The Class Play - Rookie Pass Catchers: How Good Can We Expect Them to Be?

Sam Bruchhaus is joined by Quinn MacLean to discuss how pass catchers project out from college to the pros.

Plus, a little oregon ducks talk.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Hello everyone, and welcome back tothe Summer Sports Show. Today, I'm
joined by a special guest, oneof my favorite coworkers data scientists at Summer
Sports, Quinn McLean. Quinn,how you doing today? Great, Sam,
Thanks for having me on the showtoday. I'm excited to talk Paul
with you, Yeah, for sure. And I'm having Quinn on today because
both of us have been working onpieces about young wide receivers, young pass

(00:24):
catchers one of the most electric positionson the field. I recently finished up
a piece that is now live onsoomersports dot com about how good we can
really expect any of those rookie passcatchers to be. And that's what we'll
be talking about today. Quinn,give us a little preview of what you're
working on right now. Yeah,I wanted to look at, especially at

(00:46):
the collegiate level, how we canscout wide receiver's ability to run a complete
route tree. So one thing ina little bit of preview of like an
insight, there is a lot ofthese, like top and wide receivers are
more or less running go routes orcomeback routes, probably because they have higher,
you know, higher and speed thanthe corners. Guarding them, but

(01:06):
you know that may not be indicativeof their development into the NFL. So
that's a little bit of preview ofthe piece. Well, we'll probably touch
a little bit more about it aswe progress. Yeah, really exciting.
So given that we were both youknow, interested in these rookie wide receivers,
there were so many this year thatcame out in the first round.
So Quinn, just to kind ofprime the audience, I wanted you to

(01:26):
just give your favorite pick, favoritematch between a team and a wide receiver.
Yeah, I mean I really likeRoman Dunza. I know he went
to University Washington and they had theirtrio of wide receivers. But I think
he's you know, he has theability to run a really good go route,
his ability to be used in interchangemillion different routes. I'm excited to

(01:47):
see what he does in that Chicagotrio and it kind of fills them in
nicely with Keenan Allen and Dj Mooreto be kind of that like trio of
wide receiver from where he was collegeand University Washington to the NFL. Else.
I think it's a nice like trajectoryfor him to fit in nicely there.
Yeah, I was really excited aboutRoman Dunza as miny know, he
was probably my top wide receiver onthis year's board, even though I did

(02:12):
have them pretty much clustered at thesame kind of spot, and I thought
that, you know, the MarvinHarrison juniors the neighbors didn't say, were
all pretty good. And I thinkthat's a really good lead in into kind
of what we're going to talk talkabout today, because one of my favorite
things Quinn that Dounza had going forhim kind of coming out of the season

(02:32):
in the draft is he was reallysuccessful as charted by reception perception Matt Harmon
at every single route on the routetree, And obviously I think that's going
to be really really applicable to himbecause he's in a system where there's two
top flight wide receivers as well,and so having kind of that versatility I

(02:54):
think will help him fit pretty wellin that Bear system. What are your
So it's kind of as you're lookingat this interrop type stuff about how you
know, maybe he'll get some targetstaken away, but also that ability kind
of may track from college. Yeah, I think, like I said,
the biggest thing we see a lotof these top end caliber wide receivers is

(03:15):
they end up running a lot ofgo routes and comebacks routes or what we
call hitch routes, which is basedon peer linear speed. So you know
they're just running straight down the fieldor straight down the field and maybe coming
back to get some separation from thecorners. Where we start to see some
of these wide receivers be a littlebit more ready when it comes to the
NFL, is if they're running anen route or a crossing route, something

(03:37):
that you know shows their ability tochange direction, break out of that route,
and create separation in different levels.And so what that entropy calculation purely
does from mathematical standpoint is what istheir predictiveness of their next route run.
And the higher that is, themore you know unpredictable the wide receiver is,
which means like we can take outof that that they have a complete

(03:59):
ability to run different rounds and maybetheir offensive coordinator trust them to put them
in a lot of different spots thatdo so. And so as Shane Waldron
coming over from Seattle and he isthe you know, three wide receiver set
pretty frequently, I think he'll figureout a reason or a way to find
Roman Dunesay to get him a target. Yeah, I agree, and I
think you know, the crux ofmy line of questioning that I wanted to

(04:24):
address in my article up live nowon super sports dot Com talking about how
these rookie pass catchers actually will performin their career and in their first year,
was that the hype around these people, in particularly around guys like a
Doonesday, was that they're just goingto be like ultimate superstars, or that

(04:45):
they have, you know, thisgreat set of core traits. Guys like
Ricky Pierson who jumped up into thefirst round, obviously great set of core
traits, notably xavior Worthy the fastestforty of all time. At the combine
these great set of traits, andtypically when we're things thinking about that,
it tracks to this person making animpact. And when you really look at
the numbers, Quinn, you knowit's like twenty percent chance of getting over

(05:08):
one thousand yards in the first year, forty percent chance of even getting over
one hundred targets. That actually besomething that I would probably flag on our
favorite guy, Romadonsay, is thatyou know he's going to be fighting for
targets and someone responded to my poston Twitter sharing my article of like,
how really can we expect him todo past, like, you know,

(05:29):
target rate over expected something like that, And I think it's really up in
the air. And so when you'relooking at kind of this subset of guys,
it does vary a little bit,Quinn around you know, whether they're
highly touted, Uh, those topfive top ten guys kind of where that
we thought about, particularly the Neighborsand Marvin Harrison juniors to a certain degree,

(05:53):
brock Bowers as well at the tightend position. But what I was
really interested in is you look atkind of those guys in the late second
round, and really the expectation forthem would be to have a career kind
of like Kenny Britt, you know, kind of a borderline wide receiver one
on a not so great team widereceiver two, you know, very productive,

(06:14):
but not necessarily a guy that wouldlive up to the potential of what
a lot expect. Marvin Harrison Junior, Rome Duns and Miligue neighbors. And
what I found very interesting about yourresearch, Quinn was that a lot of
these guys had really really high Intervuryscores, meaning that they're quite versatile,
and so what are your kind ofthoughts behind that, Given you've looked at

(06:34):
the data, Now, why doyou think some of those guys more at
the end may have been more versatileas compared to the guys at the front
half of the draft. Yeah,I think probably the fit into what wide
receiver like slot or maybe not slotbut white wide receiver top or they're scouted
for. So whether or not they'rein our scouting language you use like wide

(06:56):
receiver, Y, wide receiver Z, wide receiver X, Like what those
people are asked to do is veryspecific and how they master that over time.
It's probably an easier way to blendinto the NFL than someone draft in
the first round who we think islike they got to run every single part
of the route tree and it mightbe a challenge for them in terms of
the translation for them. One thingI wrote about in my article is like

(07:17):
the sweet spot for a lot ofthese NFL caliber wide receivers in terms of
like the go percentage or what percentageof their go routes is twenty to thirty
percent. Anyone that kind of reachesover that thirty percent, we think of
them as more of like a youknow, lack of better words, a
one trick pony, a specialist.But maybe that and I haven't really done
like deep research into some of thoselater rounds of like maybe those higher end

(07:38):
positions in terms of the go actuallyfit more into a specific need in that
that wide receiver trio. Which iswhy I'm excited about Roman Duneesa is like
he doesn't need to be the toproute runner on the wide receiver class because
Keenan Allen is a great wide youknow, route runner from what we know.
He doesn't need to be the topgo route receiver on the wide or
the Bears wide receiver because DJ Mooredoes a pretty good job run a go

(08:00):
route right, Like he can findhis blend into a certain role for them,
which I think will help him kindof like be more successful at the
next level right now, I think, especially with the guy like Ricky Piersaw,
you know, we are very closeto the college pro projection, you
know, and the analytics community ingeneral has you know, a thought of

(08:22):
theory that the consensus big board reallykind of tracks and and and does better
than you know, any given reachor something like that. Obviously, particularly
with this class where there were somany wide receivers drafted in the first round.
That will that will that's left tobe seen. Yeah, However,
you make some great points about howthis kind of the idea of scheme and

(08:46):
the idea of you know, translatingthat to a new level may change.
And and so Quinn, I knowyou've looked a little bit at kind of
like the G five to P fivetransfer, and I think that's a may
give us like a little idea ofhow that transfers over to the NFL.
Obviously the NFL is a lot biggergap and talent, but what have you
found kind of in the middle ofthe G five to P five transfer versus

(09:09):
any of the other transfers at thecollege level. Yeah, I was actually
gonna touch on that point a littlebit. Like Ricky Piersoll is a really
good example because he transferred from ArizonaState to Florida and he actually played alongside
his now teammate Brandon Auk at ArizonaState now at forty nine ers, and
so his ability to have like agood route tree from both programs, in

(09:31):
my mind, should translate well tothe next level. And it's probably why
the forty nine ers, you know, drafted at where he is because they
can find him a fit into theoffense knowing that he's more of a gadget
wide receiver and can fit in theslot from day one. What I found
from that like entropy change as youI think it's mostly we don't want to
look at it from conference to conferencemore or less levels of levels. So

(09:52):
like P five to G five,power five being you know, big ten
sec, PAC twelve, G five, more of less being the Mac Mountain
West, et cetera. Those guysthat are going from P five to G
five, we see the biggest jumpin their route running versatility because they might
be at the P five level awide receiver three, wide receiver four,
we're not seeing their full route runningability because they're probably more of a mercenary.

(10:16):
At the P five level, Hey, you're just going to go and
run crossing routes or go routes.But when you go to down a level,
maybe to G five, yeah,you're very talented route runner. You're
going to be able to show yourentire ability versus where guys struggle a little
bit is from that G five toP five level is going up a level
because in my mind, now they'rejoining a more crowded wide receiver room,

(10:37):
and maybe they're just being asked todo something very specific at that P five
level that attracted them to move upthat level in terms of transferring. So
and overall, when you go Pfive to P five, generally we've seen
kind of a flat change in termsof the HP change, but there is
kind of wide bands within the Pfive to and G five. Laterally,

(11:00):
the biggest ban increase in terms ofvariance is from that P five to G
five because you could go to starterrole or maybe that's just indicative of your
performance of not being good at all, you know, right, Yeah,
And I think this is going tobe a really interesting trend to keep on
watching, especially as it progresses tothe NFL, because, like you said,

(11:20):
Ricky Piersall, that the tape iskind of out on him. He's
moved from an Arizona State to aFlorida, you know, two higher flight
programs. Florida probably faces better competition. He played with an NFL quarterback,
obviously he wasn't at the NFL quarterbacklevel yet, but was a well recorded
quarterback in Jane Daniels at Arizona State. There's a lot more factors that the

(11:43):
chaos per se induced at the collegelevel by the structural elements such as NIL
and the transfer portal may track betterto the NFL just because you can see
them in more context. You cansee them against different levels of competition,
see them in different schemes, soforth, and so on and so sticking
in that kind of scheme lane thatwe've been in, Xavier Worthy obviously is

(12:09):
someone who we kind of felt wasa combined riser, meaning that he was
someone who we knew was fast,but we didn't know he was that fast.
And of course, like once youget that core number on for the
fast forty forty yard dash in history, he rows up the big boards,
ultimately getting selected by the Chiefs.And so, notwithstanding some of the stuff

(12:33):
off the field that has been happeningin the receiver room, you'd expect there
to be a lot of stuff schemedup for him by Andy Reid, and
especially given the knowledge that Patrick Holmeswill be throwing to him. What are
your thoughts kind of how on XavierWorthy is, especially given of those first
round wide receivers that we looked at, you know, he was the second

(12:54):
highest entropy. What are your thoughtson how he kind of fits into that
Chief Chiefs offense, and will hejust become a go ball guy because he's
so fast, or or will hetrack into something else. Yeah, I
think when you I'm glad you pointedout the forty times because I think that's
the easiest way of saying like,oh, yeah, he's got really good
linear speed. Easy for him tothrow him on the outside and just let

(13:15):
him run and Patrick Mahomes will findhim downfield. But in college at Texas,
like he was used in a veryversatile role. He actually has a
high percentage of in crossing routes atthe college level, which I think if
you put him the slot or theoutside, he could be pretty dangerous to
guard against given that his speed andhis ability to break out of roles.
So I don't want to discount hisroute running ability at all, because I

(13:37):
think he's exemplified that at the collegiatelevel. Yeah, I'm excited to see
how he's going to be used withinthe Chiefs. He could be the next
gadget player that they have within theiroffense, which is just very scary to
think about right now. I'm reallyexcited as well, because we saw a
player who didn't have quite the sameconcerns, but certainly the size concerns in

(13:58):
terms of DeVante's Smith obviously had amore standard wide receiver height, but was
very thin and was used obviously whenthe heisman in that Sarcassian system. Obviously
he's tracked to be a pretty goodwide receiver. Two. You can go
look on the charts that I madein the in the the article which has

(14:22):
him. You know, he's kindof to that top right section and and
so it'll be interesting to see ifthat's how Zavyworthy fits in on a very
good Chiefs team. And so Quinn, you also do are you work on
a lot of college to pro projectionresearch as well here at suomer Sports,
and so kind of tying this thisdiscussion all together, how do you feel

(14:48):
kind of about this rookie class.Do you think that this could be a
class similar to you know, thetwo thousand and four class where there's you
know, one really good player whokind of pops out that was the last
time that this many wide receivers weredrafted, this many pass catchers were drafted,
or do you think it may beunderwhelming than what we expect. What

(15:09):
are your kind of thoughts given whatyou know, kind of matters at the
college level. Yeah, I'm gladyou brought up the two thousand and four
class like that has more of theprototypical like receiver that we've thought about in
history, like the Larry Fitzgerald,the Roy Williams, the Michael Jenkins.
Those are the top people drafted atwide receiver there. That's your more traditional
outside roles. What's exciting about thisclass in particular is I feel in the

(15:31):
twenty years since that draft is thatthe scheme offensively has like evolved quite a
bit to where I think that offensivecoordinators and a lot of these different roles
are going to use these players ina lot of different looks, not just
on the outside in the slot,et cetera, which I think, in
my opinion, could lead to moreof these players being good in the first

(15:54):
year. But as you pointed outin your article, like let's not be
lofty in our expectations of some ofthese players, is that it takes them
a few years for them to reallyfit into their role overall, that they're
you know, not going to belike the star wide receivers out the get
get go, that it will probablytake them up to three years to be
to be good in the NFL.Yeah, and I think that makes sense.

(16:18):
You know, we we do kindof sometimes see, particularly with tight
ends, kind of that longer curvein terms of how they're developing. And
so, Quinn, as we kindof move on from from kind of the
articles that we wrote to kind ofsomething that's more of a passion for you
and something that's really exciting, we'reintroducing kind of a new segment where,

(16:42):
particularly for the summer, where we'regoing to go through some message board posts
and provide really great analytical answers tothem. So this one comes from one
of Organ's message boards. Obviously,Quinn, you're a huge Organ fan.
Take a through kind of your Oregonfandom. Yeah. So I was an

(17:03):
undergrad at University Oregan during the chipKelly days, and so I am.
I tell my friends and people i'vemet, I'm probably the more spoiled Oregon
fan. Went to a national championshipa few years, got to witness Marcus
Mariota. You know, the spreadoffense under under chip Kelly, going forward
on fourth down, going for it, going for two constantly. So I
think from watching that offense and seeinghow it's proliferated across college football into the

(17:27):
NFL. I you know very much, so a diehard Oregon fan and hoping
that they do well this year.So I'm excited to see how they go
into this year with probably one oftheir better rosters in recent years. Yeah,
so this is gonna sticking with ourwide receiver theme here, we're gonna
cover Troy Franklin. Obviously a widereceiver that a lot of people thought maybe

(17:48):
a borderline first second round wide receiver. Obviously ended up dropping a little bit
in the draft. But this comesfrom message board poster Pennsylvania Duck, and
he asked, is Troy Franklin thegoat wide receiver in Oregon Duck's history?
A look at the numbers. Hecites a couple of stats, hauling in
eighty one catches for one thousand,three hundred and eighty three yards fourteen touchdowns,

(18:12):
setting the Oregon school record for mostsingle season reception yards touchdowns. A
lot of good stats on the outon the outside. But Quinn, given
that you were the Oregon expert hereat Summer Sports and you're one of the
best college pro projectors in the industrytoday, what are your thoughts on kind
of is he the goat wide receiver? How will he track to the NFL?

(18:33):
Yeah, if we look at hisENTR pre score, he's got like
in the caliber range of these firstround talents we've seen. He was used
in kind of that sweet spot ofgo percentage. He had a good amount
of hitch percentage, but he hada good amount of routes that were over
the middle, like nine percent post, nine percent, crossing, nine percent
slant routes. So I think whenyou look at like a peer, here's

(18:55):
your prototypical wide receiver on the xX on the outside, I think he
should do well. And I thinkhim, like Roma Dunde what we were
talking about earlier, as he fitsinto a wide receiver room, that he
doesn't have to be the guy fromday one. Like he compared nicely with
the Courtland Sutton and a lot ofthe other gadgets that Denver Broncos have.
So hopefully he bulks up a littlebit. I know that was kind of

(19:18):
the counter to him going into theNFL is that he he's kind of on
the lower end in terms of weightof a wide receiver he'd expect. But
I think given Sean Payton is themass offensive mastermind in Denver, like,
we hope that he kind of schemeshim into some different unique routes at the
next level. Right that, Ikind of agree. I liked his profile
coming out. I think there wereconcerns I didn't quite expect him to drop

(19:41):
to the fourth round. I thoughtthat was a little shocking. But I
do have to note that given youknow his versatility, and given obviously as
a Saints fan, having watched SeanPayton, you know, scheme guys up,
Scheme up, Marcus Colston, Schemeup, Jimmy Graham, Scheme up
guys all the way down the roster, like Lance Moore who then became core
contributors despite not being super highly talentedprospects. I'm very interested to see how

(20:06):
he tracks. And I also thinka good note, particularly when it comes
to your kind of predictability, orrather unpredictability, that he is probably going
to be predictably unpredictable, given thathe already played with bo Nix and they
have that chemistry there. Yeah.So, in terms of this discussion,
Quinn, we've kind of talked aboutas college to pro but we got to

(20:30):
answer the message board question, man, is he the goat receiver. One
of my favorite things to talk aboutwho are the best receivers, And obviously
Oregon has a list of them.Who are some of the other people that
you identified who may be in thatclass. So when you sent over this
message, Boar, and I wasthinking about it, like I think,
then Oregon wide receiver history, there'skind of two classes of wide receivers.
There's and I think this gets intothe theme of what we're talking about,

(20:52):
like this versatility is there's your trueoutside wide receivers, and I think Trod
Franklin fits into that mold. Otherguys I think can give him a run
for his money in terms of Oregonhistory, as a Sammy Parker who had
a pretty good career with the KansasCity Chiefs. And then there's this like
scatback, running back wide receiver likecan play slot outside, et cetera.

(21:15):
Just known for speed. And that'swhere I countered the Dean Anthony Thomas's of
the world Braylan Addis is these kindof like really short, really fast guys,
Josh Huff who ended up getting draftfrom the fourth round to the Josh
or to the Philadelphia Eagles, andthen probably the most prolific guy a matter
Shod who for four Pro Bowls inthe NFL top five pick was more thought

(21:37):
of as a running back wide receiver, like a you know, very athletic
running back that could catch the ballout of the backfield and line up a
slot receiver. So I think thatwould probably be some of the people to
compare against. But I think he'sprobably in the conversation for top three all
time in terms of the wide receivers. For Moregan, I was really excited
when you brought up a because he'sjust like one of the coolest guys in

(22:00):
sports. You know, in alot of talk about NBC and the NBA
media deal coming up, obviously he'score to that and was you know,
you watch the MJ documentaries, he'sthere. He's really probably a top two,
top three all around kind of sportsfigure alongside some of the guys like
Bo Jackson who obviously played multiple sports, Deion Sanders, who obviously has a

(22:25):
media coaching career now yeah as well, And so it's also really cool to
see that, you know, allthese years later, he's one of the
best wide receivers, you know,running back, one of the best players
in Oregon history. As well.Yeah, great returner, great wide receiver.
I think we were talking and theseventy six ers gave him a two
day contract to like try out forthe team. So like obviously he's got

(22:47):
some basketball chops as well, ifI recall correctly, he like contributed on
the track program at Oregon, thethe great track program that Organ's put together
over the last few decades. SoI think it's tough competition a lot of
like Oregon fans have been with theprogram before the Chip Kelly days, might
have say a madra shod but likedefinitely since Chip Kelly and the coaches they've
had after that, Troy Franklin's gotto be up there in discussion, Yeah,

(23:11):
for sure. And so to kindof close it out here, Quinn
focusing still on college football. Youknow, Oregon competed last year but couldn't
make it to that college football playoff. Do you think they make it this
year? Just got to beat OhioState. That's the one game that on
the calendar that I feel like ifwe get past, then it should be
a pretty good season. And that'spretty early into the season. And I

(23:33):
know it's a little bit different herethis year in terms of the schedule,
obviously moving the Big Ten. Historically, we've played the last year of the
season against Oregon State for the firsttime and I think one hundred years.
We're playing Oregon State in September,which is unique that they've been able to
keep them on the calendar, andnow we're playing Washington at the end of
the season, which is unique.But I think you circled that Ohio State

(23:56):
game and if you get past that, then they should have a good playoff
and the expanded playoff too with thefirst year of that, which is exciting.
Yeah. And if I'm not mistaken, right, that's a little Chip
Kelly the Chip Kelly Bowl, correct. Yeah. Yeah, he's the offensive
coordinator there, and I'm excited tosee how he does with Will Howard the
running quarterback at Ohio State, anda lot of the weapons they have.

(24:17):
You know, Egbuka's returning this year. He's got a lot to I think
in their spring game they just ranout the wing tea just for just for
fun as a new personnel decision.So yeah, I'm excited to see him
come back. And you know,Oregon fans always give him a good reception
even as UCLA days too. Yeah, really exciting to hear that they trotted
out the wing tea. I comefrom a program that very unironically and very

(24:41):
successfully would run the wing tea atTwulane. I think it was my it
would have been my senior year,so twenty twenty, I believe we were
trotting the wing ta out one ofthe best red zone offenses. So unfortunately
for your Oregon defense, maybe havingto prepare some packages to defend again Ohio
State winning tea at Tech. Yeah, it's gonna be tough. Chip Kelly

(25:03):
always has something up of his sleeves. But I mean if there's a guy
that can stop him, it's probablyDan Lanning, Yeah for sure. And
Quinn finishing up that research about widereceiver entroprey. We're really excited to read
that that'll be going up on suomersports dot com here in the coming weeks.
Quinn, tell tell us where elsewe can find you. Yeah,
I'm on Twitter at Quinn's Wisdom.I'm hoping to contributing more to our websites.

(25:29):
You know, as we're getting outof the draft, I think a
lot of us have more time toput out some great research and you know,
spur the conversation of football research intothe public world. So yeah,
feel free to message me on Twitterif you have any follow up to the
research we talked today. But yeah, it's great, great talking about with
you'd say, Sam, it's beengreat. Yeah, always great having the
certified ball Noars on the podcast,Quinn. So from Quinn McLean and Sam

(25:52):
Brookhouse and all the folks at SummerSports, thank you and we look forward
to having you again.