Posts tagged RSP

Futures: My Expansion Franchise

April 23, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft

Welcome to my lab where will I concoct a winning franchise. Photo by the state of Victoria.

You’ve just been awarded an NFL expansion team and must build your personnel department. Go.

Futures: My Expansion Franchise

By Matt Waldman

When the writer of Smartfootball.com suggests that, “you should storify that series of tweets,” it’s a take on a subject worth further exploration. The topic came courtesy of Luke Easterling (@NFLDraftReport) who, on Sunday night, posed the following scenario on Twitter: “You’ve just been awarded an NFL expansion team and must build your personnel department from Draft-Twitter. Go.”

I gave my list of NFL writers, former scouts, consultants, and analysts that I’d use to build my organization, but what was more compelling to Twitter was the way I structured the jobs. My vision for team-building a front office and scouting department got a lot of positive response.

More than anything, I believe the way the Twitter community responded to my approach has to do with the fact that a lot of my audience is football writers and diehard fans who are critical of the NFL’s approach to managing its own. They’re ready to welcome a different vision.

Some of my plans aren’t unique to the NFL. There are teams that at least have an aligned vision from its ownership to its coaching staff. However, the way I’d create and continuously strengthen that alignment is a departure from the league.

I believe in the merit of my ideas, but I’m not dreaming of the day I win multiple Powerballs or inherit billions. Unless an NFL owner is alright with me reporting to work in jeans and sporting my collection of hats and caps, the likelihood of me becoming a GM went from infinitesimally small to impossible.

Then again, there have been requests for my consultation on prospect evaluation that I didn’t intend when began the Rookie Scouting Portfolio in 2006, so you never really know. Maybe my buddy Sigmund Bloom manages to raise $50 from the 20 million NFL fans around the world on Kickstarter and we’re in business. Until then, let’s call this a (hopefully) entertaining football and management exercise.

First, a couple of assumptions we need to get out of the way. If I was awarded an NFL franchise I would have done three things—among others—before I even applied for the rights to an expansion team:

A 10, 15, and 20-year cost analysis of owning a team based on my vision.
Studied the details of the city of Green Bay’s ownership of the Packers and formulated a 15-year plan to transition the team to a non-profit corporation owned by its fans (one person can own no more than 200,000 shares of its stock).
Determined the efficacy of current personnel and front office roles within most NFL organizations

The next step is building an organizational structure. There are several things that I’d do that due to time and space limitations, I won’t get into, but here are the highlights of how I’d implement a vision to build a brain trust responsible for evaluating, acquiring, managing, and developing talent on and off the field.

Read the rest at Football Outsiders.

Rehabbing the Wonderlic

April 20, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft

It's a better fit to assess football intelligence than a standardized test. See below. Photo by Brandon Velasco. — It’s a better fit to assess football intelligence than a standardized test. See below. Photo by Brandon Velasco.

The Wonderlic and the NFL’s misguided use of it continues to fascinate. I propose a solution.

If you’ve seen the Audible Podcast where I commented on the Wonderlic exam, then you know my suggested alternative to the Wonderlic.

This test was designed in 1936 and the military adopted it for measuring a pilot’s ability to think fast. One way of looking at the Wonderlic is that it’s an exam twice removed from its original purpose–if it ever had one besides one form of measuring the ever-elusive concept of intelligence.

But let’s talk about the Wonderlic’s use as a test for our nation’s airmen. While true that pilots face life or death situations, the physical stress of flying a plane is different from that of a football player.

Pilots have to be in great physical condition due to the altitude and G-Force of aerial maneuvers that cause fast changes to blood pressure, heart rates, and blood flow through the body–often resulting blackouts if a pilot isn’t in supreme condition.

The G-Force of flying a fighter jet also creates a sensation of carrying extra weight. Combine these sensations with the need to maintain a sharp mind and precision movements to control the plane, and it’s understandable why the NFL might look at the cardiovascular demands and draw a parallel between a cockpit and a pocket.

It’s one thing to be out of breath and weighed down while making lightning-quick decisions; it’s another to be breathless and pummeled from a series of moderate car accidents while trying to execute an offense. Yet what really separates the pocket from the cockpit is the type of decisions a quarterback makes that differ from a pilot.

Operating a fighter jet requires excellent skills in mathematics: reading performance tables; gauging time, speed, and fuel; understanding the geometry for specific weaponry; and mastering the impact that certain angles will have on a plane with challenging navigational movements.

A quarterback doesn’t need to know a lick of math. He doesn’t need to read anything but a clock. And his plays are diagrams and words that he has memorized. The Wonderlic tests more for math and language skills than visual diagrams and executing strategy. Moreover, it doesn’t test for the combination of the strategic integrated with motor skills and physical-mental stamina.

So like most non-NFL people, I think the Wonderlic is a useless–and often a counterproductive–assessment tool. If the league wants to make it remotely worthwhile, here’s what I suggest:

Lead the prospect to a room for an interview, workout, or press conference–whatever ruse necessary to set up an ambush.
At the ambush point, have 3 or 4 of your defensive linemen or linebackers grab the prospect, put a bag over his head and beat on him for 45 minutes.
Remove the bag, lead the prospect to a table, and administer the Wonderlic.
If the prospect can answer any question correct in 15 minutes, he passes.
If the prospect can avoid the bag or ambush and has a stand-off with his attackers, he should be considered for the top half of the draft.
If the prospect aces the test after getting beaten up or avoids the ambush altogether, he’s a first-round pick.

Yes, I’m kidding. However, a player asked to think quickly and make good decisions with accurate execution after a 45-minute mugging is closer to the reality of what you want to see than a book-smart suburban kid who scored well in controlled, standardized test environment.

If you ask me, the NFL would be better off if it put a player through an exhaustive workout and then ask him to execute physical-mental football concepts that are basic to most college players at their positions. If you want to up the stakes, add less familiar concepts that are a logical extension or advanced wrinkle of this knowledge base.

It will require more work for the league to develop, but isn’t it worth it to assess a player’s intelligence free from the socio-economic bias that comes with standardized tests? More important, isn’t it worth it to assess intelligence that’s appropriate to the environment?

But what do I know, I’m just a writer.

Reads Listens Views 4/18/2014

April 18, 2014 0 Comments read Reads Listens Views

Photo by Ashley Bovan. Solo by James Marshall Hendrix.

Fran Duffy’s Scouting Notebooks, Voodoo Chile Trip, Trio of Doom, and Solar in the Dark

What is Reads Listens Views?

If you’re new to the Rookie Scouting Portfolio blog, welcome. I post links on Friday to content I’m saving for later consumption. You may not like everything listed here, but you’re bound to like something.

Listens/Views

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Love videos like this, although I’ve heard better Hendrix versions and I can’t talk about this song without sharing this version . . .

[youtube=http://youtu.be/OEJh2FFUUoU]

Download the 2014 Rookie Scouting Portfolio

Friday’s are also my chance to thank you for reading my work, encourage you to follow the RSP blog, and download the Rookie Scouting Portfolio publication.

The RSP is available every April 1 for download. This year’s RSP is nearly 300 pages in the draft guide section and filled with analysis of 164 skill position prospects that has earned a loyal following:

Rankings
Draft history analysis
Overrated/Underrated analysis
Multidimensional player comparisons
Individual skills analysis by position

You can learn more about the RSP here. If you want to see samples of the play-by-play notes I take to write the analysis, you can find them here. If you want to know what my readers say about it, look here. If you want a quick video tour, here it is:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRsQwtyOCDM&feature=share]

If you don’t have time to look into details, know that once you look through the RSP, there will be no question in your mind that I do the work, that I have a plan about the work that I do, and that you get more than your money’s worth. It’s why more and more draftniks every spring can’t wait until April 1.

If you think that’s a ton, you ain’t seen nothing. When you purchase the RSP, you also get a free post-draft publication that’s available for download a week after the NFL Draft. Fantasy football owners tell me all the time that this alone is worth the price.

Best yet, 10 percent of each RSP sale is donated to Darkness to Light, a non-profit devoted to preventing and addressing sexual abuse through community training in schools, religious groups, and a variety of civic groups across the U.S.

Here is what the RSP donated to D2L this year. According to D2L, the RSP’s 2013 donation amount was enough to train 250 adults in communities across the country.

Pre-order the 2014 RSP and/or download past versions of the publication (2006-2012).

Reads (Football)

Scouts Notebook Series – If you haven’t checked out Fran Duffy’s excellent video series featuring the likes of Mayock, Cosell, Norris, Davis, and Pauline discussing they seek from each position, do it now.
Factors: Cecil Shorts – A look at Shorts’ 2013 season by Football Outsiders’ Rivers McCown.
Field Gulls dug up a Bill Walsh presentation on his offense – It’s technically a view, but go over there and check it out if you have an hour.
If You Give A Mouse A Concussion . . . – Robert Klemko’s story on a Stanford student’s research that might one day have an impact on football.
A Star Player Accused, and a Flawed Rape Investigation – It’s not an on-field story, but it’s important to see how higher education and big-time sports are often a poor mix.
Meet the Bag Man: How to buy college football players, in the words of a man who delivers the money – Excellent work from Steven Godfrey. I don’t care that he couldn’t name sources. I understand why. Encore from last week.

Listens

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Reads (Life In General)

Scientists Discover How to Generate Solar Power in the Dark – Some optimism for your week: Meet ‘photoswitches,’ a breakthrough set of materials that act as their own batteries, absorbing energy and releasing it on demand.
Borderland – This NPR photo-driven series is excellent. They traveled 2,428 miles along the Mexican border. Here’s what they saw.
John Roberts and the Color of Money – Applying the history of white supremacy in America to the Supreme Court’s McCutcheon decision.
Exposing the NSA: A Public Service Worthy of a Pulitzer Prize – The national-security state and its apologists don’t see it that way—which is why we have the First Amendment.
Is Stop-And-Frisk Worth It? – Civil-rights activists love that it’s now unconstitutional. But law-enforcement officials say the practice has made U.S. cities dramatically safer. Now what?
Beyond Boston – As America marks the anniversary of the Boston terrorist attack, survivors of three earlier bombings describe their journeys forward.

Listens

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A Game of Inches: The Talent Gap By the Numbers

April 16, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft, Matt Waldman, RSP Publication

Based on these numbers, less than 1 percent of the seniors playing college football will ever earn a second contract in the NFL.

Greg Linton, an NFL agent, shared this on Twitter this morning. There’s another salient point embedded in this data that goes beyond the message of “get your education.” It’s how data displays the differences in execution. It is a great way to see the differences between “good” college football and “good” NFL football.

Only the top 6.5 percent of all high school players compete at the college level. It means they are in the 93.5 percentile of all high school players. Likewise, only the top 1.6 percent of all college players enter the NFL–the 98.4 percentile. And that second NFL contract–the seal of approval that you’re a good NFL player–is reserved for less than one percent of all college players; the 99.06 percentile.

Viewing the numbers in this fashion, it doesn’t look like a big difference between the 93.5 percentile, the 98.4 percentile, and the 99.06 percentile. You’d be mistaken.

This may be a stretch for some–and it certainly isn’t scientific–but for the sake of entertainment, let’s presume that these percentiles were a reflection of a player’s success rate executing plays on a per snap basis. I understand this is not exact, but I think there’s enough to this idea to suspend disbelief long enough to make an overall point that is worthwhile.

The table below shows the amount of errors–or bad plays–that a player would commit over the course of a million plays based these percentiles that represent their standing as a college (93.5 percentile), NFL prospect (98.4 percentile), or NFL vet earning a second contract (99.07 percentile).

Plays	Percentile	Good Plays	Errors/Bad
1,000,000	0.935	935,000	65,000
1,000,000	0.984	98,4000	16,000
1,000,000	0.9906	99,0600	9,400

The difference between 65,000 errors and 16,000 errors is massive and that’s just the gap between a college player and NFL prospect who might last three years in the league. The NFL vet who earns a second deal commits 42.3 percent fewer errors than the prospect ad 86.6 fewer errors than the college player. And I’m talking about the average player on a team, which includes the best and the worst players on each squad–forget about the stars!

Even these numbers are a little harder to grasp, because we’re looking at a million plays. We won’t see any player execute that many over the course of a career–as hard as Brett Favre, George Blanda and Bruce Matthews tried.

So let’s break it down to plays in a season. Let’s estimate a player sees 40 plays a game for 16 games. I know this isn’t completely accurate for the college game or certain players in the NFL. However, it’s a more understandable sample size of plays for a season that equates to 640 plays.

Now look at the differences in errors/bad plays–it’s a lot easier to grasp.

Player	Plays	Percentile	Good Plays	Errors
College	640	0.935	598.4	41.6
NFL Prospect	640	0.984	629.76	10.24
NFL Vet	640	0.9906	633.984	6.016

The difference between 10 and 6 egregious errors per season per player is staggering–and that’s the difference between a young NFL player and a veteran. Those 41.6 errors per season for the average college player just doesn’t cut it for the pro game. This chart hints at why NFL athleticism is a difference maker in the college game even if the NFL skill and understanding of football isn’t always present.

In contrast, the gap between a prospect and vet is much smaller from an athletic standpoint, but the differences in errors is still large based on knowledge of technique, strategy, and consistency of execution. Again, this is hypothesizing that we’re discussing the average player at each level.

Now think about the top four players on each team–Pro-Bowl caliber players–that’s 128 players in the NFL. These players are in the 99.88 percentile in all of football–high school, college, and NFL. Using a sample of 640 plays in a 16-game season they would commit .75 egregious errors.

This seems hard to believe. In fact, you can see where this theory begins to crack at the seams because even All-Pros make mistakes multiple times in a season. However, how many of them are solely their fault and not something that can be explained by the error of a teammate? Not as many as you might think.

I wouldn’t throw out this examination because the numbers aren’t exactly right. The point is still a good one: The gap in talent is about consistency of execution and it requires knowledge, skill, and focus as the gap in athleticism narrows.

For analysis of skill players in this year’s draft class, download the 2014 Rookie Scouting Portfolio. Better yet, if you’re a fantasy owner the 56-page Post-Draft Add-on comes with the 2012 – 2014 RSPs at no additional charge and available for download within a week after the NFL Draft. Best, yet, 10 percent of every sale is donated to Darkness to Light to combat sexual abuse. You can purchase past editions of the Rookie Scouting Portfolio for just $9.95 apiece.

2013 RSP Post-Draft Video Tour

April 11, 2014 0 Comments read RSP Publication

“I first experienced the RSP last year and after reading several pages, you got me for only god knows how much time you’ll be doing it. I’d prepay this for the next ten years easily. I mean it in the most sincere way, this has become my most anticipated read of the year and once again, I know it will be awesome.” – Dom

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8f06wrsHVI&feature=share]

New to the RSP? Wondering what’s inside the RSP Post-Draft and how to use it? Take the video tour.

How the Pre-draft and Post-Draft work together.
Tour of the tiered cheat sheet. .
The use of ADP values and RSP values to help readers maximize dynasty draft value.

Download the RSP now and I’ll email you a week after the NFL Draft to let you know when the Post-Draft is ready for download. The publications are a package deal at $19.95.

I have readers tell me all the time that they would pay $19.95 just for the Post-Draft publication. I sell this as a package deal only because the pre-draft is just as important long-term as the post-draft. One feeds the other.