- 1 day ago
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00I'll pay him double. How about that? I'll say it now.
00:02With me now on the Western Hotline is a new guest to the show, Ryan Paganetti.
00:08Ryan and I have not spoken before, other than on Twitter.
00:12And I'm excited to welcome him because he speaks my language, and I flatter myself to say that.
00:18Football analytics. Ryan was with the Eagles when they won the Super Bowl with Nick Foles,
00:22then Jacksonville and last year Las Vegas.
00:25And Ryan, I'm Mike. Thanks for your time today.
00:28I really appreciate you having me.
00:30You're welcome. So you're not with the team now, but you're building a brand, it seems, online.
00:35And ever since I heard your name for the first time last week, I think I've seen it a half
00:39a dozen more times since already.
00:41Yeah, I really just kind of went down this direction.
00:44And, you know, the quality of life of being part of an NFL organization or coaching staff can be quite
00:51extreme.
00:51You know, you're talking in times 110-hour weeks.
00:54And, you know, if your team's not very good, unfortunately, I was part of a team that wasn't particularly good
00:58last year.
00:58I sort of wanted to give this a route and open things up to sort of consulting opportunities.
01:03And I think there was a perspective I had that was a little bit unique.
01:11And basically, I just wanted to give it a shot.
01:13And so far, there's been a really incredible reception on it so far.
01:16Yes. I heard you first with Scott Barrett on a podcast a week ago when you were talking about your
01:22time with Doug Peterson and the Eagles.
01:25Ryan, how did it start for you?
01:27You know, I started out actually in 2015 with the Eagles.
01:31And I just, you know, wanted to get my foot in the door.
01:33It was great.
01:34You know, I was fortunate to be able to get in.
01:37And I was able to stick around through a head coaching change.
01:40And then Doug Peterson sort of put me in a role where he wanted me to really focus on any
01:44kind of numbers or stats to help the coaching staff for the Eagles.
01:49And it really kind of took off from there.
01:51He had an amazing attitude about using the data.
01:53The ownership, Jeffrey Lurie, had an amazing attitude.
01:56And, you know, I was doing the game management stuff during the games and communicating when to go for fourth
02:01down, the two-point conversions.
02:02Here's what the numbers say.
02:03And in that five-year stretch I was with him, we ended up going for 25% more fourth downs
02:08than any other team and 60% more two-point conversions.
02:11We were leading the league in quarterback sneaks and different things like that.
02:14And it was an amazing experience.
02:16And it was awesome to, you know, be able to win the Super Bowl with those guys.
02:20And I was fortunate that the organization entrusted me in a role to kind of be able to contribute there.
02:27And I was so jealous.
02:29I think it was a Bill Barnwell piece that year talking about, was it red, yellow, green?
02:33Was that it with Frank Reich and Peterson?
02:36And maybe I have the year right.
02:38Yeah.
02:39So, yeah, we were kind of modifying it over time.
02:41And I was always trying to frame things in a way that would really sell it a little bit more
02:45on the coaches.
02:46So there was the ones that were kind of strong go-forts versus the ones that were leaning go.
02:53And originally it started out, I wanted to make sure that we were hitting on all the strong go-forts.
02:57And as time went on and Peterson was more and more confident with the system, it was, you know, more
03:02of that with the strong goes.
03:04And he would go for the lean go ones as well.
03:06And so it's actually a process that a number of teams around the league have kind of tried to emulate
03:10over time.
03:10And you've seen the fourth down numbers kind of go through the roof around the league.
03:14At that time, in Buffalo, I've been here on the air for more than 25 years.
03:18And a lot of those years the Bills were just mediocre.
03:22And it always frustrated me that they would, for instance, they would play New England twice a year.
03:27But they would play them as if, you know, they expected to win.
03:31Not looking for any particular edges like this stuff.
03:34You know, not accepting the fact that they were underdogs.
03:38And they just didn't.
03:38They were too proud, I guess.
03:40It's not just the Bills.
03:41I mean, this is almost all teams.
03:43So I begged for a coaching staff.
03:47And then you would need ownership probably to come around.
03:51And, you know, as you know, this is not, this is percentage, these are percentage plays.
03:56It's not just like, you know, Hail Mary stuff.
03:59These are percentage plays.
04:00So when Philadelphia started to make a name for itself with your involvement doing it, I was just so excited
04:07about it.
04:08And the question we would ask is, how do you get the coach to sort of, a former player, right,
04:13like a lot of coaches, how do you get him to sign off?
04:16And you're talking about Peterson like maybe he wasn't that tough a sell.
04:20No, I think what happened is that, Jeff, it was clearly organizationally something that Jeffrey Lurie believed in.
04:27And a lot of their personnel decisions were sort of instilled on those data-driven principles.
04:33Like, go look for a time that the Eagles drafted a running back in Jeffrey Lurie's tenure.
04:37I don't even think there's a single time.
04:39Like, examples of these analytics arguments showing up on the personnel side, and they would try to advocate on the
04:45coaching side.
04:45And I think part of the reason it was a little bit easier with Coach Peterson is he was not
04:49a victim of his own success,
04:50where you have a lot of these veteran head coach play callers that have already won a ton of games
04:55in their career,
04:56and they're thinking, why am I going to listen to this nerd telling me I'm screwed up?
05:00Like, there was this, and he had a fresh mindset on, you know, handling these situations,
05:05and I think it was really productive, and that I don't think I would have had the same success,
05:11and I don't think I would have had anywhere near the same buy-in if I had stepped in with
05:15a coach that, say,
05:16had been in the league for 15 years as a head coach, and then all of a sudden tried to
05:20tell him,
05:21hey, there's some data saying that you should try this instead.
05:24Yeah, I'm thinking of his contemporary here at the time with the Bills as Rex Ryan.
05:30And we talked to Rex every week, but I don't think there was any getting through to him about this.
05:34He knew better.
05:36Would you go as far as to say, Ryan, if I may ask, that you think you had a role
05:40in convincing Peterson to think like this?
05:44I think so.
05:45You know, he was so receptive, and as we sort of talked about what the role of me helping during
05:50the game would consist of,
05:52he's like, whatever you think is best, and I was really hammering him with all these different charts and tables,
05:57and Jeffrey Worry was seeing the same, you know, items.
06:00And I think that that combination was, like, not only is the person that's writing his check giving him the
06:07data,
06:07but he's, you know, he's seeing that from analysts.
06:10He's asking questions.
06:11He's wondering if I can modify this.
06:13He wants to know exact details of what assumptions are going into this model that explains this.
06:18And I think it allowed him to be very comfortable with it, you know, as opposed to some people,
06:23their attitude from the analytics is they just say, just go for it.
06:26Well, you have to explain exactly why it says go for it.
06:29When does it say not go for it?
06:31If you're the worst team in the league, does it still say go for it?
06:33If you're the best team in the league, you know, and that attitude, I always felt like I was a
06:37baseball catcher,
06:38and I was trying to frame it as well as possible so that he would buy in.
06:42Very cool.
06:43Ryan Paganetti with me here on the Western Hotline.
06:46I'm Mike Shope.
06:46Bulldog is off today.
06:49Let's talk about the Philly special, the touchdown before the half against New England in the Super Bowl.
06:54I'd love to know, like, I'm sure you have a detailed memory of it.
06:57I just, as somebody that's always harping on this stuff on my show,
07:03like, Collinsworth in the booth before that play, they're just almost incredulous
07:08that this is not going to be a field goal attempt, a chip shot field goal.
07:11And what happens, I think you'd also, you know, recognize with announcers,
07:17if you fail, they're going to talk about it until the end of time.
07:22But if it works, it'll never be mentioned again.
07:24Like, it's just next time around, same thing.
07:26Why don't you kick?
07:28So, I mean, you're not listening to the broadcast at that time,
07:30but talk me through sort of, like, those moments.
07:34Yeah, so what I would say is, you know, we have the exact amount of time remaining effectively
07:38and what our timeout situation is, what their timeout situation is.
07:42So, you know, leading into a third down call down there, I'm saying,
07:45hey, if we get to fourth and two or less, you know, the analytics are going to still say go
07:49for it.
07:49Fourth and one or less is going to be strong go.
07:51And so, you know, we call a third down play, and we get to whatever it was,
07:55fourth and one and a half or so, and Peterson was going to go for it.
07:58And we actually were a little bit, there was, like, a brief hesitation there
08:02as we sort of tried to pick the optimal play.
08:04Like, talk about a high-leverage situation.
08:06You know, because in that case, the field position is going to be worthless if we don't get it
08:10because they can basically just kneel out the half.
08:13And so it's a little bit different than if that situation comes up in the first quarter
08:16and you don't get it, and all of a sudden they're pinned at the one,
08:18and you can, you know, it's still an advantage for you for your next drive.
08:23So, you know, we were a little bit slow getting a play in.
08:25There was a little bit of extra thinking.
08:26We end up calling a timeout, and Doug's on the sideline calling the plays,
08:30and Nick Foles on the field.
08:32And Foles comes over, and he communicates to Doug, whatever,
08:36and we can't hear upstairs what is going on.
08:39We had no idea.
08:40And all of a sudden he walks back in, and one of our, you know,
08:43I think our quarterback coach upstairs asked Coach Peterson, like, what'd you call?
08:46And he goes, Philly special.
08:48And I just, my heart dropped a little bit because all I could think about was
08:53these fans are going to, because the fans had kind of caught on to it
08:56that I would have this role that had been brought up in the media.
08:58They're going to blame me if this does not work.
09:00Like, I am not going to be allowed back in Philadelphia.
09:03It's going to say Ryan Paganetti told them to run a trick play
09:05and throw it to Foles, and, like, some disaster is going to happen.
09:09And then I'm like, I swear, I really thought I was never going to be back allowed in Philadelphia.
09:13And obviously, you know, the play worked, and everyone talks about it,
09:16and they did, like, a TV special on the play.
09:19But there was probably a 50% chance that that play could have gone entirely different,
09:23and the rest of my life would have gone, you know, played out differently.
09:27I mean, I'm not laughing because you're saying any of that lightly.
09:29It's just sort of an amazing story.
09:32And sports, whether you're in analytics or a player, I mean, it's just so fickle.
09:37So you hit that.
09:38Then you go on and win the game, too.
09:40It wasn't like the game was over at that point.
09:42But what a great story.
09:44Part of what you've written and talked about is quarterback sneaks.
09:47Now, Philadelphia is famous for the tush-push,
09:50but we're going back before Jalen Hurts, I think, here.
09:54We certainly are if we're going back 10 years.
09:56What have you found and been able to execute in NFL front offices
10:02in terms of the quarterback sneak?
10:03Is it something that might still be something you'd consider underutilized?
10:08I would say in general, yes, it is still underutilized.
10:11But the usage has exploded.
10:14So in the year 2016, there was less than 70 sneaks in the entire league.
10:18And in this last year, there was about 340.
10:20It's really incredible when you think about it.
10:22But I grew up in Massachusetts.
10:24I went to a ton of New England games.
10:25I watched them play the Bills.
10:27And, you know, unfortunately, they beat up on the Bills a number of times.
10:29I was always growing up blown away by how more teams were not copying the Patriots.
10:35And, you know, Tom didn't have the most, you know, ideal body for quarterback sneaks,
10:39but he was leading the league in sneaks almost every single year.
10:41And there was a period of time he had doubled the rest of the league for a decade.
10:45And so I spent that 2017 offseason really kind of finding the bottlenecks with each individual coach.
10:50Why are we not using this play?
10:52Because my first year with Peterson, we ran two sneaks, one or two sneaks the whole year.
10:57And some of these concerns that they had, when you actually looked at the data,
11:00they say, oh, you can only do it when it's under a yard.
11:03You can only do it when there's an open A gap.
11:05And when actually testing these things with as much data as possible,
11:09and we had to manually tag things and study all these different metrics,
11:13it was very clear that teams were, they should be just sneaking anyways.
11:17Like, it doesn't really matter what the defense is.
11:19And, you know, some people were concerned about quarterback injuries.
11:24The quarterback injury rate was astronomically low on those plays.
11:27And we tried to take those variables and think like, okay, let's capitalize on this.
11:33And we had a big quarterback.
11:34We invested in the line.
11:35We had Brandon Brooks and Lane Johnson and, you know, Jason Kelsey,
11:39who's like at the record for most sneaks ever now for centers.
11:41And they believed in it and they liked it.
11:43You know, we started doing it and the fans got involved.
11:46And I think in that 2017 season, we converted every time.
11:49And over time, that has evolved into sort of two worlds.
11:53There's the normal quarterback sneaks, and then there's these rugby scrum tush push sneaks.
11:59And I've mentioned it online.
12:00I actually prefer the Buffalo version where you line up in a semi-believable formation
12:06because people are coming up with solutions to stopping these rugby scrum looks.
12:10They're like dive bombing really low.
12:12They're having these tactical strategies of how they're hitting certain linemen.
12:15And there's like an overlap player behind.
12:17And there's very few other things that you can do from that alignment.
12:20When you're in the Buffalo version, you at least have the upside to run other plays
12:25because, you know, they have receivers out there.
12:27It looks plausible that they could do something else,
12:30even if they end up running sneaks at, you know, one of the league highest rates.
12:3570 quarterback sneaks 10 years ago to over 300.
12:38I wonder what percentage of that 300 or 300 plus last year, Ryan, is not even run by quarterbacks.
12:44I think like Mark Andrews running all the Baltimore sneaks, you know, as a tight end.
12:49And other teams maybe even got her once or twice.
12:51I know they have Hertz.
12:52But, you know, why not?
12:55I'll give you a number.
12:56There was 46 non-quarterback sneaks.
12:59Non-quarterback, but yes, sneaks last year, which was the most I have ever seen.
13:03You know, Seattle won the Super Bowl.
13:05It didn't come up in the Super Bowl.
13:06They had been doing it with the tight end.
13:07And so a few different teams decided that either from a quarterback health standpoint
13:12or just from a preference standpoint that they were going to go down that route.
13:15I'd say for a team like Buffalo, they don't necessarily need to do that
13:19because Josh is so good at them and he almost has the body of a tight end.
13:23Now, you have pointed out that there is an element of predictability,
13:26which might be putting it mildly, to the Bills' sneak attack, so to speak.
13:32Yes.
13:33So, you know, obviously there was that unbelievably unfortunate situation for Bills fans
13:39where they lost the AFC Championship game.
13:41They actually had four sneaks stopped in the game.
13:43There was three of them on offense, defense, and then one was a two-point conversion
13:46when Josh basically threw it to, like, Curtis Samuel or somebody
13:50after he wasn't going to get it.
13:51So they really lost.
13:52He failed on four of them.
13:53But, you know, after the game, one of the Chiefs players mentioned
13:58they had a 10-for-10 streak going to the left.
13:59And I watched every sneak every week in my time in the NFL,
14:03and I knew that number was way more than 10.
14:05So this last couple weeks I actually went through,
14:08and from 2022 about week 10 through this last, you know,
14:13up until the AFC Championship game,
14:15they had run left 70 consecutive times on their sneaks,
14:18which is almost unbelievably incomprehensible.
14:21However, they were excellent doing so.
14:24So, like, I think – and then going into that game,
14:27the Chiefs had failed to stop 32 consecutive quarterback sneaks.
14:31So I totally understand the approach and the attitude.
14:33Now, the Chiefs did an amazing job game plan-wise.
14:36They clearly knew it was going left.
14:37They did some interesting things.
14:39They had an extra defensive lineman over there at times
14:41that the off-ball players would immediately start running left.
14:44You know, I honestly think that last quarterback sneak
14:46that Josh got, quote-unquote, stopped on,
14:49I really think he converted it.
14:50And, you know, it's unbelievable to think he converts that.
14:54I think they're more than likely to win that game
14:56in terms of from that moment on,
14:57and then they're more than likely to be favored in the Super Bowl.
15:00And, you know, I know Bill's fans maybe don't want to hear that
15:03because it's, like, painful,
15:04but it just shows you the margins of how close these things are.
15:07And, you know, since then, Buffalo, obviously,
15:10they're aware of the situation.
15:11They have some other versions here.
15:13They're not going to go left every single time.
15:15But from my understanding, part of that left tendency
15:17was basically the right-handed nature of the center
15:21was that he's using his right hand to snap it,
15:23so having his left arm immediately available
15:25makes it so that it was easier for him to basically go left
15:30and either block a left A-gap defender
15:32or on the nose tackle,
15:35they would double-team the nose tackle
15:36with a right guard and the left in the center.
15:38So he would take the left part of that nose tackle,
15:41and the right guard would take the right part of his body part.
15:45And that, I think, was kind of an under-discussed part of that.
15:49I've talked to a couple different centers
15:50who at least believe that's the case.
15:52Interesting.
15:53Ryan, so much good information here.
15:55I know you've recently unearthed stats
15:58about whether coordinators should be on the field
16:01or in the booth or play callers, either side of the ball.
16:04Let's spend a minute on that.
16:06I mean, it sounds like or reads like just a ton of time
16:09went into being able to, you know, use all these examples
16:12and come up with some interesting information.
16:16Yeah, so I had somebody who's got a really huge following
16:19on social media bring up the question,
16:21and a bunch of people tagged me, and they said,
16:23you know, Ryan Paganetti needs to look into this.
16:25And I kind of tried to do a deep dive,
16:27and to the best of my ability,
16:29I attempted to assess where the play color was,
16:33and I think by the end of it, I had 20 years,
16:36and I felt about 99% good of the ones that I had.
16:39There were some that were a little bit of a mystery,
16:41but the interesting kind of nuance was there seemed to be a boost,
16:45even if you remove play calling head coaches,
16:48for the play caller to be on the sideline.
16:50And I think part of that,
16:52just from being in coaching booths for a long time,
16:54is the discussions that can take place
16:56between the head coach and the quarterback,
16:58sorry, the play caller, the head coach, the quarterback,
17:01the offensive line, all these different parties on the sideline.
17:03And it's a real big hassle for the play calling offensive coordinator
17:08to speak to the quarterback between drives when he's upstairs.
17:12You have to basically use a phone, and it's like very cumbersome,
17:15and it's like you're living in the Stone Age to do so.
17:18And I think that that could be kind of a key layer there.
17:20Now, the margin is quite small,
17:22and there's some coordinators that clearly prefer being up or down,
17:25and I think like, you know, it doesn't really matter where you are,
17:28you know, if you clearly have a preference.
17:29But it was some interesting data regardless that I thought was, you know,
17:34the type of thing that I'm hoping to bring to fans
17:35that, you know, people will find engaging.
17:37Very cool.
17:39Just a couple minutes left here with you, Ryan.
17:41What's next in this world with all the transformation teams figuring it out
17:48when it comes to fourth down and two-point plays?
17:51Not everybody's there on the down-eight, go-for-two stuff yet.
17:55I mean, we're not quite – it's not unanimous yet.
17:58That still baffles the likes of Troy Aikman, which I find hilarious.
18:01Why would they do that?
18:02You know what?
18:03Open one book and find out.
18:05Sorry, getting on a tangent here.
18:07But what are a couple things maybe where teams haven't figured out yet
18:12that there's an edge, if you know?
18:14I think, you know, you still run into some scenarios
18:16where these teams are getting a little too drop-back heavy,
18:21particularly early on in the games.
18:23And for everyone who talks about run-pass balance,
18:26I think there's even more importance to play-action run balance.
18:32Like, it's very highly correlated that the teams that are running a lot of play-action
18:36are having, you know, more success both on those play-action passes
18:40and it gives a little bit of a boost to your run game
18:43because every time that there's a mesh with the running back,
18:46these defenses have to respect it more.
18:48If 80% of the time that there's a mesh with the running back,
18:50like the ball's being handed off, like that, you know,
18:53you get linebackers and second-level defenders being able to play downhill more.
18:56I think that's going to be a narrative that continues to exist.
18:59Clint Kubiak just won the Super Bowl.
19:01They were a heavy-play-action team.
19:02Sean McVay is a heavy-play-action team.
19:04I think it's going to be something that people keep an eye on.
19:07The other one that's just totally, it's insane,
19:11is the long field goal attempts ever since they changed the K-balls.
19:15So they changed the K-ball process this past year.
19:17It allowed the teams to work on the ball a lot more.
19:20And you saw 74 55-plus-yard field goals.
19:23The previous year was something like 54.
19:26And it wasn't just 55-pluses.
19:28You know, I was on the wrong side of it.
19:30You know, I know Cam Little, well, I should work for them.
19:32But Cam Little set the all-time NFL record against the Raiders right before halftime.
19:36He went 68 yards.
19:38And these numbers are, like, insane.
19:40You know, if you said this to somebody 15 years ago,
19:42they're like, what are you talking about?
19:43Did they just allow steroids?
19:45Like, it's unbelievable.
19:46But the number that kind of shocks on people is that in the year 2000,
19:50there was one total 55-plus-yard field goal in the entire NFL.
19:53This last year, 74.
19:55And so you start, it's just really, it's just wild.
19:59And you're talking, you have to handle your end-to-half
20:02and end-of-game situations significantly different
20:04because you're the Bills in the playoffs.
20:06You're playing Cam Little and the Jaguars.
20:09And Bills fans are sweating.
20:10If these guys get to the 50, this game might go to overtime.
20:14Like, that is, like, a legitimate concern.
20:16You know, I don't remember what, I think it was,
20:18whether the score was three-point margin or four-point margin at the time.
20:21I forget.
20:21But that's just, like, an example of the considerations you have to make
20:24that really weren't a thing even a couple years ago.
20:27Sure.
20:27Consider that, plus what they've done with touchbacks,
20:31trying to find the happy medium there.
20:33And it can be, like, two good plays put you in field goal range from a touchback.
20:37Right, right.
20:38Love the point about play action.
20:39When Brian Dable was here, he got a lot of credit for that.
20:42Play action in motion all the time and, like, cheat codes, you know?
20:46And I remember, too, and I really liked Micah Hyde, the Bill Safety,
20:49who was on with us, I think maybe for two years every week, at least one.
20:53And I was so immersed in all of that, that one time I brought up to him,
20:57hey, Micah, have you ever sort of read anything on
21:00or heard any coach talk about how, like, play action from an offense,
21:04really just there's no reason not to do it?
21:07And he's like, come on, no.
21:09Of course not.
21:10Don't be stupid, you know, like that.
21:12But, you know, it seems like an automatic win on any given play for an offense.
21:16Maybe you can't always do it.
21:17I don't know.
21:17But why not?
21:19What's it costing you to run somebody across the box?
21:23All right.
21:24Anyway, Ryan, I've really enjoyed this.
21:26It's good to know you, and I'll be reading your work for sure.
21:29Yeah, I'd say for sure it's an exciting time for Bill's fans.
21:32You know, the team's a great team.
21:34Every year they're contenders.
21:35I'm a believer in Joe Brady.
21:37I think he's got an exceptional offensive scheme.
21:40I've long thought that Jim Leonard is an incredibly intriguing defensive coordinator
21:45because his production in college in particular was really, really strong.
21:49So I'll be keeping an eye on their team.
21:51And obviously, you know, I think at some point here soon,
21:53they're going to finally break through.
21:54So very good.
21:56Well, again, I'll be following you.
21:58If I can do anything for you, let me know.
22:00Ryan Paganetti, my guest here on the Western Hotline,
22:03talking about some fun last decade or so history with football analytics.
22:10The field goal point is interesting.
22:11The sneaks.
22:12Can you believe that?
22:15That the Bills ran 70 consecutive quarterback sneaks to the left side
22:20in the span of two and a half seasons.
22:22Did you even notice it until the Chiefs called them out on it after beating them?
22:28I never noticed it.
22:30So there's always the next thing.
22:35Any of that of interest to you, 803-0550, we can talk some more about it.
22:40England takes the lead over Argentina at the World Cup.
22:4465th minute, England looking to get to the final, 1-0.
22:48I'm Mike Shope, and this is WGR.
Comments