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K.C. — Witten Best Receiving TE in ‘05

If July is training camp month, January playoff month and April draft month in the NFL, then June must be K.C. Joyner month. K.C. drops another tasty morsel on Cowboys fans in his weekly ESPN column. This time he rates the top pass catching TEs in football last season and gives the crown to our own Jason Witten.

Joyner ranks TE receiving in two categories, Total Yards Per Catchable Attempt (TYPCA) and Success Rate. Witten had one of the lowest drop percentages in football last year, so we can all guess his success rate would be high. However, Witten showed he was more than a dump-off option, ranking second in productivity per catch. Joyner’s summary:

The best receiving tight end in the NFL in 2005 was Jason Witten. The offensive line injuries in Dallas didn’t stop him from ranking second in the total TYPCA category and fifth in success percentage. He also had the lowest overall dropped pass percentage of any tight end.

Joyner adds one major caveat — Chargers TE Antonio Gates was the runaway leader in pass catching stats until he injured a leg 11 games into the season. Joyner expects him to assume the throne this year, good health permitting. Still, it’s good to see Witten in the TE pantheon, where we’ve all assumed he belonged.

Look for more Witten info in our Joyner interviews, which we’ll post next week.

Let’s Get Scientific!

Put on your lab coats, get your goggles at the ready and clear your work spaces !

K.C. Joyner is going to get scientific.

I e-mailed K.C. your best questions last week and got a response from him today. He’s up to his eyeballs in work, wrapping up Scientific Football 2006 and getting it to the publisher, but he’s promised to get us answers in the coming days. Check in for analysis on Roy Williams, the secondary, Jason Witten, tight ends in general, the offensive line, the affect of Flozell Adams’ injury, Dallas’ run defense and other issues.

Perennial Skins Bias

We all know that there is an anti-Cowboys bias as it relates to the Hall of Fame, but is there also a pro-Redskins bias at work in team rankings? 

If you watched the ESPN guys rate the passing receivers last night, you might answer in the affirmative. The ratings finished with the Redskins being placed in the #3 spot and the Cowboys finished with the #5.

This might just be more of the “Washington made all the right moves this off-season” mantra that has permeated from the Bristol studios for the past couple of seasons, mainly due to the return of Chief Joe Gibbs.

In March, the Redskins sent a 3^rd round pick in 2006 and a 4^th round pick in 2007 to the 49ers for receiver Brandon Lloyd. They also signed receiver Antwaan Randle El to a seven-year deal worth $31 million with an $11.5 million signing bonus. To bolster their tight end position, they signed Christian Fauria from the Patriots.

The Cowboys signed Terrell Owens to a 3-year deal worth $25 million – a contract that is in essence three one-year deals.

After watching the show and with some prodding (Thanks, John) I decided to take a stab and substantiating the rankings by comparing the two prospective starting lineups. In doing so I assumed 3 receivers and a tight end – since the ESPN crew were only looking at those positions and excluded running backs.

For the Redskins I used last year’s numbers for Santana Moss, Lloyd, Randle El and Chris Cooley. Cooley is one of those hybrid players but was used more as a receiver than a back. NFL.com also has him listed as a tight end. I did not use Fauria because his numbers over his career are horrendous – his best season was 377 yards in 1998 with the Seahawks.

For the Cowboys I used Terrell Owens, Patrick Crayton, Terry Glenn and Jason Witten.

This task was made a bit difficult because the Cowboys have two players – Owens and Crayton – who did not play in all 16 games. So I looked at it from a couple of different angles.

Straight-up numbers

Looking at the raw statistics I see the following (Games is the total number of games by all four players):

The first thing that jumps out is that with 14 more games the Redskins rated only one more touchdown. The differences between the other numbers seem inconsequential - 41 receptions (avg 3 per player), 551 yards (avg 39 yards per player). Remember - Terrell Owens missed over half of the season and Crayton over a quarter.

Assume an entire season

Let’s extrapolate Owens’ and Crayton’s numbers out to a full 16 games. Now, some may say that this would not be fair because we don’t know what they would do over a full season. What I’m trying to do is estimate a full season based on what the player was doing at the time. Given that, here are the numbers:

As you can see the Cowboys now lead every category on the board.

Per Game Average

Because some may not like the assumption that the players would have continued to perform at a consistent level, let’s look at the numbers that each has and come up with a game average:

Here, the Cowboys are within hundredths of a point on the 40-plus receptions and .7 yards fewer per catch. With the exception of touchdowns, where they two teams tie, they lead in all other categories, including first downs and over a 2-to-1 ration of receptions 20-plus yards.

Looking at these numbers, one can see that, if anything, the Cowboys receiving corps have better numbers that what the Redskins have. My guess is that the crew were also taking into account pass blocking and how poorly the Cowboys did last year after Flozell Adams was lost to injury.

What do you think?

BoysBlog Fantasy

Blog regular AlanTdot is looking for a few good players. Take it away, Alan:

It’s the slowest time of the year for football diehards like a lot of us and I can’t help but start looking at some of the ‘fantasy’ football sites and start planning my draft.

But Wait!!!

Before you start cursing me, (“fantasy loser get a life”) let me say this: I can’t stand people who watch football games and cheer for some obscure nine yard button hook on third and 22 from their back up WR that will have absolutely no bearing on who wins the game but gets them an extra 2 points in their “fantasy” league.

However……

There is an element of Fantasy Football that is a bit addictive – like crack or popcorn shrimp – and the competition is kinda fun and the trash talk can get pretty funny.

I have asked Raf if he would sanction a ‘BoysBlog’ Fantasy Football League and he has agreed. We could have a small entry fee – five bucks? ten bucks? – that would go to getting a couple of autographed jerseys and/or footballs for the eventual winners. (Probably me. But don’t let that hold y’all back!!)

What we need now is some feedback on where you think we should host our little tournament, and what the format should be.

And to all those who can’t stand ‘fantasy’ football, and worry that the post will be littered with references to this league, please don’t worry; we have a World Cup fantasy challenge going on right NOW and we have not corrupted any Cowboys posts with blasphemous talk of ‘footie’.

…suggestions and interests parties please post below!!

The Dog Days Get to Us All

The DMN’s Jean-Jacques Taylor slams the Cowboys for not extending defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer’s contract, which enters its final year. Taylor claims this makes Zimmer a lame duck.

So? In that case, make me a lame duck. Zimmer will make $1 million this year. That buys a lot of security in my world and probably in yours.

Want a simple explanation, J.J.? How about this –

In 2004, Zimmer had the Nebraska job in hand and backed out of it, saying he wanted an NFL head job and didn’t want to detour through the college ranks;

Last offseason, he was a short-lister for the Rams job.

Zimmer has been this close to leaving for two years now. He wants a head coaching job. The team thinks he’s ready for one and has recommended him. He’ll probably hit the market again and will likely take a good job, college or pro, if it’s offered.

With so many big negotiations on deck — Jason Witten’s, Roy Williams, Bradie James’ — why waste time extending a deal for a guy you expect to leave?

I can already hear a counter argument. “But it will leave Dallas in the same place as ‘94, when Jimmy Johnson left and Norv Turner was already gone.” Perhaps, but to me this is just one more small indication that Bill Parcells isn’t planning on retiring after ‘06.

Chop To the Top

Cowboys OLB Demarcus Ware hopes karate can help him become a sack master. ESPN’s Len Pasquarelli reports that Ware took up the martial art weeks ago with the goal of improving his hand usage. (Story is subscription only.) Ware likes the early results, saying,

“In just a short time, I’ve learned a lot, and I’m getting a better read now on what the other guy is doing with his hands. It should be a big help to me this year.”

Before you pencil in 15 sacks for Ware this year, understand a potential downside to karate as a training tool. Former Cowboys conditioning coach Bob Ward (1976 - 1990) used karate to improve the D-linemen’s hand skills. Hall of Famer Randy White swore by Ward’s methods. But Jimmy Johnson fired Ward after two years, claiming the Dallas linemen were so engaged in hand fighting their opponents, they forgot the objective is to get past them as quickly as possible.

It’s a paradox that could have come from Mr. Miyagi — apparently, the best way to use karate on the football field is to barely use it at all.

Shopping for Supplements

Update: The Boston Globe claims “a line of teams” are willing to spend either a third or a fourth round pick on Ahmad Brooks in the supplemental draft. Sounds about right to me. I’m guessing Brooks will go to either the Niners or Browns in the third round. He’s an ideal 3-4 ILB, when his head is right. If he gets past those two he won’t last past Miami.

With the NFL’s supplemental draft approaching, scouts gathered this week to assess former Virginia LB Ahmad Brooks, the top prospect in this year’s very small group.

According to the Boston Herald, representatives from 22 teams watched Brooks run through a battery of drills. He weighed in at 260 lbs. and ran two 40s. One averaged in the low 4.5s and the other was just under 4.7. Brooks benched 225 lbs. a disappointing 19 times.

I doubt the Cowboys would select Brooks unless he was available in the third round. Bill Parcells is on record that he loves linebackers and tight ends and will stockpile good ones any time they become available. Brooks is a talented one. He’s also had disciplinary and accountability problems which won’t do him any favors.

If interest is any indication, Brooks will likely become a 49er. ‘Niners coach Mike Nolan attended the workout. He was the only HC to do so.

Rate the Rivals

Who will be the toughest opponent in the division this year?  They’ve all got good coaching staffs and have all made the playoffs the past two seasons.  Each has reason for optimism:

Philadelphia lost T.O. but some pundits are heralding that as addition through subtraction.  The team had a good draft and still has Andy Reid and Jim Johnson running the offense and defense.

New York has locked up most of the talented offensive veterans surrounding Eli Manning.  The Giants have the best pass rushing ends in the conference and signed almost every free agent DB they could to improve their leaky secondary.

My money is on Washington.   Yeah, they went free agent crazy, but don’t they always?  This time, they targeted their weaknesses well.  They’ve got a solid o-line and running back and spent heavily to give Santana Moss and Chris Cooley some receiving partners.

The bigger reason I pick the Redskins is their defense.  Gregg Williams proved again last year why he’s one of the top handful of DCs in the league.  Joe Gibbs rode Williams’ D deep into the playoffs and Dan Snyder invested in improving Williams’ pass rush.  No team in the division gave Dallas more trouble last year. Â  I expect more hard times from this this year.

Your turn.

Will T.O. Raise the Butterfinger Quotient in Dallas?

KC Joyner has another tasty morsel on ESPNet about receiver drops. (Sorry, this one is protected too, so no link.) He tabulated the number of passes dropped by the number of catchable passes a receiver faced to calculate drop percentage.  From this, we see some good news and some potentially bad news — depending on how you contextualize the data.

In 2005 Dallas had two of the surest handed receivers in the game.  TE Jason Witten was fourth in drop percentage, with only four miscues on the season.   His 4.5% drop percentage ranked just behind T.J. Houshmandzadeh, Marvin Harrison and Bobby Engram and just ahead of Steve Smith.  Fellow Cowboy Keyshawn Johnson ranked ninth overall, with six drops and a 5.1% drop percentage.

Johnson is gone and Terrell Owens replaces him this year.  Johnson offers a performance boost, being a much better deep threat than Keyshawn.  But he also offers a potential drop in efficiency — his 10.2% drop percentage ranked 18th worst in the game for receivers with 40 or more catches and is double Keyshawn’s ‘05 rate.

You’re probably wondering if Owens’ deep speed will compensate for his poorer hands?  I am.  But before we go too far into hypothetical calculations, let’s add this piece of data to the discussion:  T.O.’s Eagles had four receivers on the 20 worst list.  Fellow WR Reggie Brown was third with a 16.3% rate of drops.  TEs Greg Lewis and L.J. Smith were 9th and 12th on the list.  For all his drops, T.O. was the surest handed player on his team.

Was is just coincidence that so many Eagles ranked among the league’s worst for drops or can we blame other factors?  Was it the system, the QB throwing them the ball, the poor Philly running game that made receivers marked men, the coaching or some combination of these?  I didn’t see the Eagles enough to know, but my suspicion is that it’s not a matter of chance.  We know that CB Aaron Glenn went from a horrible ‘04 in Houston to a respectable ‘05 with Dallas.  We’ve chalked that up to DB coach Todd Bowles‘ coaching touch.  If T.O. cuts his drops this year, we’ll know position coach Todd Haley made Owens pay more attention to detail.

Submit Your Questions for K.C.

Football analyst and ESPNet columnist K.C. Joyner has kindly agreed to another question and answer session with you. Since we lack a chat function — or do we, Raul? — I would like questions to submit to him via e-mail. Include yours in the comments thread.

Scientific Football 2005 was a comprehensive analysis of NFL passing games, with stats on tight ends, receivers, quarterbacks, defensive backs and safeties. It was a good start towards the hard statistical analysis you can find in baseball, but left areas like the running game and pass blocking untouched. This year, K.C. has included stats on run blocking and run defense by linemen. He may have more new stat lines, though that’s not yet clear from our e-mail exchanges.

Scouting Report 2007 — The Return of the Big Receiver

(Why are we talking about college WRs and potential draft picks in June? Because camp is still six and a half weeks away. And if you’ve hung around this joint for any amount of time, you know we’re always ready to talk draft.)

Jimmy Johnson was a defensive coach, but he loved wide receivers. He drafted one on the first day four of the five years he was in Dallas. In fact, between 1988 and 1993, Dallas went wideout wild, taking these players with high selections:

1. 1988 — Michael Irvin, 1st round;
2. 1990 — Alexander Wright, 2nd round;
3. 1991 — Alvin Harper, 1st round;
4. 1992 — Jimmy Smith, 2nd round;
5. 1993 — Kevin Williams, 2nd round;

Not a bad list. Two potential Hall of Famers in Irvin and Smith, an effective deep threat in Harper and a solid role player in Williams. We can only wonder what the ’90s offense would have looked like had Smith and Jerry Jones not had a falling out over the treatment of Smith’s appendicitis.

The position has been the most neglected in the Jerry Jones and Bill Parcells years, at least from a draft perspective. Since 1996, only two first day picks have been used on wideouts, with disastrous results. Jerry used a ‘96 3rd rounder on the forgettable Stepfret Williams and an ‘02 second rounder on the unforgettable — for all the wrong reasons — Antonio Bryant.

Uh, make that four high picks. Jones also sent two #1 picks to Seattle for Joey Galloway, who tore his ACL one quarter into his Cowboys career and never built a rappoire with an aging Troy Aikman. (The Dallas picks were turned into Shaun Alexander and Koren Robinson.)

Parcells has built his WR corps on the cheap, shipping a 6th rounder to Green Bay for Terry Glenn, swapping Galloway to Tampa Bay for Keyshawn Johnson and drafting Patrick Crayton in the 7th round two years ago. He’s gotten good bang for his buck, but didn’t get a true blue chipper until Terrell Owens arrived.

Dallas now possesses the best collection of wideout talent since 1993, when Michael Irvin, Alvin Harper and Kevin Williams topped the depth chart, but it’s living on short time; Owens will turn 33 this season and burns through organizations the way baseball manager Billy Martin did, quickly and spectacularly. Glenn is 32 and has a long injury history.

Dallas needs young blood at wideout and soon. Many draft analysts expected Dallas to break with Parcells’ established draft patterns and select a wideout high this past year. The team might have, had the position not been the thinnest in recent years. Fortunately for Dallas, need may meet opportunity in 2007. Next year could provide another deep crop of large receivers to rival 2004, when Larry Fitzgerald, Roy Williams, Reggie Williams, Lee Evans and Michael Clayton all went in the top 15. Of that group, only Evans is shorter than 6′3″.

Look at Scouts Inc.’s preseason top 10 college wideout prospects and you’ll see size:

1. Dwayne Jarrett, USC, 6′4″, 210 lbs.;
2. Ted Ginn Jr., Ohio State, 6′0″, 181 lbs.;
3. Jeff Samardzija, Notre Dame, 6′4″, 214 lbs.;
4. Calvin Johnson, Georgia Tech, 6′4″, 226 lbs.;
5. Sidney Rice, South Carolina, 6′4″, 198 lbs.;
6. Jason Hill, Washington State, 6′1″, 211 lbs.;
7. Steve Breaston, Michigan, 6′1″, 196 lbs.;
8. Derrick Williams, Penn State, 6′0″, 191 lbs.;
9. James Hardy, Indiana, 6′6″, 215 lbs.;
10. Billy Pittman, Texas, 6′0″, 198 lbs.

Even the speed guys, Ginn and Pittman, average six feet in height and 190 lbs. in weight. The group is underclassman heavy — Jarrett, Ginn, Johnson and Pittman are juniors. Rice, Williams and Hardy are only sophomores. Draft followers know however, that inexperience has never kept top prospects from leaving early and grabbing the big money.

It’s beyond early, but these are ten names to watch this fall. If Dallas can get its offensive line sorted out, several of these guys will get serious attention from the team next spring.

Update: Jeff Samardzija signed a long term contract with the Cubs, making him a longer shot top prospect. Don’t rule out an NFL career for him — he wants to play pro baseball and football. Deion Sanders tried this for a while, joining the Falcons in October after his Braves seasons ended, so it can be done.

OL Success May Be Closer Than We Think, Part II

K.C. Joyner offers another kernel of optimism for Cowboys fans. In his weekly chat on ESPN Insider (sorry, it’s protected so no link) he was asked where Kyle Kosier rated last year. He said,

“Kosier did surprisingly well in the run metrics. He ranked 17th among guards with 4.6 modified yards per carry (yards per attempt X success percentage). He was 8th in success percentage among guards, so he is quite a solid blocker.”

Understand that Joyner’s metrics only apply to run blocking, not pass blocking. But then, the greatest worry has been that Kosier’s run blocking will pale compared to Larry Allen’s. I seriously doubt Kosier’s pass blocking skills as a guard suffered next to Allen’s, at least not in 2005.

I’m trying to get K.C. to speak to us, so I’m hopeful we can get more information in the next few weeks. I’m also going to make an unsolicited plug for K.C.’s book. Last year’s was impressive. The amount of data he compiled on passing offenses and defenses kept me busy for weeks. This year, he’s added data on the running game, so Scientific Football 2006 should be that much better. It’s not cheap, but there’s nothing else like it on the market.

OL Success May Be Closer Than We Think

Bill Parcells mentioned at his last press conference that fans and the press didn’t understand how close his offense was to establishing itself when LT Flozell Adams tore an ACL last season. A soon to-be-released ratings of NFL run blocking offers some support for Parcells’ claim and for an unsung member of the offensive line.

KC Joyner, author of the Scientific Football books and an ESPNet football analyst, is adding run blocking to SF 2006, adding to the excellent passing statistics he used in SF 2005. Joyner gives a sneak preview of his run blocking tables in an ESPNet post (subscription only, I’m sorry to say). Joyner uses two metrics. The first, Yards Per Attempt, shows how many yards a runner averaged behing a specific lineman’s blocks. The second, Blocking Percentage, measures the number of times a lineman successfully blocked his man. Joyner combines them to create “Combined Rankings” a stat that gives equal weight to both categories.

While no Cowboys’ lineman made the top ten in either Yards per Attempt or Blocking Percentage, center Al Johnson tied for sixth cin Combined Rankings with Bears’ guard Roberto Garza and Saints’ tackle Wayne Gandy. Johnson was one spot behind former Cowboys C/G Matt Lehr, who’s now a Falcon.

I’m interested in seeing where the Cowboys’ guards ranked. Joyner’s numbers suggest that Johnson’s problems with big nose tackles were not as frequent or as bad as we’ve all come to believe.

Our Ratings — Defensive Ends

This will be a tough category or categories to tease out. The rankings in most books favor 4-3 ends, because most teams favor that scheme. If you went back a few years, you would have found that only Pittsburgh played the 3-4 full time and the Patriots played it some of the time.

That’s different today, as at least eight teams play 3-4. Most reside in the AFC, where Patriots, Dolphins, Jets, Steelers, Browns and Chargers play a base 50. In the NFC only the Cowboys and 49ers run it. (Note the influence of the Parcells/Belichick coaching trees; of the eight teams running 3-4, five of them are run by Big Bill, Little Bill or their disciples. Wade Phillips, the Chargers DC, learned it from daddy Bum, who put some nasty units on the field for Houston in the ’70s.)

3-4 ends have different responsibilites than their 4-3 mates. They have two gap run responsibilities, so they have a tougher path to the QB. They have to go straight through offensive tackles, rather than being able to outrun tight ends or OTs around a corner. For this reason the 3-4 guys get fewer sacks, and make no mistake about it, the preseason rankings are based on sacks.

Consider PFW’s top ten:

1. Dwight Freeney
2. Jason Taylor
3. Richard Seymour
4. Michael Strahan
5. Julius Peppers
6. Simeon Rice
7. Leonard Little
8. Jevon Kearse
9. John Abraham
10. Osi Umenyiora

Several of these players, Taylor, Little and Abraham, fit the Charles Haley mold — fast, 260 lb. lightweights who have also lined up as OLB in a 3-4 scheme. Seymour is the only true 3-4 guy on this list. He’s the only one big enough to play end in that scheme. For my money, he’s the best DL in football, because he also lines up as a DT in the 4-3 and brings pressure there. (If you wonder what NFL front offices think, know that top pick Mario Williams‘ contract looks like a copy of the deal Seymour signed a few months ago. Seymour is the benchmark at his position right now.)

In fact, Seymour is the only 3-4 end rated in the top 20. Shaun Ellis, the 20th rated end, could count as a second, but we should wait and see until he works in the scheme. Though Bill Parcells drafted him, Ellis has spent most of is time in Herman Edwards‘ 4-3, a variant of the wide end schemes that Tampa Bay plays.

If we want the Cowboys ends to get a little respect, I think the list has to be split, with 4-3 ends in one and 3-4 ends in another. It won’t change my opinion of Seymour, but it will bring some guys like Bryant Young back up the lists. Going off the top of my head, I see the 3-4 list full of kids, like Chris Canty and San Diego’s Luis Castillo, who looked really good right out of the box last year.

In the 4-3 world, I can’t see how Julius Peppers dropped so low. Sure, his sack totals dropped last year, but if you were starting a team, were given your pick of the league and were told you were running a 4-3, would you take anybody else?

Now More Prizes!

Update on the World Cup tourney:  The good folks from the Hamster have sent us THREE t-shirts, so the top three finishers in the pool are now ensured a prize.

Update II:  The Hamster folks have also sent me a drawing commissioned to celebrate Michael, Troy and Emmitt’s group induction into the Ring of Honor last year.  We will use this as a premium for our final pre-camp fund raising drive.  Everybody who has already made a donation will be automatically entered in the drawing.

Not to be outdone, we’ll be rolling out a line of blog merchandise very soon, once we iron out some supplier issues.  Keep watching.

• 2008 Cowboys Tickets on eBay

• Burst Media

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