Redskins Add WRs Pierre Garcon and Joshua Morgan

[SirClintonPortis]

Originally Posted by 30gut

I feel like we're going in circles now where you devalue Moss and Gaffney's actual production while talking up heretofore unseen production from a UDFA rooke RT and a drastically underperforming and injured RT.
My point is simple net-net Gaffney and Moss are better WRs then Willie Smith and Jammal Brown are RTs.
I don't see how anyone can say they know what Gaffney and Moss provide and say its not much when compared against the level of play at the RT position.

2011
Jabar Gaffney 68 catches 947 yards 5 tds
Pierre Garcon 70 catches 947 yards 6 tds
Santana Moss 48 catches 548 yards 4 tds (missed 4 games with a broken hand)
Moss's 2010 season (then one where he didn't break his hand like this year) 93 catches(top 10), 1,115 yards(top 10) 6 tds

We're on different pages. It is not that the numbers representing output are irrelevant, but rather whether such statistical outputs can be maintained given state of the player's inputs of production. Output is either performance on the field or on the statsheet. Inputs are things like scheme, speed, agility, hands, playbook knowledge, physical wear and tear.

I am more concerned with making projections about future production than about who was better in 2011-2012. So Moss and Gaffney produced those numbers. Can they maintain or surpass them next year, two years from now, etc? Similarly, will Smith and Brown be better, the same, or worse in 2012? Brown, Moss, and Gaffney are at the stage of their career where production trends downwards. This is correlated with the inputs becoming less productive. Whereas Smith is either going to do nothing and bust out of the league or he will improve his game because his inputs become "more productive".
Did Moss and Gaffney produce better than Brown and Smith in 2011-2012? Sure.
Can Moss and Gaffney keep up their level of play? Maybe. If not, production will trend downwards.
Can Brown get better? He'll either stay the same or get worse.
Can Smith improve substantially(aka get closer to his ceiling)? Yes, he can. He might stay the same or get worse...but he has to really slack off considering he held his own against fierce pass rushers.

Separate from the matter of maintaining statiscal production levels are on-field impacts that are not tangible on the statsheet, such as drawing double coverage or being a deep threat; valuable commodities for opening up an offense. These are things not captured on the statsheet.


Just as an aside, since you used Moss's 2010 stats, I will throw out there that Armstrong's DYAR that year was 133 compared to Moss' 117 and his DVOA was 7.4% compared to Moss's -2.1%. Food for thought.

The stats are for reference.
For example when you say that Moss/Gaffney don't provide much you can look refer to the stats and see there actual production numbers.

I know its purpose is for reference...and acquiring perspective. Stating its purpose is not a defining and then breaking down the stat's shortcomings.

I want to know what the stat means and what are its shortcomings. Such as if I were to explain what is Gross Domestic Product, I would have to explain what it measures and its shortcomings.

Actually the only one making blind statistical inferences is you.
I posted the stats you made assumptions and inferences based on the stats.

Um no, I made no inferences of any sort. In fact, my wall of text was precisely intended to show that no conclusive statements could be made from just telling me some rankings and showing me "advanced stats" without explanation.

You provided absolutely no explanation of what DYAR and DVOA mean or their shortcomings, but yet I'm supposed accept my initial point is countered:
1. based one year's worth of data(small sample)
2. from data loaded with confounding variables
3. by using stats that measure output, not inputs

And of course, rankings can hide things...like the actual values of the DYAR and DVOA.

So again, simply put I think addressing the RT position this offseason with a proven quality starter provides greater benefit to our rookie QB then adding a couple of 2nd tier WRs with upside.
Or as i've stated previously:

Given certain assumptions, this viewpoint is plausible. I do not believe those assumptions are well-founded enough. These assumptions include the inability for Willie Smith's inputs of production to become more "efficient"(i.e working on his technique, improving his strength, etc), that Moss and Gaffney's inputs of production are not going to deterioriate, and that our newcomers cannot have a spike in their output.

Separately, the use of the fallacious line of thought that the same output value is due to viritually identical inputs is commonplace in your posts. There are easy counterexamples to this faulty reasoning. For example, two countries produce 100 units of clothes. One country used 100 units of labor and no units of capital to produce that many clothes. The other country used 1 unit of capital and 20 units of labor to produce that many clothes.