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Random Commanders Thoughts

I think history would show that less that 50% of 1st rounder's start, and hold the job. Much less for 2nd & 3rd rounder's.

Sure I heard Keim say the other day that only 20% of 3rd rounders ever become starters.

The jist is, most fans have totally unrealistic expectations of early round draftee's.
 
We don't need pro-bowlers, we just need starters so the stats you present, Ax, are really just fluff. Many players taken in the first round may not have been pro-bowlers, but were not necessarily busts either.



New England had 3 pro-bowlers this year...are you going to tell me players like Donta Hightower and Chandler Jones, or even Nate Solder, were busts a busts from the first round because they didn't make pro-bowls?
 
true dat Ax. on the flip side...probabilities notwithstanding..ever since the Cowboys set this all off...a lot more rigor has been brought to the process. it's more than a flip of the coin...less than pure science - especially sine (calling Mr Leaf) so much rolls with the psychology/human dimension.

weird how QBs have a higher hit rate than OTs.
 
I get the mindset pov....on the part of the fans. you are right. I'm talking abt the coaches. win/lose or draw......among leaderships' missions is building the culture, instilling loyalty, submerging some individual instincts into the abstraction of the "corporate" personality. in this case, the "corporation".....is the team. I would argue that it is precisely in periods of uncertainty and under-performance that appeals to the past matter most. the Skins were emphatically a team of excellence and achievement in the past. these are not values that change with the prevailing winds. just saying that even absent references to better times.....I don't think Gruden is all that invested in the Skins as an enterprise with 70 years of history. I don't think...at least from a distance...that he himself has the mindset one would want the players to demonstrate. it's subtle. it's the difference between "let's win today" and "let's win to restore the tradition and pre-eminence of this Super Bowl winning franchise". Just reflecting that somehow....Gruden doesn't strike me as steeped in the Redskins as a team with traditions, a proud history, etc., etc. He wants to win....no doubt about that. where he wins....may not be all that important when he does his personal rank ordering.

simply put...and it's just my take: he doesn't strike me as passionate about our franchise. he's in it as a job. he's in it to win....as a marker of professional excellence and personal accomplishment. but the Redskins? they just happen to be the vehicle of the moment. is he a George Allen or Joe Bugel kinda Redskin? make up your own mind.

almost forgot: the players (or a lot of them) will follow the coaches' lead...even in this age of "me first" players.

The difficulty I have with this perspective is the seeming evaporation of the idea of a NFL head coach having anywhere near the amount of time necessary to assimilate a team's history as part of their coaching "schema." We recently witnessed another "Black Monday" of head coaches-and now GMs-getting pink slips. This seems to be becoming an annual affair with more and more heads rolling within a short timespan as NFL franchises now are firing entire staffs wholesale at season's end under what appears to be an increasing "win now" pressure from both owners and fans.

To expect a first-time NFL head coach faced with an enormously steep learning curve in not the best environment to also assimilate a team's history from the get-go seems a bit much, IMO, especially facing a short time window of "expected success." Basically, coaches are now viewed as employees with a job to do with tenure based on short-term performance rather than as part of the team's "persona" and as such aren't measured by how well they identify-or can be identified- with a team's historical "image."
 
Teams that do well in one area, say draft, also tend to do well in others, ie free agency and trades.

Take Green Bay. Their qb, rb, wrs and most OL are drat picks.

Meanwhile over the years they have been successful in free agency, getting players that helped lead them to titles - Reggie White and later Charles Woodson.

They also feasted off of trading backup quarterbacks - Aaron Brooks, Mark Brunell, Matt Hasselbeck - they took middle and late in draft and gaining higher picks in return.

Hasselbeck, a former sixth round pick, brought back a #1 and a #4 from Seattle.

The overall percentages don't mean much to teams like this that tend to 'make' their own luck.
 
Charles Woodson didn't lead them to any title. A little known quarterback did. Reggie white AND Brett Favre did. Perspective is a mother****er
 
The difficulty I have with this perspective is the seeming evaporation of the idea of a NFL head coach having anywhere near the amount of time necessary to assimilate a team's history as part of their coaching "schema." We recently witnessed another "Black Monday" of head coaches-and now GMs-getting pink slips. This seems to be becoming an annual affair with more and more heads rolling within a short timespan as NFL franchises now are firing entire staffs wholesale at season's end under what appears to be an increasing "win now" pressure from both owners and fans.

To expect a first-time NFL head coach faced with an enormously steep learning curve in not the best environment to also assimilate a team's history from the get-go seems a bit much, IMO, especially facing a short time window of "expected success." Basically, coaches are now viewed as employees with a job to do with tenure based on short-term performance rather than as part of the team's "persona" and as such aren't measured by how well they identify-or can be identified- with a team's historical "image."

how hard is it to periodically remind folks "I'm an heir to George Allen and Joe Gibbs and three Super Bowls. We're gonna play Redskins football and restore pride, performance and winning"? must just be me - connecting to the past periodically (how difficult can that be?) is more energizing than "I'll have to go back and look at the tape. Gonna have to coach-em up better." bleh......especially when the rewind on that produces no results.....actually traps folks into wondering "hmmmm.....coach em up better? how'd that work out coach?"

mindless crap coach. tap into some higher themes now and then. part of the complete package.
 
None of these dudes even know Gibbs as a coach and probably think Allen means the son.

There are no old players on the coaching staff or anyone around to remind them of pride and caring about this like we the fans do.
 
G
Our history? You mean twenty-something years ago?

Fan, you know the feeling you get when you see the Dan Marino jersey at the end of the bar on a Sunday afternoon? Do you actually want to talk football with that guy?

How about a Jim Plunkett jersey? Do you think they know football?

That's exactly the same way people feel when we walk in wearing an Art Monk jersey.
Sooooo...wearing my John Riggins throwback is now labeling me as a fan that knows nothing?

That's a load of horse hockey. Hell, those of us who grew up in the Glory Years are the last witnesses that can actually confirm that the Redskins were good at one point in time and that we know what actual winning football looks like.

You're basically saying " get with the times old man".

And I say " Get off my lawn."
 
Nice Sherman T Potter reference. I can appreciate a good colonel line any day
 
None of these dudes even know Gibbs as a coach and probably think Allen means the son.

There are no old players on the coaching staff or anyone around to remind them of pride and caring about this like we the fans do.

Good point Mike.

In my mind it's rather like this: before gruden even accepted he had to think through...at some point...."Washington Redskins...they did win some SBs...they did have one of the great coaches Gibbs....Vince Lombardi was there...I'm going to be part of that tradition." doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that much. he works for an owner who certainly remembers..as does his Tampa Bay buddy Allen. all I'm saying is that even were he totally clueless.....this is simple knowledge to remind his players what this team has accomplished and will accomplish again. it's part of leadership to tap into these things. not quite the same.....but none of today's Marines stormed the shores of Tripoli....but the song references times of bravery, accomplishment, esprit de coors...errrrr....corps, etc., etc., and long held traditions. The symbolism has import. He didn't need to be part of the times to tap into that history and symbolism. To remind the players they have a legacy to live up to. It's easy to do....one of the tools in the kit as it were.

Those players see the Lombardis in the glass case one imagines. They are there as a reminder of past greatness and a beacon to future greatness.

nothing for anyone to get steamed over. It's something that occurs to me as part of the gameplan a coach in control brings into play. I can buy into the narrative some are putting forth that gruden was mightily un-prepared for the magnitude of the challenge and the franchise chaos...i.e., he couldn't act like one of the better coaches would have because he wasn't...well...one of the better coaches....not yet anyway.
 
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Tandler has a nice blurb on what 'we' know about the hierarchy within the FO on FA.

From what we know, a free agent acquisition has to start with McCloughan wanting the player to come to the Redskins. He has final say on the 53-man roster so nobody is added to it without his OK. So he brings his list to Allen and Schaffer to take care of the money part of it.

Here is where the matter of trust and the crux of your question comes in. They need to have a discussion about what they think the player is worth and come to a consensus as to how high they will go to get that player. That is more Allen’s and Schaffer’s area of expertise than McCloughan’s so he is going to have to trust the cap guys’ estimates and evaluations.

Could Allen torpedo the process by overstating what a player might fetch on the market? Could he not negotiate in good faith if he really doesn’t like a player that McCloughan wants to bring on board? The answer to both is yes. But the NFL is a small world and word would get back to McCloughan, potentially poisoning the well at Redskins Park. We’ve seen it before but Allen is too savvy to do something like that.
 
G
Sooooo...wearing my John Riggins throwback is now labeling me as a fan that knows nothing?

That's a load of horse hockey. Hell, those of us who grew up in the Glory Years are the last witnesses that can actually confirm that the Redskins were good at one point in time and that we know what actual winning football looks like.

You're basically saying " get with the times old man".

And I say " Get off my lawn."

I couldn't agree more. Wearing an Art Monk jersey only tells me how long that person has actually been a fan. Wearing a John Riggins jersey tells me how long you've been a fan AND it tells me that if there is anyone I could talk to about football, chances are, it's you.
 
Just a little something that was posted on Facebook today. I thought I would post it in here & share it with the rest of my B&G family.

[video]http://www.video.theblaze.com/video/v37227219/redskins-controversy[/video]
 
We don't need pro-bowlers, we just need starters so the stats you present, Ax, are really just fluff. Many players taken in the first round may not have been pro-bowlers, but were not necessarily busts either.



New England had 3 pro-bowlers this year...are you going to tell me players like Donta Hightower and Chandler Jones, or even Nate Solder, were busts a busts from the first round because they didn't make pro-bowls?
No Sir. The point was that too many have unrealistic expectations of draft choices. Blanket statements that 2nd & 3rd rounder's should become starters in their 1st season. It's nice when it happens, but it is far from a gimmie.

A 35% chance of a 1st rounder being a bust, increases to 50% in the second round. 80% in the 3rd, according to Keim. Anything after that is needle in a haystack. Yes, the stats I posted were based on pro bowl/all pro numbers. But if they fall as drastically as they do, there can't be much doubt that the average players fare even worse.

So, there's a lot of luck to the draft. Just sayin.
 
Sorry AX...but the article is built upon a bogus logic. Someone else has already noted that the stats are generated from pro bowl appearances. that logic wasn't completely explored.

1) The number of pro bowlers selected each year is arbitrarily fixed. this has all sorts of derivative consequences...i.e., the variables are not independent (they are highly correlated)

- multiple pro bowl selections...i.e., the same guys being selected each season....means fewer opportunities for others to be selected each season.

- because the number of selections each season is fixed...there are players performing at a very high level who do not get selected. the logic of the article brackets these players into the negative category which we know isn't the case

2) the selection process itself...as we have all argued...is skewed. in statistical terms...the selection process has a bias

- it can be a popularity contest

- it can miss players who play at a very high level but for lousy teams...hmmmm...Ryan Kerrigan....2014?

- following upon the last....the level of play can be highly influenced by the quality of play of the other players. similarly, the level of play can be influenced by the level of play of the opposition. easy schedules (i.e., weaker teams) play into the stats that lead to pro bowl selection. does the cap play into this?

That there are hits and misses is indisputable. that said, a better analysis would go on to answer questions such as the following:

- is there a better standard than pro bowls to capture return on investment? i.e., a "good" selection? is Matt Ryan a good first round selection or not? Joe Flacco had never been selected for a pro bowl before this last year if memory serves. according the scheme in the article...Ozzie and the Ravens fall on the negative side of the ledger for that pick. in short, pro bowls as the metric isn't, IMO, a very rigorous standard. (the author was lazy)

- what is the variation by round?

I find the hidden argument - that it's a crap shoot - to miss the essential point. The draft is an investment. The folks picking the stocks employ various methods to determine the FUTURE value of an asset (the players). predicting the future inherently has risk associated with it. what matters is getting better at the process. the process requires more thought invested in the higher rounds given the cost of the investment. why are some teams better than others? why do some teams never improve at their hit rate? perhaps there are factors other than seat of the pants luck that play into this - for instance, Front Offices populated by the Vinny Cerratos of the world. The article misses all these subtleties. In my mind, the correct question isn't whether it's pure chance, it's why some teams are better than others; has the methodology become more accurate over the course of the last 30 years? how can the methodology be improved over the next 30 years? what variables have the least certainty? are there better substitutes for these variables as predictors? are teams like the Skins inherently behind the power curve if they only employ a limited number of scouts (relative to the pool of draftable players) each season?

Luck certainly plays into it. but the article does little to examine the process itself. it simply looks at a biased set of outcomes and does little else with the data. the argument would be lucky to earn a C+ in a freshman stats class.

- has the selection process gotten better over time?

- are some teams better at it than others?
 
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Try not to fixate on the pro bowl aspect. That was but one example of how percentages fall drastically from the 1st round, to the 3rd. That's all.

Every team has selected busts. Happens to all of them.
30% of 1st rounder's are busts.
50% of 2nd rounder's
80% of 3rd rounder's

The draft is, and always shall be, a crap shoot.

The Cheatriots, are one of the worst mid round drafting teams in the league.
(They cheat to make up for it ;) )
 
Try not to fixate on the pro bowl aspect. That was but one example of how percentages fall drastically from the 1st round, to the 3rd. That's all.

Every team has selected busts. Happens to all of them.
30% of 1st rounder's are busts.
50% of 2nd rounder's
80% of 3rd rounder's

The draft is, and always shall be, a crap shoot.

The Cheatriots, are one of the worst mid round drafting teams in the league.
(They cheat to make up for it ;) )

I didn't. I focused on the process and methodology. I think the problem itself deals inherently with uncertainty - and like multiple areas in life - uncertainty can be quantified and bounded. it's not a crapshoot. it's a risk management kinda problem. Gil Brandt started this whole thing......as teams get smarter about this and hire people with the right skill sets...the results will continue to improve. benchmarking what is good performance...btw....hasn't been addressed by anyone. there's no standard to balance this whole discussion with!!!

so...we aren't really at odds....we're just framing the analysis differently. there will always be uncertainty. the smarter teams will evolve to more sophisticated approaches and...over time...do a better job managing that uncertainty. same thing as with stock brokers, insurance agents, military planners, computer network defense teams, etc., etc. how do we handle uncertainty? how do we reduce it? how do we reduce the unfavorable consequences of poor decisions?

anywho....interesting ideas being put on the table by everyone! I will run with the assumption that we hired Mclovin precisely because he has expertise & method that makes him better than the average!!! that the thought that no matter what he brings to the table.....he will be wrong 60, 70, 80 per cent of the time....is a conceptual straight jacket that doesn't have to be worn. I will rest on the assumption that what matters most is that he is better at it than his peers...and that he will get even better over time.

it is unbelievably friggin cold right right now! time to find something to warm folks up :)
 
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