Have you seen me?

[zoogs]

I'm not saying it was doing poorly. I'm saying that with only 14 runs, outliers can have an outsize effect on the average. There's no evidence whatsoever that Nebraska was on its way to, or could have pummeled Miami on the ground. If the game had been closer? Maybe the run game would have had that chance, but I'm pretty sure it would have been a fairly balanced split anyway.

 

We're unlikely to see Nebraska go for a 70% run plan like last year against Miami. For that definition of "committing to the run", Nebraska will likely almost never commit to the run.

 

Although I'd also hope that while aiming for 50-50, they'll still post YPC solid enough for people to continue clamoring about how the run game is and we just needed to call more run plays.

[Mavric]

I'm not saying it was doing poorly. I'm saying that with only 14 runs, outliers can have an outsize effect on the average. There's no evidence whatsoever that Nebraska was on its way to, or could have pummeled Miami on the ground. If the game had been closer? Maybe the run game would have had that chance, but I'm pretty sure it would have been a fairly balanced split anyway.

 

We're unlikely to see Nebraska go for a 70% run plan like last year against Miami. For that definition of "committing to the run", Nebraska will likely almost never commit to the run.

 

Although I'd also hope that while aiming for 50-50, they'll still post YPC solid enough for people to continue clamoring about how the run game is and we just needed to call more run plays.

 

What do you mean there is no evidence? Newby averaged 5.9 ypc. Minus the sacks, the team also averaged 5.9. If we had run it 45 times instead of thrown it 45 times, that would extropolate to 265 yards on the ground. The only reason there is any evidence lacking is because that's all the more times we actually ran the ball.

 

I'm not asking for running the ball 70% of the time. It was actually 80% last year but it seemed to work out pretty well. But our running stats - at least on a yards per carry basis - are really not that bad this year. Not great but not nearly as bad as people are making them out to be. The main reason we don't have more rushing yards is that we're simply not running the ball very often. We are currently #94 in the country in rushing attempts per game. And that's with one game that was close the entire way and another game that we won in a blowout so simply being behind doesn't explain it.

[zoogs]

We're going to have to agree to disagree on the meaningfulness of doing "extrapolation" such as 45 * YPC.

[Guy Chamberlin]

Here's another stat, at least for those that care about stats:

 

Nebraska is currently averaging 7.5 yards per passing attempt for the season, good for #61 in the country.

 

We are currently averaging 5.1 yards per rushing attempt for the season, good for #39 in the country.

 

That would also seem to indicate to me that, relatively speaking, we're better at running the ball than passing the ball.

Another way to look at that is Nebraska is averaging 2.4 more yards on passing plays than rushing plays.

[84HuskerLaw]

I always felt to have a good indicator or 'feel' for how the running game or passing game is really working as a practical matter, it was best to take the total yards and attempts and take out the top 10% and bottom 10% and recompute the average so that the 'statistical average' really reflects the average (think - "typical" as a definition). In other words, throw out the outliers and look at the core data. By way of quick example, if we had a set of running plays with gains as follows: -1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 22, and 45, you come up a mathematical average of 10.7 yards per carry on the ten runs. However, if you throw out the bottom 10% being the -1 and 2 yard carries and the top ten % being of course the two long runs, then you come up with a 6.5 yard per carry mathematical average. While both are pretty good averages, the 10.7 arguably is bumped way up by just one single play being a 45 yard gain. Likewise, a big loss of say 19 yards on a QB sack can make otherwise decent running yards by the quarterback's designed runs look poor. Obviously, we can say that with a sample size of just ten carries, each carry can have a substantial effect on the statistical average if it is an outlier (really high or low). Likewise, a team with only a dozen passes per game and 6 completions will have a modest 50% completion rate but if two of those passes are long TDs, the yards per attempt and per catch yards can be very high. The larger the number of attempts (whether runs or passes), the more typical or average will be the statistical averages. To be most meaningful and indicative of the relative success of the running game, a team would need to attempt perhaps 30 or more runs per game and similarly for passes. Osborne's teams often did not pass enough to fairly indicate the strength of the passing game, although most also agreed that NU passing was quite effective in generating yardage and keeping the defense somewhat honest in their schemes.

 

We all would surely agree that Riley's offense is predominantly a passing attack with significant number of running plays mixed in. Osborne was the opposite by general desription with the bulk being runs and a limited number of passes mixed in. Ultimately, the more effective the passes are for Riley, the better the runs should become as the defense will attempt to adjust and adapt itself to limit the passing attack and become more susceptible to runs. It was vice versa with Osborne's run oriented attack as defneses focused on crowding the line and loading up the box to try to overplay the run. Beck's idea was to keep the defense guessing constantly by sometimes over passing and sometimes over running, seemingly on a randum basis. I believe Beck's plays were often called as randomly as drawing them out of a hat rather than sequenced plays where one or more plays are intended to set up one or more other plays that follow. Random is NOT, in my view, an ideal way to call plays, although it may be more unpredictable than any other way to select plays. One can keep the defense honest by random play calls IF the defense fears your playmaking ability. Often, it seems defenses are not afraid of our offensive power.

[zoogs]

I'm not sure I agree with throwing out outliers -- that just creates a new "modified mean" statistic that can be hard to understand. I guess the larger point is that the mean is one measure, but it's not necessarily very descriptive. The same means can come from data that is distributed very differently. Not that we'd have a great feel for the meanings of standard deviation either.

 

You make a good point about how everything kind of fits together. That's a good way to explain it; different pieces and different plays complement each other. If you're running a lot and not running very well, for instance, maybe that's okay because it serves up the deep passes you hope to hit now and again. If you're throwing 60 times a game in a spread short passing offense, maybe that's okay because it opens up the runs...and everything in between.

 

Supposing a completely different scheme / philosophy / gameplan throws too many things up into the air. But I guess that's half the fun: we don't know what might've happened with a different approach, but we can always wonder.

[Thanks_Tom RR]

My concern with Newby, and the difference I see with Wilbon, is he does not get many earned yards. He is often tackled during first contact, which appears to be because he does not churn his legs through contact.

 

Wilbon on the other hand is shifty enough to make guys miss and has had a few runs develop into decent gains when it looked like he would be TFL because the blocking was poor.

[TheSker]

 

Here's another stat, at least for those that care about stats:

 

Nebraska is currently averaging 7.5 yards per passing attempt for the season, good for #61 in the country.

 

We are currently averaging 5.1 yards per rushing attempt for the season, good for #39 in the country.

 

That would also seem to indicate to me that, relatively speaking, we're better at running the ball than passing the ball.

Another way to look at that is Nebraska is averaging 2.4 more yards on passing plays than rushing plays.

 

Run the ball

[BIG ERN]

The EYES never lie. I've seen Newby leave a lot of yards on the field that Wilbon would have capatilized on. That is a fact.

[GBRedneck]

Our national statistical ranking in Yds/Attempt is the same for rushing and passing. But in pure yards, our rank is much, much lower for rushing because of so many fewer attempts.

 

Despite the average results of an individual play being similar for rushing or passing, we put all of our eggs in the passing basket.

[commando]

The EYES never lie. I've seen Newby leave a lot of yards on the field that Wilbon would have capatilized on. That is my opinion.

fixed it for you

[BigRedBuster]

The EYES never lie. I've seen Newby leave a lot of yards on the field that Wilbon would have capatilized on. That is a fact.

Well.....no.....the only fact in this statement is that you saw Newby run the ball. You can be pretty sure on some plays there were more yards to be gained. It is pure speculation that Wilbon would have gained those yards.

[cornographic]

 

Did he shoot Riley's dog?

 

Newly looks tentative and doesn't finish his runs. Far too much hesitation. Wilbon has far more upside. Let's give him a chance.

I like Wilbon a lot, but have to wonder if the style of offense is conducive to any running back being successful. I think we'll have to be far more dominating on the line and knock off the dumb penalties on every big play instead of trying to dink and dunk our way down the field.

 

It kinda helps the running game when your team doesn't get down by 2-3 TDs in the 1st half. There's no problem with the offensive style and rushing attack, as displayed in the USA game where TNewb nearly went bicentennial in ydge. Riley basically said, post BYU game, that he wanted to get TNewb established, but I'm sure as the season rolls on, Mikale will be worked regularly back into the rotation. The guy is really good, he will be seen again, have patience sports fans.

[teachercd]

So...is Wilbon not playing or being the starter a coaching mistake? Or is the just the case of "the backup is always better" I guess I find it hard to believe that staff doesn't know who the best RB is but considering that Gangwish started the year at DE it does make me wonder just a bit.

[BIG ERN]

 

The EYES never lie. I've seen Newby leave a lot of yards on the field that Wilbon would have capatilized on. That is a fact.

Well.....no.....the only fact in this statement is that you saw Newby run the ball. You can be pretty sure on some plays there were more yards to be gained. It is pure speculation that Wilbon would have gained those yards.

 

 

I pointed out in a different thread a few weeks ago that over the course of last year Imani Cross had better numbers across the board than Newby. For our system (no offense to Cross), this probably shouldn't happen.