Sooo.....I love spreadsheets and numbers....and I fell completely down a rabbit hole.
After reading some of the criticisms or critiques of my previous article, I decided to dig deeper, and to go further than any bored person on a weeknight that probably had better things to do but really didn't want to do any of them, should have gone.
I started to reassess my formula, not because it was bad, but because it just needed to be better. The original iteration didn't take into account certain things like age or size, and just compared straight stats.
So how do you incorporate other things that may or may not play a factor? You treat it like a Hail Mary, you close your eyes, you heave it as hard as you can, and pray you connect (make sense of it all).
Without beating around the bush, here is my new formula:
Age/Weight Score + SPD(0.
+ STR + AWR(0.6) + AGI + ACC + TAK(0.6) + STA(0.1) + INJ(0.1) + TGH(0.1) = Score
For comparison, the old formula:
(SPD*.5) + STR + AWR + AGI + ACC + TAK + (STA*.1) + (INJ*.1) + (TGH*0.1) = Score
First off, I wanted to try to incorporate a Prospect's age at the draft, and their size. For age, I kept it pretty simple. I have seen discussions regarding progression, and what an average per year usually is, and I want to say it's somewhere in the 4ish points range. Since these are prospective players and it's all based on potential and there are a lot of things that COULD come into play, I went with 3 extra points per year. You will also see that progressible stats in my equation do not carry full weight, so since extra years means more progression points before regression, 3 instead of 4 felt fitting and consistent. So simply put, if the oldest player drafted is typically 24, that equated to 0 points, with a +3 for each year younger, so a 21 year old gets an extra 9 points in their final total.
As for size, I'm not at all convinced that a 6'6" Defensive Tackle has any advantage over a 6'2" Defensive Tackle, but I will accept that weight most definitely plays a role. I like to see my DTs hit 300+ pounds, as do most others, so I figured that 300-320 is about the average weight range. Usually being bigger than that comes with it's own penalty when you start to look at the physical attributes, but if a DT manages to maintain similar SPD/AGI/ACC while also being 350 pounds instead of 300, then there should be some added benefit to that. So I went with a -3 points for being under 300 pounds, and a +3 for being over 320 pounds. (I'm open to tweaking this)
Next is the SPD stat. I previously had it at 50% weight, and I didn't like that. As I was writing my article, I felt like I saw a correlation between a player's SPD and their Tackles for a Loss and Sacks. I feel like it would make sense that ACC really only applies to the first few steps a player takes, so after that the SPD stat has to take effect and help grab players behind the line of scrimmage. To me, a TKL and SCK are mostly the same thing, whether you're tackling the QB or the HB, you're just going after whoever currently has the ball, and if you can get them behind the line of scrimmage, that is what matters.
That being said, it's not a bolded attribute, but it is static, and cannot be improved with progression points, so I bumped it to an 80% weight.
Next are the AWR and TAK stats. Some will argue that AWR doesn't have any affect on a DT, but I disagree. I'd like to see some research for and against that though, I'm always open to learn something, but you're going to have to feed me good informative data.
With both of these being bolded attributes, they are important, but both are also progressible, therefore I simply gave them a 60% weight, just behind the SPD stat. You can often also improve them with a trip to Training Camp as well, so I felt the 60% was fair.
Lastly, all of the bolded and static attributes, STR, AGI, and ACC all got full weight to their value. I wanted them to truly stand against each other for a full comparison.
Then extra lastly.....the STA, INJ, and TGH attributes all remained at a 10% weight, because again I really feel like that are only a small tiebreaker. They are important enough to consider, but not important enough to drastically affect your decision.
Without further ado, here are the results!
As you can see, the numbers look a little different, but Kenny Clark remains on top. Even more so after entering his actual stats. He's an absolute stud.
I extended my research out a few years, and added the first round DTs from the last 5 years. There's really not too many that go in the first round, people definitely focus more on the defensive ends with their top picks.
I also went ahead and added a couple of the suggestions I saw people make, as well as my own top DT. And then looked at the top sack-getters from 2015 and added some of them for comparison.
As you can see, I did not tailor this to fit Kenny Clark. I edited it multiple times, and tried to think through everything thoroughly and fairly, and was willing to accept the results. But, while some came close, Kenny Clark still sits atop this list!
If anyone has any other DTs they think might have been a better prospect, let me know, and I'll run them through the same equation!
