"Poor Throw %" and how it relates to Zach Wilson vs. the rest of the league

[Hal N of Provo]

2 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Cool, so let's just not talk about Zach Wilson the rest of the offseason, then?

Oh. Ok.  
 

…

 

Well we could talk about…

 

…

 

No
 

….

 

Uh

 

…

 

Then let me tell you about this rash I picked up in Saigon  

[docdhc]

1 minute ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Well, every other metric I've seen says Wilson played bad, also, so are we to conclude that he's secretly good based on this then? 

Instead of people complaining about what I presented, it would be helpful for folks to put in the leg work on their end and counter the point with #'s of their own.  People suggesting any metric is "useless" without providing adequate proof as to WHY its useless, or countering it with metrics of their own, doesn't advance the conversation a whole lot.  

Like I said I'm not being critical of you, I appreciate the leg work you did and am commenting on the metric you presented.  I thought that was the point of the thread.  You could use very common stats like completion percentage, QB rating, Passing yards per game to show that Wilson played badly this year.  I am not suggesting that this stat shows Wilson played well.  I'm just suggesting that this particular stat isn't useful in judging which QBs are good or bad.  

[UntouchableCrew]

The fact that Jimmy Garapolo is 2nd in this category casts a shadow over the whole thing... And Aaron Rodgers, who never turns the ball over, is 20th?

Like, does anyone believe that is true? Not even a defense of Zach it's just... Suspect.

 

[Augustiniak]

15 minutes ago, JoJoTownsell1 said:

Taylor Heinecke 16.4 pct

Jacoby Brissett 16.5pct

Tom Brady 19pct. 

Just let that sink in before using these stats as anything remotely helpful. 

 

The best proof that wilson improved is with the eye test, not these random stats.

[Warfish]

1 minute ago, UntouchableCrew said:

The fact that Jimmy Garapolo is 2nd in this category casts a shadow over the whole thing... And Aaron Rodgers, who never turns the ball over, is 20th?

Like, does anyone believe that is true? Not even a defense of Zach it's just... Suspect.

 

I'm always a bit wary of what I think are subjective stats.

The one I always wonder about it "Possible Interceptions" and "Possible Touchdowns".  

I do tend to prefer the more firm stats that lack subjectivity.  With that said, sometimes the "advanced" stats, even semi-subjective ones, can be informative.  Certainly as much as things like PFF position and unit rankings and the like.

[SomebodytoAnybody47]

I found another fun chart/stat/whatever the f you want to call it:

Shows which QBs have the most support around them. Zach, obviously, low on the support list. 

 

[UntouchableCrew]

3 minutes ago, Warfish said:

I'm always a bit wary of what I think are subjective stats.

The one I always wonder about it "Possible Interceptions" and "Possible Touchdowns".  

I do tend to prefer the more firm stats that lack subjectivity.  With that said, sometimes the "advanced" stats, even semi-subjective ones, can be informative.  Certainly as much as things like PFF position and unit rankings and the like.

I agree. I like the idea of trying to have stats that better represent play vs. hard stats that can be misleading at least hard stats are, you know, facts.

[Sperm Edwards]

1 hour ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Much has been made of Wilson's weapons, or lack thereof, when analyzing his improved play over Weeks 12-18 compared to Weeks 1-7.  So, piggybacking off of @Warfish's thread, I felt this deserved one of its own.  

Here's a fairly good metric that isolates out the WR aspect of the equation:  Poor throws and poor throw %.

According to pro-football-reference, Wilson had 87 total "Poor Throws" on the season on 383 attempts, or 23.8 % of his throws:  https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/W/WilsZa00/gamelog/2021/advanced/

In Weeks 1-7, he had 46 bad throws on 181 attempts, or 25.4 %.

In Weeks 12-18, he had 41 bad throws on 202 attempts, or 20.3 %.

So he did improve in this category.  But where do those numbers compare to the rest of the league?  Unfortunately, the site doesn't provide the rankings, so I had to look up all the QB's in the league with 6+ starts this season to find this information.  These are the rankings:

1. Joe Burrow:  10.7 %
2. Jimmy Garoppolo:  12.9 %
3. Jalen Hurts:  14.0 %
4. Kyler Murray:  14.1 %
5. Matt Ryan:  14.5 %
6. Justin Herbert:  14.6 %
7. Dak Prescott:  14.7 %
8. Derek Carr:  15.5 %
9. Ryan Tannehill:  15.9 %
10. Tua Tagovailoa:  16.3 %
11. Taylor Heinicke:  16.4 %
12. Jared Goff:  16.5 %
13. Jacoby Brissett:  16.5 %
14. Teddy Bridgewater:  16.7 %
15. Kirk Cousins:  17.1 %
16. Andy Dalton:  17.2 %
17. Josh Allen:  17.4 %
18. Davis Mills:  17.4 %
19. Mac Jones:  17.7 %
20. Aaron Rodgers:  18.2 %
21. Ben Roethlisberger:  18.4 %
22. Daniel Jones:  18.4 %
23. Sam Darnold:  18.5 %
24. Matthew Stafford:  18.6 %
25. Russell Wilson:  18.6 %
26. Pat Mahomes:  18.8 %
27. Carson Wentz:  18.8 %
28. Tom Brady:  19.0 %
29. Lamar Jackson:  19.7 %
30. Zach Wilson (Weeks 12-18 only):  20.3 %
31. Trevor Lawrence:  20.5 %
32. Baker Mayfield:  20.9 %
33. Jameis Winston:  21.7 %
34. Justin Fields:  21.9 %
35. Tyrod Taylor:  22.1 %
36. Zach Wilson (overall):  23.8 %
37. Zach Wilson (Weeks 1-7 only):  25.4 %

 

Certainly, some will look at the above list and notice some pretty bad QB's towards the top of the list, and some better ones towards the bottom.  Obviously, this metric is influenced by how risk-averse a QB is.  The more risks a QB takes, the higher % of "poor throws" there will be.  Some really good QB's tend to take a lot of risks.  

But does that argument help or hurt Wilson?  After all, he was instructed to take less chances in the 2nd half of his rookie season, and his INT's went down.  But his poor throw % from Weeks 12-18, if extrapolated to a full season, still would have ranked him near the bottom of the league.  

 

So his rookie accuracy - even with dirting all those yips throws - was still better than Josh Allen's rookie season (25.7% poor throws), and that came while facing a lower percentage of dropbacks under pressure. 

Therefore he's on pace to become a top 5 QB. Excellent news!

[Scott Dierking]

There are 3 kinds of lies:
Lies

Damn Lies

Statistics.

[Larz]

He played 3 good games out of what, 12?

Not exactly ground breaking information here lol

[Sperm Edwards]

Just now, Scott Dierking said:

There are 4 kinds of lies:
Lies

Damn Lies

Statistics

Jetsfan80 posts

Wow, personal attack there. Uncalled for, bra.

[Scott Dierking]

Imagine the vacuum that exists which allows:

-Every quarterback to throw the same exact pass, in the same exact conditions, against the same exact defense, to the same exact WR talent, from the same exact playbook.

 

[Snook]

42 minutes ago, The Engineer said:

I mean im not sure the point of all this. People that dont like ZW will continue to feel that way. People that do like ZW will continue to feel that way. No one is flipping the other side. He's going to be the QB here for at least the next 2 years. So... posts like this are about as useful as an as*hole on an elbow

It explains why my Grandma was so disgusted with my elbows being on the table.

[Scott Dierking]

4 minutes ago, Sperm Edwards said:

Wow, personal attack there. Uncalled for, bra.

I love me some Jetsfan80. But sometimes I wish he would marry a second wife also. Keeping in line with the Utah obsession.

[JTJet]

30 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Debate the point, not the poster.  I'm curious as to the mental gymnastics you choose to employ to make you feel better about this.  

That's rich coming from you. "Debate the point, not the poster"? Lol that's what you do literally every time someone even smiles about Zach. 

And while I'm not quite flexible enough to perform gymnastics, I can simply say the only thing I need employ is that Zach's a rookie on an extremely sh*tty team across the board. 

[HawkeyeJet]

One of the most interesting pro football reference advanced stat combos to me is Wilson’s pressure rate.  Highest in the league.  I wouldn’t have guessed that, but only qualifying QB pressured 30% of attempts.  That by itself isn’t so interesting, but his pocket time(time before he threw or was pressured) was smack dab in the middle of the league.

Quite a few ways you could take that I suppose.

[Warfish]

12 minutes ago, JTJet said:

I can simply say the only thing I need employ is that Zach's a rookie on an extremely sh*tty team across the board. 

So tell us how you really feel about JD, lol. 

[Warfish]

3 minutes ago, HawkeyeJet said:

One of the most interesting pro football reference advanced stat combos to me is Wilson’s pressure rate.  Highest in the league.  I wouldn’t have guessed that, but only qualifying QB pressured 30% of attempts.  That by itself isn’t so interesting, but his pocket time(time before he threw or was pressured) was smack dab in the middle of the league.

Quite a few ways you could take that I suppose.

Indeed.  Depends on how they're defining "pressured".  For example, a QB could be holding the ball way too long, leading to the plays breaking down and the rush getting past, and that would be "pressured", but in that case the pressure is because of the QB, he is not a victim of it.  Conversely, the O-line could be poop, and the QB barely get a chance to drop back before getting hit, and that would not really be on the QB, but would equally qualify as "pressured". 

It could be useful, but only in combination with other stats to help sort out the why behind the first stat, as you started to do above with "pocket time".

[HawkeyeJet]

29 minutes ago, Zachtomims47 said:

I found another fun chart/stat/whatever the f you want to call it:

Shows which QBs have the most support around them. Zach, obviously, low on the support list. 

 

I believe they are called Weapinz.  

[HawkeyeJet]

2 minutes ago, Warfish said:

Indeed.  Depends on how they're defining "pressured".  For example, a QB could be holding the ball way too long, leading to the plays breaking down and the rush getting past, and that would be "pressured", but in that case the pressure is because of the QB, he is not a victim of it.  Conversely, the O-line could be poop, and the QB barely get a chance to drop back before getting hit, and that would not really be on the QB, but would equally qualify as "pressured". 

It could be useful, but only in combination with other stats to help sort out the why behind the first stat, as you started to do above with "pocket time".

That’s why I think it’s interesting when you pair the 2.  If his pressure rate was high and his pocket time was high, I’d say that clearly points to him constantly holding the ball to long.  But since his pressure is high but pocket time average, I’d say that’s probably more equal parts holding the ball too long and leaky pass pro.  I thought the line held up fairly well, but they gave up a lot of “quick” pressure all season.

[rangerous]

frankly i don't see a whole lot of difference between a qb who make 18% bad throws (aaron rodgers) vice one around 20% (wilson) if bad throws is the only criteria.  They're not really that comparable because the teams are totally different.  the only way this is valid is if the teams are somehow normalized so each qb has the same blocking, receivers, etc.

[FidelioJet]

43 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

 

The point is he was better in the 2nd half than the first but that he still didn't meet the standards to have that play be deemed "good" from a league-wide perspective.  It was also an attempt to show how Wilson's play looked when isolating out the "weppinz" variable that gets brought up in every Wilson thread attempting to evaluate his play.

But if you're happy with Wilson's bad throw % being about 30th best in the league from Weeks 12-18 then I'm happy, Fido.  

Well, let me try and explain my position - so we don't have to go back and forth with this for the next 8 months.

Zach Wilson was a raw talent (probably should have sat for a year) who struggled mightily early.  While he showed flashes of what he can be - he had little control of the offense...

What that told me he was starting from a low base, or as many have stated a "low bar"

So when starting from a low base you have further to go up than someone starting from a higher base

I did not expect him, after a 10 games to become a top QB in the league.  It just doesn't work that way -   I hoped and expected to see him progress and show that he was growing. That is precisely what I saw.

So yes, I think, again, we do agree - him being at the bottom rung is okay this year as long as he continued to show progress in the areas that matter.

Next year, I expect him to start off at a much higher level (basically where he left off) and continue to grow.  So the numbers you're seeing now won't be acceptable - but at the same time I don't expect him to be a top 10 QB next year, but would expect to see him in that high 20's by year end.

 

[Jetsfan80]

31 minutes ago, Scott Dierking said:

Imagine the vacuum that exists which allows:

-Every quarterback to throw the same exact pass, in the same exact conditions, against the same exact defense, to the same exact WR talent, from the same exact playbook.

 

Sample size is important, sir.  Washed out a lot of those variables.

I’ll take a look at intended air yards for each of those QBs later tonight, to accomplish 2 goals:  1) see if I’m right about the “risk averse” QBs having lower AY per attempt, and 2) To make you even angrier.  ?

 

[SomebodytoAnybody47]

 

10 minutes ago, HawkeyeJet said:

I believe they are called Weapinz.  

Wilson still sucks!

[Jetsfan80]

47 minutes ago, UntouchableCrew said:

The fact that Jimmy Garapolo is 2nd in this category casts a shadow over the whole thing... And Aaron Rodgers, who never turns the ball over, is 20th?

Like, does anyone believe that is true? Not even a defense of Zach it's just... Suspect.

 

Interesting you bring up Garoppolo, since he plays in basically the same highly risk-averse system Wilson plays in.

Meaning this doesn’t make the point you think it does.

[Jetsfan80]

47 minutes ago, Augustiniak said:

The best proof that wilson improved is with the eye test, not these random stats.

Eyes lie.  Stats really don’t when used correctly.  

[Jetsfan80]

30 minutes ago, JTJet said:

That's rich coming from you. "Debate the point, not the poster"? Lol that's what you do literally every time someone even smiles about Zach. 

And while I'm not quite flexible enough to perform gymnastics, I can simply say the only thing I need employ is that Zach's a rookie on an extremely sh*tty team across the board. 

When have I ever attacked you instead of the points?

I do attack Fido and Peace Frog though.  I’ll give you that.  

[HawkeyeJet]

I will say this.  The amount of Simpson gifs used warms my heart.  The tension can always be broken with The Simpsons.

[FidelioJet]

12 minutes ago, rangerous said:

frankly i don't see a whole lot of difference between a qb who make 18% bad throws (aaron rodgers) vice one around 20% (wilson) if bad throws is the only criteria.  They're not really that comparable because the teams are totally different.  the only way this is valid is if the teams are somehow normalized so each qb has the same blocking, receivers, etc.

It's not - if Wilson threw one less "bad throw" every other game - he would be at the same level of the likely league MVP.  Who, not so coincidently, runs pretty much the same offense. 

Frankly, if you're going to use this data it should be rather uplifting to the people that think he was awful.  It this data means something and you believe ZW was awful - only the slightest improvement would be necessary for him to be on the level of Aaron Rodgers with his bad throw %...

 

[RoadFan]

1 hour ago, Jetsfan80 said:

I addressed this in the post.  Brady and Rodgers take more risks, which increases their poor throw %.  

No metric is perfect, but it does seem like you want to be somewhere in that 16-19 % "sweet spot" to be happy about your performance, unless of course you're a total boss like Joe Burrow, that is.  @RoadFan.   

Any lower than 16 %, generally, and you're not taking enough risks or shots downfield.  Any higher than that and you're missing far too many of the easy throws. 

Given that Wilson took a lot let risks in Weeks 12-18, its a bit alarming to see his poor throw % exceeding 20 % in that span.  

I think we can all agree that the likes of Tyrod Taylor, Baker Mayfield, Jameis Winston, and fellow rookies Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields is NOT the kind of company we want Wilson to be in, no?  

Burrow is a baaaaaawwwwwhhhhhsssssss!

[Augustiniak]

18 minutes ago, HawkeyeJet said:

That’s why I think it’s interesting when you pair the 2.  If his pressure rate was high and his pocket time was high, I’d say that clearly points to him constantly holding the ball to long.  But since his pressure is high but pocket time average, I’d say that’s probably more equal parts holding the ball too long and leaky pass pro.  I thought the line held up fairly well, but they gave up a lot of “quick” pressure all season.

On top of this, you have the crappy wrs and all the injuries.  It’s not as if wilson was waiting for Stefan diggs and Keenan allen to get open.  

[Doggin94it]

1 hour ago, Jetsfan80 said:

I'm not going through 37 other QB's to isolate their play Weeks 1-7 and 12-18.  I'll maybe do that for the other rookies but its senseless to do so for all of them. 

We all agree Wilson played better in Weeks 12-18, and that this improvement was encouraging out of our rookie QB.  So even when isolating his Week 12-18 performance to make him look better, he still ranked 30th among season-long stats, which featured a more stable list of veteran QB's whose poor throw % probably didn't change a whole lot from the first half of the season to the 2nd.  

This was an attempt to make Wilson look good and it still didn't work for him.  Sorry to be the bearer of bad news on this one.  

No, I just want to make you do more work, 80.

[kdels62]

Along with Adj Y/A, I think this would do a good job of showing who is a game manager and who can change a game. It could then tell you who is a capable and who is an incapable game manager. 

 

[Smashmouth]

2 hours ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Much has been made of Wilson's weapons, or lack thereof, when analyzing his improved play over Weeks 12-18 compared to Weeks 1-7.  So, piggybacking off of @Warfish's thread, I felt this deserved one of its own.  

Here's a fairly good metric that isolates out the WR aspect of the equation:  Poor throws and poor throw %.

According to pro-football-reference, Wilson had 87 total "Poor Throws" on the season on 383 attempts, or 23.8 % of his throws:  https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/W/WilsZa00/gamelog/2021/advanced/

In Weeks 1-7, he had 46 bad throws on 181 attempts, or 25.4 %.

In Weeks 12-18, he had 41 bad throws on 202 attempts, or 20.3 %.

So he did improve in this category.  But where do those numbers compare to the rest of the league?  Unfortunately, the site doesn't provide the rankings, so I had to look up all the QB's in the league with 6+ starts this season to find this information.  These are the rankings:

1. Joe Burrow:  10.7 %
2. Jimmy Garoppolo:  12.9 %
3. Jalen Hurts:  14.0 %
4. Kyler Murray:  14.1 %
5. Matt Ryan:  14.5 %
6. Justin Herbert:  14.6 %
7. Dak Prescott:  14.7 %
8. Derek Carr:  15.5 %
9. Ryan Tannehill:  15.9 %
10. Tua Tagovailoa:  16.3 %
11. Taylor Heinicke:  16.4 %
12. Jared Goff:  16.5 %
13. Jacoby Brissett:  16.5 %
14. Teddy Bridgewater:  16.7 %
15. Kirk Cousins:  17.1 %
16. Andy Dalton:  17.2 %
17. Josh Allen:  17.4 %
18. Davis Mills:  17.4 %
19. Mac Jones:  17.7 %
20. Aaron Rodgers:  18.2 %
21. Ben Roethlisberger:  18.4 %
22. Daniel Jones:  18.4 %
23. Sam Darnold:  18.5 %
24. Matthew Stafford:  18.6 %
25. Russell Wilson:  18.6 %
26. Pat Mahomes:  18.8 %
27. Carson Wentz:  18.8 %
28. Tom Brady:  19.0 %
29. Lamar Jackson:  19.7 %
30. Zach Wilson (Weeks 12-18 only):  20.3 %
31. Trevor Lawrence:  20.5 %
32. Baker Mayfield:  20.9 %
33. Jameis Winston:  21.7 %
34. Justin Fields:  21.9 %
35. Tyrod Taylor:  22.1 %
36. Zach Wilson (overall):  23.8 %
37. Zach Wilson (Weeks 1-7 only):  25.4 %

 

Certainly, some will look at the above list and notice some pretty bad QB's towards the top of the list, and some better ones towards the bottom.  Obviously, this metric is influenced by how risk-averse a QB is.  The more risks a QB takes, the higher % of "poor throws" there will be.  Some really good QB's tend to take a lot of risks.  

But does that argument help or hurt Wilson?  After all, he was instructed to take less chances in the 2nd half of his rookie season, and his INT's went down.  But his poor throw % from Weeks 12-18, if extrapolated to a full season, still would have ranked him near the bottom of the league.  

 

Well this is pretty much something we already know but a 3% Improvement is hard to call an improvement in this category.

[Jet Nut]

1 hour ago, FidelioJet said:

 

What's the point here?

That Zach Wilson had a rough rookie year but was substantially better in the second half than the first half of the season?

Agreed!

I do appreciate the work here though - thank you!

None

irs just another how can I bitch about ZW today thread