How much does actual production matter when evaluating prospects?

[maury77]

Last year Zach Wilson went #2 overall. He had a phenomenal junior year, but his prior 2 years at BYU were nowhere as good. Trey Lance went 3 with only one year of tape. This year, you have a lot of rumors that Travon Walker will go number 1 overall and his stats are, frankly, mediocre. Thibodeaux has not put up huge sack numbers. Even Jameson Williams only had 1 year of good production. Drake London was also a bit of a one year wonder. 

Obviously you have examples like Joe Burrow, who just lead his team to a Super Bowl after only having one dominant season in college (even though it was arguably the best season in history for an NCAA quarterback). It is also obvious that being statistically dominant in college does not guarantee that you will be a good NFL player (too many examples to mention). 

There isn't necessarily a right or wrong answer, but I'm curious for those of you who choose to respond, how much weight do you give to a prospect's career production when evaluatiing him?

[kdels62]

1 hour ago, maury77 said:

Last year Zach Wilson went #2 overall. He had a phenomenal junior year, but his prior 2 years at BYU were nowhere as good. Trey Lance went 3 with only one year of tape. This year, you have a lot of rumors that Travon Walker will go number 1 overall and his stats are, frankly, mediocre. Thibodeaux has not put up huge sack numbers. Even Jameson Williams only had 1 year of good production. Drake London was also a bit of a one year wonder. 

Obviously you have examples like Joe Burrow, who just lead his team to a Super Bowl after only having one dominant season in college (even though it was arguably the best season in history for an NCAA quarterback). It is also obvious that being statistically dominant in college does not guarantee that you will be a good NFL player (too many examples to mention). 

There isn't necessarily a right or wrong answer, but I'm curious for those of you who choose to respond, how much weight do you give to a prospect's career production when evaluatiing him?

I don’t weigh career production at all. It’s final year production + total reps for me. 

Using the Zach Wilson example, he had a solid freshman year but more importantly he emerged as a freshman starter at a school full of 26 year olds. That helps because it means he got on the radar at a younger age. His actual production is less important at that point.

I feel like that past performance stuff has led to the overrating of guys like Darnold, Rosen, and even Trevor Lawrence. 

[maury77]

34 minutes ago, kdels62 said:

I don’t weigh career production at all. It’s final year production + total reps for me. 

Using the Zach Wilson example, he had a solid freshman year but more importantly he emerged as a freshman starter at a school full of 26 year olds. That helps because it means he got on the radar at a younger age. His actual production is less important at that point.

I feel like that past performance stuff has led to the overrating of guys like Darnold, Rosen, and even Trevor Lawrence. 

I'm not saying that you are wrong, but aren't you concerned that outlier performances may sometimes have more to attribute to other considerations rather than the player being good?

[derp]

It depends on the position and where you’re drafting them. Production market share breakouts at a young age are one of the few things correlated to WR success at the next level, for example, and that’s definitely a data point I like to look at. In general you’d rather have the 18, 19 year old who dominated 21, 22 year olds than the guy who needed to be 21, 22 and more physically developed to dominate - Kevin White comes to mind as a negative for an older breakout - but obviously individual circumstances vary and it certainly changes position to position.

I think this class has a few good young producers and a few good recent producers but basically not really anybody who’s truly sustained that over multiple years, plus a lot of guys lost their sophomore/junior/true senior seasons, and that’s why it’s regarded as a pretty weak class at the top.

[kdels62]

4 minutes ago, maury77 said:

I'm not saying that you are wrong, but aren't you concerned that outlier performances may sometimes have more to attribute to other considerations rather than the player being good?

I do worry. But in the end a player being good his final year is more important than the totality of his work. Since it represents a point in time where the player would be a featured part of his team and his share of his teams performance is greater than when he was younger. 

[nycdan]

Anyone here old enough to remember Renaldo Nehamiah?  An interesting case study in extreme physical gifts with absolutely no football experience.  

[maury77]

26 minutes ago, nycdan said:

Anyone here old enough to remember Renaldo Nehamiah?  An interesting case study in extreme physical gifts with absolutely no football experience.  

Yup. Olympic hurdler that went to the 49ers I believe

[nycdan]

28 minutes ago, maury77 said:

Yup. Olympic hurdler that went to the 49ers I believe

Yep.  world class speed.  accomplished basically nothing in the NFL.

[UntouchableCrew]

I won't pretend to be a great talent evaluator but I'd imagine it's part of the calculus and for every player, every position, for every level of competition, the round you'd consider him, etc. it matters more or less.

Ideally you want:

• Rare, elite physical gifts/freakish athleticism
• Impressive play style/skills/instincts/good tape that improves year over year 
• Great production that increases year over year
• Great character/is the type you'd be comfortable giving a lot of money to

Someone like Travon Walker scares the ish out of me because despite his freakish athleticism you're projecting him as an elite player pretty much based on that athleticism (and character) and not really based on anything he's done. But that's why it's a projection of course -- what could he be vs. what is he.

Frankly, Walker strikes me as the kind of guy who in the right system, in the right scenario, could be a superstar. And then everyone would laugh at the "dumb teams" who passed on him... And yet I don't know if he's really going to be a game changed for the Jaguars, Lions, or Jets. 

[Dwight Englewood]

On 4/20/2022 at 8:11 AM, maury77 said:

Last year Zach Wilson went #2 overall. He had a phenomenal junior year, but his prior 2 years at BYU were nowhere as good. Trey Lance went 3 with only one year of tape. This year, you have a lot of rumors that Travon Walker will go number 1 overall and his stats are, frankly, mediocre. Thibodeaux has not put up huge sack numbers. Even Jameson Williams only had 1 year of good production. Drake London was also a bit of a one year wonder. 

Obviously you have examples like Joe Burrow, who just lead his team to a Super Bowl after only having one dominant season in college (even though it was arguably the best season in history for an NCAA quarterback). It is also obvious that being statistically dominant in college does not guarantee that you will be a good NFL player (too many examples to mention). 

There isn't necessarily a right or wrong answer, but I'm curious for those of you who choose to respond, how much weight do you give to a prospect's career production when evaluatiing him?

You have to contextualize stats.  Wilson had monster stats his last season at BYU but it was mostly against community college defenses.  The Wilson lovers developed tunnel vision and absolutely refused to think the level of competition had anything to do with his stats.

 

Then look at DK Metcalf.  569 yards receiving his last season at Ole Miss.  2nd round pick.  Nobody took into account his qb sucked and he got injured and missed a couple games.

 

For some reason, people now are knocking Thibs' level of competition in the PAC-12.  Call me crazy but the PAC-12 last I checked is a power 5 division one conference.