The Miami Dolphins' Problems with Sacks: Is the Culprit Ryan Tannehill?

[FinfanInBuffalo]

So you noticed that they said "only" 37% of throws have come in less than 2.3 seconds, despite the fact that 37% is more than a third of them, and that they said nothing at all about how quickly Tannehill moved in response to pressure?

They said "only" because 63% of passes are thrown in more than 2.3 seconds. Tannehill faced pressure (on average) a full half second before the average pass is thrown.

And you're claiming it's the OL because Tannehill is experiencing a different kind of pressure than other QBs in the video, whereas the video tells us nothing about what other QBs experience. I on the other hand am claiming nothing on the basis of the video.

No. I'm claiming that Tannehill was not at fault for a majority of the sacks based on watching the games and the video. You wondered why Tannehill is sacked more often despite not being pressured on a greater % of his throws. I merely offered the space provided to throw (along with many, many other potential factors) as a possible explanation based on my knowledge of football. Fortunately for me, the video supports my suggestion with visual evidence.

You, OTH, dismiss visual evidence in favor of data that you admit does include most of the factors involved in a sack.

 

[tazthenomad]

I'm willing to learn anything I don't already know. What problems are you seeing with the process specifically? My understanding is that I'm using frequencies of events (e.g., pressures, sacks on pressures) as the key variables here.

I appreciate your openness to learning and I'm sorry but this I don't have the time to do this from scratch and I'm sure no one else in the forum wants to hear about this kind of thing. In summary, I would suggest that you go to a library (or you may even have a book or two on this already) and look at this like like a manufacturing process. When they are analyzing variation within a process and the "what went wrong" events that are outside the process norm - they don't compare averages. They put the data in a time-based sequence and look at "special causes" for those events. This involves gathering data on those events exclusively. Including the general numbers in the special event data (sacks in this case) only obscures the special causes.

 

[Atila]

I'm just curious, shouright - do you actually think our OL is average or better? Is that why you are arguing so vehemently?

 

[Phindog]

I'm just curious, shouright - do you actually think our OL is average or better? Is that why you are arguing so vehemently?

No he thinks Tannehill is below average,thinks Tannehill is 70% of the problem behind all the sacks.

 

[Shouright]

No. I'm claiming that Tannehill was not at fault for a majority of the sacks based on watching the games and the video. You wondered why Tannehill is sacked more often despite not being pressured on a greater % of his throws. I merely offered the space provided to throw (along with many, many other potential factors) as a possible explanation based on my knowledge of football. Fortunately for me, the video supports my suggestion with visual evidence.

But again, the visual evidence doesn't necessarily support your suggestion, because we still don't know on the basis of the visual evidence alone whether Tannehill has any less space to throw than the average QB, and we don't know whether his smaller space to throw (if present in comparison to other QBs' spaces to throw) is a product of his lack of sooner movement during plays in which he's sacked.

In other words, this theoretical construct of yours may not distinguish Tannehill's experience of the pass rush from that of other QBs (again, the video doesn't tell us), and even if it does, it still may in fact reflect Tannehill's inability or unwillingness to move sooner in response to the pass rush. He may not be creating enough space for himself early enough in the play, on some of the plays in which he's sacked, and that may in fact be why his number of sacks is so astronomically high.

Again, only a league-wide comparison can tell us with any certainty. You may be right, or not.

 

[Shouright]

I appreciate your openness to learning and I'm sorry but this I don't have the time to do this from scratch and I'm sure no one else in the forum wants to hear about this kind of thing. In summary, I would suggest that you go to a library (or you may even have a book or two on this already) and look at this like like a manufacturing process. When they are analyzing variation within a process and the "what went wrong" events that are outside the process norm - they don't compare averages. They put the data in a time-based sequence and look at "special causes" for those events. This involves gathering data on those events exclusively. Including the general numbers in the special event data (sacks in this case) only obscures the special causes.

What if they're simply looking at how often something "went wrong" in comparison to other manufacturing plants? Would they then not look at frequencies as I did in the original post? Frequencies of sacks in comparison to the average team? Frequencies of pressures in comparison to the average team? Would this not be the same as looking at how often something "went wrong" in the manufacturing plant, if in fact what we're interested in is how often that happens in that plant in comparison to other plants?

And that at that point we're indeed looking at deviation from the norm (or the average). How much does plant X (the Dolphins) deviate from the average plant (the league average), in terms of how frequently it screws up.

 

[Shouright]

I'm just curious, shouright - do you actually think our OL is average or better? Is that why you are arguing so vehemently?

I think it's awfully easy to pin the blame on an area of the team we're not so interested in seeing succeed (compared to Tannehill), when the evidence we're using is based largely on what we're seeing in the Dolphins alone.

I think when you see a quarterback get sacked, the knee-jerk response is to think his offensive line let him down. Now, combine that knee-jerk response with the fact that we desperately want to see the quarterback succeed so we can believe we've finally found the one we need, and now what kind of knee-jerk response might one have?

When a QB moves successfully, avoids the pass rush, and makes a throw, even if it's a throw-away, the result of the play is much less likely to make us think the offensive line sucks, even though the quarterback might have been pressured no differently initially than on most plays in which he's sacked. And this is what the stats say, really, that Ryan Tannehill is pressured no more often than the average QB, yet he's sacked astronomically more often than the average QB when he's pressured.

Again, take a look at the play that starts at 3:20 here and see what immediate, successful movement can do on a play in which another QB might have been sacked:

[video=youtube;0zPAnyM0yO4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zPAnyM0yO4[/video]

Now, if he had taken longer to move, or moved more slowly, and been sacked, and that happened time and time again, how much would you think his offensive line sucked? If on the other hand he moved successfully a large percentage of the time, and made similarly successful plays out of it a large percentage of the time, how much less would you think his line sucked, even though the pressure the line was surrendering might be no different?

And as it turns out, though it's just one example, Russell Wilson is actually pressured 13% more of the time he drops back to pass than Ryan Tannehill, yet he's sacked 15% less of the time when he's pressured. His offensive line is allowing more frequent pressure than Tannehill's, yet he's being sacked a great deal less often on those pressures.

Now, does he have less "space to throw" than Tannehill on a regular basis, or might there be some other explanation exclusive to the Dolphins? Perhaps, but we sure can't determine that from a video of Ryan Tannehill's sacks alone. We're not seeing 1) plays in which he's perhaps similarly pressured but isn't sacked, or 2) plays in which other QBs are sacked.

 

[EricCartman]

this thread is really pathetic, it is like watching someone talking to a wall: you just don't care about any answers they gave you

the only reaction is

peace out

 

[KTOWNFINFAN]

this thread is really pathetic, it is like watching someone talking to a wall: you just don't care about any answers they gave you

the only reaction is

peace out

That is so completely backwards. He is giving reasons with data to back it up, while others are dreaming up stuff to ignore the obvious. The problem might be fixable, but we can't even BEGIN to try and fix it if we aren't honest about it's origins. One thing the stats SCREAM, and anyone who watches with an open mind can see, is that even if Ryan had the best OL in football, he would still have a big problem of giving up too many sacks.

Ryan is still really young, and has some good QBs coaches around him. QBing at the NFL level takes time. Brees started out rather slow as well, as did Manning. Lets give him some time at getting used to how much time he really does have and see if it doesn't begin to get better. But while we wait lets don't start acting like the jets with Sanchez, burying our heads in the sand and ignoring the obvious. I can't imagine anyone on this board saying Ryan is good enough at pocket presence. He has to get better to become elite. He does a lot of things really well but he takes WAAAAY too many sacks that are his fault. Our OL and backs are not great at pass blocking, but they are not the reason we lead the league in sacks.

We all knew coming out that he was going to be raw in certain areas. He is getting better but lets not make excuses either. Last year Ireland was a bum for not giving Ryan a chance because he didn't have any WRs to throw to. This year it is the OL, next year the cheerleaders won't be cheering loud enough. Ryan is a special player with a few rough spots that still have to be ironed out. Be patient, he will get there. He works too hard not to.

 

[dlockz]

The line is one of the worst pass blocking units in the league coupled wth all around bad pass blocking from backs and TE's. If the data showed he had more time to pass than other qb's u could make a case he is the one to blame but his pass protection time is among the shortest in the league.

 

[FinfanInBuffalo]

Again, take a look at the play that starts at 3:20 here and see what immediate, successful movement can do on a play in which another QB might have been sacked:.

Compare that play to the Tannehill completion on 4th down against the Ravens. On those plays, both QBs had room to move and both avoided the sack. And take a look at the 2 sack/fumbles by Wilson against the Cardinals. Both occurred after 3 or 4 seconds of protection. He had time and room to avoid sacks on both and didn't do it. Several posters and at least one sports writer have reviewed the sacks and give Tannehill the majority of the blame for 6 of the 24. That does not seem inordinately high to me. I saw Wilson do it twice on Thursday.

Now, does he have less "space to throw" than Tannehill on a regular basis, or might there be some other explanation exclusive to the Dolphins?

Guess what? You don't know and therefore cannot reach a valid conclusion. There is insufficient data to make the conclusion you are attempting to make.

One final point, you keep claiming that Tannehill could have avoided some (most? all?) of the sacks. The real question is "Should he?". I don't expect you to understand this but asking Tannehill to solve the problem on those sacks where pressure was quick and from multiple rushers (check the video, they happened) would take away from his ability to stand in the pocket and deliver passes. He would need to be making decisions to not throw sooner than he should and that would not necessarily be good.

BTW, why are there only 18 QBs in the data in your original post? The data is obviously incomplete. You are missing data for many QBs that have thrown almost all their team's passes this year, including: Wilson, Luck, Roethlisberger, Kaepernick, and others. What gives?

 

[Shouright]

Compare that play to the Tannehill completion on 4th down against the Ravens. On those plays, both QBs had room to move and both avoided the sack. And take a look at the 2 sack/fumbles by Wilson against the Cardinals. Both occurred after 3 or 4 seconds of protection. He had time and room to avoid sacks on both and didn't do it. Several posters and at least one sports writer have reviewed the sacks and give Tannehill the majority of the blame for 6 of the 24. That does not seem inordinately high to me. I saw Wilson do it twice on Thursday.

That's entirely possible, so what we need is an objective, systematic, league-wide study of "space and movement." The video of course doesn't provide that.

Guess what? You don't know and therefore cannot reach a valid conclusion. There is insufficient data to make the conclusion you are attempting to make.

I've made a conclusion that in my opinion is supported by the data, and I've acknowledged there are other conclusions that could also be supported by the data (such as yours). What I won't acknowledge on the other hand, is that the video provides the evidence to adjudicate the issue either way.

One final point, you keep claiming that Tannehill could have avoided some (most? all?) of the sacks. The real question is "Should he?". I don't expect you to understand this but asking Tannehill to solve the problem on those sacks where pressure was quick and from multiple rushers (check the video, they happened) would take away from his ability to stand in the pocket and deliver passes. He would need to be making decisions to not throw sooner than he should and that would not necessarily be good.

It's a good question, and I suspect it's one the coaches might be struggling with as well right now. Are they ready to blow a playoff possibility this season to further Ryan Tannehill's development as a pocket passer, or are they going to let him use some of the skills he has that are a lot more like the ones we're seeing from Russell Wilson in these videos.

BTW, why are there only 18 QBs in the data in your original post? The data is obviously incomplete. You are missing data for many QBs that have thrown almost all their team's passes this year, including: Wilson, Luck, Roethlisberger, Kaepernick, and others. What gives?

I noticed that, and unfortunately I can't answer the question. When you default the PFF data to "75%" (which supposedly means QBs who have taken 75% of their team's snaps, and which I thought would eliminate backup QBs completely), it removes the QBs you mentioned. I guess that's some kind of glitch on their part, I don't know.

 

[2413fanphins]

this is the worst thread I have ever come across in the history of all my years on finheaven.

I've seen a lot of threads. I've seen a lot of 1 star threads from this same O.P.

this is a trainwreck.

what a waste of bandwidth and money.

 

[Shouright]

this is the worst thread I have ever come across in the history of all my years on finheaven.

I've seen a lot of threads. I've seen a lot of 1 star threads from this same O.P.

this is a trainwreck.

what a waste of bandwidth and money.

Well I appreciate your bumping it up to the top of the list of threads, because I believe the discussion's been quite good, and perhaps its visibility at the top of the list will attract members who can make a contribution much better than yours. :up:

 

[finjim]

The line is one of the worst pass blocking units in the league coupled wth all around bad pass blocking from backs and TE's. If the data showed he had more time to pass than other qb's u could make a case he is the one to blame but his pass protection time is among the shortest in the league.

When I give thumbs up to Dlockz, Shouwrong has to know something is terribly wrong this thread, but I doubt he will figure it out.