PFF: The Overrated Sack (1 Viewer)

[CaliSaint4Life]

https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2013/02/05/the-overrated-sack/

Every year I make it my mission in life to come up with new and creative ways to show the sack stat is the most abused one out there. Sure, for some people it can be a reward for consistent play, but many others benefit from people caring too much about a small sample size, or, in some cases, players are punished because people don’t pay enough attention to what they actually do on the field.

The information is there. You don’t need to be a slave to the sack stat anymore and can instead appreciate players for more than what they do on 2% of plays.

Good article. Too much weight is put on sacks in my opinion and this article does a good job of making a case for that. Hopefully it sparks a good debate and convinces people to look past that one stat.

 

[Bayouman007]

a defense with a 20 sack a year guy will be better than the same defense without that 20 sack a year guy. It might be overrated to lots of people, but hits on opposing teams qb's wins games every week in the NFL

 

[bornnraisedwhodat]

Great read. Watt is a beast!!

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

 

[boutte]

Yeah I always thought that sack numbers were a little overblown. Although it probably gives a good indication of how much pressure is being brought to bear. If a guy is consistently forcing the QB to throw early his sack numbers aren't necessarily telling the story. If a guy hits a QB 8 times in a game that QB is going to start looking over his shoulder. That's when you're having an effect on the game.

 

[King Puppy]

I agree that when viewed by itself, number of sacks is a fairly vapid stat. For sabermetrics folks, it's analogous to RBIs in baseball. Lots of situational things go into both of those numbers.

Another way to look at it is that defining the best DE solely by number of sacks is akin to determining the best RB based only upon the number of rushing TDs they have.

 

[SaintsAreWinners]

I don't know. I think the INT stat is more overrated for judging DB's than the sack stat is for judging linemen.

 

[TruSaint]

Sacks are overrated, the most important would be pressure, a sack ends one play, pressure changes the whole game makes quarterbacks scared and make bad reads, throw bad passes and pick, I would rather a player with 15 pressures a game and 1 sack then a player with 5 pressures and 2 sacks

 

[CaliSaint4Life]

a defense with a 20 sack a year guy will be better than the same defense without that 20 sack a year guy. It might be overrated to lots of people, but hits on opposing teams qb's wins games every week in the NFL

But you can get hits on a QB without sacks. Also, if a defense has a 20 sack a year guy, then there are a lot of things going right that needs to be look that allows those sacks to occur. Players around him, coverage, scheme, offense. etc...

 

[St. Geezy]

The sack stat, to me, is very important. My Dad and I used to have this argument all the time.

Sacks are VERY hard to get in the NFL. 15 sacks is a special season. It shows two things: a.) you're closing on the QB successfully 15 times, which is VERY tough to do and b.) you're getting fairly consistent pressure in order to be in position to close on the QB those 15 times.

Yes, it's easy to say a player like Watt only got a sack on 2.35% of his plays, but what percentage did Will Smith get? Sacks are darn hard to get, that's what makes them great. It's an accomplishment that gets taken for granted and is something Saints fans definitely shouldn't be taking for granted.

Sacks kill drives and are demoralizing to an offense.

 

[Firecross]

Sacks are drive killers, field goal range killers, most teams with high sack counts make the playoff's, teams that don't, they usually have high takeaways.

However

In today's NFL, you need to play good redzone defense, get off the field on 3rd downs, get turnovers. You don't NEED a 40+ sack defense, but you have to get pressure enough to get teams off the field on 3rd down or force teams into field goals.

 

[bradman1965]

Whenever there is an incentive for anything there will be a drive to achieve that incentive. Since sacks are the ultimate individual defensive incentive they are overrated, but the idea of defensive pressure in aggregate is certainly not overrated.

 

[bornnraisedwhodat]

Its not saying sacks as a whole are overrated. But pointed out which sacks are very impressive sacks vs ones that arent.

For example a sack where the QB is holding on to the ball for six seconds then runs into the lap of a linemen is not impressive. But a guy who can get to the QB in under 3 seconds (the average time it takes a QB to throw) is very impressive.


They had another interesting article adjusting yards per rush for running backs. For example, as awesome as AP is, per rush he really didnt average much. But he would break of huge runs that inflates his average yards per rush attempt. They took it and looked at literally every rush attempt and came up with an average. If Im not mistaken PT was top 10. Obviously its not saying a guy like AP is not good, but just a different way of looking at yards per rush. People hear "Woah, so and so is avery 10 yards per rush!!" but obviously a guy isnt getting 10 yards every time he runs.

 

[St. Geezy]

Its not saying sacks as a whole are overrated. But pointed out which sacks are very impressive sacks vs ones that arent.

For example a sack where the QB is holding on to the ball for six seconds then runs into the lap of a linemen is not impressive. But a guy who can get to the QB in under 3 seconds (the average time it takes a QB to throw) is very impressive.


They had another interesting article adjusting yards per rush for running backs. For example, as awesome as AP is, per rush he really didnt average much. But he would break of huge runs that inflates his average yards per rush attempt. They took it and looked at literally every rush attempt and came up with an average. If Im not mistaken PT was top 10. Obviously its not saying a guy like AP is not good, but just a different way of looking at yards per rush. People hear "Woah, so and so is avery 10 yards per rush!!" but obviously a guy isnt getting 10 yards every time he runs.

Yeah, but an absurd average like that means he's breaking several long ones. Sometimes I think PFF goes a little overboard with its analysis. Not everything they say should be treated as bible.

Why isn't Will Smith getting these supposed "gift sacks" that Jared Allen is getting, since it is so easy?

 

[bornnraisedwhodat]

Yeah, but an absurd average like that means he's breaking several long ones. Sometimes I think PFF goes a little overboard with its analysis. Not everything they say should be treated as bible.

Why isn't Will Smith getting these supposed "gift sacks" that Jared Allen is getting, since it is so easy?

I like all these crazy stats. Gives you a closer look at some of these things.

And Will Smith Im sure got a few gift sacks.

 

[St. Geezy]

I like all these crazy stats. Gives you a closer look at some of these things.

And Will Smith Im sure got a few gift sacks.

I like reading their stuff too, but they're not always right. This is one of those instances where I feel like they're over-analyzing.