Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better

Tommy Lawlor wonders if Dion Lewis might be the guy to break Marty Mornhinweg's constant dependence on a single running back:

Dion Lewis could be the RB to change all of this. The key is that he’s not just a runner. Dion, based on this summer, looks like he could be a weapon in the passing game as well. He must show that he can be counted on as a blocker. For those who might compare him to Ryan Moats because both guys are small, don’t. Lewis is already an infinitely better blocker than Moats was.

I agree with Tommy that the Eagles need to spread the load around where possible. Running backs just don't last long in the NFL, and the more you can rest them, the healthier they'll be. However, the problem with Lewis is that he's essentially a (very) poor man's version of McCoy. Even if he's as good as recent reports out of training camp suggest, Lewis will always be worse than McCoy at pretty much every phase of the game. Thus, having him replace McCoy is always a loss for the offense.

I think one of the reasons Correll Buckhalter was a good complement to Brian Westbrook is that he could do many of the same things, but had a different style and different strengths. It's (similar to) a comparative advantage problem.

Hot Read: Competing Values on Heisman Winner

On Wednesday, Tommy Lawlor discussed the possibility that the Eagles could sign likely free agent Reggie Bush. The idea is fun to think about, especially from a video game all-star team perspective. But the debate over Bush actually raises an interesting dichotomy of Eagles front office philosophies.

First, there’s the motivation to bring in dynamic, multi-dimensional offensive players. Especially at running back the Eagles show little interest in anyone who can’t catch the football as well as they can run it. And when they do, often the results aren’t pretty (see: Hunt, Tony).

And yet, there’s also the guiding conviction not to overpay for second-string players. You can see this all over the field, where the Eagles look for bargains and/or young players to fill in as back ups, but especially at running back. Correll Buckhalter never required a large investment before the team let him walk away for four years, $10 million last offseason.

When the Eagles signed Chad Hall — the poor man’s Reggie Bush — these two strategies came together perfectly. But with Bush himself, those values would clash and I tend to think frugality would win out.

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Recently I’ve seen a couple of positive remarks about Trevard Lindley, and how we shouldn’t count him out for an increased role in 2011. I hope he can improve and make a significant contribution in year two, but in limited snaps last season his numbers were ugly. Just compare him to Dimitri Patterson, everyone’s favorite whipping boy:

Patterson — Target Rate = 19.4%, Catch Rate = 62.8%, Pass Defensed Rate = 7.7%

Lindley — Target Rate = 19.1%, Catch Rate = 65.8%, Pass Defensed Rate = 0%

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Kevin Kolb rumors all converge on Arizona, where the latest analysis examined the possibility that the Cardinals could offer a deal similar to what Houston sent Atlanta for Matt Schaub: a first round swap and two second round picks. Just for the record, that kind of deal would be perfectly in line with Kolb being worth a mid-to-late first rounder. According to the draft trade value chart and accounting for one of the second rounders being a future pick, that 2007 deal assessed Schaub’s value as equal to the 21st overall selection.

Eagles Draft Night: Playing the Predictions Game

Let me preface this post with a reference to last year, when I predicted that the Eagles would trade back out of the first round. Turned out the Eagles did the exact opposite and traded up 11 spots to grab defensive end Brandon Graham. Howie Roseman, Andy Reid, and the rest of the Eagles front office are pretty unpredictable. So why try? Because it’s fun.

Tonight the draft will kickoff with the first round in prime time. Before you sit down to watch, check out my predictions and sound off if you have other opinions:

• The Eagles will not take Jimmy Smith. Despite his talent, Smith has a whole host of behavior issues. “Two abortions, aggravated assault, two minors in possession, three failed drug tests… that’s a little excessive,” an anonymous NFL personnel man told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. The Eagles have never drafted a player with that much criminal history. Yes, they took a chance on Michael Vick, but only after weeks of due diligence and a very low-risk contract. I don’t see the front office taking that chance with their number one pick. Plus, I think if the team were interested in Smith, they wouldn’t have let all these rumors stand about him being their top interest. The media have largely anointed him as the Eagles pick, and I think the team is content to let that smokescreen stand.
• But the Eagles will take a top cornerback in the top few rounds. I have my eye on the second round crop, where the team could draft a player of similar caliber to Nate Allen, who they snatched with the 37th overall pick last year. Virgina’s Ras-I Dowling sticks out as a possibility. Lots of talent, senior year lost to injury — he’s tailor-made for the Eagles.
• The Eagles won’t pick at 23rd overall. They haven’t gone with their assigned spot since 2006, which not coincidentally was their highest pick in a long time. With the Eagles consistently drafting in the latter half of the first round  (26, 19,  21, 24 over the last four years), it makes sense to either move up to snatch a truly valued player (Jeremy Maclin, Brandon Graham) or drop back into the second round and get similarly value at a lower price (Kevin Kolb, DeSean Jackson).
• At least two more linebackers in this year’s draft plans, after the team snatched Keenan Clayton and Jamar Chaney in 2010. As I wrote about last week, there are only three linebackers who will definitely be around in 2011 — Clayton, Chaney, and Moise Fokou. Even if you assume Stewart Bradley returns, that’s just four players for six or seven spots.
• Less than 10 rookies. After taking 13 players last year and seeing three of those never take a single snap in 2010, the Eagles won’t use all of their selections this year. Some of those picks will be packaged to move up in this draft or get future picks in 2012.
• No quarterback. Sorry conspiracy theorists, it just doesn’t make sense for the Eagles to add another quarterback this year with Mike Kafka in place as a back up and plenty of veterans on the market. Plus, drafting another quarterback before trading Kevin Kolb takes away some of that leverage the Eagles have by arguing that they could just keep him.
• Correll Buckhalter 2.0. With Brian Westbrook admirably replaced by LeSean McCoy, the Eagles need a running back who they can develop to be the long term back up. Neither Jerome Harrison nor Eldra Buckley is that guy, but mid round prospects like Hawaii’s Alex Green, Cal’s Shane Vereen, Oklahoma’s DeMarco Murray, or Oklahoma State’s Kendall Hunter could be.
• Ignoring the defensive line? After heavily targeting pass rushers in last year’s draft, the Eagles have a glut of young players along the defensive line. Outside of Trent Cole, none of them really stand out (especially with Graham’s ACL injury). But you can’t address every weakness and if the Eagles don’t add a top d-lineman early, I could see them passing entirely in favor of additions along the offensive line and elsewhere.

Originally published at NBC Philadelphia. Photo from Getty.

Is LeSean McCoy Progressing Faster Than Brian Westbrook?

Does that mean McCoy has progressed a year faster than his predecessor? Not necessarily. First of all, McCoy was coming from the advantage of a big time college football at the University of Pittsburgh. Westbrook, on the other hand, was making the leap to the NFL from D1-AA at Villanova. He was fighting an uphill battle to even make it in this league.

Second, we don’t know that Westbrook couldn’t have taken on a bigger load earlier like McCoy did. #36 entered the league when the Eagles already had two capable backs in Duce Staley and Correll Buckhalter. Andy Reid didn’t need to rush him along like he did with McCoy.

So, all that aside, what if we do want to compare the early Westbrook years with what we’re seeing from McCoy? Ultimately I think you have to compare Westbrook’s 2004 season, his first as “the man,” to McCoy’s 2010. And looking at the actual numbers, you can see a pretty obvious trend…

Eagles RB Past: Brian Westbrook and Company

The Eagles are undoubtably at a crossroads in the backfield. Yet given the huge change at quarterback, if anything the turnover at running back has been overlooked.

Two years ago Brian Westbrook was one of the best halfbacks in the NFL and received a raise from the Eagles for the vital role he played on the team. Eight years, 107 regular season games, some of the most spectacular performances we have ever seen. Now he’s gone.

There’s plenty to discuss about the future, and I’m working on a companion post about LeSean McCoy, but for now, let’s just look at the past — gaining some insight into Westbrook’s career and Eagles running backs in general.

For the first chart, I went through the seasons of data and attempted to isolated 1st & 10 rushes. The problem with taking all of the rushes as one big group is that you pull a lot of short yardage, goal line, and passing downs into the equation. This does decrease the sample size, but you take what you can get in order to make the data more usable.

Looking at basic first down yardage, we can get a sense both of how the Eagles have used their backs and how well they did. I started in 2003 (BWest’s first significant rushing year):

Some general notes:

• Correll Buckhalter was really good as Westbrook’s back-up from 06-08. Then Leonard Weaver stepped in last year and provided basically the same numbers. It’s interesting that the Eagles felt they needed to bring in Mike Bell when Weaver proved so effective as a change of pace back. Perhaps they just want him blocking more.
• As a running team, the Eagles reached peak effectiveness in 2007. Not coincidentally, that was the year the Eagles most tried to ride the Westbrook express — to the tune of 368 touches from scrimmage.
• This is unnecessary, but damn Lamar Gordon was bad.
• 2009 wasn’t the Eagles’ most effective rushing year, but despite having most of the carries taken by two new additions, it wasn’t that much worse than 2008, or the Super Bowl year of 2004. In other words, good enough.
• Speaking of 2009, McCoy may have trailed Westbrook overall in yards per carry, but when you standardize the carries, LeSean was much better than his hobbled mentor.

You can go through and find other interesting tidbits, but I’m most interested in tracking Westbrook’s career arc. And it looks pretty clear when you graph the yards per carry listed above. I also added an Effective Yards per Carry measurement based on Football Outsiders’ DVOA/Effective Yards stat:

The thing that jumped out to me first was how similar Westbrook’s career looks to Donovan McNabb’s, when I made his graph a few months back. McNabb’s career peak came later in his career (makes sense for a QB), and Westbrook was reaching the top of his game just as McNabb was just starting to decline (an interesting topic for later dicussion). Yet the career shapes are very similar: a few years of middling potential, followed by a peak of 2-3 years, and finally a drop.

As with all stats, DVOA sees something slightly different than my selection of first down runs (especially last season, when Westbrook was really bad on 1st & 10). But overall, they all likely reflect this same, impressive career arc. Too bad that career won’t end where it began.