Is This year ours in the ACC?

[Milwaukee]

Name another sports message board in the world where "standard deviation" is used. I might have more to say when I look it up. But I like it.

Name another sports message board where Barry Sanders is the reason the Detroit Lions lost so many football games. I dare you.

 

[Jerry the Jacket]

If I have learned anything from being a Georgia Tech football fan for over 60 years it is you never know what to expect from one year to the next.

Go Jackets!

 

[Oldgoldandwhite]

I think some people are going to be shocked at how much we will miss both Thomas and Marshall next year.

I will not be one of them. I look for some early season struggles.

 

[MikeJackets]

I will not be one of them. I look for some early season struggles.

I think the offense will be pounding it with Matthew Jordan,Qua Searcy and Dedrick Mills who will run for 1250+ yards. I think that helps the defense by eating up a lot of clock and will help GT to finish 9-3 making it to the ACCCG.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Name another sports message board where Barry Sanders is the reason the Detroit Lions lost so many football games. I dare you.

Yup, nobody says this. Certainly not Detroit Lions fans.

I just Googled Barry Sanders standard deviation and I found this:
http://www.ign.com/boards/threads/w...comes-to-evaluating-a-running-back.108528866/
"I much rather have a running back who has 4.0 ypc than one with 4.5 if the one with 4.0 has much less deviation."
"Because Barry Sanders would then be the worst RB of all time."

Where someone else said Barry Sanders would be the worst running back of all time if you measured by standard deviation. Ha! I wouldn't go that far. But my point is its nice to have an occasional 50 yard run and 60 yard run. But if your other 20 carries are between -5 yards and +1 yards, you'll never sustain any drives. And Detroit had whom most people would consider one of the greatest running backs of all time, yet they sucked. How could that be possible?

I'll never find it anymore, but in one particular game he had like 150 yards and 2 TDs and they put up on the TV late in the game his yards per individual carry, and it went something like -2, 0, 1, -3, 1, 25, 0, 2, -3, 1, 4, 55, -1, 0, -2, 1, 0, 0, 60, -1, -2. That will put you in 3rd and long quite a bit and make it damned near impossible to convert many 3rd downs without having to pass all the time.

 

[zhavenor]

Yup, nobody says this. Certainly not Detroit Lions fans.

I just Googled Barry Sanders standard deviation and I found this:
http://www.ign.com/boards/threads/w...comes-to-evaluating-a-running-back.108528866/
"I much rather have a running back who has 4.0 ypc than one with 4.5 if the one with 4.0 has much less deviation."
"Because Barry Sanders would then be the worst RB of all time."

Where someone else said Barry Sanders would be the worst running back of all time if you measured by standard deviation. Ha! I wouldn't go that far. But my point is its nice to have an occasional 50 yard run and 60 yard run. But if your other 20 carries are between -5 yards and +1 yards, you'll never sustain any drives. And Detroit had whom most people would consider one of the greatest running backs of all time, yet they sucked. How could that be possible?

I'll never find it anymore, but in one particular game he had like 150 yards and 2 TDs and they put up on the TV late in the game his yards per individual carry, and it went something like -2, 0, 1, -3, 1, 25, 0, 2, -3, 1, 4, 55, -1, 0, -2, 1, 0, 0, 60, -1, -2. That will put you in 3rd and long quite a bit and make it damned near impossible to convert many 3rd downs without having to pass all the time.

You do realize they made it to the NFC championship game and made the play-offs multiple times with Sanders right. That being said I would much rather have a back or Quarter back the would make the plays that are there instead of going for broke all the time. Give me Aikman instead of Favre or Terrell Davis instead of Sanders.

 

[MikeJackets]

You do realize they made it to the NFC championship game and made the play-offs multiple times with Sanders right. That being said I would much rather have a back or Quarter back the would make the plays that are there instead of going for broke all the time. Give me Aikman instead of Favre or Terrell Davis instead of Sanders.

I'd taken Emmitt Smith along with Aikman

 

[zhavenor]

I'd taken Emmitt Smith along with Aikman

We might as well take that offensive line too while we are at it Man that offense was awesome in retrospect.

 

[MikeJackets]

We might as well take that offensive line too while we are at it Man that offense was awesome in retrospect.

The 1991-1995 Dallas offensive line was one of the best I've ever seen.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

You do realize they made it to the NFC championship game and made the play-offs multiple times with Sanders right. That being said I would much rather have a back or Quarter back the would make the plays that are there instead of going for broke all the time. Give me Aikman instead of Favre or Terrell Davis instead of Sanders.

Yup, they made the playoffs 5 times and missed it 5 times. But in 4 of those 5 playoff years they made it in as the wildcard and lost every time. Even with Barry Sanders, arguably one of the best running backs of all time, they lost massively - here is the number of losses by year: 9, 10, 5, 11, 7, 8, 7, 11, 8, 11. If you squint, you can see 1 good season in there out of 10.

 

[zhavenor]

Yup, they made the playoffs 5 times and missed it 5 times. But in 4 of those 5 playoff years they made it in as the wildcard and lost every time. Even with Barry Sanders, arguably one of the best running backs of all time, they lost massively - here is the number of losses by year: 9, 10, 5, 11, 7, 8, 7, 11, 8, 11. If you squint, you can see 1 good season in there out of 10.

I think your numbers are some what misleading and your loses include post season loses. He played with the Lions from 89-98 the wins and loses are as follows
89- 7-9
90- 6-10
91- 12-4
92- 5-11
93- 10-6
94- 9-7
95- 10-6
96- 5-11
97- 9-7
98- 5-11

Not earth shattering but not all that bad. Starting in 92 when Holmgren and Favre went to the Packers he was fighting for 2nd tier with the Bears with the Packers and Vikings being overall above them in the divison. 91 they lost to one of the best teams of all time in the Redskins. In 95 with Scott Mitchell at QB they were upset by the Eagles. They were starting to decay at the end when Ross came in. If I remember correctly Sanders wasn't to happy about Ross insisting on putting a FB in front of him. To answer you question before you ask no I'm not a Lions fan but grew up from 5 years old on in Wisconsin and was a Packer fan. I use was because I'm no longer an NFL fan. I don't think they wasted his career.

 

[ncjacket79]

Yup, they made the playoffs 5 times and missed it 5 times. But in 4 of those 5 playoff years they made it in as the wildcard and lost every time. Even with Barry Sanders, arguably one of the best running backs of all time, they lost massively - here is the number of losses by year: 9, 10, 5, 11, 7, 8, 7, 11, 8, 11. If you squint, you can see 1 good season in there out of 10.

So you think those Lions would have been better without Barry? Maybe the silliest post ever. You're talking about the Lions. It's not like he was holding that offense back.

 

[zhavenor]

So you think those Lions would have been better without Barry? Maybe the silliest post ever. You're talking about the Lions. It's not like he was holding that offense back.

I don't think that's what he was saying at least not in that post. He's saying that they wasted his talent and could have should have done more with his talent.

 

[augustabuzz]

I think the offense will be pounding it with Matthew Jordan,Qua Searcy and Dedrick Mills who will run for 1250+ yards. I think that helps the defense by eating up a lot of clock and will help GT to finish 9-3 making it to the ACCCG.

It may be tough to make the ACCCG with a 5-3 conference record.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

So you think those Lions would have been better without Barry? Maybe the silliest post ever. You're talking about the Lions. It's not like he was holding that offense back.

No, I'm saying if you had 2 choices, which do you pick:
* A running back who averages 5.0 yards per carry with a standard deviation of +/- 8 yards.
* A running back who averages 4.3 yards per carry with a standard deviation of +/- 2 yards.

80% of his runs seemed to go for -5 to 0 yards.

 

[forensicbuzz]

You do realize they made it to the NFC championship game and made the play-offs multiple times with Sanders right. That being said I would much rather have a back or Quarter back the would make the plays that are there instead of going for broke all the time. Give me Aikman instead of Favre or Terrell Davis instead of Sanders.

I would never take a dawg running back not named Herschel Walker, even then I'd hesitate.

 

[zhavenor]

I would never take a dawg running back not named Herschel Walker, even then I'd hesitate.

I just meant his running style but sorry for insulting people with my vulgar words. Let me change it to, if you would allow me, to Curtis Martin so I do not offend with impropriety

 

[Sideways]

I have never heard CPJ speak with as much firm confidence as he has about MJ. Shockingly supportive and defensive of him from a man who typically says things like 'he did okay', 'he acquitted himself pretty fairly'. MJ to me does a long list of things very well. There is also a list of things he needs to improve on, such as pitching, passing, expanding his playbook... I love how he walks up and down the line to communicate in each lineman's ear. The man is a leader. He also has not had a chance to practice with the first team constantly over and over and over like he will now. I think he also give us the anti-Barry Sanders that we had with JT. That is to say, JT would pull plays out of thin air for positive yards. But also at other times he would dance around and spin instead of turning it up field, resulting in losses. One big reason why Detroit never made it far with Barry Sanders is that type of standard deviation. Barry Sanders would run for 140 yards and 2 touchdowns. But 3 of his runs would account for 120 yards. You can't sustain drives when 80% of the time you're going backwards. Now this is not a fair comparison, so please don't take it to be fully that way...but on the margins I hope you get what I'm saying. We will miss JT a TON, but I mean to say life goes on and we can win with someone else. The only other guy we lose on offense is Freddie, but Cooper got enough playing time that I don't think we'll have a noticeable dropoff. Everybody else is back. We saw if Mills is healthy and on the field he is a beast. Remember we did absolutely nothing against Clemson last year...well except for Mills, who averaged almost 5 yards per carry, had 75 yards rushing, and our only TD. We lose some deeper down BB (Marcus Allen) and AB (Lynn Griffin, Isaiah Willis), but I am hopeful Benson/Q and Cottrell/etc can effectively fill those spots. On D, we 'only' lose PJ Davis, Pat Gamble, Francis Kallon - honestly with our new class of LBs and the way Simmons/Saint-Amour and others came on, I don't think we see a dropoff here either.

I think we can win 9-10 games if we play well. BUT....but but but but but...we ALWAYS seem to start slowly. Like its the first time we've played in this offense and are still learning it. We can't have 75 missed assignments against Tennessee and UCF and Pitt and North Carolina. As we saw even with BAD teams last year like Boston College, Duke, and Virginia - if we aren't playing well, we can struggle to beat anybody. I'm going into this season hopeful that we can replicate this year's performance with an even higher upside due to our competition's losses, but knowing it ain't that easy with us.

This is intriguing to say the least. I was not aware that MJ had earned so much confidence in Coach Johnson who is forever typecast as the ultimate skeptic and cynic. Kind of like Bear Bryant. Once a player intent upon impressing the Bear made a huge hit in practice and jumped up saying "Coach, did you see that! " Quoth the Bear: "Boy, I listen for hits more than see them" The point about starting slowly is succinct. We seemingly always start slowly against good competition even with JT at the helm last year against BC We will miss the following the most in order of difficulty to replicate what they did for us: (In my opinion so don't flame away too much)

1. JT (just because Smoove was the best)
2. Marshall (I am always going to remember his toughness against UGA when he knew he was going to leave)
3. Freddie (Coach says up the middle is vital in our offense)
4. PJ Everywhere all the time on defense Miss him very much
5. Pat Leader up front Effort was always there.
6. Marcus Allen Unselfish, always ready to play, dependable
7. Isaiah His block in the Georgia game was one of many memorable blocks and runs. Will miss his blocking and unselfish willingness to do the dirty work
8. Francis He never reached his potential until his senior year when he showed flashes. Thank goodness he was ready to play this year.

People will say that compared to some of our opponents, we do not lose that much to graduation. Not so sure about that. As always at Tech, graduation losses of good players is problematic and not easily solved by just getting a "Bag Man" to shovel cash at some four or five star recruit.

 

[Skeptic]

Yup, nobody says this. Certainly not Detroit Lions fans.

I just Googled Barry Sanders standard deviation and I found this:
http://www.ign.com/boards/threads/w...comes-to-evaluating-a-running-back.108528866/
"I much rather have a running back who has 4.0 ypc than one with 4.5 if the one with 4.0 has much less deviation."
"Because Barry Sanders would then be the worst RB of all time."

Where someone else said Barry Sanders would be the worst running back of all time if you measured by standard deviation. Ha! I wouldn't go that far. But my point is its nice to have an occasional 50 yard run and 60 yard run. But if your other 20 carries are between -5 yards and +1 yards, you'll never sustain any drives. And Detroit had whom most people would consider one of the greatest running backs of all time, yet they sucked. How could that be possible?

I'll never find it anymore, but in one particular game he had like 150 yards and 2 TDs and they put up on the TV late in the game his yards per individual carry, and it went something like -2, 0, 1, -3, 1, 25, 0, 2, -3, 1, 4, 55, -1, 0, -2, 1, 0, 0, 60, -1, -2. That will put you in 3rd and long quite a bit and make it damned near impossible to convert many 3rd downs without having to pass all the time.

Well, they had one of the greatest wide receivers of all time and yet ... that happened.

 

[Skeptic]

I think the offense will be pounding it with Matthew Jordan,Qua Searcy and Dedrick Mills who will run for 1250+ yards. I think that helps the defense by eating up a lot of clock and will help GT to finish 9-3 making it to the ACCCG.

I hope you are right, I really do. But the skeptic in me comes when when I recall 2015 coming off the 2014 season. A major board debate then was how much we would suffer from the massive departure of our skill positions, mostly a wonderful Aback lineup that pretty much was the best group we ever had, highlighted by their experience-earned blocking skills, particularly but not limited to the edge. The phrase used at the time to disregard or at least minimize such losses was that those positions -- WR and Abacks -- were "plug and play". Pretty serious discussion as I recall, and both sides were pretty righteous. We learned, confirmed a year later by Johnson, that they were not plug and play, but skills hard learned. So I revert to game one. Then one at a time.