Trevor Penning is PFF’s top graded Saint; Penning is highest graded NFL OT in Week 10 (10 Viewers)

[St. Widge]

How does Myles Garrett have one of the most quiet games of his career yet most of the OL ranks below average? They must be putting more blame on Myles Garrett’s play.

They used lots of chips on Garrett. But the numbers do seem low. I tend to wonder how good the PFF OL ratings are overall. They often seem to fail the eye test.

 

[St. Widge]

People need to stop believing these "ratings". These so called "analysts" pff has are simply nerds in the basement who have nothing better to do than to watch film and play with numbers and critique everybody..

No different than political polling, they are never accurate.

That certainly used to be the case, but I think they have more credibility now that some of their guys have moved on to NFL jobs and I think they now have guys with NFL experience. But I still tend to think that their OL grades are too subjective and lack the context of what the assignment was for each individual OL. Still, I guess if they are always that bad, then it can at least be used to compare relative ability vs. other O-linemen with a large enough sample size. But I'm not sure there per game grades are all that accurate.

 

[kcirdor]

People need to stop believing these "ratings". These so called "analysts" pff has are simply nerds in the basement who have nothing better to do than to watch film and play with numbers and critique everybody..

No different than political polling, they are never accurate.

Umm.. we are a bunch of nerds on a forum studying numbers and coming up with our own theories... so yay pff and ssf.

 

[SweetT]

Umm.. we are a bunch of nerds on a forum studying numbers and coming up with our own theories... so yay pff and ssf.

 

[DSnfla]

People need to stop believing these "ratings". These so called "analysts" pff has are simply nerds in the basement who have nothing better to do than to watch film and play with numbers and critique everybody..

No different than political polling, they are never accurate.

That's not really true, they now have former coaches on staff and Slowik and Zac Robinson worked for them.

 

[DSnfla]

I said the same thing when TP got the best PFF rating of OT's last week that I say now PFF is a bit of a guide, they can be wrong in both directions

 

[DSnfla]

TP blocks 2 guys and bails out Fuaga and still gets a 61 pff grade

 

[Rouxble]

TP blocks 2 guys and bails out Fuaga and still gets a 61 pff grade

I wish they kept their original grading system. When PFF started, players would accumulate pluses and minuses to net out a total score for their performance. At some point, they figured out that grades would have more mass appeal, so they changed to the current system that converts those pluses and minuses to a grade.

The grades do help for comparison purposes to some extent, but people get hung up on grades like a 61 even though that is considered an average grade (is it so bad for a player some considered a bust to have an average NFL-level performance for one game?).

With the old system, his score would have been close to zero, which means the positives netted out the negatives and/or most plays were graded neutral (did his job, nothing special or terrible). A zero is nothing to get excited about, but it tells you that he played well enough as a starter.

 

[Belfast Saint]

TP blocks 2 guys and bails out Fuaga and still gets a 61 pff grade

One could argue that's a minus because he never got his helmet on the play side of the DT...

 

[Taker597]

TP blocks 2 guys and bails out Fuaga and still gets a 61 pff grade

This is an example of the incredible highs that Penning can reach. Crazy he's already 25 years old

 

[DSnfla]

One could argue that's a minus because he never got his helmet on the play side of the DT...

But could he have? Doesn't Ruiz's position pretty much prevent him from getting that far to his left? You're an OL guy you tell me bud

 

[DSnfla]

This is an example of the incredible highs that Penning can reach. Crazy he's already 25 years old

Well he turned 23 in his 1st season. , Hurt most of that season and missed almost all of his offseason after that. Was put in a bad position by an abysmal OL coach and offensive staff. I look at this as almost like a redshirt rookie season for him. I think he raises his floor with almost every game. I'm predicting he's gonna be a top 15 RT by the end of next yr if he stays healthy

 

[Belfast Saint]

But could he have? Doesn't Ruiz's position pretty much prevent him from getting that far to his left? You're an OL guy you tell me bud

Well, I was just providing an opposing view and can understand if someone sees that as a minus.

Not for me personally, but I could understand it.

There are many names for that block - combo, double team, scoop. The emphasis tends to be the same, the play side OL needs to secure the block and make it possible for the backside player to reach. Depending on scheme/assignment/alignment the speed at which there is disengagement from the play side OL can differ. But unless the DT moves away/slants backside, the play side OL should impact the hips, shoulders and pad height of the DT, giving the back side OL the opportunity to reach and take over the block. I think Ruiz does that, for the most part.

Penning's angle and momentum should be such that he works forcefully through where Ruiz was to get play side of the DT and reach him (my coaching point has always been to work through the armpit of the play side OL). I think perhaps his angle was slightly off and not enough depth and he ended up on the backside shoulder. You could argue that Ruiz needed to stay a tick longer, but again, hard to say exactly what the coaching points are in terms of length of engagement.

In my view, Penning put himself behind the 8 ball, and you could argue some of that is on Ruiz, but Penning then does what you're taught - if you can't reach, stay engaged and push as hard and fast as you can. He did a good job of that. That's Plan B but it works because in the zone, sometimes, if you push hard and fast enough, the RB can cut it back behind you, which is what happened. However, had the RB stayed play side, the DT would have crushed him for a TFL.

So it could be a minus because the initial engagement was lost but could be a plus because plan B was executed well. The outcome of the play, the RB cutting back or not, should not really matter for the OL grade.