Quick post today.  We’ll start taking a detailed look at the upcoming season soon (hopefully next week), but I wanted to mention a high-level point today.  The over-arching question is: Are the Eagles better this season than they were last season?

I haven’t ventured a complete answer just yet; I still have a lot of stats to go through.  However, I have stated quite explicitly that, from a pure roster perspective, I don’t think the Eagles improved very much (and may actually have gotten worse).  There’s a problem with that statement, though.  It’s incomplete.  Here’s why:

When we talk about a team’s “true” ability level, we’re not really discussing discrete values.  Although many pundits (i.e. anyone/everyone on ESPN) views season projections this way, it’s a very bad method of forecasting.  In reality, ex-ante (before each season), the best we can do is put together an expected performance distribution.  In other words, before the season, we have no idea how many wins each team will produce.  Beyond our inability to fully quantify all the known controllable variables, there’s a HUGE degree of natural uncertainty (luck) in the game.

I touched on this a bit before last season.  In making my projection for the Eagles, I gave a range of outcomes before settling on 9.1 (if I remember correctly) as the average.  I ALSO explained that the Eagles were among the highest VARIANCE teams heading into last season.  Put simply, the team, prior to last season, had perhaps the largest range of expected outcomes.  So while I thought the team “should” win between 9 and 10 games, I also thought it was reasonably possible for them to go 4-12 or 12-4.  Chip Kelly was a big reason for that range; he brought with him a very large degree of uncertainty.  In hindsight, things works out generally as expected (at least on this site) and the Eagles finished with 10 wins.  Note that, given the point differential, the Eagles “true” performance last year was 9.4 wins (via Pythagorean formula).

So why am I telling you this?

Well, if we think about each team’s expected performance as a probabilistic distribution, then there are TWO main ways for the team to actually improve.  Most clearly, a team can increase it’s average win projection.  For instance, it could sign multiple impact starters, or take a great prospect very high in the draft.  Doing so might shift the teams entire distribution to the right, like so:

This is a graphic I used before the playoff game against the Saints.  The X-axis is wins in this example.  The values don’t really matter.  What matters is that the team has moved from left to right.  Clearly, the blue distribution represents a better team.  It’s average performance is much higher.

BUT, there is another way to improve (several actually but we’re focusing on the big ones), at least conceptually.  A team can keep its average win projection the same, but decrease its expected variance.  For example, the Eagles might still be looking at 9.1 wins this year, but the team’s range may have decreased.  That means our certainty increases.

Visually, it might look like this (again borrowing from this post from last season):

Notice the Cardinals; distribution is much narrower than the Eagles’.  Pretend that both have the same average (i.e. move the Eagles to the right so it’s centered on the Cardinals).

That’s better.  To borrow a finance concept, think of the distribution like a stock.  Many analysts/investors use volatility (technically standard deviation, not variance, but for our purposes they’re the same thing) as a proxy for risk.  When looking at an investment, you have to look at both the expected return AND the risk associated with the investment.  Here, you have to look at both the expected average win projection AND the range of potential outcomes.

It’s important to note here that, assuming a symmetrical distribution, narrowing the range ALSO decreases upside while minimizing downside.  Hence, sometimes it is better to have a wide distribution, like when you are a bad team.  However, since there are diminishing returns at the top end of the distribution (a 10 win playoff team isn’t much worse off than an 11 win playoff team), especially where the Eagles look to be headed (good enough to make the playoff but not good enough to challenge for a bye), a smaller range of outcomes is an improvement for the team.

Here’s the important part:

While it’s unclear whether or not the Eagles have shifted their distribution to the right (i.e. expect to win more than 9.4 games this year), it seems very likely that the team has narrowed its range of expected outcomes.

Chip Kelly is no longer huge unknown.  Nick Foles expected performance is undoubtedly higher this year than Michael Vick’s was before last season.  Personnel-wise, the Eagles have made significant improvements below the starters on the depth chart.  Obviously, injuries are a massive source of uncertainty.  Although the Eagles have not added any impact starters (making it tough to increase projected wins), they have made the roster more robust, particularly on the defensive side of the ball.

So yes, the Eagles likely are better this year, if only in terms of uncertainty.  Whether the team’s average win projection has improved is a separate issue that I’ll address over the next couple of weeks.

Now that everyone’s had a chance to recover from the draft, it’s time to start breaking it down in more detail.  I had a few notes earlier this week, but today I want to take things a bit further.  First, though (as usual), I have to clear a few things up regarding the TPR model:

– The TPR model is not predictive; it is not meant to be.  Moreover, I developed the TPR model as a conceptual demonstration of what I believe to be the correct method of drafting.  Namely, consensus forecasts are more valuable, over the long term, than those of individual scouts.  Additionally, any useful draft board has to account for the difference in positional impacts.  Unfortunately, I don’t have nearly enough data to work with, hence the TPR model is mainly useful conceptually, and not practically.  So, just because the TPR model lists a prospect as a “reach” or a “steal” does not necessarily mean it was a bad pick, we’re just nowhere near the confidence level required to make such classifications.

However, that doesn’t mean we should ignore it.  While the model can’t tell us anything definitively, it can certainly shed light on particular picks and prospects that warrant increased scrutiny (that’s the law classes bleeding into my vocabulary).  So, I don’t want to represent that the TPR model is definitive.  Also, my personal opinions diverge from the model’s results sometimes (significantly in certain cases).

Hopefully that clears things up a bit.

That brings us to the Eagles draft.

Overall, I thought the team did OK:

– The trades, in particular, were phenomenal.  Getting a 3rd round pick for moving down 4 spots in the 20s is an absolute heist.  Getting anything for Bryce Brown is as well.  I like Brown, but it was abundantly clear last season that he did not fit the new offense.  The trade up for Jordan Matthews wasn’t quite as good, from a probabilistic view.  But, I’m willing to cut the team more slack here because (a) it was in the 2nd round, and (b) I really like Matthews.  With Lee coming off the board at 39, Matthews appeared to be the top WR remaining for most people (not the TPR rankings though).  As a result, he probably wouldn’t have been there at 54 (Davonte Adams, another WR, was taken at 53).

Theoretically, it’s possible the Eagles could have traded up fewer spots and still grabbed Matthews, but we have to assume Howie chose the best option available.  Hence, the Matthews trade wasn’t a great one, from a strategic standpoint, but it also wasn’t bad.

– I mentioned the possibility of saturation drafting at the WR position.  Hopefully you listened, because that’s exactly what the team did.  Rather than taking on in the first round, the Eagles took two later on.  See this post for the full breakdown of why that was a good decision.  Note, though, that the idea behind saturation drafting is that it dramatically increases the odds of finding ONE good player.  Hence, the Eagles are likely to get a good WR out of this draft.  That does NOT mean that both Huff and Matthews are both likely to pan out.

– The Eagles also seemed to follow what I had outlined as my Plans A, B, and C.   Plan A was to draft a LB (Mosley or Barr), Plan B was to draft a S (Pryor or Dix), Plan C was to trade down or take the best CB available.  Those top 4 players were off the board at 22 (Dix went with the 21st pick), so trading down became the best option.  Post-draft buzz says the Eagles also would have taken Cooks or Beckham (WRs) if they had been available at 22.  Regardless, I was pretty happy with the 1st round strategy (though not necessarily the end result).

– The Eagles did, however, take a LB after trading down to 26, just not one of the players we were all expecting or hoping for.  This, of course, is the biggest question in the Eagles draft:  Was Marcus Smith a “reach”?

The short answer is yes.  Howie admitted as much.  He said that the team really wanted an OLB and that Smith was the last player at that position they’d be happy with.  So they traded down a few spots and grabbed him.  That’s a relatively defensible strategy, provided they REALLY like this kid and there really weren’t other opportunities to trade down farther (but not too far).  However, it does seem like a low-probability play.  See the disclaimer above, but Smith was ranked just 140th overall in the TPR model.  He was selected 26th…  The only comparable “reach” in the first two rounds was the selection of Justin Britt, chosen 64th overall by the Seahawks.  He was unranked (i.e. not in the top 150).

One the bright side, the model does not differentiate between 3-4 and 4-3 positions.  Generally, I don’t think this is a big deal.  BUT, if there is one position the model is probably undervaluing, it’s the rush LB in a 3-4 scheme.  That seems to be where Smith fits.

Moreover, it’s been reported that there were two other teams ready to move up for or ready to draft pick in the late first round.  I’ve explained previously why I’m somewhat skeptical of reports like that, but to the extent it IS true, it adds confidence to the pick.

The upshot is: there were almost definitely higher probability prospects available at 26.  So Smith was not the optimal choice.  That doesn’t mean he won’t work out.  Drafting for need CAN result in fantastic picks, because a “hit” occurs where it will have the biggest impact.  However, it’s a higher risk play, because drafting for need means you pass on prospects with better chances of panning out.

So…Higher risk, higher reward (though the tradeoff is not equal, hence sub-optimal).  I’m guessing some fans are fine with that strategy, especially because the Eagles were able to trade down first before doing it.

– You’ll hopefully remember that I don’t pay much attention to the late round picks.  They usually don’t matter.  It’s fun to get excited about these guys, but the cold hard fact is that nearly all of them will end up either not making the roster or as bottom-of-the-depth-chart players.  So Taylor Hart, Beau Allen, Ed Reynolds….hope for the best, but it’s not worth spending much time analyzing them now.

The Bad News

There are a couple of higher level issues I have with this year’s draft:

– The team did not draft an OL.  I’ve made it clear that I think the aging line is a big area of risk.  The team’s offense revolves around the running game, and Foles isn’t exactly going to run away from guys that get through.  I was hoping the team would at least add a late-round OT (those guys have much higher hit rates than any other late-round position).  Maybe they means they’re confident in the current depth OL.   At some point, though, the Eagles will need to start lining up replacements for Peters and Mathis.  Herremans I was kind of hoping would be replaced this offseason…

The danger is in having to replace them all at once.  That’s the situation the team should be trying to avoid, because finding one good starter is hard enough.  Finding 3 at the same time almost guarantees that you’re going to have a big hole for at least a season or two.

– The Eagles, on paper, appear to be a worse team than they were last season.  I know this is a long term build, but it still hurts to see the team take a step backwards.  On offense, the team lost D-Jax and added two rookie WRs (not likely to contribute) and Darren Sproles (old and getting older).  On defense, the team added Malcolm Jenkins and Smith, who seems unlikely to start.  I know people expect guys like Ertz, Kendricks, Logan, etc…to get better, and that will probably happen (for at least 1 or 2 of them).  Still, I just don’t see any reasonably objective way to say this teams roster is better now than it was last season.

Again, I’d rather look long-term than short, but just start preparing yourselves for a potential step-backwards season.

We’re in the midst of the offseason lull and draft coverage will ramp up soon.  Therefore, it’s a good time to take a high level look at the roster and see what the team’s “needs” are.  Having that framework makes following free agency and the draft much easier (and useful).  One big point before we begin:

This year feels completely different from last year (at this time).  However, that doesn’t mean the goals aren’t very similar.

One year ago, the Eagles looked like a complete mess, and appeared to be at the very beginning of a long rebuilding process.  At least that was the message you got from reading most beat writers.  Readers here obviously knew that things weren’t quite that bleak.  This year, the general Eagles vibe seems to be that it’s a team that has already “rebuilt”, and are now ready to take the next step towards contending (perhaps not competing with Seattle and San Fran next year, but certainly solidifying a place just behind them).  From my point of view, that’s a bit aggressive.

The team took a huge step forward this season (I will probably refer to 2013 as “this season” until FA starts).  Most important was the hiring of Chip Kelly.  However, a number of players emerged as potentially significant contributors to a contending team.  Specifically, Boykin, Lane Johnson, and Zach Ertz all seem to be somewhat reliable pieces that either weren’t with the team last year or still carried a lot of uncertainty (Boykin).  Johnson and Ertz both had issues, but given the totality of their performances, I think the odds are very good that both will become strong starters.

While that certainly helps, we can’t let it blind us to the fact that the team still has a lot of weaknesses.  The defensive roster is still very much in flux or just plain bad.  Most glaring is the lack of talent and depth in the DB corps.  However, the LBs aren’t good either and the DL has some holes as well.  Special teams was atrocious for parts of last year (outside of Donnie Jones), and the kicker probably needs to be upgraded at some point in the near future.  On offense, the scheme obviously works, but Jason Peters and Evan Mathis are getting old, and the WR group is thin and could use some more high-end talent.  LeSean McCoy, the Eagles MVP and the guy the offense is built around, is a unique talent.   If he were to get injured, the consequences for the offense could be catastrophic.

So…in light of all that, what should the Eagles do?

I’ll go through position groups in more detail later, but for now let’s just focus on a few big priorities.

1)  Add talent – This seems so simple, yet it gets glossed over far to quickly by most people.  Did you watch the Seahawks this year? Did you watch the Broncos?  If the answer is yes, then you must have realized that those teams operated on a much higher level than the Eagles did.  Until the Eagles become a “contender”, first priority is to add talent whenever and wherever possible, within the structure of the team of course.  So that doesn’t mean go out and buy every FA available.  It does mean the team should be flexible and agnostic as to what positions it looks to upgrade.

If it were me, I’d go through every FA, under the age of 28, in the league and see where they would slot on the Eagles depth chart.  If they’re an upgrade, I make them an offer.  If that ends up just getting you a handful of 3rd stringers, so be it.  Fans don’t get excited about those type of signings, but they’re really important, especially in the “build” phase.

2) Backup QB – This has to be a high priority.  Michael Vick is gone, he no longer makes sense for the team.  As we saw last season, QB depth is vital to any team looking to make the playoffs.  It’s extremely rare to find someone who can step in and take your team to a title (Brady and Warner were anomalies).  However, you do need someone who can step in and win a few games.  Again, not a sexy position to upgrade, but if Nick Foles goes down for 2-3 games next season, it could cost the team a playoff spot.  When the FA class shakes out a bit, we can look at potential targets here, but it’s HEAVILY dependent on the contract.  As far as traits go, I just want someone who is competent and DURABLE.  I’d gladly sacrifice a bit of talent for durability.  As I said, you’re almost definitely not winning the title with a 2nd string QB anyway, so the extra talent isn’t going to get you much.  Meanwhile, an injury to the 2nd string QB can be a season-killer, as it nearly was for the Eagles this year.

3) DBs….a lot of them – No position group on the team is as weak as the DBs.  The CBs are OK, but each of them seems better suited to a #2 role.  The Safeties are a bigger concern, obviously, and you can’t count on the draft to fix them.  A lot of fans are hoping for a Byrd signing here, but I think it’s too early for a move like that.  Rather, I’d look to sign 2-3 mid-level guys to reasonable deals and see which ones stick.  That’s a similar approach to last season.  Kenny Phillips and Patrick Chung didn’t pan out, but they didn’t cost the team anything either.  Hopefully the BPA when the Eagles pick in the draft is a DB, but you can’t count on that.  In the meantime, keep adding low-risk players and try to make incremental improvements.  That way, when you do find the #1s, the rest of the depth chart is already in place.

4)  LBs – Similar story to the DBs, but for slightly different reasons.  The Eagles LB corps last season was serviceable, and occasionally very good.  Unfortunately, they’re not likely to stay that way.  Demeco Ryans is obviously not a long-term solution, neither is Trent Cole.  I still don’t see Brandon Graham as a viable starter either (in this defense).  That’s a lot of holes to fill, and it’s not going to be done in one offseason.  If the team can plug one of those two spots with a long-term guy, even if he’s just above-average, it will have taken an important step.  The rush LB will draw most of the attention this offseason, but don’t forget about Demeco’s spot.

5)  The Offense – This ties into the first priority, adding talent.  Most of the focus will be on the defensive side of the ball, and for good reason.  However, it’d be a BIG mistake to forget about the offense.  Remember, an above average offense is a NECESSARY condition for winning the SB.  The same cannot be said of the defense.  The Eagles’ offensive position is more precarious than it might seem.  The WR corps is thin, even if Cooper or Maclin return.  One injury to D-Jax and suddenly the group looks like a weakness rather than a strength.  McCoy is also a HUGE risk factor.  The offense is built around him, and the fact that he is so good means there’s just no way to adequately replace him if he goes down.  Another weapon or two would help alleviate that risk.

Lastly, Jason Peters is now 32 years old.  Evan Mathis is 32 years old.  Todd Herremans is 31 years old.

Moral of the story here is that nobody should be surprised if the Eagles take an OT in one of the first two rounds this year.  If that’s the BPA, I have absolutely no problem taking an OT in the first round, even if he sits a year behind Peters (or Johnson before he switches sides).

As I said, I’ll take a much more detailed look at the roster soon, and I think I’ve come up with a good way to visualize things.  In the meantime, be hopeful, but realistic.  There are a LOT of holes in this team, and barring an amazing draft, it’s going to take more than one offseason to fill them.

You may have noticed that I’ve been posting less often over the past few weeks.  I’ve been swamped with other projects and school.  Fortunately, some of that is clearing, so I’ll have more time to get back to the Eagles.  First, though, I wanted to briefly talk about one of the things I’ve been working on.

As part of the Penn Law curriculum (which is not altered at all for JD/MBAs), every student has to complete 70 hours of pro bono work.  I’ve chosen to fulfill my requirement by volunteering with the Iraqi Refugee Assistance project.  Over the past few months, I’ve been working with a client in Baghdad, helping him and his family apply for resettlement in the U.S.   He and his family have been the victims of severe persecution (attacks, kidnapping, threats, etc…) and have no other choice but to flee the country.  As you can imagine, the red tape involved in U.S. resettlement is immense; that’s where we come in.

This March, six other students and I will be traveling to Kurdistan (Northern Iraq) to conduct in-person interviews with Syrian and Iraqi refugees.  To that end, we’ve started an online fundraising drive to help cover the costs (flights to Erbil ain’t cheap).  If you can help out, please do.  If not, no worries, but at the very least, please watch the video below.  Awareness is a big part of the problem, so just taking 3 minutes to learn more about the situation is helpful as well.  UPDATE:  Video below is not my client, he’s just a good example of the type of people we’re helping.

Help Out

Thanks in advance.  I promise this won’t become a habit (I think this is the first non-sports post I’ve done actually), and I’ll get back to the Eagles soon.

– Brent

Sticking with the preseason review today (no better time to do it than a bye week, other than after the season ends, of course).  This time lets revisit the list of overrated and underrated teams I posted before the season started and see how things stand.

Overrated

The original post is here.  Below, I’ve included the summary table.

To refresh, I simply took the Football Outsiders projections and compared them to the Vegas lines to see where the biggest differences were and what they could tell us about the expected performance of teams.  As you can see, pretty much nailed this one. The most overrated teams, by this measure, were Atlanta and Minnesota.

Atlanta, of course, is currently 2-9 and arguably the biggest disappointment in the league this year (though I’d obviously argue that they shouldn’t have been so highly rated to begin with.

Minnesota was another gimme.  Anyone taking the Over (7.5 wins) for this team was either crazy or stupid.  Specifically, I said:

I have the Vikings in the 4-5 win range, which is even lower than FO.  While there are a number of explanations (including the points above), it really comes down to Christian Ponder versus a very tough schedule.  I think it’s likely to be a train wreck.

To date, the Vikings are 2-8-1.  Ponder hasn’t exactly been a train wreck, but with 9 interceptions (to 7 TDs) and a rating of 78.7, he hasn’t been good either.

Miami started the season strong, winning the first 3 games, but has lost 6 of 8 since then.  Currently at 5 wins, the Dolphins are likely to surpass the FO projection, and may even get to the 8 wins O/U (I doubt it though).

All told, you’d have done pretty well by following this chart.  Certainly regarding the teams identified as the most significant projection dislocations.  Said differently, if you looked at the original post and took the under on the Vikings and Falcons, you’re pretty happy now.

The Eagles, of course, are not on this list.  FO projected the team to win 7.8 games, while the O/U was set at 7.5, making them Underrated, though only marginally so.  My personal projection was for 9 wins, which still looks pretty good.

Busy week (exams approaching), but I’m hoping to post performance distributions for prominent QBs to continue our discussion (in more detail) about reasonable expectations, so look for that sometime in the next couple of days.

First, here’s a good article that is similar to points I’ve made here before (you’ve seen it if you click on the links I tweet).  Basically, it’s a lot easier to avoid stupid decisions than it is to make consistently smart decisions, and the impact of each is comparable.  (I.E. you can be “smart” by just NOT being stupid)

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Something absolutely crazy may or may not be happening with Aaron Hernandez right now.

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I usually ignore things like this, and there have already been a couple Lombardi takedowns, but I simply can’t let this pass without comment.  Read this, or just look at the italicized excerpt below:

Cleveland Browns general manager Mike Lombardi recently spoke about the team’s focus on building first-half leads. 

“If you can’t effectively throw the ball, if you can’t get the lead … early in the game, if you can’t rush the passer, then you’re going to have a hard time winning,” Lombardi told The Plain Dealer. “One of the most critical statistics in football today is first-half point differential. The top five teams that lead at halftime … typically are always going to be playoff-caliber type of teams.”

Utterly astonishing.  This man is an NFL GM (Sorry Cleveland!).  You know what’s also a “critical statistic”?   Full-game point differential.  Just wait till Lombardi realizes that; there’s no telling what crazy strategies the Browns will come up with.

This of course begs the question: What the hell were the Browns trying to do last year?  Not take the lead in the first half?

In any case, it appears as though the Browns have finally realized that the key to winning is outscoring your opponents.  This is surely the end of Browns futility.  I hope Chip Kelly is taking notes…

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In yesterday’s post, I forgot to include the Wildcat/Ronnie Brown effect when describing the Dolphins dramatic turnaround.  This has obvious relevance for Eagles fans.  A novel/creative offensive approach takes the league by storm and helps a previously inept team reach the playoffs?  Nice…

Also, Tom Brady was injured that year and the team committed the fewest turnovers in the league. (Thanks to Tommy Lawlor for pointing that out).

Again, the recipe for the Eagles this year is:  mean-revert in turnovers, take advantage of the new coach boost, be LESS terrible in the defensive secondary (hard not to) and Special Teams (near impossible not to), and capitalize on a weaker schedule.

If the team does that, playoffs are a completely reasonable goal.

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Hopefully you took my advice and have been watching the NBA finals.  Already a historically great series.  It is now a close game 7 away from one of the top 5 EVER (not hyperbole).

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Oh yeah, the Stanley Cup finals are now tied at 2-2 after an OT win by the Blackhawks.

Somebody needs to create the sports equivalent of a step-down drug to help fans adjust from the NBA/NHL playoffs and some football news to Just Baseball….

Last year a number of good Eagles writers/bloggers teamed up to create the 2012 Eagles Almanac, a 78 page preview magazine for the Eagles season.  This year I’ve joined the team.  Together, we hope to create the definitive pre-season preview and provide fans with the type of in-depth, Eagles-specific analysis you can’t find anywhere else.

To help the effort, we’ve started a Kickstarter campaign.

Here is the link.

Please click through to see a more detailed description and a list of writers.  $10 gets you a digital copy, $25 gets you a hard copy.  I’ve reviewed last season’s edition and seen this year’s preliminary article list; I promise you won’t regret ordering the 2013 Almanac.

We’ve set a fairly modest fundraising goal and hope to raise enough to allow us to cover the publishing, printing, and shipping costs associated with delivering an actual book.  As of right now, roughly 24 hours since the launch, we are sitting at just under 100 backers and nearly halfway to the primary goal.  You can, of course, wait until its published to decide whether you’re interested or not, but let’s face it; if you read THIS site, you’re going to want it, so you might as well order now and take some credit for helping it get off the ground.

Thanks in advance for your support.

-Brent

Apologies for no post yet today.  I’m putting the finishing touches on a dramatically updated PVM system.

I’ll be up later tonight with the full rankings and methodology.