DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Paul DePodesta joining Browns as Chief Strategy Officer

Not even close. Had they went the standard ho hum "Football guy" direction, they would have been scraping the bottom of the Barrel like they have been for the past 8 years.

They just pulled one of the smartest, most winning executives they could possibly have hopes for. Even if it doesn't work, it's worth a shot.

Every knowledgeable person I have seen on TV ..... former coaches and GMs ...... say that analytics can be used as an evaluation tool, but it should not be the (or a) top level tool. Mort was just about rolling his eyes at this news. I bet most of the world was doing the same.

You can use analytics to confirm what you see with your eyes, but not to decide what you see.

It sure looks like we are building a front office built mainly on analytics. It seems to me that this stands no chance of working. It looks to me that Jimmy is trying to show how much smarter than the rest of the league he is. Heck, I hope he's right, and this works and brings a Super Bowl win ..... but I just don't see it happening. I see us right back here again in a couple of years ...... *Boom* go the Browns ..... again.

I still wonder just what top caliber head coaching candidate is going to want to wade into this situation. I just don't see anyone actually taking this job. Maybe a guy takes an interview for the experience, but like Gage, McDaniels, and Wisenhunt, IIRC, last time around, they won't want anything to do with this job.

This system is not set up to allow the GM and Coach to use their skills and abilities to their best advantage. I think that the Browns will have a hard time hiring a top guy at either position.

Why not have an assistant gm as well?

What is Mike Fratello doing these days?

What is "Chief Strategy Officer" and what are his job duties?

What were his duties with the Mets? Will he be in charge of scouts and talent evaluation or will he be in charge of how much a 16oz beer costs?

Couldn't someone go back and run the analytic process on the previous drafts with only college and combine stats to see who was the BPA at each pick? That would prove your statement.

But yes, our picks have been terrible when we have traditional guys in charge, doing something different will either be good or same as it is today. We can't get worse.

JC

Intriguing for sure. Moneyball or advance analytics definitely work in baseball and basketball as well. Only old school scouts and players still question saber metrics,. However, the big difference is those are seasons played with many games for players to perform to their respective mean. The NFL is a 16 game season where we often see guys have tremendous years and then fall off the map.

I'm not saying it can't work (as I was skeptical in basketball), but out of all the major sports football would be the hardest to incorporate analytics because of the number of games you are playing really doesn't lend itself to statistics all that much.

Fixed it...

I wonder if/how his duties will tie-in with the Quality Control guys...

There is always a subjective (scheme, intagibles etc.) element to it, analytics would never have drafted a 5'10 QB and subjectively a QB with alcohol problems would have essentially put Manziel off the draft board. Just as an example.


Both play a role, pure analytics doesn't win, but it certainly has a place.

I suppose I believe in Analytics in some instances of player evaluation for the draft but outside of that its useless.

If a tackle doesnt have 33 inch arms, he has no chance of playing tackle. 3 cone drill will tell u more than any other drill. 40 time is completely useless.

It however does not measure stiff hips in a corner. it doesnt measure field of vision for a back or the ability to pre and post snap read.

Just not much value in it for me. I see big old fat ass of an offensive linemen up in the air and i know he is gonna be a pop and drive blocker. I dont need to measure his ass to know this lol.

Why not? Nothing else has worked.

Just thought of something. This just didn't happen in the last few days. This had to be in the works for while.

Makes me think that Haslam has been planning that Farmer and Pettine were gone weeks, maybe months ago.

Actually it is probably at it's worst in draft evaluation. It is not meant to be a substitute for scouting, it is an addition and being that there are so many college teams with varying competition, college stats can only go so far in helping you. The competition level in the NFL is much more even and therefor more has more useful data.

All those measurements you are talking about have very little to do with analytics. Those are more scouting measurements. What analytics looks at is statistics and odds. Everything a player does is graded and compared to other players at his position. It is much more effective as a decision making tool than a pure scouting tool.

Analytics can be applied to much more than player evaluation. You could select personnel such as scouts based on their historical evaluations hit/miss percentages. You could analyse opponents strengths and weaknesses to help form better game plans. You could evaluate levels of competition in the college ranks to discover overlooked solid players. You could incorporate the new VR training programs with data analysis to make tweaks to things like strength and conditioning or limiting concussions... So there is much you can learn from data with real experts applying the right kind of analysis and almost anything can be improved upon with it.

There is however two very real drawbacks; errant data and data paralysis. The wrong data or conclusion will screw the pooch and too much data with multiple possible conclusions cause you to delay or avoid taking action.

Awesome points. That makes complete sense.

It looks like this is the case.

Regression analysis should take care of that...

Analytics would have had is draft Carr or Bridgewater

Be prepared for us to draft some projects though. The Mets top draft choice this year was a raw OF out of high school (Desmond Lindsay).

How the draft works for SABR teams in baseball is they use scouts, projection systems, and whatever other proprietary information they have to assign a distribution of value a player might have. So the Mets might think he has a 10% chance to be worth $50M, 20% chance to be worth $30M, etc. and just multiply by the value by the probability, then sum up all the outcomes.

That basically gives each player a dollar figure. So a player with a very high ceiling (10% chance to be worth $200M) would be ranked higher than a player with a low ceiling (100% chance to be worth $15M).

Agreed. Analytics require a mean so to speak. There is no mean than can be calibrated between two OTs that played at Alabama and West Mass St. In baseball saber metrics were most useful in identifying FAs that were over the +\- at their position, but under the radar. The most important thing they did was identify stats that lead to winning such as OBP and OPS.

I'm still skeptical that football has enough games in a season to do true statistical analysis.....but I am intrigued. It might be a dumpster fire, but will at least be a new way of thinking dumpster fire. The friggin Browns found a way to keep me hooked going forward after all.

Not to mention, using an example from 'Moneyball':

The goal was to find a formula to "buy hits" in baseball. Just how do you apply that to offensive lineman, or fullbacks... or any position that is not easily statistically defined?

I'm sure that a number of things like this have already been worked out or else they wouldn't have fully gone down this road, but when you can't even get past subjective ratings for OLine on a standard statistical site, it really makes me wonder how they are planning to apply reliably, repeatable analytics to some of these positions.

Maybe it is more about using the analytics to determine a type of player that we need or should be looking for, and then it will be up to the scouts/GM to find the player that fits the model's prediction?

I have no clue at all how this will pan out, but it is at least interesting.

Also, Chip Kelly was HUGE on analytics.

Look what that got him.

This would make Mr. Spock's eyebrow go up for sure. Not being a numbers guy I can't speak too in depth on the subject but it looks to me like this will help in narrowing down who should be on our draft board to begin with and then let the football guys do what they do to maximize the outcome.

Fascinating!

He can coach. He just shouldn't be a GM too. I've never been a fan of a guy being a GM and coach. I know it's worked, but it's a lot of responsibility.

You could also say they are also along the line of thinking as to why Dallas took a Lineman over Johnny Manziel.

That is what I am wondering as well. One of the big things saber metrics did was prove that closers weren't that indicative to winning. Sure they are great to have, but if you have only so much to spend it was much lower on the totem poll than quality SP or guys who put up quality OBP numbers.

Maybe in football we find out that elite CBs are nice to have, but not as important as pass rushers or vice-versa. Again I'm not sure it will work, but at least a new type of dumpster fire that is interesting.

I like this thinking. If it's about looking at statistics and trends, then it stands to reason that say, we get a DC who runs a 3-4 defense. Our "Brain Trust" can look to see a) what kinds of players do we really need to run it plus b) how to adapt that 3-4 to current trends in opponent offenses. The NFL is a copy cat league, is it not?

I wonder if that is also why they are limiting the GM role? Find a guy that puts his ego second, and is purely focused on the talent. Info passed down from the Brain Trust could possibly make the scouting search a little more efficient for the scouting department.

I hope Jimmy looked at his fantasy football record before he hired him.

Great hire

I am a dodger fan and while it didn't work with him in the top job - the management systems he built still resonate with the team - very smart guy

The coordinator in newengland is a big believer in analytics so is chip

But it really doesn't matter - you could bring coughlin in and just let him coach them

The better organizations have this type of infrastructure - coaches and general managers are put in positions to succeed by having good people throughout the organization.

I'm caustiously optimistic about this. Certainly there's no way for pure statistics to pick who's a football player and who's not but at least it shows that Haslam may be coming to realize that he needs help.

I bet that report that he paid for that said Bridgewater was the guy is really gnawing at him...

From what I understand, the 76'ers are one of the most Analytics based teams.

They sure are rampaging their way to a championship, aren't they?

They have used analytics to "build" a team that has won 19, 18, and 4 so far this year.

Analytics can be a tool. In a way, most coaches use a form of analytics in the preparation for a team. "If the opposing team does this, our opponent does this X% of the time".

However, the coaches have to also have a feel for the game, and how the game is going. They have to take into account injuries, weather, and tons of other factors.

If coaching could be accomplished by computer, we'd already see computerized coaching.

I still firmly believe that there are a few traits that successful coaches must have. They must be great leaders. They must relate to players. They must be able to set, and enforce goals, and manage the "big picture". They must be able to delegate.

None of these have anything to do with analytics. Technology has its place, as a contributing tool ... but man, making it the backbone of the decisions an NFL team makes ... well .... I could see us becoming the 76'ers of the NFL. (If we aren't already)

j/c

You all better get or renew your ProFootballFocus subscription!

This is very interesting. Media guys think this is new stuff. I disagree. I bet most teams already have some form of analytical strategy in place. Most major college football teams already implementing.

Creating a pillar in your organizational chart simply brings this concept to a whole new level. It certainly justifies sacking Farmer and Pettine old school replaced with new school.

This is just comical, and proves even more that our owner don't have a clue.

Look folks Football IS NOT complicated...for God's sake...

Football is nothing more then hitting and tackling - Paul Brown.

This will go down a long line of another list of failures....and we fail because we can't get out of our own damn way...give me 80k a year and medical benefits and i'll get this team into the playoffs without a franchise QB...its not that hard.

You want to win in the NFL, you do 4 things consistently:

1. Run the Football
2. Stop the Run
3. Rush the Passer
4. Play solid special teams

thats it..and none of those 4 require a franchise QB...I watched Bill Cowher win 10-12 games with Kordell Stewart for pete's sake doing just this...watching Marty win 12-14 games a year with junk at QB....even watched Jimmy Johnson make the playoffs in Miami with junk at QB

I don't care who we hire until we do get people in here that are COMMITTED to football and not political crap taking players the media thinks we should take, this team will continue to be trash.

Everyone Told me Clay Matthews Jr. wasn't worth a 1st rd pick, all the media said the Browns shouldn't take him either because he was a "reach" BS, I saw a hard nosed football player that fits the mold of #1-4 and until the Browns start drafting guys that fit the mold of #1-4 we will continue to be losers, and stats don't measure #1-4, physical presence, attitude, and heart does...all things the Browns and statistical anaylitics all lack to measure...Joe Thomas is the only guy on this team and maybe Alex Mack that have #1-4 and it shows.

YTown, baseball really uses this stuff to Nth degree. Tony La Russa and Dave Duncan, while with St. Louis Cardinals, were huge in this concept.

After all it is only numbers. One must learn how to interpret. It simply adds confirmation and strategy to subjective thinking.

And now we have a Harvard connection with this guy and Sashi Brown

Knight, neither is baseball.

Throw the ball. Hit the ball.

Sport embraced analytics.

eww boy ..... I've heard it all now. Getting ready for LaLa land no doubt.