Conner McGovern to Bills

[Einstein]

8 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

“The player grading is for the fans"? Do you have some quotations stating fro coaches and FO folks saying they never use the player grading?

 

In one article I saw a while back a coach said that if their opinion on a player differs from PFF's, that's a signal for them to go back and watch some more tape

 

He has no quotations and no source. He is speaking from a position of ignorance due to his preconceived notions of PFF that he can not let go. His notion is that PFF grades are subjective, but so is ALL grades. Before PFF, when an O-line coach graded a linemen after a week of training camp practice, that grade was subjective to the o-line coach.

 

It also becomes less subjective as it passes through several tiers of analysts reviewing it. At PFF, a player can not be graded until it goes through 3 tiers of people. And some of those tiers include former college/NFL players and coaches. He ignores all of this.

 

As you mentioned, coaches have come around on PFF. Everyone from Shanahan to Reich to even McDermott have talked about how valuable PFF is. Of course Cheese will just say “but they use it for the data not the grades”. Except he ignores that the data is what drives the grade. And he has 0 proof that NFL teams don’t use the grade.

 

He even brought up an old article about a player alleging that agents/players pay PFF to change grades. He thought that was a “gotcha” but he didn’t realize it was actually a “gotcha” for him. Because agents/players wouldn’t spend thousands of dollars to change grades to impress the average fan. They would do it to impress teams who would be paying them millions of dollars. Therefore, IF it is true (and I doubt it), then it just furthers the point that teams use PFF player grades.

 

Its an anti-PFF agenda and no matter what evidence you give him, he won’t believe it. Better to give it up and allow him to live in his reality.

[MrEpsYtown]

Let me just add, with the run-blocking stuff. McGovern's footwork looks a little sloppy to me, but I think that is something that Kromer can definitely fix. If you watch his Penn State highlights, he is crushing people and run blocking was his strength. I know college vs the NFL, but it passes the eye test for me. 

[Royale with Cheese]

3 minutes ago, Einstein said:

 

No i’m done with it because you have a very limited knowledge of PFF, have never been there, do not know anyone who has worked there, and do not know how teams use it. You speak from a position of ignorance. Also it’s boring for other people on the forum to see two people engaging in page-long arguments.

 

And yes, Reid has always struggled with OL evaluation.

https://www.nbcsports.com/philadelphia/eagles/andy-reid-offensive-linemen-nfl-philosophy-howie-roseman

 

"The last 20 years, the Eagles have the No. 5 offense in the NFL and they’ve had an incredible 10 offensive linemen go to a total of 26 Pro Bowls, most in the NFL.

In the last 20 years, Eagles offensive linemen have been picked to more Pro Bowl teams than in the previous 54 years combined in which there was a Pro Bowl or NFL all-star game."

"It’s up to Roseman to keep the pipeline going, a pipeline that’s helped guide the Eagles to two decades of success and a Super Bowl championship. A pipeline started 20 years ago by Andy Reid."

 

I already showed you PFF's evaluation of Reid's offensive lines in KC but you cherry pick which PFF evaluations we can use.

[Einstein]

8 hours ago, Richard Noggin said:

 

I agree with you that generally, informed analysts can break down NFL game film with some degree of accuracy and insight. But there is danger in the proliferation of a "youtube (sic)...whole industry of guys doing film breakdowns

 

Nailed it.

 

This is what cracks me up the most. The same posters who will crap on PFF, will also post or read articles by Joe Buscaglia where breaks down the film.

 

Buscaglia’s resume involves working at a radio station and then as a sports writer. That’s it. Somehow they will take his word, over analysts at PFF who have been in the NFL or college football, and watch every snap of every game of every team.

[BringBackFergy]

1 hour ago, Einstein said:

 

Nailed it.

 

This is what cracks me up the most. The same posters who will crap on PFF, will also post or read articles by Joe Buscaglia where breaks down the film.

 

Buscaglia’s resume involves working at a radio station and then as a sports writer. That’s it. Somehow they will take his word, over analysts at PFF who have been in the NFL or college football, and watch every snap of every game of every team.

Buscaglia is best known for:

 

1) Describing a player as "good", "great", "elite" or "bad"

2) He reads other professionals work and steals their terminology "shifty hips", "lateral speed", etc.

3) He has been anointed a draft guru by local radio personalities...he takes the top 10 mock drafts, shakes them up a bit and regurgitates as his own.

 

Not a big fan. 

[BullBuchanan]

4 hours ago, Royale with Cheese said:

 

Cossell is on OBL a lot and I've heard him talk about this as well.  He mentioned that it's almost impossible to grade the players instinct because of the nuances.  We don't know the player saw, anticipated or other intangibles.  

 

We don't know if a blown assignment was execution or scheme based many times.  There was a game where the Bills struggled and Allen stated that the team they were playing threw looks at them the never seen before.  If a particular play gets blown up because the defense had the perfect call against us...we were outschemed in that instance but the players will get the negative grade.

 

If Allen gets pressured immediately on a blitz....do we know for sure if Allen didn't audible correctly, he called the wrong protection, or Morse called wrong protection, or Bates picked up the wrong bltzer, or Cook didn't leak out for the check down or they were just simply outschemed etc....

There are things we will never know as fans and "youtube experts".

Many of these "youtube experts" are former players and NFl personnel. It's not just Johnny's NFL Takes. The DB Room and The QB School are two examples. Brett Kollman is not an NFL guy but his content is fantastic.

Again this is where knowledge of the game comes in. You can absolutely tell if a play succeeds because of scheme. When Allen Says things like "they threw us looks that they "have never seen before", it doesn't mean they just invented a whole new defensive scheme. It means they disguised a coverage to look like one thing instead of another. If Allen reacts as though he believes it's the original scheme, then the disguise succeeded. If he reacts as though it's the actual scheme, then he saw through it. Progressions would change, look offs would change.

Given a certain offensive playcall vs a certain defensive playcall, there is either an optimal solution or an audible should be called to put the team in a better position. You can tell by watching a play if scheme beats scheme, and from a scheme you know what responsibilities are going to be. If Bates blocked the wrong man, most of the time you can probably tell by what the offensive playcall was, what the other linemen did, and what the run fit was. And since this is all in the context of whether or not it's possible to grade a play, if it ever happens to be in question, PFF has this covered: "Plays in which there is a clear question mark regarding assignment, we can defer to a “0” grade and not guess as to which player is right or wrong".

You want so badly to be right on this, but you're at the throw ***** at the wall stage and see what sticks.

Edited March 15, 2023 by BullBuchanan

[Thurman#1]

 

5 hours ago, Royale with Cheese said:

It’s a subjective based system in which a grader gives his opinion on whether or not they believe player did the right thing.  
 

If Aaron Rodgers 5 TD 0 INT performance is rated 23 points lower than Ryan Fitzpatrick 6 INT and 0 TD performance…it has major grading issues IMO.  
 

But yes, at least we can agree on your last paragraph!

 

 

Sorry, what are you talking about? Yeah, you're right, "If Aaron Rodgers 5 TD 0 INT performance is rated 23 points lower than Ryan Fitzpatrick 6INT and 0 TD performance  ... it has major grading issues." I'd agree. My IMO too. Here's the thing, though, PFF did NOT rate Fitz's 6 INT game higher than Aaron Rodgers's game.  Or any other QB performance in history up to that time, actually. 

 

Here's what Sam Monson had to say about that, "New York Jets quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick landed on PFF’s Team of the Week for his excellent performance in Week 2 in a Thursday night win over the Buffalo Bills, but he followed that up with a six-interception disaster against the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 3. That earned him a PFF grade of 21.4, a catastrophic score that isn’t just the worst single-game grade of the season, but is the worst single-game grade we have ever seen from a QB over the past decade of grading. To put it in even harsher perspective: PFF has graded 2,717 games of NFL regular and postseason play, and Fitzpatrick just posted the worst single-game performance we have ever seen. By our system it was worse than the Peyton Manning dumpster fire from a year ago against the Chiefs that saw him benched after four interceptions for his own sake. It was worse than any game Jamarcus Russell managed, or the trainwreck performance Josh Freeman had for the Vikings that seemed to have effectively ended his NFL career." That was written the day after the game.

 

https://www.pff.com/news/pro-ryan-fitzpatrick-just-earned-the-lowest-pff-grade-weve-ever-given-a-qb

 

And there is only one game in Fitz's career where he had 6 INTs. Don't know what numbers you're comparing exactly. Perhaps PFF has changed their system, or have two different systems? I don't know. But I do know they thought Rodgers' game was kinda average, just not as good as the stats would have painted it, and also thought that Fitzy was absolutely awful that game.

 

So, what in the world are you talking about?

 

As for subjectivity, yeah, it's a subjective system.

 

Equally, absolutely anyone grading film is going to be using a subjective system based on opinion on how well the guy did what he was supposed to do. Absolutely everyone, even his own team will be including subjectivity, though certainly less so than anyone else. 

 

But PFF goes out of their way to tell their film graders that if you can't be sure what went on, don't grade that play.

Edited March 15, 2023 by Thurman#1

[Royale with Cheese]

5 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

Many of these "youtube experts" are former players and NFl personnel. It's not just Johnny's NFL Takes.

Again this is where knowledge of the game comes in. You can absolutely tell if a play succeeds because of scheme. When Allen Says things like "they threw us looks that they "have never seen before", it doesn't mean they just invented a whole new defensive scheme. It means they disguised a coverage to look like one thing instead of another. If Allen reacts as though he believes it's the original scheme, then the disguise succeeded. If he reacts as though it's the actual scheme, then he saw through it. Progressions would change, look offs would change.

Given a certain offensive playcall vs a certain defensive playcall, there is either an optimal solution or an audible should be called to put the team in a better position. You can tell by watching a play if scheme beats scheme, and from a scheme you know what responsibilities are going to be. If Bates blocked the wrong man, most of the time you can probably tell by what the offensive playcall was, what the other linemen did, and what the run fit was. And since this is all in the context of whether or not it's possible to grade a play, if it ever happens to be in question, PFF has this covered: "Plays in which there is a clear question mark regarding assignment, we can defer to a “0” grade and not guess as to which player is right or wrong".

You want so badly to be right on this, but you're at the throw ***** at the wall stage and see what sticks.

 

Are TJ Lang, Eric Wood, Greg Cossell and the Kelce's "Johnny NFL Takes?"

 

Because they are saying the exact opposite.  I tend to believe them more than you.  It's just funny how you won't take their opinion into consideration at all but a PFF guy is "scientifically sound" in his evaluation.  WTF.

 

Explain to me how the Kelce's and Lang are wrong.

 

“I think some positions are easier to grade. If you see a quarterback make a bad decision, that’s obviously easy to grade," Lang told Valenti. "But when it comes to offensive and defensive line play, there’s just so much scheme that goes into what we do up front that nobody else outside of the building can possibly know what we’re supposed to do."

 

“The thing is that these PFF graders are grading off of what they think the play should be,” Travis Kelce said. “Whereas we might have a specific fundamental or we might have a specific call that takes us into something else and the play doesn’t work. … The graders don’t necessarily know the objective of the play and the fundamentals that we’re being taught.”

[Royale with Cheese]

13 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

 

Sorry, what are you talking about? Yeah, you're right, "If Aaron Rodgers 5 TD 0 INT performance is rated 23 points lower than Ryan Fitzpatrick 6INT and 0 TD performance  ... it has major grading issues." I'd agree. My IMO too. Here's the thing, though, PFF did NOT rate Fitz's 6 INT game higher than Aaron Rodgers's game.  Or any other QB performance in history up to that time, actually. 

 

Here's what Sam Monson had to say about that, "New York Jets quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick landed on PFF’s Team of the Week for his excellent performance in Week 2 in a Thursday night win over the Buffalo Bills, but he followed that up with a six-interception disaster against the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 3. That earned him a PFF grade of 21.4, a catastrophic score that isn’t just the worst single-game grade of the season, but is the worst single-game grade we have ever seen from a QB over the past decade of grading. To put it in even harsher perspective: PFF has graded 2,717 games of NFL regular and postseason play, and Fitzpatrick just posted the worst single-game performance we have ever seen." That was written the day after the game.

 

https://www.pff.com/news/pro-ryan-fitzpatrick-just-earned-the-lowest-pff-grade-weve-ever-given-a-qb

 

And there is only one game in Fitz's career where he had 6 INTs. Don't know what numbers you're comparing exactly. Perhaps PFF has changed their system, or have two different systems? Or perhaps they left a negative sign off of the 21.4? I don't know. But I do know they thought Rodgers' game was kinda average, just not as good as the stats would have painted it, and also thought that Fitzy was absolutely awful that game.

 

So, what in the world are you talking about?

 

As for subjectivity, yeah, it's a subjective system.

 

Equally, absolutely anyone grading film is going to be using a subjective system based on opinion on how well the guy did what he was supposed to do. Absolutely everyone, even his own team will be including subjectivity, though certainly less so than anyone else. 

 

But PFF goes out of their way to tell their film graders that if you can't be sure what went on, don't grade that play.

 

I guess I was confused thinking -0.8 was smaller than 21.4?  If you can decipher this....let me know.  

 

https://www.pff.com/news/why-aaron-rodgers-earned-a-slightly-negative-grade

 

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers ended last night’s game with a -0.8 grade overall. This isn’t a bad game, just because the number begins with a minus, but it is an average grade very close to zero for a player who threw five touchdown passes, which seems crazy on the face of it. It’s not.

Edited March 15, 2023 by Royale with Cheese

[Thurman#1]

13 minutes ago, Royale with Cheese said:

 

I guess I was confused thinking -0.8 was smaller than 21.4?  If you can decipher this....let me know.  

 

https://www.pff.com/news/why-aaron-rodgers-earned-a-slightly-negative-grade

 

Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers ended last night’s game with a -0.8 grade overall. This isn’t a bad game, just because the number begins with a minus, but it is an average grade very close to zero for a player who threw five touchdown passes, which seems crazy on the face of it. It’s not.

 

 

I don't know why the numbers are different.

 

But I'm not the one who claimed that PFF has major grading issues because they thought the Fitz game was a better perfromance than the Rodgers game. Even though they clearly didn't. Again, maybe they changed their numbering system. Dunno. But your attack there is based on a mistake. Clearly they did not rank those games that way. They very clearly have the Rodgers game as average and the Fitz game as historically bad.

 

 

Edited March 15, 2023 by Thurman#1

[starrymessenger]

3 hours ago, MrEpsYtown said:

Let me just add, with the run-blocking stuff. McGovern's footwork looks a little sloppy to me, but I think that is something that Kromer can definitely fix. If you watch his Penn State highlights, he is crushing people and run blocking was his strength. I know college vs the NFL, but it passes the eye test for me. 

People familiar with the player are unanimous in saying that he is a well below average run blocker in any kind of power scheme such as they use in Dallas. Absolutely not a people mover. Based on (what little) tape I've seen of him I think he can be a satisfactory contributor zone blocking in a scheme that emphasizes speed, mobility, anthleticism  and resulting spread concepts. If, as I hope, we land a power back to complement what we've got in Cook and Hynes the bigger back can run behind Bates on the left side of the line. If given the scheme McGovern can grade out as average in the run game and well above average in pass pro the Bills will have done well in signing him. Interestingly when the Boys were looking for ways to use him he was very effective lining up as a H-back. Maybe he could be our short yardage specialist lol.

[PBF81]

3 hours ago, Einstein said:

Nailed it.

 

This is what cracks me up the most. The same posters who will crap on PFF, will also post or read articles by Joe Buscaglia where breaks down the film.

 

Buscaglia’s resume involves working at a radio station and then as a sports writer. That’s it. Somehow they will take his word, over analysts at PFF who have been in the NFL or college football, and watch every snap of every game of every team.

 

Here's my issue with film, highlights, etc.  They're just that, HIGHlights.  To take a handful of plays out of the performance dossier of a player without looking at the particulars leads teams down the wrong path.  

 

It's easy to notice that some of these highlight videos of players on big school teams are often against schools in smaller divisions or even the FCS, the old D-IA.  As a scout, I'd be placing my biggest emphasis on how players did against their counterparts in college that will be playing in the NFL.  If we had done that with a bunch of our draftees over the years, Beane not excluded, I'm not sure we'd have drafted them as high or at all.  Zay Jones was just one of them.  

 

It's important to look at the circumstances too.  It reminds me of an SCTV skit that John Candy did years ago where he's playing hockey on some Canadian lake against a bunch of kids, knocking them all around and dominating.  LOL  

 

 

[gobills404]

https://spotify.link/fDXkeK03byb

 

The 14:00 mark of this podcast has a Cowboys podcaster doing a good assessment of the move. To summarize, he said that he looked ”dramatically” better at RG playing for an injured Zack Martin than he did playing at LG in 2022. This would allow Bates to move back to LG where he has said he’s more comfortable. McGovern can also play all 3 spots on the iOL just like Bates. He also said that he thinks McGovern’s style/skillset is better suited for the Bills offense than the Cowboys. Sounds like there’s a good chance McGovern could be an even better player in Buffalo than he was in Dallas.

Edited March 15, 2023 by gobills404

[Thurman#1]

4 minutes ago, starrymessenger said:

People familiar with the player are unanimous in saying that he is a well below average run blocker in any kind of power scheme such as they use in Dallas. Absolutely not a people mover. Based on (what little) tape I've seen of him I think he can be a satisfactory contributor zone blocking in a scheme that emphasizes speed, mobility, anthleticism  and resulting spread concepts. If, as I hope, we land a power back to complement what we've got in Cook and Hynes the bigger back can run behind Bates on the left side of the line. If given the scheme McGovern can grade out as average in the run game and well above average in pass pro the Bills will have done well in signing him. Interestingly when the Boys were looking for ways to use him he was very effective lining up as a H-back. Maybe he could be our short yardage specialist lol.

 

 

Yeah, wasn't that hilarious? Mosher, the guy Marino interviewed, said he was graded out as sensational at h-back and fullback. Said they'd used him that way around 100 snaps when they couldn't get him on the field any other way, even thrown him a few passes.

 

Also said that in Dallas, he'd been a lot better as an RG than an LG, but they're very much set at RG with a probably future HOFer there, so he only got used at RG when Zack Martin was injured. But that when playing there, McGovern was a lot better. 

 

Which is just perfect for the Bills, wanting to put Bates back at LG as that's his best spot.

[Einstein]

2 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Which is just perfect for the Bills, wanting to put Bates back at LG as that's his best spot.

 

Great point.

[Royale with Cheese]

1 minute ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

I don't know why the numbers are different.

 

But I'm not the one who claimed that PFF has major grading issues because they thought the Fitz game was a better perfromance than the Rodgers game. Even though they clearly didn't. Again, maybe they changed their numbering system. Dunno. But your attack there is based on a mistake. Clearly they did not rank those games that way. They very clearly have the Rodgers game as average and the Fitz game as historically bad.

 

 

 

I didn't use the word "better" performance.  I said they rated Rodgers lower than Fitz which they clearly did.  I also said that's where my problem lies and you clearly agreed.  

 

If there system is based on evaluating every play and grading it positive, negative and neutral.....Rodgers was graded to have more negatives in that game.

 

[Thurman#1]

3 hours ago, Einstein said:

 

Nailed it.

 

This is what cracks me up the most. The same posters who will crap on PFF, will also post or read articles by Joe Buscaglia where breaks down the film.

 

Buscaglia’s resume involves working at a radio station and then as a sports writer. That’s it. Somehow they will take his word, over analysts at PFF who have been in the NFL or college football, and watch every snap of every game of every team.

 

 

Yeah, where did you read that the analysts at PFF have been in the NFL or college football? 

 

They do interview people and find people who know football. But you're assuming they've played football with zero evidence. Everything I've seen says they don't require ex-players. Just people who know football and can pass their interview. They then get some training on the grading system, and then  And that's not a knock on them. PFF does an excellent job. Again, if they didn't the teams wouldn't pay them.

 

But they're 

 

And it's not like every PFF grader watches every game. There isn't time for that. Nowhere even slightly close.

 

You're right that watching every snap and every guy's performance on it is important to understand thoroughly player performance in any given game.. Joe does that, every guy on every snap in every Bills game. And he's been doing it for years.

 

He's very good. So are PFF. You can get plenty from both. Neither are perfect. If they disagree, you need to look at the film yourself and figure out which one is right, and further, compare what other film watchers are saying. Saying that PFF is right on an issue because they're PFF and Buscaglia is wrong because he's Buscaglia is simply a dumb ad hominem argument.

 

 

[BullBuchanan]

34 minutes ago, Royale with Cheese said:

 

Are TJ Lang, Eric Wood, Greg Cossell and the Kelce's "Johnny NFL Takes?"

Because they are saying the exact opposite.  I tend to believe them more than you.  It's just funny how you won't take their opinion into consideration at all but a PFF guy is "scientifically sound" in his evaluation.  WTF.

 

You completely misinterpreted that statement. I didn't slight any of the NFL players or personnel you mentioned but Eric Wood and Travis Kelce aren't professional football evaluators either. Both of them only played for one pro team and Kelce has been under the same coach in the same system his entire career. I don't expect him to understand the complete scope of the game when it's not his responsibility to know it. He's also one guy. One person's take doesn't prove or disprove anything. The specific quote of his that youc alled out is addressed diretcly by PFF, which I already sent you:

"The thing is that these PFF graders are grading off of what they think the play should be"

"Plays in which there is a clear question mark regarding assignment, we can defer to a “0” grade and not guess as to which player is right or wrong."

To expand, here's more context:

"These plays are few and far between and since we are grading every snap, missing out on a handful throughout the year should not affect player evaluations. Examples of potential gray areas include coverage busts, quarterback/wide receiver miscommunications and missed blocking assignments."

To summarize, the situation Kelce calls out exists, but is rare. when it exists, the play is not given a positive or negative grade.

You're trying to look like the smartest guy in the room on this without doing even the bare minimum of information gathering. Again, try reading up on a subject you want to debate: https://www.pff.com/grades

The fact that NFL players don't understand statistical analysis should not be surprising. There aren't a lot of NFL players qualified to be professionals in fields of Science, Technology, Engineering or Math, which are the types of people that build statistical models like this.

These guys apparently think it's impossible to know what their jobs are unless you're int he room with them, but once you start studying the game, you start to realize that football is a lot less of a mystery than it appears.

[Einstein]

7 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

Yeah, where did you read that the analysts at PFF have been in the NFL or college football? 

 

There are lots of former players or coaches work at PFF. Including Andrew Berry (former NFL player), Bruce Gradkowski (former NFL player), Mike Johnson (former NFL linemen), Steve Palazzolo (former UNH coach), Jeff Dooley (former RI coach), Mike Renner (former college linemen), Eric Eager (former coach at MU), George Chahrouri (former coach at Harvard), Ben Linsey (former college linemen), Anthony Treash (former AZ db), Andrew Erickson (former college WR), etc.

 

These people are typically Level 2 and 3 (verification of what level 1 thinks).

[Royale with Cheese]

6 minutes ago, BullBuchanan said:

You completely misinterpreted that statement. I didn't slight any of the NFL players or personnel you mentioned but Eric Wood and Travis Kelce aren't professional football evaluators either. Both of them only played for one pro team and Kelce has been under the same coach in the same system his entire career. I don't expect him to understand the complete scope of the game when it's not his responsibility to know it. He's also one guy. One person's take doesn't prove or disprove anything. The specific quote of his that youc alled out is addressed diretcly by PFF, which I already sent you:

"The thing is that these PFF graders are grading off of what they think the play should be"

"Plays in which there is a clear question mark regarding assignment, we can defer to a “0” grade and not guess as to which player is right or wrong."
To expand, here's more context:

"These plays are few and far between and since we are grading every snap, missing out on a handful throughout the year should not affect player evaluations. Examples of potential gray areas include coverage busts, quarterback/wide receiver miscommunications and missed blocking assignments."

To summarize, the situation Kelce calls out exists, but is rare. when it exists, the play is not given a positive or negative grade.

You're trying to look like the smartest guy in the room on this without doing even the bare minimum of information gathering. Again, try reading up on a subject you want to debate: https://www.pff.com/grades

The fact that NFL players don't understand statistical analysis should not be surprising. There aren't a lot of NFL players qualified to be professionals in fields of Science, Technology, Engineering or Math, which are the types of people that build statistical models like this.

These guys apparently think it's impossible to know what their jobs are unless you're int he room with them, but once you start studying the game, you start to realize that football is a lot less of a mystery than it appears.