Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - Printable Version
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RE: Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - msqueri - 04-29-2022
There is no doubt Stanford's OL play the last five years has massively deteriorated compared to the OL play from the previous five years (the previous nearly ten years actually). Definitely a really, really big part of the story of Stanford's decline in recent years. I wouldn't argue if one said it was the biggest. It's probably that and the deterioration of the defense generally.
But when I say Stanford's OL was good to slightly sub-par in run blocking three of the last five years, I am trying to be empirical. I pointed out the line yards stat earlier and my reference was to how we ranked in run blocking in three of the last five years. For those not familiar, this is a Football Outsiders advanced metric for run blocking. Offensive line is notoriously difficult for fans to evaluate, as the untrained eye will usually focus on the ball and have difficulty disaggregating the individual performances to assess who played well or poorly on a given play. That is why I appreciate having more objective metrics provided by Football Outsiders and Pro Football Focus.
In my judgment, the metrics by those outfits pretty clearly reinforce the narrative we've built based on our naked eyes that Stanford's OL play has deteriorated over the last five years compared to prior. Here are the Line Yards rankings (again, a run blocking metric) for every Pac-12 team each year Gould has been on staff (numbers correspond to years working backward, so 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017):
Arizona - 72, 70, 37, 26, 30
Arizona State - 3, 2, 86, 63, 66
Cal - 6, 69, 76, 29, 115
Colorado - 106, 101, 25, 116, 70
Oregon - 2, 37, 52, 64, 20
Oregon State - 1, 7, 36, 119, 120
Stanford - 126, 23, 58, 114, 74
UCLA - 10, 39, 65, 56, 105
USC - 38, 109, 100, 100, 38
Utah - 21, 79, 31, 47, 92
Washington - 92, 63, 41, 66, 33
Washington State - 95, 52, 30, 94, 28
This allows a rough run blocking ranking across the Pac-12 for this span (I provide both average and median by rank based on median):
1. Oregon - 35 average, 37 median
2. Arizona - 47 average, 37 median
3. Oregon State - 56.6 average, 36 median
4. Utah - 54 average, 47 median
5. Arizona State - 44 average, 63 median
6. UCLA - 55 average, 56 median
7. Washington State - 59.8 average, 52 median
8. Washington - 59 average, 63 median
9. Cal - 59 average, 69 median
10. Stanford - 79 average, 74 median
11. USC - 77 average, 100 median
12. Colorado - 83.6 average, 101 median
10th best in run blocking is, of course, really not good. Interestingly, this Football Outsiders judgment of our run blocking aligns very closely with our run game's statistical output - 10th or 11th in yards per career each of the last four years.
To complete this picture of how much blame to assign to OL versus running back, let's look at Pac-12 ranks in yards per carry the last five years. Using the same methodology as above, here are the 2017-2021 Pac-12 run game rankings:
Arizona - 100, 71, 50, 30, 1
Arizona State - 25, 2, 119, 41, 85
Cal - 33, 105, 113, 78, 108
Colorado - 107, 47, 80, 103, 102
Oregon - 13, 33, 38, 63, 19
Oregon State - 12, 16, 54, 97, 86
Stanford - 117, 77, 108, 112, 6
UCLA - 32, 25, 107, 83, 105
USC - 61, 114, 91, 87, 40
Utah - 2, 24, 43, 57, 81
Washington - 120, 56, 78, 65, 25
Washington State - 88, 44, 76, 117, 129
That renders the following rough run game rankings for this span:
1. Oregon - 33.2 average, 33 median
2. Utah - 41.4 average, 43 median
3. Arizona State - 54.4 average, 41 median
4. Arizona - 50.4 average, 50 median
5. Oregon State - 53 average, 54 average
6. Washington - 68.8 average, 65 median
7. UCLA - 70.4 average, 83 median
8. USC - 78.6 average, 87 median
9. Washington State - 90.8 average, 88 median
10. Colorado - 87.8 average, 102 median
11. Stanford - 84 average, 108 median
12. Cal - 87.4 average, 105 median
My attempts at ranking here try to account for both average and median for a full picture, but that's arbitrary. If I ranked by median, Stanford would be dead last.
Ultimately, I think the bottom line is that Stanford's run blocking has been bad (10th in the conference) and the overall run game has been, if anything, a bit worse, arguably the worst in the conference. This suggests failure by the offensive line and even worse failure by the running backs. Note how markedly better the Colorado and USC run games have been despite Football Outsiders judging their run blocking to be even worse than Stanford's.
Outside of the context of an idle message board debate, the real bottom line is what a Pac-12 assistant said in The Athletic article: Stanford can't run the ball worth a s!&@.
RE: lex24 - Goose - 04-29-2022
(04-29-2022, 12:28 PM)lex24 Wrote: Thanks for the clarification. I disagree on it being difficult to place the “blame”. When backs are consistently getting hit at or behind the line due to penetration from the d-line, there isn’t a whole lot they can do. And perhaps my recall is suspect- but I remember a ton of times when the back would get the handoff take one step and get plastered. Defensive line penetration destroys a running game.Agree. This did happen a lot, your recall is spot on. However, that one step can matter. It can mean that if you juke that guy the place he came from is wide open and you can run through it a very long way. Love did that a lot. He also got tackled a lot when he couldn't avoid the penetrating lineman. Asking a lot, I know, but that's why you are there. It happened in 2020 too (perhaps not as often), but that year it seemed to me Jones was better at making the first guy miss, and in 2021 he basically never did avoid the first man. Again, you shouldn't have to do so, but that was Stanford football at the time.
lex24 - lex24 - 04-29-2022
(04-29-2022, 12:34 PM)msqueri Wrote: There is no doubt Stanford's OL play the last five years has massively deteriorated compared to the OL play from the previous five years (the previous nearly ten years actually). Definitely a really, really big part of the story of Stanford's decline in recent years. I wouldn't argue if one said it was the biggest. It's probably that and the deterioration of the defense generally.
But when I say Stanford's OL was good to slightly sub-par in run blocking three of the last five years, I am trying to be empirical. I pointed out the line yards stat earlier and my reference was to how we ranked in run blocking in three of the last five years. For those not familiar, this is a Football Outsiders advanced metric for run blocking. Offensive line is notoriously difficult for fans to evaluate, as the untrained eye will usually focus on the ball and have difficulty disaggregating the individual performances to assess who played well or poorly on a given play. That is why I appreciate having more objective metrics provided by Football Outsiders and Pro Football Focus.
In my judgment, the metrics by those outfits pretty clearly reinforce the narrative we've built based on our naked eyes that Stanford's OL play has deteriorated over the last five years compared to prior. Here are the Line Yards rankings (again, a run blocking metric) for every Pac-12 team each year Gould has been on staff (numbers correspond to years working backward, so 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017):
Arizona - 72, 70, 37, 26, 30
Arizona State - 3, 2, 86, 63, 66
Cal - 6, 69, 76, 29, 115
Colorado - 106, 101, 25, 116, 70
Oregon - 2, 37, 52, 64, 20
Oregon State - 1, 7, 36, 119, 120
Stanford - 126, 23, 58, 114, 74
UCLA - 10, 39, 65, 56, 105
USC - 38, 109, 100, 100, 38
Utah - 21, 79, 31, 47, 92
Washington - 92, 63, 41, 66, 33
Washington State - 95, 52, 30, 94, 28
This allows a rough run blocking ranking across the Pac-12 for this span (I provide both average and median by rank based on median):
1. Oregon - 35 average, 37 median
2. Arizona - 47 average, 37 median
3. Oregon State - 56.6 average, 36 median
4. Utah - 54 average, 47 median
5. Arizona State - 44 average, 63 median
6. UCLA - 55 average, 56 median
7. Washington State - 59.8 average, 52 median
8. Washington - 59 average, 63 median
9. Cal - 59 average, 69 median
10. Stanford - 79 average, 74 median
11. USC - 77 average, 100 median
12. Colorado - 83.6 average, 101 median
10th best in run blocking is, of course, really not good. Interestingly, this Football Outsiders judgment of our run blocking aligns very closely with our run game's statistical output - 10th or 11th in yards per career each of the last four years.
To complete this picture of how much blame to assign to OL versus running back, let's look at Pac-12 ranks in yards per carry the last five years. Using the same methodology as above, here are the 2017-2021 Pac-12 run game rankings:
Arizona - 100, 71, 50, 30, 1
Arizona State - 25, 2, 119, 41, 85
Cal - 33, 105, 113, 78, 108
Colorado - 107, 47, 80, 103, 102
Oregon - 13, 33, 38, 63, 19
Oregon State - 12, 16, 54, 97, 86
Stanford - 117, 77, 108, 112, 6
UCLA - 32, 25, 107, 83, 105
USC - 61, 114, 91, 87, 40
Utah - 2, 24, 43, 57, 81
Washington - 120, 56, 78, 65, 25
Washington State - 88, 44, 76, 117, 129
That renders the following rough run game rankings for this span:
1. Oregon - 33.2 average, 33 median
2. Utah - 41.4 average, 43 median
3. Arizona State - 54.4 average, 41 median
4. Arizona - 50.4 average, 50 median
5. Oregon State - 53 average, 54 average
6. Washington - 68.8 average, 65 median
7. UCLA - 70.4 average, 83 median
8. USC - 78.6 average, 87 median
9. Washington State - 90.8 average, 88 median
10. Colorado - 87.8 average, 102 median
11. Stanford - 84 average, 108 median
12. Cal - 87.4 average, 105 median
My attempts at ranking here try to account for both average and median for a full picture, but that's arbitrary. If I ranked by median, Stanford would be dead last.
Ultimately, I think the bottom line is that Stanford's run blocking has been bad (10th in the conference) and the overall run game has been, if anything, a bit worse, arguably the worst in the conference. This suggests failure by the offensive line and even worse failure by the running backs. Note how markedly better the Colorado and USC run games have been despite Football Outsiders judging their run blocking to be even worse than Stanford's.
Outside of the context of an idle message board debate, the real bottom line is what a Pac-12 assistant said in The Athletic article: Stanford can't run the ball worth a s!&@.
From 2008-2018 my vantage point for watching Stanford home games was on the sidelines right at the LOS. To say it gives a different viewpoint and perspective is an understatement. The line play is what you notice first and foremost. (Conversely, you have a fairly poor perspective for watching the pass game downfield). For so many of those years Stanford was tremendous across the offensive front and pretty darn good to excellent at times on the defensive front. Consistently winning up front was, I think, what propelled Stanford in its “glory years”
Losing decidedly up front is what has them in the doldrums. So, I believe Stanford will not recover until the lines improve dramatically.
RE: lex24 - Goose - 04-29-2022
(04-29-2022, 02:26 PM)lex24 Wrote: Losing decidedly up front is what has them in the doldrums. So, I believe Stanford will not recover until the lines improve dramatically.Totally agree. Stanford can't overcome a bad OL with good running backs, a good QB and good receivers. They can be better than 3-9, but getting to even 0.500 with a bad OL and a bad DL is tough. In the many years where Stanford was all offense, no defense it was proven that without a DL, even if you can score scads of points, you aren't going anyplace. This is an attribute of the game and immutable.
RE: Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - fullmetal - 04-29-2022
Still, better to have a great OL and bad DL than the opposite, imo. Even a good DL will get worn down from minimal rest owing to their offense's three-and-out turnovers. A good OL can grind out possessions and give their DL ample rest, which matters.
Have both lines be good, if we can, duh.
RE: Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - Goose - 04-30-2022
(04-29-2022, 10:58 PM)fullmetal Wrote: Still, better to have a great OL and bad DL than the opposite, imo. Even a good DL will get worn down from minimal rest owing to their offense's three-and-out turnovers. A good OL can grind out possessions and give their DL ample rest, which matters.I think you are correct, in that if we can score every time we get the ball, we can usually rely on the other team stopping themselves at least once. However, we also can have that issue, and it really sucks when a great offensive effort comes to naught because the other team drives down the field to beat us in the 4th quarter. We have seen that movie a lot. Last year we saw the "can't do anything" movie, which is worse.
Have both lines be good, if we can, duh.
RE: Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - JohnR34231 - 04-30-2022
(04-30-2022, 07:56 AM)Goose Wrote:(04-29-2022, 10:58 PM)fullmetal Wrote: Still, better to have a great OL and bad DL than the opposite, imo. Even a good DL will get worn down from minimal rest owing to their offense's three-and-out turnovers. A good OL can grind out possessions and give their DL ample rest, which matters.I think you are correct, in that if we can score every time we get the ball, we can usually rely on the other team stopping themselves at least once. However, we also can have that issue, and it really sucks when a great offensive effort comes to naught because the other team drives down the field to beat us in the 4th quarter. We have seen that movie a lot. Last year we saw the "can't do anything" movie, which is worse.
Have both lines be good, if we can, duh.
Yeah, I remember last year in both the Washington and Wazzu games both the offense and the defense had the chance to win the game late in the fourth quarter and neither could get it done. The offense didn't even have to score, all they had to do is grind out a few first downs. Definitely frustrating.
RE: lex24 - old spanish trail - 04-30-2022
(04-29-2022, 02:03 PM)Goose Wrote:(04-29-2022, 12:28 PM)lex24 Wrote: Thanks for the clarification. I disagree on it being difficult to place the “blame”. When backs are consistently getting hit at or behind the line due to penetration from the d-line, there isn’t a whole lot they can do. And perhaps my recall is suspect- but I remember a ton of times when the back would get the handoff take one step and get plastered. Defensive line penetration destroys a running game.Agree. This did happen a lot, your recall is spot on. However, that one step can matter. It can mean that if you juke that guy the place he came from is wide open and you can run through it a very long way. Love did that a lot. He also got tackled a lot when he couldn't avoid the penetrating lineman. Asking a lot, I know, but that's why you are there. It happened in 2020 too (perhaps not as often), but that year it seemed to me Jones was better at making the first guy miss, and in 2021 he basically never did avoid the first man. Again, you shouldn't have to do so, but that was Stanford football at the time.
Agree totally re Jones and found it most puzzling.
(04-29-2022, 11:47 AM)Goose Wrote:(04-29-2022, 10:13 AM)fullmetal Wrote: It may not be up to the RB coach to determine how often an RB gets a pass out of the backfield (see: offensive coordinator...sigh).And the OC may have to keep the back in to pass block so the QB doesn't get killed. I hope next year that will be needed less often, but I also hope our backs can pass block.
Quote:Gould gets a pass from me due to massive OL underperformance (compared to their recruiting hype). I think we need to see massive performance improvement at QB coach and OC (for the last few years!).What has been lacking in our QB performance and how can those problems be fixed? IMHO QB is a spot from which we have received a pretty good performance. Mills certainly did very well. I liked what we saw from McKee last year, although after he got hurt he perhaps was a bit less effective. Anything there you see and don't like? I know the QB coach is also the OC, but here I am asking about the QB hat.
One thing Jones did well was block in pass pro. Maybe he didn't want that to be his main function any more.
RE: Has there been an uptick in outbound transfers? - msqueri - 05-02-2022
I agree with lex24 that it all starts up front, on both sides of the ball. As I just posted in another thread, there is much that needs to happen for that, spanning recruiting, coaching, strength and conditioning, and player retention, at the very least. I am struggling to see the theory of the case for how this is going to get markedly better but hope has to spring eternal until some alternative presents itself.
For 2022, there is a plausible case for optimism for the offensive line and none (even that's mild) for the defensive line. For 2023, if our "seniors" depart then offensive line is in for a rebuild and just how much we have with DL remains to be seen based on what players show this year and how much they can mature year-on-year. More fundamentally/long-term, both positions have deteriorated in recruiting compared to what Shaw built in the 2012-2017 recruiting classes and there is scant evidence the 2023 recruiting class will return to the 2012-2017 standards at OL or DL recruiting. The culture, nastiness, and strength and conditioning standard don't seem to be what they once were.