First off, please excuse me for posting a football post on the eve of a UK/Duke basketball game. Great win by the Cats tonight! It looks like it will be a great season.
Now, I appreciate that there have been more topics and posts about the Vandy game than maybe any other game besides the FLA game. In terms of QB play, probably more posts for this game than any other, and understandably so. I am not trying to get people to take sides any more than they already have. However, I like looking at statistics and appreciate all of the posters and contributors that do lots of hard work to inject some objective insight into our discussions.
In any case, I apologize for the late post on this topic but I was out of the country last week and just got a chance to watch the Cats last two games. Because of all of the drama leading up to the Vandy game and the QB situation, I wanted to look at the QB play, specifically the passing. Consequently, I viewed, and reviewed, each pass in slow motion (thanks also to the many replays in the broadcast) in order to make a subjective judgment about the quality of each pass. To repeat, this “analysis” is based on my judgment via what my eyes tell me. I will readily admit that it is a small sample (and that I could have gone back and looked at the Auburn game for more data points but I have not had the time) and I am not going to try to draw any sweeping conclusions. I just want to point out what I saw in a structured way.
Passing Patrick Towles Drew Barker
Completions 10 5
Good Throw 8 5
Good Catch 2 0
Incompletions 15 2
Clear Drops 3 0
Tough to Catch 4 1
No Way to Catch 4 1
Good Defense 1 0
Threw it Away 2 0
Tipped Pass or Hit 1 0
Interception 1 1
Bad Pass 0 1
Great Defensive Play 1 0
So, looking at these numbers, they basically say that it would be great if we had more observations. However, since we don’t, what can we infer? First off, of the completions, all of Barker’s completions were on the money. For Patrick, there were two good plays by the receiver on less than perfect passes (nice low catch by Conrad and the throw that was behind Baker). Of the incompletions, Patrick was penalized by several drops, which did not affect Barker. That might bring the whole “catchable” ball discussion into play but that discussion is highly speculative and I am not going to go there. More important, 8 of Patrick’s incompletions were very low or no chance type balls (Tough to Catch or No Way). Those two categories represent over 50% of his incompletions, similar to the numbers for Barker (although with a very low sample). Otherwise, the remaining incompletions by Patrick were throws under pressure. We didn’t really see that from Barker, who many have said (and I think rightly so), is due to his faster decision making. Finally, in terms of interceptions, Barker threw a bad pass to a safety that made a great break on the ball and Patrick’s interception was a great play by the defender on a ball that was thrown a little low. Both cost a touchdown in a game that was decided by less than a touchdown.
While I have been a Patrick supporter from the beginning of the season, I definitely think it is time (OK, past time) to give Barker a chance to get a full game of experience and see what he does with it. Whether the Charlotte game is a good barometer doesn’t matter as much as him getting lots of game reps. Either way, I don’t feel that we will be in any worse of a position for the UL game.
As for other parts of the game that I think some have talked about but I wanted to give my opinion on, I liked the following:
Defense
Go Big Blue!!!
Now, I appreciate that there have been more topics and posts about the Vandy game than maybe any other game besides the FLA game. In terms of QB play, probably more posts for this game than any other, and understandably so. I am not trying to get people to take sides any more than they already have. However, I like looking at statistics and appreciate all of the posters and contributors that do lots of hard work to inject some objective insight into our discussions.
In any case, I apologize for the late post on this topic but I was out of the country last week and just got a chance to watch the Cats last two games. Because of all of the drama leading up to the Vandy game and the QB situation, I wanted to look at the QB play, specifically the passing. Consequently, I viewed, and reviewed, each pass in slow motion (thanks also to the many replays in the broadcast) in order to make a subjective judgment about the quality of each pass. To repeat, this “analysis” is based on my judgment via what my eyes tell me. I will readily admit that it is a small sample (and that I could have gone back and looked at the Auburn game for more data points but I have not had the time) and I am not going to try to draw any sweeping conclusions. I just want to point out what I saw in a structured way.
Passing Patrick Towles Drew Barker
Completions 10 5
Good Throw 8 5
Good Catch 2 0
Incompletions 15 2
Clear Drops 3 0
Tough to Catch 4 1
No Way to Catch 4 1
Good Defense 1 0
Threw it Away 2 0
Tipped Pass or Hit 1 0
Interception 1 1
Bad Pass 0 1
Great Defensive Play 1 0
So, looking at these numbers, they basically say that it would be great if we had more observations. However, since we don’t, what can we infer? First off, of the completions, all of Barker’s completions were on the money. For Patrick, there were two good plays by the receiver on less than perfect passes (nice low catch by Conrad and the throw that was behind Baker). Of the incompletions, Patrick was penalized by several drops, which did not affect Barker. That might bring the whole “catchable” ball discussion into play but that discussion is highly speculative and I am not going to go there. More important, 8 of Patrick’s incompletions were very low or no chance type balls (Tough to Catch or No Way). Those two categories represent over 50% of his incompletions, similar to the numbers for Barker (although with a very low sample). Otherwise, the remaining incompletions by Patrick were throws under pressure. We didn’t really see that from Barker, who many have said (and I think rightly so), is due to his faster decision making. Finally, in terms of interceptions, Barker threw a bad pass to a safety that made a great break on the ball and Patrick’s interception was a great play by the defender on a ball that was thrown a little low. Both cost a touchdown in a game that was decided by less than a touchdown.
While I have been a Patrick supporter from the beginning of the season, I definitely think it is time (OK, past time) to give Barker a chance to get a full game of experience and see what he does with it. Whether the Charlotte game is a good barometer doesn’t matter as much as him getting lots of game reps. Either way, I don’t feel that we will be in any worse of a position for the UL game.
As for other parts of the game that I think some have talked about but I wanted to give my opinion on, I liked the following:
Defense
- Stamps playing physical ball again
- CJ having another good game
- Henderson playing well, for the most part
- Edwards flying around
- Defensive Linemen for comprising 5 of the top eight tacklers on the game (when was the last time that happened!)
- Offensive line run blocking – there seemed like some good holes but still inconsistent
- QBs – both started well (not so good on the follow through)
- Liked early play calling – less excited about it later
- Kemp was running hard
Go Big Blue!!!
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