Fact-Based Football

The Cutler/Orton/Tebow Trade...Revisited

2011-11-23T10:17:00.001-08:00

So.....Now that Kyle Orton has been sacked by the Broncos and Jay Cutler is out for the season for the Bears, I thought it would be nice to look back upon the initial trade that brought Orton to Denver, Cutler to Chicago, and was partially responsible for bringing Tim Tebow to Denver. In this article I will attempt to clarify who ultimately wound up being involved in this trade, and then I will attempt to use a metrics-based approach to do a light evaluation of how this trade has worked out so far. The source information for this article comes from a brilliant article done by Denver Post writer Mike Klis, and from the data and statistical analyses done by the hard working folks over at Pro-Football Reference.com.

Here is a diagram outlining how the trades started out and who ultimately was brought to the Broncos/Bears either wholly or in part, by this trade.

To summarize the personnel involved in the trade, the Broncos traded Jay Cutler and the draft pick that ultimately wound up being Johnny Knox to the Bears. In exchange, the Broncos got Orton and draft picks that ultimately wound up becoming Robert Ayers, Demaryius Thomas, Eric Decker, 1/2 of Richard Quinn, and 1/3 of Tim Tebow. Yes, part of this trade went toward the draft pick that was Tebow, so it wouldn't be too far off base to say that the Cutler trade was partially responsible for Tebow coming to Denver.

While many have criticized Josh McDaniels' actual draft selections, he seems to have been pretty good at trading picks for more picks and moving around the draft board. In this case he took 2 - 1st Round Picks and a 3rd Round Pick and wound up with 2 - 1st Round Picks, a 3rd round Pick, 1/2 of a 2nd Round Pick and 1/3 of a 1st Round Pick.

So how good or bad was this trade??

It is awfully hard to use a fact-based approach to evaluate a trade of this kind, but I have taken a stab at rating it "so far" while keeping in mind that most people in this trade are still very young. I have utilized a metric devised by the folks over at Pro-Football Reference.com. The metric is called Approximate Value and in its simplest terms is an attempt to measure the value of players across positions and sides of the ball. A better/fuller explanation of this metric can be found at the Pro-Football Reference Blog.

Now don't take the rest of this post too serious as it is more for fun than anything else, but I have taken the AV described above and attempted to evaluate the trade with the AV metric. I have probably misused it by summing the AV's to try to get to an overall AV trade value. Here is what I found:

AV Analysis	2009	2010
Cutler	11	12
Knox	6	9
Bears Total	17	21

Orton	11	11
Ayers	3	4
Thomas	0	2
Decker	0	1
1/2 of Quinn	0.5	1
1/3 of Tebow	0	1
Denver Total	14.5	20

Through the 2009 and 2010 seasons, the Bears hold a slight advantage when the AV's are totaled. While certainly too early to really tell if this was a fantastic trade for either team, it will be fun in the future to watch these players and see how this trade, involving so many players, turns out...Enjoy!

Happy Thanksgiving to all...Cheers...

Bo

Why Are The Broncos 5-5 After Starting 1-4?

2011-11-20T07:57:00.001-08:00

So...It would be very easy to jump on the Tim Tebow bandwagon or the Tebow blasting ship, however here at Fact-Based Football we prefer to let the numbers do the talking. While it cannot be denied that Tebow has had an emotional impact on the Broncos versus the more sedate Orton, I wanted to take a quick, yet more evidence-based view of the Broncos recent success in an attempt to see where the success is coming from.

Here are at least some the factors that have given rise to the recent 4-1 run for the Broncos:

1) Turnovers... -5 vs. +1

During the first 5 games of the season the Broncos were a -5 in turnovers and were negative in 3 of those 5 games. In the last 5 games, the Broncos have been a respectable +1 and have only been negative in 1 game (the blowout by the Lions). This is one area that Tebow definitely helps. With all the talk about inaccuracy we can be sure that so far in his career he has not thrown a lot of "completions" to the opponents.

2) Time of Possession... 26:43 vs. 31:36

Since the bye week, the Broncos have averaged a Time of Possession that is almost 5 minutes greater per game. Quotes from some of the defensive players have suggested they feel fresher with this extra time. This change in time can probably be attributed to.....

3) Rushing... 24-102 vs. 40-208 and 31- 123 vs. 27-105

These are the rounded rushing numbers for the Broncos and their opponents this year. What do we see? Before the bye the Broncos ran 23.6 times per game for 101.8 yards. After the break, they are rushing the ball 39.6 times per game for an average of 208 yards. On the other side of the ball the defense had been giving up 30.6 carries for 123.4 yards per game before the bye and since they are at 27.4 and 104.8. Giving up about 20 yards less per game may not be very significant, but gaining greater than 100 more per game on offense has contributed. Give credit to the Offensive Line, the Coaches, and to the Running QB for helping get this stat up after the bye.

4) Defense...Defense...Defense...

With all the attention and heroics from the offense during the late game comebacks, it might be hard to see how the defense has been perhaps, as great a contributor to the Bronco's turnaround as any factor. Before the break, opponents were completing 22.8 passes per game. After the break it is 21.0, making this a pretty even stat. The noteworthy stat in passing, however, is yards. Before the bye the defense allowed an average of 281.2 yards per game. After the bye, that number is now almost 50 yards less per game at 238.6. Lastly, the all important points statistic. Before the bye the team was averaging 21 points per game. Recently they have averaged 20 points per game. On the defensive side of the ball, before the break, the team was allowing 28 points per game. Now they are allowing only 21, a drop of 7 points per game (this includes the Lion blowout). With so many of the Broncos game being decided by 1 TD or less (7 of their 10 games this year), having the defense give up 7 less points will often be the difference between losing by 4 or winning by 3.

So What is the Point??

While it cannot be denied that changing starting quarterbacks after the bye has had a significant effect on the Broncos, as always there are many factors that we can point to for their recent success besides the QB change. Better ball protection, better coaching, better offensive line play, significantly better defensive play are only the areas I touched upon in this article. In summary, football remains a team game and as long as the Broncos continue to get improved play from many if not all facets of their game, they will continue to challenge for the AFC West title.

A Small Look at Game Winning Drive Statistics

2011-11-18T11:17:00.001-08:00

So.... I am not saying that Tebow will always win when his team trails in the 4th quarter, and I am not saying he will be the best late-game quarterback that ever lived. However, I thought it might be fun to take a quick look at Tebow's comebacks versus some of the best ever.

Since data about who had the most game-winning drives the fastest is hard to find, we decided, here at Fact-Based Football, to take a quick peak at the QB's considered to be the #1 and #4 Game-Winning Drive QB's of all time (as compiled by Pro-Football-Reference (PFR), see: NFL Career Game-Winning Drives Leaders). Those 2 QB's are Dan Marino and John Elway. According to PFR, Marino had 47 career game-winning drives, Elway had 40 and Tebow has 3 in 8 career starts.

So what is the point??

How many starts did it take for these 2 great QB's to get their first 3 game-winning drives? For Elway, he got his 3rd game-winning drive in his 23rd game, a 16-13 win against the Chargers on 12/9/84. Marino got his 3rd game-winning drive in his 19th game start, a 31-17 win against (ironically) the Jets on 11/4/84. Stats on the the first 3 game-winning drives for the QB's are listed below.

Now I am not saying that Tebow will reach or surpass these two Hall-of-Famers in game-winning drives. What I am saying is that after only 8 starts, he certainly has a head-start.

Tebow's first 3 games with Game-Winning Drives:

								Passing									Rushing
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
2010	15	2010-12-26	23-134	DEN		HOU	W 24-23	16	29	55.2%	308	1	1	89.4	10.62	9.76	10	27	2.70	1	4QC / GWD
								Passing									Rushing
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
2011	6	2011-10-23	24-070	DEN	@	MIA	W 18-15	13	27	48.1%	161	2	0	91.7	5.96	7.44	9	59	6.56	0	4QC / GWD
2011	10	2011-11-17	24-095	DEN		NYJ	W 17-13	9	20	45.0%	104	0	0	61.2	5.20	5.20	8	68	8.50	1	4QC / GWD

Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 11/18/2011.

Elway's first 3 games with Game-Winning Drives:

								Passing									Rushing
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
1983	15	1983-12-11	23-166	DEN		BAL	W 21-19	23	44	52.3%	345	3	0	101.0	7.84	9.20	3	23	7.67	0	4QC / GWD
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
1984	11	1984-11-11	24-136	DEN	@	SDG	W 16-13	19	35	54.3%	188	0	0	69.7	5.37	5.37	6	25	4.17	0	4QC / GWD
1984	15	1984-12-09	24-164	DEN		SDG	W 16-13	18	31	58.1%	193	0	1	63.0	6.23	4.77	7	23	3.29	0	GWD

Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 11/18/2011.

Marino's first 3 games with Game-Winning Drives:

								Passing									Rushing
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
1983	10	1983-11-06	22-052	MIA	@	SFO	W 20-17	15	29	51.7%	194	2	0	96.0	6.69	8.07	5	10	2.00	0	GWD
1983	14	1983-12-04	22-080	MIA	@	HOU	W 24-17	17	26	65.4%	195	1	1	84.6	7.50	6.54	1	4	4.00	0	4QC / GWD
								Passing									Rushing
Year	G#	Date	Age	Tm		Opp	Result	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	Int	Rate	Y/A	AY/A	Att	Yds	Y/A	TD	Notes
1984	10	1984-11-04	23-050	MIA	@	NYJ	W 31-17	23	42	54.8%	422	2	2	85.6	10.05	8.86	4	4	1.00	0	4QC / GWD

Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table
Generated 11/18/2011.

8 Starts...How Do These QB's Stack Up?

2011-11-18T07:15:00.001-08:00

On Thursday Night football 11/17/2011, Tim Tebow and the Broncos continued their run to contend for the AFC West title. This game was Tebow's 8th as a starter in his career, and this win brought his starter record to 5-3 (4-1 in 2011). The game did nothing to resolve either way the debate about Tebow and his ability to throw.
Here at Fact-Based Football, we decided to take a look at a number of QB's and how they performed during their first 8 professional starts. The group we looked at for this analysis are: Tim Tebow, Mark Sanchez , Joe Flacco , Kyle Orton , Sam Bradford , and Matt Ryan .

Sanchez and Flacco were chosen because they brought their respective teams to the AFC Championship game their first year as starter. Orton was chosen because it is always fun to compare Tebow to Orton and because Orton led his team to the playoffs in his first year as starter. Bradford and Ryan were chosen because they were each the AFC Offensive Rookie of the Year in their first season (Bradford in 2010 and Ryan in 2008).

Here are their stats:

Name	Record	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp%	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Bradford	4-4	171	292	1674	11	8	75.9	58.6	5.7	3.8	2.7
Flacco	5-3	136	220	1464	5	7	75.6	61.8	6.7	2.3	3.2
Orton	5-3	122	225	1186	7	9	62.9	54.2	5.3	3.1	4.0
Ryan	5-3	133	227	1661	9	5	85.4	58.6	7.3	4.0	2.2
Sanchez	4-4	114	214	1443	8	10	67.6	53.3	6.7	3.7	4.7
Tebow	5-3	92	196	1281	10	4	76.9	46.9	6.5	5.1	2.0

So what is the point??

It is not surprising that all of the QB's in this group delivered a 4-4 or 5-3 record in their first 8 games. While Tebow has been shown to be the most inaccurate of this group, we can also see other interesting facts. For instance, Tebow has the second highest QB Rating, the highest TD%, and the lowest Int %. This data seems to support the idea put forth by many Tebow fans, that he protects the ball and delivers results (i.e. TD's) versus just stats (e.g. comp pct and yards).

Thursday Night Preview: Tebow vs. Sanchez

2011-11-15T14:20:00.001-08:00

So... a lot of the discussion boards are lit up with discussions about Tebow vs. Sanchez. Many of the folks posting are saying things like "Sanchez is much better, he made it to the AFC championship game in his first year, Tebow wont be able to do that". Here at Fact-Based Football, I decided to take a look at this comparision.

Ironically, even though Sanchez made it to the AFC Championship Game he didn't start out with a boom. His record for his first 7 games as a starter is merely 4-3, which by the way is the same record as Tebow's over his first 7 starts (which covers 3 from last year). Even though Tebow's critics have talked about how lousy his throwing is, you can see from the table below that after 7 starts, he has thrown for almost exactly the same number of times for almost exactly the same amount of yardage as Sanchez did in his first 7 starts.

Name	Rec	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp%	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Tebow	4-3	83	176	1177	10	4	78.7	47.2	6.7	5.7	2.3
Sanchez	4-3	94	179	1178	6	10	61.2	52.5	6.6	3.4	5.6

Yet, all we hear about is how bad Tebow is at the throwing part of the game.

In Sanchez's first year as a starter, the facts show that the Jets played great defense and ran the ball very well, helping to carry their young QB to the AFC Championship Game.

So What is My Point??

Now it might be unlikely that the Broncos will get to the AFC Championship Game as the Jets did Sanchez's first year, however, the Broncos defense and running game might be good enough to get the Broncos and their young QB in the playoffs in a similar way.

Why Elway Should Like Tebow...at Least for Now...

2011-11-14T11:30:00.001-08:00

So we all should know that it is way too early to judge Tim Tebow, especially on the throwing part of his quarterbacking. That being said, if we do look at how Tebow has done so far, he should be getting a lot of compliments from John Elway, especially if John remembers how his career started.

Obviously we can't yet know if Tebow will develop like Elway did, but for at least the first 7 games of his career, he looks like a lot better QB. Just goes to show you that it might be just a tad early to judge how good he will be. Here is a comparison of Tebow vs Elway that I have put together here at Fact-Based Football comparing the 2 QB's over their first 7 starts.

Name	Record	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp%	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Tebow	4-3	83	176	1177	10	4	78.7	47.2	6.7	5.7	2.3
Elway	2-5	63	142	757	1	9	37.2	44.4	5.3	0.7	6.3

I Hear..."Well He's Not as Good as Vick"...

2011-11-10T14:30:00.000-08:00

So apparently the experts are saying that the reason the Broncos were successful last week against the Raiders, is because they implemented an offense similar to the one run for Michael Vick when he first came into the league. Of course, these same experts follow that up with "Well he's not as good as Michael Vick". This being a blog about Fact-Based Football, I decided to put that to the test.

Below are the numbers (yet again) for Tebow in his first 6 professional starts. This time, I decided to compare them to Vick's first 6 starts. Here is what they look like:

Name	Rec	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp%	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Tebow	3-3	81	168	1108	9	4	77.7	48.2	6.6	5.4	2.4
Vick	2-4	68	131	794	5	1	80.1	51.9	6.1	3.8	0.8

My conclusions? For everyone complaining about Tebow's accuracy, Vick's 51.9 is only 5 incompletions away (less than one per game) from Tebow's 48.2. Vick has a worse record and less completions. The most incredible stat, however, is Vick's ball protection. He only threw 1 interception in his first 6 starts. That is quite impressive. In general, however, for those talking about the great disparity between these two players, I would have to say that through their first 6 starts, the disparity not become apparent.

Another Interesting QB Comparison...

2011-11-08T09:00:00.000-08:00

...So it looks like folks in Denver are calming down (at least for a week) on this whole QB situation (winning will do that). Now that we are taking a breath and the prognosticators are going after the Offensive Coordinator (for play calling) and the style of offense played ("this style will get the QB killed"), it looks like the regular Broncos fan can now relax for a few days. With this respite, I thought it might be fun to do some other early career QB comparisons with Tebow. I am going to use his 6 game, 3 win, 3 loss "body of work" to compare with some other folks. Today, I am going to look at Tebow's first 6 games versus Kyle Orton's first 6 career starts. Here is the comparison:

Name	Record	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp%	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Tebow	3-3	81	168	1108	9	4	77.7	48.2	6.6	5.4	2.4
Orton	3-3	93	168	819	5	7	61.1	55.4	4.9	3.0	4.2

Ironically, after six starts they each threw 168 times. The rest of the numbers speak for themselves. Both 3-3 in wins and Orton has the advantage in completion percent for throws that are quite a bit shorter. Also, as mentioned in my earlier post, so far Tebow has really been able to both throw a higher percentage of TD's and protect the ball better than every other person I have compared him to so far.

So What is The Point???

It looks like the conclusion of this blog post is that Tebow is a better choice for the Broncos now and he would have been a better choice for the Bears had he been old enough in 2005.

Money Talks and We All Know What Walks...

2011-11-07T12:58:00.000-08:00

So let me ask you a question... If you had to chose a QB for the next 6 games, and you knew they would perform as follows, which one would you pick?

QB#	Record	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp %	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
#1	3-3	81	168	1108	9	4	77.7	48.2	6.6	5.4	2.4
#2	3-3	85	163	1035	5	10	56.7	52.1	6.3	3.1	6.1
#3	3-3	107	167	1076	2	7	68.8	64.1	6.4	1.2	4.2
#4	2-4	49	114	620	1	6	41.2	43.0	5.4	0.9	5.3

None of them give you a winning record over the 6 games, so it might seem like a worthless comparison. Please humor me and allow me to change the question....

Which quarterback would you pick if you had to pick one for the entire season, if you knew this is how they would play for the first 6 games? Basically, the question becomes which one seems to be the QB that gives you the best chance to win the rest of the year.

Would you pick the most accurate one? (#3). Would you pick the one with the most TD's, highest QB rating and lowest Interception Percent? (#1). Would you pick QB#4? He has the worst record so far and lowest completion percentage. What would you say if I told you that QB#4, the 1 TD and 6 interception guy is destined for the Hall of Fame?

Let's stop the secrecy, tell you who everyone is, and what this is all about. Each of these QB's stats is for their first 6 professional starts. QB#1 is Mr. Inaccurate, Tim Tebow. QB#2 is Mark Sanchez. QB#3 is Joe Flacco. QB #4 is, ironically, John Elway after what I believe (I couldn't get definitive verification so I apologize if this is inaccurate) to be his stats after his first 6 starts.

So what is my point????

I am not a Tebow fan or hater. As a matter of fact, I thought is was an extremely foolish move to trade draft picks to move up to choose him in the 1st round. I thought if Denver wanted him they could have gotten him in the 2nd at least. Not his fault. That being said, it seems like there is a lot of "piling on" by the experts without much in the way of a factual basis. One prognosticator has suggested that if Flacco or Sanchez played "like this" the team would not have put up with it. Put up with what? All these guys are 2-2. Even the Denver legend, Elway, had a worse start.

In general, Tebow has protected the ball better than these other guys and has fared at least as well in wins and losses. I think it is time to let the kid have his first 16 starts before folks start to burn him in effigy...

Name	Record	Comp	Att	Yds	TD	Int	QB Rate	Cmp %	Yds/Att	TD%	Int%
Tebow	3-3	81	168	1108	9	4	77.7	48.2	6.6	5.4	2.4
Sanchez	3-3	85	163	1035	5	10	56.7	52.1	6.3	3.1	6.1
Flacco	3-3	107	167	1076	2	7	68.8	64.1	6.4	1.2	4.2
Elway	2-4	49	114	620	1	6	41.2	43.0	5.4	0.9	5.3