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Cake day: October 16th, 2023

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  • I’m a broken record on this subject, but TJ Hockenson is heavily overrated because he gets tons of targets and thus puts up impressive counting stats. But his targets are inefficient compared to the elite receiving tight ends. He gets a lot of empty catches and yards; screens that gain one yard, dumpoffs that gain 6 yards on 3rd/10, etc.

    Even after his big game this week, he’s 13th in TE DYAR, and 19th in DVOA. He’s not an all-pro level player.


  • While I applaud the effort that went into this post, the stats you chose to use are… not great.

    QB rating is a bad stat, for a variety of reasons. Adjusting it by removing spikes is good, but that’s a very minor improvement to a bad stat. Removing knocked down passes and throwaways is bizarre, and might make the stat worse, not better.

    On target percentage / bad throw percentage are useful, but come with the caveat that they aren’t adjusted for throw difficulty. QBs who throw a lot of checkdowns will do well in these stats, but poorly in actual performance. This is also one of the reasons why QB rating is bad; it rewards QBs for completing a lot of short, inefficient passes.

    Separating YAC from QB performance is also very difficult to do statistically, and really requires game charting and/or individual grading (eg PFF) to be done properly. Does the QB deserve credit for a WR who breaks 3 tackles and takes a quick slant 60 yards to the house? No. But does the QB deserve credit for a perfectly placed post that the WR catches in stride and houses? Yes.

    At the end of the day, you’d be better off doing this with some combination of EPA, DVOA, ANY/A, and PFF grades. All of these are better than what you’re using. And yes, PFF grades are surprisingly good; this is coming from someone that used to slam their methodology. You can read more about the value of various QB statistics here.

    Note: when I say a stat is “better” or “worse”, I mean a higher/lower correlation with winning, and/or points scored, and/or future performance.