This isn’t the NBA, you can find with regularity impact players throughout the first, particularly in the top 15-20.
Had he literally taken best player available with his first and second rounders in most of those drafts he'd have gotten better players than a lot of these picks. Why is that hard to acknowledge? We said the same with Sweeney in the Bruins forum. Whether it's Bill getting cute or whatever his reason, the consensus has been better than him with early rounders for the most part. This year Jones and Barmore were kinda right there with consensus. Kraft commented there was a change in the process. I don't know what it was, but it wasn't taking Ras-I Dowling and Tavon Wilson and JoeJuan Williams and Duke Dawson and getting nothing with second rounders. Everyone misses, Bill misses an awful lot, even if those picks aren't top 10. I don't think this is really arguable, the question is more can past history predict future performance.
Yes, everyone misses. That's the point. One can criticize him all they want but where is the evidence that Belichick misses because he's trying to prove he's smarter than Mel Kiper??? IMO, that is just a lazy narrative. No team follows the "consensus" not that there really even is one single consensus especially once you get past the first half of the first round.
Thanks for this.
That's certainly my concern. I know when predicting prospects every year SMU crosses a bunch of guys off the list at LB because Bill won't take anyone that light.
This seems like a really odd play to take a stand on. Mac might have been able to read the rush and adjust the line if his veteran former 1st rd pick WR had a clue as to where to line up and where to go on the play. Tough to make any line adjustments when you literally have to put the WR in motion, he also can't count on him to run his route so that is one passing option immediately eliminated. I think when they go over this play in film session the critique ends with Harry and they either suggest burning a TO in that situation or congratulate Mac for not taking a delay of game or sack or turning it over. Would TB12 have done anything differently in this situation? Perhaps he would have burnt the final TO of the game then but I think he probably would have taken the incompletion as well, something we saw him do many, many times in his final season.
It's a minor thing, I just noticed it since the play was posted.
Agreed I always cringe when I hear "Player X isn't a Team Y type player" to me any player that helps you win games should be your type of player. Trying to fit a round peg into a square hole rarely works. Sometimes you have to reform the hole to get the best out of the peg. See: Seguin, Tyler
I doubt Brady burns the team's final timeout.
You are criticizing a rookie QB because he came to the line, realized one of his receivers was out to lunch, got the play off and threw the ball away when his first read wasn't open.
And here you acknowledge that veteran Tom Brady might have thrown the ball away, before pivoting back to criticizing Jones for doing what you admit Brady might have done.
I mean I explained in the post you quoted the difference. I don't think I am the one not being objective here. There is a difference between taking the snap seeing what is happening and choosing to throw it away and taking the snap and immediately throwing it out. Man it is getting crazy in this forum with regards to any indication that you think Mac might have things to improve, or may have made a less than ideal play.
I think this is a bit exaggerated. Most teams want a mix of interior DL types to play situationally, including space eaters, and I don’t think the Pats are really an exception. Most of the interior DL the team has drafted high, including Barmore last spring, are more athletic guys with some perceived pass rush upside. We’ve just whiffed the pick on guys like brown and Easley. BB clearly has a preference for bigger LBs who will hold up against the run and wondering about that is fair game. But that also needs to be contextualized in that (like other teams) the team’s “base defense” at this point is really the nickel in which a safety is playing as the weak side LB so we’re really talking about two true LBs on the field and most teams will have at least one of them be a bigger guy. We also just drafted a 6’0 235 pound off ball linebacker (albeit in the fifth round) so that is one sign of being willing to consider a different physical profile.
Hey, I listed Mac as one of my 3 goats for yesterday (specifically for missing high on a couple of open slants, both of which should have been completed and one of which turned into a pick 6) so I think I am capable of criticizing him when it is due.
Also, as was noted earlier, every probability model is different, and often have significantly different outputs. The OT punt for example, had a big split between the 2 most used public models, one said it added WP to go for it, the swing was more than 10 percentage points I believe, the other didn't, which model you use would have a large effect on this as well.
It should be noted, these aren't +2 / +3% implying a 51/49 or 52/48 decision or whatever. It's saying you're going from, say, a 20% chance to a 22% or 23% chance of winning the game, which is pretty significant.
The difference of 2 or 3% is probably well within the error bounds of the models being used.
Another interpretation is that the input variables that aren't captured in the models and which he is leaning heavily on are essentially constants for this season. He simply doesn't trust his offense with its rookie QB, patchwork OL, and newcomer WR/TE group to execute in high-leverage "gotta have it" situations when the defense is going to bring its most exotic pressures or otherwise reach deepest into its bag of tricks. And overall he thinks he has a better defense than offense.
There were multiple examples of the Pats screwing up the end of the first half going back to 2014. I think that had a lasting impression in BB.
I get it, and I'm still saying that isn't nearly significant enough to be meaningful in making those decisions. You can feel that Belichick is systematically being too conservative, and you may be right. But these computer models don't prove that, or even close.
I'm very curious, what's your standard for significance here? What is it based off of?
I don't think the win probability models can say anything about any single decision to go for it or not. The coach may (and almost certainly does) have information that the But I do think they are informative when it comes to the trends. Belichick has become ultra conservative, very likely to the detriment of his team, is a fair conculsion to draw from the model. Belichick was wrong to (for example) kick the field goal against Tampa Bay is not fair.
Yes, I would agree with that.
I'm not sure. I think a lot of folks forget that when the Pats got the ball back with under two minutes or so in the first half, a huge percentage of the time, BB/Josh/whoever would call a draw play on first down. If that got stuffed, they'd get conservative. If it popped for a first down to get them some field position, they'd use a timeout, or if they got a first down, they'd go into the no-huddle. But that initial draw (or sometimes screen) play was the key to the entire series. If it didn't work, he didn't risk kicking it back to an opponent with over a minute left and half a field to work with.
FWIW, I don't believe this is accurate in at least one of the cases (EdjSports? Sorry, can't remember). The model is more sophisticated than simply taking context-independent averages.
They have the 10th oldest roster in football and just spent the most guaranteed money ever in a single offseason. If they go 7-10 with a rookie QB that's performing as well as you could reasonably expect in the "not costing you games" front, that's not good by any definition.
I'm not willing to call the FA class a miss yet. Judon is a home run. Agholor has been disappointing but Bourne and Hunter have shown as much as you can reasonably expect given the O Line problems. Jury is out on Smith, given that he's been stuck blocking most of the time (not his strength, but necessary for now). Godchaux was a lesser signing but has been a mixed bag. Feels very much like an incomplete grade overall at this point.
It really isn't good. 9-8 would be good.
Is he? He had one year as that guy and even then his production was inflated by a lot of broken play long balls. I have a lot of doubts over his ability to produce as an outside receiver.
It was the first year anyone tried it to be fair. And that's how big play WRs are. I mean, Agholor gets better throws on a couple long balls where he was open for a TD this year, maybe hangs onto that slant for 20+ yards, he's probably sitting at 350+ yards an 3 TDs through 6 games. Not amazing, but in the Woods/Claypool level of year this season. He's not a true #1, but he's gonna get open deep 2 or 3 times every couple weeks, with the Raiders they hit most of those, here we've missed them.
He still had only 800 yards and a terrible catching percentage. I don't know, I just never saw what they thought they were getting with Agholor. 2004 David Patten maybe? Still not the guy I'd give that money to.
Almsot 900 yards. He was 29th in the league in yards and tied for 15th in TDs. Other guys in the general area... Robert Woods, Dionte Johnson, Tee Higgins, CeeDee Lamb, Chase Claypool... he was really good last year. And what they thought they were getting was a legitimate field stretcher, something the Patriots haven't had in quite a while.
