PFF grades Vol Offensive players.

[Vfl2407]

I don’t know what this means or matters but I do think the offensive line numbers are fairly disturbing.

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[BigOrangeMojo]

I don’t know what this means or matters but I do think the offensive line numbers are fairly disturbing.

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The scores pretty much confirm the eye test.

Nico was good but not great

Sampson was great and Bishop was very good

The WR play was not good, especially when Thornton was injured (which was often)

Kitselman was a good TE

Our tackle play was absolute trash

The interior line play was OK (I would have thought this would be a little higher, especially for Mays, but Mays struggled against bigger DLs)

 

[loservol]

Nico graded at a C and Sampson got an A.

 

[xpsyclonex2002]

Hard to argue with those numbers. Pretty cryptic means of scoring but at the end of the day, it jives. Beside Sampson, There isn't a single player on offense that we couldn't live without. The second string and 3rd string is the scary part. Our starters are mid and the backups drop off sharply. That explains why we aren't competitive with top 5 teams. The depth isn't there.

 

[TN Volunteers.]

I don’t know what this means or matters but I do think the offensive line numbers are fairly disturbing.

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Cooper mays got a 68. I do not know if this is good or not but it sounds bad. I thought he played well.

 

[Carp]

The scores pretty much confirm the eye test.

Nico was good but not great

Sampson was great and Bishop was very good

The WR play was not good, especially when Thornton was injured (which was often)

Kitselman was a good TE

Our tackle play was absolute trash

The interior line play was OK (I would have thought this would be a little higher, especially for Mays, but Mays struggled against bigger DLs)

Eh, not really. PFF can be useful, but I would not call it super accurate.

They have no way of knowing what a player's assignment was on any given play. If a CB gives up a long TD because he was supposed to have safety help over the top, but the safety doesn't rotate over, then PFF will incorrectly penalize the CB. And there are a probably a dozen or so plays like that over the course of every game where they penalize someone for something that wasn't their fault.

 

[KTrain]

If everyone saw the names of the 300 graders their giving peanuts, to grade this and come off as experts. Most ppl thinks because they use PFF and when you see Pro you think a former Pro football player. It's fun to look at and makes them a lot of money. I was surprised at how low Lance Heard was although by eye test he was low, but they must factor in all the drive killing penalties. If they are right, he may not be starting next year to play as much as he did and get under 50 or the actual real coaches may have him graded a bit higher. Fun little read but just a shot in the wind IMO.

 

[Vfl2407]

If everyone saw the names of the 300 graders their giving peanuts, to grade this and come off as experts. Most ppl thinks because they use PFF and when you see Pro you think a former Pro football player. It's fun to look at and makes them a lot of money. I was surprised at how low Lance Heard was although by eye test he was low, but they must factor in all the drive killing penalties. If they are right, he may not be starting next year to play as much as he did and get under 50 or the actual real coaches may have him graded a bit higher. Fun little read but just a shot in the wind IMO.

Interesting. I’d never really seen a breakdown like this.
I wonder if it’s something that college coaches would give any credibility at all.

 

[BigOrangeMojo]

Eh, not really. PFF can be useful, but I would not call it super accurate.

They have no way of knowing what a player's assignment was on any given play. If a CB gives up a long TD because he was supposed to have safety help over the top, but the safety doesn't rotate over, then PFF will incorrectly penalize the CB. And there are a probably a dozen or so plays like that over the course of every game where they penalize someone for something that wasn't their fault.

It's a good tool. It's not perfect but other than Mays, it came back with results that I expected....


Of course you are the same guy that disputes the low PFF scores for the worst run teams in the NFL (Titans and Browns)

 

[pimo1]

Hard to argue with those numbers. Pretty cryptic means of scoring but at the end of the day, it jives. Beside Sampson, There isn't a single player on offense that we couldn't live without. The second string and 3rd string is the scary part. Our starters are mid and the backups drop off sharply. That explains why we aren't competitive with top 5 teams. The depth isn't there.

Thos numbers are skewed a bit because we didnt rotate a lot of guys on offense. The backups really didn't play a lot of snaps so their numbers are gonna be feast or famine. even when a lot of them did get snaps they weren't targeted... PFF numbers for a lot of positions can be weird.

WR/TE you can be great but if you never get thrown to even when open or everytime you get thrown to its like double coverage your numbers will look bad.
RB similar.

I think the only positions where PFF numbers really hold solid are Linemen and QB. If they are in the game every snap they are directly involved in the outcome of the play. Even on a handoff the QB can mess up. On a sweep left the WR on the right hash has no real impact on the play unless he commits a foul.

Outside of QB and linemen, you can mess up at your job every snap and it not affect the outcome of the play or the game. If a corner/safety never gets targeted/run at does not matter if they got burnt or cant tackle as long as the guy on playside did their jobs. If a QB messes up its all over... If a lineman messes up its probably all over. RB/WR/TE in most cases unless they have the ball in their hands the impact on the play its not end of the world. But at the same time if you're a WR and your QB overthrows every ball to you and/or feeds you hospital catches.. your PFF score is gonna suck. Not saying that's the case just saying context is important. Don't just look at a low, or high, score and take it at face value.

 

[Carp]

It's a good tool. It's not perfect but other than Mays, it came back with results that I expected....


Of course you are the same guy that disputes the low PFF scores for the worst run teams in the NFL (Titans and Browns)

???

PFF is most certainly not super accurate. It's like looking at ERA in baseball to try and judge a pitcher solely off that. ERA is useful, especially when it's combined with other stats. But it's impossible to make an accurate opinion on how good a pitcher is based on ERA alone.

PFF is even worse because the stat itself is not grounded in actual hard data. Instead, it's opinion based.

I can tell you I watched every Vols game. Some even multiple times. I also watched other SEC teams all season. I can assure you Lance Heard was not one of the worst OL on this team, much less the conference.

 

[Tnphil]

Chris Collinsworth....Former NFL player and current NBC play by play announcer owns PFF. Maybe we should ask him how good his company is?

 

[bigmac]

Doesn't surprise me, honestly. We've all seen the struggles.

 

[BigOrangeMojo]

???

PFF is most certainly not super accurate. It's like looking at ERA in baseball to try and judge a pitcher solely off that. ERA is useful, especially when it's combined with other stats. But it's impossible to make an accurate opinion on how good a pitcher is based on ERA alone.

PFF is even worse because the stat itself is not grounded in actual hard data. Instead, it's opinion based.

I can tell you I watched every Vols game. Some even multiple times. I also watched other SEC teams all season. I can assure you Lance Heard was not one of the worst OL on this team, much less the conference.

These are full season ratings

Lance Heard was absolutely awful the first half of the SEC schedule. Go back and watch the Florida and Arky games.

He was better towards the end. He was probably our best lineman against OSU. But in full season scores, you cant toss out what we saw against Arky and UF...

 

[landscapingvol]

I don’t know what this means or matters but I do think the offensive line numbers are fairly disturbing.

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Which is what I do not understand about our lack of effort for a couple of above average lineman and a proven wr. That may change but I don’t understand the optimism surrounding our improvement for next year on the oline considering we are losing the best of the bunch. I hope I am wrong but I am afraid we are going to struggle in that area next year as well

 

[KTrain]

Chris Collinsworth....Former NFL player and current NBC play by play announcer owns PFF. Maybe we should ask him how good his company is?

It could be somebody that frequents boards like this board and is just casually watching the games. PFF employs over 600 full or part-time analysts, but less than 10% of analysts are trained to the level that they can grade plays. Chris Collinsworth has made a mint on this arbitrary rating but its something else for a football junkie to look at. They give them a 300 page manual and training video. IMO the guys on here that are passionate about this team would be better to discuss. I bet some of these guys just zooming through tapes when grading these guys has to get boring after a while, not much trust in this process.

 

[DaddyChad]

Cooper mays got a 68. I do not know if this is good or not but it sounds bad. I thought he played well.

What we’ve had behind Cooper has been even more concerning. Whoever is the new starter will have to be much better than what we had at Florida a couple years ago.

 

[DaddyChad]

These are full season ratings

Lance Heard was absolutely awful the first half of the SEC schedule. Go back and watch the Florida and Arky games.

He was better towards the end. He was probably our best lineman against OSU. But in full season scores, you cant toss out what we saw against Arky and UF...

Agree but what you saw at the end of the year is hopefully what we expect from him. He was hurt then had to play his way into shape. Also mentally in a bad spot when you know you’re supposed to be the man and you’re letting people down and hurting yourself in the process. Campbell on the other side was also injured all year. We should be better, deeper next year.

 

[KTrain]

What we’ve had behind Cooper has been even more concerning. Whoever is the new starter will have to be much better than what we had at Florida a couple years ago.

His backup I think played that game @ UF in 2023 Addison Nichols who started at center for Arkansas this year. He has gone into the transfer portal as of now with no landing spot so far.

 

[BigBadVol]

Sampson fumbling became a problem.

 

[BigBadVol]

His backup I think played that game @ UF in 2023 Addison Nichols who started at center for Arkansas this year. He has gone into the transfer portal as of now with no landing spot so far.

That should tell you Nichols is average at best.

 

[livefaith]

The scores pretty much confirm the eye test.

Nico was good but not great

Sampson was great and Bishop was very good

The WR play was not good, especially when Thornton was injured (which was often)

Kitselman was a good TE

Our tackle play was absolute trash

The interior line play was OK (I would have thought this would be a little higher, especially for Mays, but Mays struggled against bigger DLs)

All of this sounds correct. Think I'll skip the article.

 

[BigOrangeMojo]

Agree but what you saw at the end of the year is hopefully what we expect from him. He was hurt then had to play his way into shape. Also mentally in a bad spot when you know you’re supposed to be the man and you’re letting people down and hurting yourself in the process. Campbell on the other side was also injured all year. We should be better, deeper next year.

Biggest concern for next year is we kept rolling an injured Campbell/Dayne out there when it was pretty clear they were unable to block P4 level pass rushers. Heard's gradual improvement gives me some hope he'll take a decent leap next year....

 

[xpsyclonex2002]

Thos numbers are skewed a bit because we didnt rotate a lot of guys on offense. The backups really didn't play a lot of snaps so their numbers are gonna be feast or famine. even when a lot of them did get snaps they weren't targeted... PFF numbers for a lot of positions can be weird.

WR/TE you can be great but if you never get thrown to even when open or everytime you get thrown to its like double coverage your numbers will look bad.
RB similar.

I think the only positions where PFF numbers really hold solid are Linemen and QB. If they are in the game every snap they are directly involved in the outcome of the play. Even on a handoff the QB can mess up. On a sweep left the WR on the right hash has no real impact on the play unless he commits a foul.

Outside of QB and linemen, you can mess up at your job every snap and it not affect the outcome of the play or the game. If a corner/safety never gets targeted/run at does not matter if they got burnt or cant tackle as long as the guy on playside did their jobs. If a QB messes up its all over... If a lineman messes up its probably all over. RB/WR/TE in most cases unless they have the ball in their hands the impact on the play its not end of the world. But at the same time if you're a WR and your QB overthrows every ball to you and/or feeds you hospital catches.. your PFF score is gonna suck. Not saying that's the case just saying context is important. Don't just look at a low, or high, score and take it at face value.

You're first sentence corroborates my statement. We didn't play backups. Why? Because the talent drop off was steep.

 

[pimo1]

You're first sentence corroborates my statement. We didn't play backups. Why? Because the talent drop off was steep.

It was not a dropoff of talent it was more experience. We have a very very young team at WR the guys we played were all upperclassmen.... not only that CJH has never played a deep rotation at WR.. the only reason we ever go past 5 guys is injuries and blowouts.. period. In his time at UT Squirrel white is the only exception to that rule... he is the only underclassman to ever get significant snaps as a freshman and that was mostly because of blowouts. Every year he has been here the WR rotation is made up of Juniors and Seniors sans injuries and Squirrel except 2021 when he literally had nothing but underclassmen as backups.

In order WR's who caught 10+ passes
2021 Tillman, Jones, Payton (inj), Hyatt (soph)
2022 Hyatt, McCoy, Keyton, White, TIllman(inj)... Keyton got snaps because Tillman was out) white backed up Hyatt.
2023 Squirrel, Keyton (in for McCoy), Thornton(inj), McCoy (inj), Nimrod(backup slot), Webb (in for Thornton)
2024 Thornton, Mccoy, White, Brazzell, Nimrod (injury snaps for the main 4 lol)

Since CJH has been here only 3 freshmen have ever caught 10+ passes. The only one that was 'productive' was white at 30 which sounds super impressive until you realize it happened in 8 games all blowouts (9 of his catches came in the bowl game). Almost all his catches 21 of 30, and both TD's, came from Joe Milton. If the team is healthy he runs a 4 man rotation at WR. Even in times we had mass injuries he only goes 5-6. On any year you go past the first 4 and anyone else got in it was because of injuries. If Tillman hadn't been injured Squirrel does not get half the regular season snaps he got his freshman year and ends up with 20 and 1TD instead of 30 and 2. Regular season he caught 12 passes and 2 TD's from Milton and 9 passes from Hendon. I will admit Hendon used him as a PI cheat code though.

Bank this, outside of injuries and blowouts we will not play more than 4 WR's plus Boo this year regularly. If we bring in another transfer WR it means Staley or Jefferson gets bumped down to the under 10 catches club. Which is why I don't think we take another WR in portal its more likely to be a CB or DL. So the WR looks like this.
Brazzell
Matthews
Staley?
Jefferson
Boo


I just realized something researching this 3 of our walk-on tight ends including Charlie Browder hit the portal.. Makes sense with what we have coming in. but dang.