is that meaningless?

 

Oh, so Marshawn Lynch is equal to Lamar Miller?

 

The contribution of Marshawn Lynch doesn't positively affect Wilson's ability to run?

 

Umm, I'd say it's a little tougher.

 

Man can you imagine if Mike Wallace was in Seattle with Wilson?? 12-1300 yards 10+ TDs in his sleep. Just thinking out loud here. That would be a great fit.

 

I don't disagree. But winning it makes people think he's better than he actually was.

People were calling Eli elite remember? Winning does cloud judgment somewhat.

 

Games from 2014 where Seahawks defense allowed more than their average:

9/14 - 30 points - 119.1 rating
9/21 - 20 points - 99.9 rating
10/12 - 30 points - 47.6 rating
10/19 - 28 points - 110.1 rating
11/2 - 24 points - 63.9 rating
11/9 - 17 points - 53.7 rating
11/16 - 24 points - 98.2 rating

So, out of 7 games where the defense allowed more than their average, Wilson had rating below 90, and worse than his average, in 3 of them. His rating also varies wildly. To sit and act like Wilson doesn't play any worse when his defense is worse than their average isn't exactly accurate. Now, maybe I'm crazy off base in how I did this, but I'm not really a mathematician, and I know some get upset if you add ratings together and divide to average them (not sure why, though), and I get him having an 84.6 rating average in those games where his defense allows more than their average of 15.8. His average on the year was 95. That seems to indicate that his level of play decreases on average when his defense plays "poorly."

 

Should it mean anything at all if his play under those conditions is already at a level associated with winning in the NFL? Should his ability to "up his play" be infinite, moving further upward as a direct function of how his defense plays? If his defense plays extremely poorly, should his QB rating be 150?

 

Then see the post above that shows that Russell Wilson outperforms every single other "elite" quarterback when behind on the scoreboard.

Your theory is thoroughly debunked by that data.

 

I'll tell you what happens:

 

There's nothing wrong with averaging passer ratings, as long as you want the "average passer rating per game". If you want the formula of passer rating to rate QB's over a season, then I can see why some would object and ask you to calculate the rating over the season's stats.

Your list above I think goes to show the problem of using passer rating I mentioned before: because passer rating includes TD's (part of the game score), scoring less generally means you have lower passer rating AND scoring less generally means you are more likely to lose. So the relationship isn't surprising. I bet you see that for most teams.

Maybe it's better to use YPA differential because of this. I don't have "points scored" in my database yet so I can't do that for you, but maybe someone else can.

 

You seem to be operating under the assumption that this is abnormal.

That is incorrect.

Quarterbacks do not play as well from behind on the scoreboard as they do ahead on the scoreboard, generally speaking.

 

So then, does it not follow that a QB who is blessed with the most dominant defense in a game, should put up pretty good numbers with a defense that averages 15.8 points allowed per game? Further, if playing from behind is anything like the games they lost, which equates to being down a score, is that not drastically different for a QB who is trying to overcome 14-21 point deficits, all without the benefit of a dominant defense and very good run game?

You guys act like I'm trying to say that Wilson is trash. I'm not. I'm just not ready to crown him king, when it should be obvious to everyone, that having that defense makes his job a whole lot easier. And when the job is easier, you look much better. Also, Wilson's average rating is the same when behind as it was for the entire season. He doesn't seem to do anything differently. I'm not saying that's a bad thing. However, when Wilson has to overcome his "poor" defense, when they allow over their average, his rating dropped around 11 points.

 

Yes but only to a degree.

If you're willing to actually consider the data on it.

During his career Russell Wilson has scrambled 153 times for 1267 yards and 2 TDs. He has had kneeldowns/sneaks that work out to 53 times for -42 yards.

That leaves 102 actual runs in his career for a total of 657 yards and 9 TDs. Over three seasons that works out to about 34 runs for 219 yards and 3 TDs every season. Versus scrambling of 51 times for 422 yards and ~1 TD.

Essentially more than two-thirds of his running success is SCRAMBLING...which is not affected by Marshawn Lynch.

 

Strawman argument.

A running game is not wholly consisted of the primary back carrying the football. In fact many evaluators think the talent of the ball carrier takes a far backseat to the quality of the blocking and the soundness of the scheme.

 

What I'm acting like is that you're ignoring extraordinarily pertinent data regarding your suppositions which I've posted over and over again. Because you are.

The data on Russell Wilson's performance level relative to other elite quarterbacks when trailing in the score EXISTS. You don't have to sense it or imply it with some kind of vague and indirect set of logical statements. It's there. Right in front of you. I've posted it in here at least twice.

 

How many scrambles were after a play-action? That would be directly affected by Marshawn Lynch.