Purdue, home of the QB killer

When I go through my lists of pass rushers, looking for the next potential gem, one peculiarity keeps popping up.  Purdue, despite being a rather mediocre college program, produces a disproportionate number of good pass rushers.  Not Miami.  Not USC.  Not Ohio State.  Purdue.  It makes no sense to me.  They don't really produce many great NFL players at other positions, but this seems to be something they do rather well.  They even have the Den of Defensive Ends listed on their team website, pointing to their primary peculiar accomplishment.

I've already shown the basics of my approach for finding pass rushers here, so I thought I would lay out a list of the rather strong collection of Boilermakers, that keep their school on the national radar.  Some are going to be bigger stars than others, and some might just be situational pass rushers, but they are all interesting to some degree.  These are just the players from 1999 to the present.

Player                      Year           Kangaroo Score        Agility Score        Total        Avg. TFL

Rosevelt Colvin	1999	0.545	0.754	0.556	N/A
Chike Okeafor	1999	0.392	0.707	0.306	N/A
Akin Ayodele	2002	0.496	1.102	0.672	N/A
Shaun Phillips	2004	-0.290	0.893	-0.005	15.75
Rob Ninkovich	2006	0.267	1.013	0.446	13.25
Ray Edwards	2006	1.421	-1.566	0.509	11
Anthony Spencer	2007	-0.215	-0.025	-0.011	17
Cliff Avril	2008	0.287	0.215	0.301	15
Ryan Kerrigan	2011	0.805	0.007	0.632	22.25

As I've said before, I'm usually looking for explosive players (measured by the Kangaroo Score), hopefully with a measure of agility added to the mix.  The Avg. TFL number, is the player's average number of tackles for a loss in their last two years in college.  If a player has a total score over 0.500, and is averaging over 15 TFL, then I consider them a high priority draft prospect.

If there ever was a school that repeatedly produced outliers, who exceeded my expectations, it would be Purdue.  It's not that their players are bad athletically.  It's just that their athletic measurements tend to be in the good to somewhat mundane category.  A few, such as Shaun Phillips or Anthony Spencer, are even well below average, though Phillips was quite agile.  Only Kerrigan, Colvin, Ayodele, and Edwards would have probably caught my computer's attention.  However you want to look at it, I'm past the point of  wanting to bet against players from Purdue.  Almost none of them turn out to be bad.

I've often wondered if they had a head coach, or position coach, who had a particular type of player he recruited.  Or perhaps, they have someone who really does a great job of coaching technique to the players.  Generally, I feel that coaches do very little to change or improve players, but whatever is going on in West Lafayette is intriguing.  The weirdest part about it is that I know they switched head coaches in 2012 and 2009, so it is difficult to attribute it all to one man (though they've only produced one pass rusher, Kerrigan, since the last switch).  Joe Tiller seems like the most obvious person to look to, but he is is 70 now, and probably not looking to dip his toes into the NFL waters at this point.  I kind of like the idea that their is a senior citizen 'meat-head whisperer' out there.  If anyone has any theories, I'd be glad to hear them. 

Maybe it's all just a coincidence.  The sample size still isn't exactly huge.  It only looks peculiar when you compare the results to other top schools that might only produce 2-4 decent pass rushers in the same time span.  All I know is, when draft season rolls around, and I see a defensive end/outside linebacker prospect from Purdue listed, I pay attention, even if the measurements seem a bit off.  Statistics be damned, they're putting something in the water in Indiana.

Explosive pass rushers!

If you were drafting a 3-4 outside linebacker, or a 4-3 defensive end, how much would you really care about their ability to stop the run, if they were a hellacious pass rusher?  You probably wouldn't care very much.  Guys who can stop the run are a dime a dozen.  You could pick one up in the fifth round without much difficulty.  Teams struggle much more with finding guys who can turn the opposing quarterback into a paraplegic.

If you have read through the other nonsense I have posted here, what I'm about to say will seem very predictable.  Teams should draft freak athletes!  Look for guys who can jump really high!  Blah, blah, blah.  I'm even bored with myself.  Once again, we're going to pull out the old Kangaroo Score.  The Kangaroo Score, in this case, relates to a player's ability to effectively bull rush and their explosiveness when the ball is snapped.  There will also be a visit from the Agility Score, and a special guest appearance by the often neglected bench press.  The bench press results from the combine don't really matter too much, and will only represent 10% of a player's total score.  At some point I might get rid of the bench press altogether.  It really only serves to eliminate the freakishly weak.

First of all, we'll look at the 3-4 outside linebackers.  Generally speaking they will be a bit more agile than 4-3 defensive ends.  It should make sense that a 3-4 outside linebacker would benefit from better agility, since they will drop back into coverage with greater frequency than defensive ends.  Other than that, the differences are insignificant, regardless of what stupid things people say about "Oh, he won't fit this scheme".  It's all nonsense.  For the most part they are pretty interchangeable.  Basically, the lighter the player is, the more they will require/benefit from increased agility, so as to avoid offensive tackles who could maul them.  I will also be including the player's average number of tackles for a loss in their last 2 years in college.  I'll explain why a bit later.

3-4 Outside Linebackers
Player                     Weight      Bench        Kang. Score  Agility Score       Total    Avg. TFL

Shawne Merriman	272	25	1.960	0.506	1.351	13.25
Connor Barwin	256	21	1.642	1.186	1.282	16
Brian Orakpo	263	31	1.979	-0.312	1.240	14
Justin Houston	270	30	1.581	0.506	1.226	16.75
Cameron Wake	236	20	1.371	0.843	0.996	8
Demarcus Ware	251	27	0.759	1.529	0.979	17.25
Adalius Thomas	270	24	1.573	-0.306	0.855	18
Von Miller	246	21	0.532	1.846	0.814	19.5
LaMarr Woodley	266	29	1.195	-0.075	0.800	15.25
Kamerion Wimbley	248	24	1.008	0.143	0.651	8.25
Ryan Kerrigan	267	31	0.805	0.007	0.632	22.25

Hmm, that sure is a lot of exceptional athletes there.  I wonder if that is a coincidence?  Some difficult individuals might be tempted to say,"Hey, why does Connor Barwin have a higher total score than Demarcus Ware?  That can't be right."  These people are assholes, who want to make my life difficult.  Yes, you.  The scores themselves don't really matter that much, as odd as that may sound.  All we care about is whether a player crosses certain thresholds when it comes to being more explosive and agile than his average peer.  These guys are.. so shut up.

4-3 Defensive Ends
Player                     Weight     Bench      Kang. Score    Agility Score        Total    Avg. TFL

Mario Williams	295	35	3.123	0.005	2.104	19.5
JJ Watt	290	34	2.308	1.084	1.918	18.25
Kyle Vanden Bosch	270	26	1.211	1.559	1.238	14
Brian Robison	259	27	1.383	0.926	1.172	12
Chris Long	272	24	1.238	0.814	0.990	14.25
Will Smith	275	30	1.629	-0.454	0.967	16.25
Aaron Schobel	263	21	1.098	1.043	0.912	N/A
Jevon Kearse	262	24	1.083	0.769	0.883	10
Andre Carter	249	20	1.230	0.577	0.831	19.5
Jason Babin	260	28	0.492	0.988	0.677	29.5
Justin Tuck	265	24	1.060	-0.004	0.637	16.5
Robert Quinn	265	22	0.968	0.076	0.565	12.75
Greg Hardy	281	21	1.370	-0.846	0.509	14.25
Rob Ninkovich	260	23	0.267	1.013	0.446	13.25

What's that you say?  These guys look pretty athletic too?  Hmm, I'll have to look into that.  Surely it is just a coincidence.  In some ways, Brian Orakpo and Adalius Thomas should fit in better here, since their agility score were a bit lower.  Some of these players like Brian Robison, Kyle Vanden Bosch, Chris Long, etc. would likewise probably prove capable of playing quite well in a 3-4.  People would shriek and squeal,"No, Chris Long wouldn't fit in that scheme."  Why not?  He's about as agile as Cameron Wake, and no heavier than Shawne Merriman or Justin Houston.  Jason Babin really should be in a 3-4, since he doesn't have great explosive power, but has excellent agility.  This might be why he briefly thrived in the nonsensical "wide 9" defense in Philly.  It let him line up very wide outside the offensive tackle (similar to how he would line up in a 3-4) and avoid some physical confrontations.  The same thought probably applies to Rob Ninkovich.

Yes, J.J. Watt is really a 3-4 defensive end, which is more like a defensive tackle (sort of like Mario Williams who I also included), but I can't resist posting his numbers everywhere I possibly can.  They are amazing!

Yes, this is leaving out quite a few guys who scored well, but who became busts (it also leaves out some who were just "good").  This is why I include the Avg. TFL here.  If you additionally filter players who had a low number of TFL it eliminates most of the athletic guys who became failures.  In general, I sort guys like this.  If they have a total score over 0.500 and averaged 15 TFL in their last two college years, they get a first round grade.  Then the TFL requirement goes down to 14 for the second round, 13 for the third, etc.  If you stick to that your likelihood of success should fall somewhere between 65-82%, regardless of the round in which a player is taken.  Of course, this does require pursuing players that the computer suggests are the most valuable targets, but these players are also frequently available later than you might suspect.  The league-wide average success rate is somewhere between 20-30%.  The reason I give a range of percentages is because precisely defining success is tricky here, and this covers the strictest and loosest possible definitions of the term that I can imagine.  This is based on examining 702 linebackers and defensive ends, so sample size isn't really an issue.  Once you get to the third round, I think it is okay to start taking guys with total scores between 0.300 and 0.500, but the TFL meter gets reset.  So, 15 TFL for the third round, 14 TFL for the fourth, etc. 

So far, using this system has only resulted in one potential first round pick who turned out to be a bust.  Unfortunately that player was Vernon Gholston.  What can you do?  On the flip side, the system does alert you to an undrafted player like Cameron Wake, as a very interesting prospect.  I have no idea how teams weren't interested in someone as athletically gifted as him.  Sure, he wasn't very productive in college, but that sort of athleticism seems worth a late round pick.

Now let's look at some of the stupidest moments in recent NFL history.  Who were some highly drafted players that haven't turned out to be worth much?

Player                     Weight    Bench        Kang. Score    Agility Score     Total       Avg. TFL

Courtney Upshaw	272	22	-0.754	-0.843	-0.743	15.75
Brandon Graham	268	31	-0.120	0.722	0.291	23
Derrick Morgan	266	21	0.225	0.012	0.079	14
Tyson Jackson	296	20	-0.022	-2.013	-0.696	N/A
Aaron Curry	254	25	0.811	-0.266	0.430	14.75
Aaron Maybin	249	22	0.705	-0.619	0.199	12.25
Larry English	255	24	-0.272	-0.118	-0.196	16.5
Robert Ayers	272	17	-0.811	-1.056	-0.944	13.75
Everette Brown	256	26	-0.459	-1.092	-0.559	16.5
Derrick Harvey	271	31	-0.320	-0.082	-0.070	15
Quentin Groves	259	30	0.531	-0.325	0.347	13
Jarvis Moss	250	16	-0.517	-0.105	-0.503	10

The guys in this group have two things in common. They were all taken in the first two rounds, and they all suck.  Aaron Curry almost has a passable score, but almost passable isn't what you want to see in a first round pick.  The computer would have viewed him as a 3rd rounder.  While many of them had impressive statistical production in college (high TFL numbers, in this case), their physical measurables suggested that there was a reasonable likelihood that this dominance wouldn't continue at the NFL level.  I also realize that it is awfully early to call Courtney Upshaw a bust, but I'm willing to go out on limb with that hunch.

There is an additional category of pass rushers, that relies very heavily on high agility scores, which I've now written about here.  I'll also try to get into some of the weird pass rushing outliers too.