[CTcard]

[quote author=CTcard link=topic=11056.msg104875#msg104875 date=1415759553]
It would seem I am in a distinct minority, but I think a primary reason for some of the troubles is the radical shifts we have seen, particularly this year away from the run-first power game. The backs themselves are still averaging decent numbers per carry, but their carries are way down.

The primary RBs
2011 - 5.55 yds/carry; 32.8 carries/gm
2012 - 5.04 yds/carry; 29.2 carries/gm
2013 - 5.26 yds/carry; 32.0 carries/gm
2014 - 5.43 yds/carry; 18.7 carries/gm

I'm not sure the relationship is clear -- I have a strong suspicion that efficiency would decrease as carries increase. It seems to me a lot of these runs are against-the-grain, when the defense doesn't quite expect it. Running at 2011-13 volume requires you to run when the defense knows it's coming.

FWIW, Football Outsider's S&P+ metric -- which tries to measure success rates and explosiveness -- ranks our run offense (101st) as much worse than our passing offense (53rd).
[/quote]

Some of what you say is probably true - that running more would mean less effectiveness per carry, though there may a counter effect from "wearing out the defense".  I would maintain that the imbalance between effectiveness and number of carries is so large, that it argues we should run the ball more. On the other hand, I am personally biased towards a strong run game (at least for Stanford) so it is quite likely that I tend to read numbers through that lens.

I use the Football Outsiders numbers from time to time, but it bothers me that I don't know their formulas to the extent that I could reproduce them. Thus I don't feel like I know in enough detail what they are measuring. For example, a good power run game is not necessarily "explosive", so I might not care if our run game measured poorly on that metric - might not depending on the details. In addition, this stat seems to include all run plays except stats, which is better than the NCAA standard but doesn't focus on the bread and butter RB stats as I did. 

[CTcard]

[quote author=CTcard link=topic=11056.msg104875#msg104875 date=1415759553]
It would seem I am in a distinct minority, but I think a primary reason for some of the troubles is the radical shifts we have seen, particularly this year away from the run-first power game. The backs themselves are still averaging decent numbers per carry, but their carries are way down.

The primary RBs
2011 - 5.55 yds/carry; 32.8 carries/gm
2012 - 5.04 yds/carry; 29.2 carries/gm
2013 - 5.26 yds/carry; 32.0 carries/gm
2014 - 5.43 yds/carry; 18.7 carries/gm

I'm not sure the relationship is clear -- I have a strong suspicion that efficiency would decrease as carries increase. It seems to me a lot of these runs are against-the-grain, when the defense doesn't quite expect it. Running at 2011-13 volume requires you to run when the defense knows it's coming.

FWIW, Football Outsider's S&P+ metric -- which tries to measure success rates and explosiveness -- ranks our run offense (101st) as much worse than our passing offense (53rd).
[/quote]

Some of what you say is probably true - that running more would mean less effectiveness per carry, though there may a counter effect from "wearing out the defense".  I would maintain that the imbalance between effectiveness and number of carries is so large, that it argues we should run the ball more. On the other hand, I am personally biased towards a strong run game (at least for Stanford) so it is quite likely that I tend to read numbers through that lens.

I use the Football Outsiders numbers from time to time, but it bothers me that I don't know their formulas to the extent that I could reproduce them. Thus I don't feel like I know in enough detail what they are measuring. For example, a good power run game is not necessarily "explosive", so I might not care if our run game measured poorly on that metric - might not depending on the details. In addition, this stat seems to include all run plays except stats, which is better than the NCAA standard but doesn't focus on the bread and butter RB stats as I did.