Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Cleveland Browns Shadow Offseason: The Head Coaching Search


How a football team is run starts with the head coach. More so than other sports, like baseball and basketball, football head coaches have autonomous control over in-game strategy and outcomes, and in some cases even more operations-based tasks such as player acquisition and roster control. Knowing that, it’s extremely important for a team to thoroughly vet each candidate and find the one that most fits what they are trying to do.


And I mean that on a philosophical level. You need to find the guy that fits the philosophy and identity of the organization. For example, with the real life Cleveland Browns new-age front office shakeup, in my opinion, it would be a horrible idea for them to sign an “old-school” head coach. Guys like Mike Singletary need not apply. They need to find a head coach that will not only be accepting of their philosophy, but they must EMBRACE it. The reverse also applies. An innovative head coach with radical ideas on how to run an organization will butt heads with a front office and ownership that is used to old school football traditions. We saw that happen this past season with Chip Kelly and the Eagles.


In my search for a head coach, I wanted to start by looking at the numbers. I set out to find what were the most effective signs of a successful head coach, and go from there. I built two logistic models, based on a decade of head coaching hires to predict the percent chance of that coach accomplishing two things: (1) Chance of having a season with a win percentage of at least 0.500 within 4 years of being hired, and (2) Chance of making the playoffs within 4 years of being hired. I tested many variables such as total years of coaching experience, age, and what side of the ball they previously coached (offense vs defense). None of these variables had any statistical significance. However, there were two that did: previous head coaching experience and percentile rank in yards per play on their side of the ball (either offense or defense). Previous head coaching experience actually had a negative correlation, meaning that retreads more often than not did not end up working out. Keep in mind that this is just an interesting thing to look at, and is not the end all, be all of the search.


I took a list of the rumored head coaching candidates, and used the model to make some predictions:


Name
Team
Position
0.500 Chance
Playoffs Chance
Harold Goodwin
Arizona Cardinals
OC
88.02%
68.47%
Sean McDermott
Carolina Panthers
DC
87.31%
67.09%
Darrell Bevell
Seattle Seahawks
OC
84.96%
62.75%
Matt Patricia
New England Patriots
DC
83.22%
59.76%
Greg Roman
Buffalo Bills
OC
82.26%
58.19%
Ben McAdoo
New York Giants
OC
88.81%
56.65%
Dirk Koetter
Tampa Bay Bucs
OC
45.98%
47.58%
Hue Jackson
Cincinnati Bengals
OC
39.56%
41.32%
Tom Coughlin
New York Giants
HC
36.44%
38.26%
Adam Gase
Chicago Bears
OC
78.31%
37.90%
Chip Kelly
Philadelphia Eagles
HC
17.64%
19.29%


This year looks like an excellent year for head coaching candidates. Just on this list, the model has 6 candidates that have a better than 50% of making the playoffs within 4 years of being hired. Not too shabby. As you can see, retreads like Hue Jackson, Tom Coughlin, and Chip Kelly all struggle. I think that Hue Jackson has a pretty good chance of beating those odds though, just because he probably should not have been fired by Oakland after a solid 8-8 season.


Before we narrow down the search, let me outline what I want from my head coach. For starters, I want a head coach to be, above all else, the leader for the entire coaching staff. He (or she) needs to be able to oversee all phases of coaching and ensure that they are all being held to a high standard. This includes game preparation and player development. That does not, however, include absolute power on player acquisition. I don’t want my coach concerned with finding the “best fits” for his scheme, but rather collaborating with his coaching staff to construct a scheme that fits the players that the front office provides them. The head coach will still assist the general manager and front office in the offseason with potential draft picks, but will have no absolute power involving the draft.
My criteria for a potential head coach basically comes down to three qualities: innovative, collaborative, and confident. Obviously, with my analytics-heavy philosophy, I would want them to embrace that as well. They need to be able to work with their staff to create a scheme and strategy that fits the roster, all while being the symbol for success of the organization. And that last part is very important. The head coach needs to convey to the players, staff, and public that this organization will be successful no matter the circumstances, even if things don’t seem that way. Success is the standard, not the goal.


When it comes to football specific things I look for, I want them to focus on passing on both sides of the ball. I’m not saying eliminate the running game, but it needs to be limited in its use on offense. It’s much less efficient than passing the ball, and that’s why the league has been becoming more and more pass heavy as time goes on. The same goes for the defense. Other than that, I don’t have much of a preference. Whether it’s a west coast system, spread option, or down field vertical passing scheme doesn’t really matter to me. The talent on the team should have a significant impact on those kinds of decisions.


With that in mind, let’s take a look at my top three candidates:


Matt Patricia
Defensive Coordinator, New England Patriots





The mountain man-looking Matt Patricia has been an emerging candidate recently, getting some interest from the real life Cleveland Browns before they went ahead and hired Hue Jackson. A former offensive lineman from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Patricia has coached on both sides of the ball in his journey to defensive coordinator for the Patriots. He’s done a great job as coordinator, improving the defense’s yards allowed per play each year from 24th best in the league in 2012 to 7th best this season. Maybe the most interesting thing about him is that he majored in aeronautical engineering while in college. One could reasonably conclude that based on that background along with working with the Patriots would make him open to more analytical football decision making.


In the end, Patricia ends up as number three on the list because I just can’t find out enough about his personality or coaching style. The Patriots have pretty strict rules about their coordinators talking with the media, meaning there is next to nothing I can find about him. There are very few interviews of his out there on the internet, and even when there is he doesn’t reveal much (in typical patriot fashion).


Sean McDermott
Defensive Coordinator, Carolina Panthers





Like Patricia, McDermott is a guy that has massively improved Carolina’s defense since he took the reins in 2011. They went from 30th in yards allowed per play to 2nd in 2015. Specifically, I like that he has done a lot without much. He took young, raw players like Josh Norman and Kawann Short and turned them into superstars. He knows how to work with what he has and develop what he has.


Harold Goodwin
Offensive Coordinator, Arizona Cardinals





I love Harold Goodwin. He would be my top choice. Goodwin was a long time offensive line coach for the Steelers, who followed Bruce Arians to his stops at Indianapolis and Arizona. The offense yards per play went from dead last in 2012 when they got there, to the best in 2016. A lot of that has to do with Bruce Arians’ influence on the offense and acquiring quarterback Carson Palmer, but Goodwin was a co-architect in this beast of an offense.


When you watch interviews and videos of Goodwin, you can instantly see how smart he is at teaching. Here, you can see him coaching up guys at OTAs back in June. He can easily communicate technique to has players, and that’s paid dividends for Arizona’s once shoddy offensive line. In interviews, he talks a lot about efficiency, which jives with the philosophy that I bring to a team. Efficiency should be a focus for any team.


One concern some may have is that Goodwin didn’t call the plays for the Cardinals, a job that Arians took. I’m not all that concerned about that. I want the head coach to act as more of a “big picture” leader, and I think that play calling can get in the way of that. I would actually prefer that the coordinators be the ones calling the plays, so that the head coach can be focused on the team as a whole.

Thursday, January 7, 2016

Cleveland Browns Shadow Offseason: QB Roster Breakdown



An NFL roster lives and dies by the quarterback. No other position affects the game the way a quarterback does and no other position correlates to winning as much as the quarterback. The importance on passing efficiency demands that NFL teams do their best to acquire the best talent possible at quarterback. For that reason, our roster breakdown will begin there.


Recently, the Browns as a team have failed as an organization to bring in good quarterback talent. It’s a far cry from the days of Otto Graham. Since 1999, the Browns have trotted out 24 different starting quarterbacks. There was hope with Johnny Manziel but between poor performance on the field and drama off the field, it seems like Johnny Football’s days in Cleveland are numbered.


To begin my analysis of Manziel, I think it’s important to look at his college resume. He’s been in the NFL for 2 years now but he’s only had around 200 passes making him still somewhat of an unknown quantity. Coming out of college, Manziel failed my quarterback benchmark metric test, having a INT index of -0.323. If you haven’t read about my quarterback benchmark test, you can read about it here. Basically, if a quarterback prospect fails any of the benchmarks, their chances of success in the league drastically drop.


Looking into the early returns of Manziel’s NFL career, they are not promising. Let’s take a look at a blind chart of three first round quarterbacks in their first 2 years in league:


Name
Cmp%+
Y/A+
TD%+
INT%+
QB 1
79
87
83
104
QB 2
76
90
93
103
QB 3
82
89
78
89


These numbers are era-adjusted indexes for each passing stat in each column, making it easier to compare players over the course of time. A number of 100 equates to league average production. You can find all of these numbers for every player over at pro-football-reference.com, an excellent stat resource.


So, all these guys look pretty close, right? Quarterback number 1 is Johnny Manziel, quarterback number 2 is Jamarcus Russell, and quarterback number 3 is David Carr. Not great company. With the exception of interception percentage, Johnny was below league average in every measure of quarterback play, including the ones that aren’t shown on this chart.  By all accounts, Manziel’s play on the field statistically has been shaky at best, disastrous at worst.


When comparing his tape in the NFL to what he put out in college, you also see him repeating the same exact mistakes that he was making then. His footwork is still erratic, he still holds the ball like a loaf of bread when scrambling, and has a tendency to lock onto receivers. He just hasn’t progressed past where he was two years ago. Whether the blame should be placed on Manziel himself or the chaotic situation around him is irrelevant. The fact remains that time is running out. There have been some bright spots, but they have been few and far between.


All of these warning signs are not even considering the off the field issues. I’m not going to claim to have any insider information on this, but it’s not good. It comes down to reliability. There is no capacity to be able to trust Johnny with fully taking the job seriously. This seems to be supported with his lack of technical progression on the field. For these reasons, we have to go into this offseason assuming that we need a new quarterback.


Moving onto the other quarterbacks on the roster, Josh McCown could be a candidate to start next year, if we’re unable to find someone to replace Manziel. Ignoring his pretty awful year in Tampa Bay, his stints in Chicago and Cleveland have been nothing short of remarkable. He’s getting up there in age, turning 37 in July, but may yet have one more year in him. I’d prefer to keep him as a backup, but could play for us if emergency strikes.


Austin Davis and Connor Shaw are interesting options for the 3rd QB spot. Davis has
underrated arm strength, hitting a 58 mph ball at the combine in 2012. Davis has had flashes of potential in St. Louis, but has looked dreadful this year. Connor Shaw was pushed into playing as a rookie, and did as well as he could have hoped. He’s actually a pretty good athlete, running a 4.66 40 time with a 7.07 three cone at 206 pounds. I expect these guys to come into camp and compete for the 3rd, with the loser being cut.


CONCLUSION:

This has to be the biggest position of concern for the Browns. They desperately need a franchise quarterback that they’ve lacked for so many years. Luckily for them, I see plenty of potential options to go with. In free agency, there are intriguing reclamation projects such as Colin Kaepernick and Robert Griffin III expected to be available. In the draft, there are a whopping 7 prospects that pass my quarterback benchmark test. At this point, I fully expect to be taking a QB at the 2nd overall pick. When you have a pick that high with very good QB prospects available, you have to take a chance on one of them. The question, however, is which one? I’ll investigate that further in another blog post, coming soon.

Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Cleveland Browns Shadow Offseason: The Beginning....



Over the past week, there has been a lot of organizational change within the Browns which has intrigued other teams around the league and football fans everywhere. The Browns have seemingly made a concerted effort to integrate analytics and statistical analysis into their decision making process by promoting Sashi Brown to VP of football operations and hiring Paul Depodesta of Moneyball fame as their chief strategy officer. While I’d argue that they are definitely not the team to do this (New England was first, Jacksonville more recently), it’s rare to see analytics put this much into the forefront of a team’s organizational structure. It’s a move that received a lot of blowback from football traditionalists, but the football analytics community has to be excited to see a team that is truly trying to add analytics into their decision making process in a meaningful way. I know that I am.

For the draft season this year, I wanted to do a ‘shadow offseason’ with a team that of my choosing. With their recent front office changes, I can’t think of a better team to apply my philosophy to than the Cleveland Browns.

A  ‘shadow offseason’ will be my modified version of a ‘shadow draft’. A shadow draft is exactly what it sounds like, you (the player) make picks for whatever team you decide to draft for and see how you do in comparison. I’ve seen this done more so in the baseball community, but there are a few people that do NFL ones. I’m expanding to an ‘offseason’ where I select my head coach and sign players for free agency.

First thing that I will be focusing on will be breaking down the roster and finding where the areas of focus should be. I’ll be going most in depth with the quarterbacks(as you may have been able to guess), but I’ll have an article for every position group. These should all be finished by March, so that I can prepare offers for free agents.

On the head coaching search, I’ll just be listing some candidates and giving my reasoning for each. It’s impossible to say whether or not any of them would actually take the job, but it’s an interesting topic that I’d like to write a little about.

Getting into free agency, I’ll be doing different articles on each position group and including ‘formal’ offers to each player that I want to potentially sign. To simplify things, I will be doing only the length of the contract and guaranteed money for that contract. I’ll determine whether I signed the player by comparing the actual guaranteed AAV to what I offered. It’s simple, and isn’t 100% accurate to real life, but I want to have some way of simulating free agency and maneuvering with the salary cap.

Finally, leading up to the draft I will be posting my scouting articles that I’ve been doing for the past few years. For the full breakdowns, I’ll be focusing on guys that I’ll likely want to draft when I’m on the clock. However, I will still push out my model projections, filter results, positional rankings, and big board for every player on my radar even if they don’t get the full breakdown treatment.