A New Statistic I'm Tracking for 2017 - YARDS AFTER CATCH

[KB_fan]

57 minutes ago, stbugs said:

Love your posts but I don't think we can glean anything from these. Shepard made a great move and since the D was completely shifted right he needed just one move and he was running as far as the end zone line was away. KB actually made a nice effort to get 4 more yards when he had a couple guys right there. Olsen unfortunately was a victim of Cam's rustiness and was basically catching while going to the ground. Also, Stewart and CMC got all but 1 yard after the catch because every catch they made was a screen at the LOS. Those are designed to basically be all YAC.

Also, unfortunately we are missing some downfield receptions to Olsen, Dickson and CMC where Cam just flat out missed them and they had a bunch of yards to gain. 

I like the thought, but based on this game with a rusty Cam, it isn't really telling a good story. 

Sure, I can see your point.  I certainly wasn't complaining about KB's 4 YAC or Olsen's 0.  And I certainly recognize that playcalling and YAC go hand in hand.

This is just meant to be a tool to track to what extent Panthers' offense may be changing and who are the players helping us get more YAC.

[KB_fan]

6 minutes ago, Moorgan said:

Contact not Catch. Would mostly apply to RBs I'd assume. PFF I think had a stat about in the off season that JStew leads the league in that stat and I was wondering if that was something you tracked as well. Or am I confused? (always possible)

OOPS, duh.  Sorry I obviously have Yards after CATCH on the brain...!

No, I don't think yards after CONTACT is in the gamebook, and I''ve only ever seen PFF report on that in terms of RB elusiveness..., I assume it's one of their premium stats, but I will keep an eye out for it.  I've never tracked it.

 

[KB_fan]

Just a few links to add to this for now.

You can see YAC stats (total YAC,  YAC/reception) for individual players for 2016 here:

https://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/yards-after-the-catch/2016/

As one would expect (and exactly as St Bugs discussed above), most of the YAC leaders are RBs... guys like Tevin Coleman, Ezekiel Elliot, Spencer Ware all of whom averaged around 12 YAC/ reception.

For WRs (looking at those who saw significant playing time/receptions), some of the best guys average about 7 YAC/reception.  (Guys like Taylor Gabriel, Adam Humphries, Golden Tate)

Here are Carolina players' YAC averages for 2016:

columns after position from L to R are receptions, receiving yards, total YAC,  YAC/receptions

the table is sorted by total YAC from highest to lowest.

 

 

[KB_fan]

Here's a little deeper look at YAC stats for 2016 by position, for RBs, TEs, & WRs - it will give us a good idea of what is good, what is average/median for players at each position that we can use to measure Panthers' current offense this season.

Note:  I eliminated players with less than 15 receptions as players with few receptions can have much more extreme averages.  I wanted to look at guys who were consistent contributors to their team's receiving game.

All this data is from Sporting Charts, which I dumped into Excel:

https://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/yards-after-the-catch/2016/

 

First a look at RBs:

The MEDIAN YAC/reception for RBs in 2016 was about 8 yards, among 61 RBs who had at least 15 receptions in the season.

Fozzy averaged 10 YAC/reception, ranking him 9th among RBs. 

Jonathan Stewart had few receptions (only 8) so technically was eliminated from my ranking list above, but he would have ranked around 16th with is average of 9 YAC/reception.

So Panthers already had some RBs who can get YAC, but Stew in particular was not used in this way in our offense.

[KB_fan]

For Tight Ends:

In 2016 Greg averaged 4.7 YAC/reception - ranking him 18th among 51 TEs with at least 15 receptions.

The MEDIAN YAC for TEs was 4.1 YAC/reception, but a few TEs were amazing in terms of their YAC:  Gronk, McDonald, Kelse, Bennett all averaged over 7 YAC / reception.

[KB_fan]

Now, for WRs.  THIS is where the rubber meets the road for the Panthers, and where we need to see some improvement!

Of 116 WRs with at least 15 catches in 2016, Panthers WRs ranked as follows:

#48  Philly Brown  4.5 YAC/reception

#54 Devin Funchess 4.3 YAC/reception

#73 Kelvin Benjamin 3.8 YAC/reception

#87 Ted Ginn Jr. 3.4 YAC/reception  (this one surprised me, honestly.  With his speed, I expected Ginn to be higher.)

The MEDIAN YAC/reception for WRs in 2016  was 4.0 YAC / reception.

Here's the full table:

[KB_fan]

Here's a side-by-side comparison of Panthers 2015 and 2016 receiving and YAC stats:

The main things I note re: individual players:

Olsen:  Mr. Consistent

Philly Brown & Funchess actually improved their YAC stats in 2016 over 2015, while Ginn's YAC/reception declined.

Fozzy took a lot of receiving snaps from Stew & Tolbert in 2016, but given his excellent YAC, I'm not complaining.  With those stats, you can see why he made the roster again...

 

But looking at the overall picture from a TEAM standpoint is quite interesting.

The YAC totals / averages from 2015 to 2016 are fairly similar.  It was not some dramatic decrease in YAC that caused our offense to fall apart in 2016.

However, it is interesting that two of the guys getting the most receptions in 2016 were the guys with the lowest YAC/reception (Ginn & KB), whereas that was not the case in 2015.  Ginn's decrease in YAC in 2016 and Cotchery's absence played a role, but forcing so many passes towards KB also may have hurt our offense in 2016.  (Note KB's YAC/reception improved in 2016 over 2014, when his YAC/rec was only 2.5 yards...)

YAC is not the be all - end all, as the Panthers' success in 2015 showed.  You can have a successful offense without it.  But more YAC certainly can take some of the pressure off of Cam to do it all, and that's why I like the fact that 2015 of our passing yards in yesterday's game came in the form of YAC.

[KB_fan]

Sporting Charts also has team rankings for YAC stats:

https://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/team-yards-after-catch-statistics/2016/

Here's the 2016 rankings by YAC/reception average.  Panthers ranked 20th.  But obviously the rankings can't tell  you much about a team's success.  Atlanta & NE lead the list.  But Cowboys are #21, while Chargers & Jets ranked highly...

 

Panthers ranked 25th in the league in 2015.... again showing YAC stats do not always correlate with success. 

It will be interesting to see how an emphasis on shorter quicker passes, more screens, etc. and a hoped=for increase in YAC this season will translate in terms of overall success of the Panthers offense in regards to the stat that matters most:  Wins.

[KB_fan]

One last link of the night - kind of an extra credit / bonus reading link, as I've not had time to look closely at the article.

Football Outsiders has created a measurement they call YAC+ to try and evaluate how much better or worse the player does in terms of YAC given their role & the context of the play.  For those interested in YAC, see what you think.  This article looks at the 2015 season.  I'm not sure yet if they have the stats online / free for 2016.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-analysis/2016/2015-yac

 

[KB_fan]

By the way,  it turns out I wasn't ignoring or blocking out YAC stats in previous years.  Just started to look at my 2016 gamebooks again and discovered YAC stats are NOT included anywhere in the 2016 gamebooks... so I won't be able to go back and do a game by game YAC analysis for 2016 or 2015...