Injury Prone Quarterbacks
When Evan Silva tweets, I look, then read, then absorb.
Why? Because he is pretty much the Jim Cramer of the fantasy football industry. What he says moves the value of fantasy players in the fantasy draft marketplace. Similar to what Cramer says moves the value of the stock market both up and down.
This particular tweet caught my attention.
Note: All images can be clicked to be enlarged
The reasons for it catching my attention:
I will preach until the end of my existence that you must never allow your draft strategy to be contradicted by injury history or injury risk. The logical reason: because anyone can get hurt, at any given moment.
I am on team draft Lamar Jackson in the second/third round. A common case built against Jackson and other scrambling quarterbacks: being at risk of injury due to high rushing volume (Note: Jackson has had 323 rush attempts in his first two seasons).
Interested, I dove into the article.
The overall article builds a strong case that scrambling quarterbacks are not at a higher or lower point of risk of injuries than quarterbacks who are primarily pocket passers. The below are some of the points that the writer makes that I found the most interesting and important:
May I repeat? “The risk for a scrambling quarterback is almost equal to the quarterback who is sacked: once every 91.7 plays for the scrambler, once every 92.5 plays for the guy getting sacked.”
Even though I do not allow injuries or risk of injuries to skew my drafting strategy (and I believe you shouldn’t either), I opened this article in search for validation to not fear injury for scrambling quarterbacks, and I got it.
Feeling fluffed up.. I continued to read.
What drew my attention to the article quickly turned to curiosity while reading:
Well, now that we can end the argument that scrambling quarterbacks are most at risk, who are the quarterbacks that are getting the hit most as they throw? Who is most at risk?
It just so happens that PFF.com records that exact categorical metric, “Pressure Hit As Threw.”
Naturally, I dropped the analysis I was working on and jumped on the task like a monkey on a banana.
DATA SET 1: 2015-2019 TOTALS
To determine the quarterbacks most at risk when throwing, there are two key metrics that can be analyzed: 1) pressured dropbacks 2) pressure hit as threw. Both of which are PFF metrics.
The top table ranks the quarterbacks by total pressured dropbacks (greatest to least)
1st - Russell Wilson - 1225, 2nd - Philip Rivers - 1170, 3rd - Matt Ryan - 1091
The bottom table ranks the the quarterbacks by total pressure hit as threw (greatest to least)
1st - Carson Wentz - 42, 2nd - James Winston - 41, T-3rd - Blake Bortles/Dak Prescott/Cam Newton - 34
The players in green: Philip Rivers, Matt Ryan, Jameis Winston, Matthew Stafford, Blake Bortles, Eli Manning, and Dak Prescott all finished in the top 12 for both metrics. These players may be inferred as the most at risk. Not only are they receiving the most pressure from opposing defenses, but they are getting hit the most while they throw.
Focusing on the players in green, a weighted average was completed for both metrics (third table to the right). Total pressure dropbacks received a value of 1 and total hit as threw received a value of 10. Hit as threw received a value 10x pressured dropbacks because you only get injured if you are hit while throwing. Therefore, it justifies significantly higher weight because not all quarterbacks that are pressured get hit. This however does not eliminate the need to account for pressured dropbacks because pressure received means there is a chance to be hit, and chance needs accounted for.
1st - Philip Rivers, 2nd - James Wintson, 3rd - Matt Ryan
DATA SET 2: 2019 TOTALS
Data set 2 is the same modeling as summary 1.
Total pressured dropbacks (greatest to least)
1st - Matt Ryan - 269, 2nd - Russell Wilson - 243, 3rd - Carson Wentz - 241
Total hit as threw (greatest to least)
T-1st - Jared Goff/Daniel Jones - 14, T-3rd Jameis Winston/Mason Rudolph - 12
Weighted average combined score
1st- Jared Goff, 2nd- Daniel Jones, 3rd- Jameis Winston
DATA SETS 1 AND 2 COMPARISON PLUS AVERAGE THROW TIME
When comparing both data sets 1 and 2, there are three players within each time period that ranked top 12 in both pressured dropbacks and hit as threw. Highlighted in blue below:
Jameis Winston appears to be the most at risk because he ranks top three in both data sets. Matt Ryan and Philip Rivers interestingly both have an average ranking of 4th.
Time Passing Analysis and Pass Blocking Efficiency
At this point, my curiosity really started to take over. Why are these the quarterbacks that are most at risk? Is it due to a tendency like holding the ball too long, or is it due to poor blocking by the offensive line? To answer these questions, it shouldn’t be a surprise that PFF also has metrics for both time to throw and pass blocking efficiency (Yes, they really do have a metric for everything).
The below table captures average time to throw (seconds), average time in the pocket (seconds), and average time to sack (seconds) for Jameis Winston, Philip Rivers, and Matt Ryan for the 2015-2019 time period. The table also includes their respective ranking for each metric (greatest to least) compared to all other quarterbacks.
From 2015-2019, Jameis Winston has topped an average top 12 finish in each metric. The Buccaneers also ranked 15th in pass blocking efficiency (PBE) the last 5 years, 8th in 2019. That means he’s had more time to throw than the majority of quarterbacks, but is still getting hit the most while throwing. Often ridiculed for holding the ball too long, the data is saying that he waits until the pressure hits and slings the rock. YIKES, JAMEIS.
Philip Rivers is near the bottom across the board. On average, the Chargers PBE ranked 29th the last five years. This certainly answers the question as to why Phil is often seen screaming “Dang, nabbit!” and “Shoot!” as he runs to the sideline.
Matt Ryan is middle of the league in average time to throw and average time in the pocket, but near last in average time to sack. Atlanta ranked an average of 12th in PBE the last five years. It is worth noting they ranked 22nd last year, which was the worst of the last five years. Like Jameis, he’s had the time to throw and waits until the pressure is there to throw. Bring a blitz and the data says he’ll be looking like a lost stick figure unable to evade and extend the play. There are just some quarterbacks that I cringe when they try to scramble. Matt Ryan is one of them.
Final Thoughts
Evan Silva’s tweet sent me down a data dive, but I needed to have answers.
The main takeaway is that the most at risk quarterbacks of injury are the quarterbacks that are being hit the most while throwing (Per the Yahoo/Sporting News article, every 67.3 plays).
Answering the question of, “Who is the most at risk quarterback being pressured and hit the most?” There are three quarterbacks that were outliers in the data: Jameis Winston, Philip Rivers, and Matt Ryan. All have received consistent pressure and have been hit the most for both the 2015-2019 and 2019 time periods.
However, since Jameis finished top three in the weighted rankings for both time periods and data sets analyzed, and has had a good offensive line for those time periods, it can be inferred that he is the most at risk quarterback of injury. Why? Because it may mean he tends to hold the ball too long and then decides to throw as he is hit.
But who knows, maybe his offseason lasik eye surgery will improve his decision making, he’ll get playing time in New Orleans due to a Drew Brees Injury, start throwing before he gets hit, and never throw another interception again.
The fantasy world needs James Winston back in action.
S/o to @EvanSilva for the Twitter post and the appreciation of my initial analysis that I shared over the Twitter-sphere.
Data Source:
All raw data used in analysis is from pff.com
