Submitted by KJ6BWB t3_122avg2 in dataisbeautiful
Comments
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdpusmg wrote
Because pass attempts is highly correlated with overall yards as shown here: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/122c5b2/american_football_starting_quarterback_pass/
Since they're so highly correlated, we can ignore them in this chart if desired -- I included them as bubble size because I thought I might get a response like this.
Exiled_From_Twitter t1_jdpw9z9 wrote
But that's the point, if you throw more you will have more yards. You are using counting stats and not efficiency, which is way more useful. There's no correlation whatsoever between a quarterback's height and his overall performance.
Adsequalbads t1_jdprayu wrote
This is flawed, need to look at yards per game as a starter. Injuries are not accounted for. One player on here might have played 10 and another 17.
Adsequalbads t1_jdprgq0 wrote
Would also look at career totals.
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdpsaou wrote
Injuries should average out across the season unless shorter people have a better chance of being injured? Although, come to think of it, it probably is the case that shorter people are more likely to get injured when tackled by someone over 300 lbs.
Anyway, I ran the stats for all quarterbacks, even teams that had four. I even included everyone who even attempted to throw a ball. That's 107 people. In general, considering all of them, the trend bore out. It was basically still the exact same trend when I limited it to only people who threw more than 1,000 yards in the season, etc.
Adsequalbads t1_jdr0br1 wrote
How would they “average out”?? Both of your short qbs had injuries last year that took them out of a number of games. In this case even one game would be a big impact on these numbers. Do you know anything about football or math?
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdra4s9 wrote
Which short quarterbacks are you referring to?
Odd_Connection_7167 t1_jdpwso2 wrote
So Trace McSorley threw for only 400 yards because he's short? Or because he's a shitty quarterback who only threw the ball 80 times?
Your other chart was more compelling.
JPAnalyst t1_jdqhf83 wrote
You’re looking at volume here when you need to be looking at efficiency. Players who throw more pass for more yards. This needs to be done as yards per attempt if you’re trying to glean anything meaningful out of this. And you would benefit in using a sample size of more than one season. For Example Russell Wilson’s 2023 is absolutely not indicative of the QB he has been throughout his career. Same with Tua. You’ve got an again Joe Flacco listed at 1,000 yards because he’s done, he has one foot out the door and his 2023 shouldn’t be the data used to judge his effective as it relates to his height. This is extremely flawed for so many reasons. If you aren’t looking at a players efficiency (again, not volume) over a longer period of time, you’re going to be led to a wrong conclusion.
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdqten0 wrote
> You’re looking at volume here when you need to be looking at efficiency. Players who throw more pass for more yards.
I did that at https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/122c5b2/american_football_starting_quarterback_pass/
Why should I let a player's past greatness affect their current stats? If they have one foot out the door to retirement now and aren't doing so great now then they aren't doing so great. And probably the overall tenor of the game has changed over time. For instance, as overall player height increased in basketball, we see an overall net increase in slam dunks over long three pointers. If you can take two or three steps and have a better chance at making more points then why not do that.
However, i admit a greater volume of data might show something different. Feel free to put that together, I'm excited to see what you come up with. :)
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdplye0 wrote
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Where or how you got the data (Source): https://www.pro-football-reference.com/
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The tool used to generate the visual (Tool): Excel
I saw https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/121pvx7/oc_nfl_quarterbacks_of_passes_batted_down/ and it said there wasn't a relationship between quarterback height and how many throws get batted down. Ok, that's interesting but what about the throws that didn't get made because the quarterback didn't think he could throw through/past a defender? Or throws purposefully thrown out of bounds or to nobody for the same reason? I mean, who cares about just what happens at the line of scrimmage? I want my team to win!
So I compared the heights of everyone who passed a ball with how many yards total yards they threw over the season.
One person said, "But you're including backup quarterbacks in that and some of them threw for bupkus." Yup. But when I cut out everyone who didn't throw for a total of at least 1,000 yards during the season, it's still basically the same chart. I just don't have a bunch of small-yarders at the bottom of the chart. In fact, I think it's fair to only look at the 32 main quarterbacks and not include everyone else because there's far more deviation in that small group of 32 than there among the group consisting of everyone else who even attempted a pass, even if they weren't a quarterback.
In any case, Russell Wilson and Kyler Murray aside, in general more height means more passing yards.
AskOk3196 t1_jdpqgnu wrote
Makes sense because they have a greater field of view in general
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdpqv9f wrote
I was thinking that perhaps there's diminishing returns if a quarterback is too tall. Does it make it too easy for opposing players to see where the quarterback is looking and where the ball will be thrown? Probably not.
If I limit the sample to players who threw at least 1000 yards then remove Russell Wilson and Kyler Murray, there does appear to be diminishing returns for the tallest football players but if I then remove Patrick Mahomes that apparent diminishing return goes away. In other words, although in general more height means more yards, Patrick Mahomes is so good he makes everyone taller than him appear to be slacking.
NarcissusLovesEcho t1_jdprbls wrote
I don't watch much football, so maybe this is dumb, but are shorter QBs more likely to run rather than drop back and pass? If so, I could imagine a lot of their yards coming in the form of run yards. Likewise, when they're scrambling, they're more likely to do short yardage passes. In contast, the tall QBs might be more likely to drop back and give more time for the medium/long routes to develop for bigger gains.
KJ6BWB OP t1_jdpsnvx wrote
> but are shorter QBs more likely to run rather than drop back and pass
Based on this, I would presume so. This post was created in response to https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/121pvx7/oc_nfl_quarterbacks_of_passes_batted_down/ which stated:
> I always just assumed, like some others may have, that shorter QBs have a higher rate of passes batted down. While we can easily look at Baker Mayfield or Kyler Murray to try and explain this as true, we can also look at Russell Wilson, Tua Tagovailoa and Drew Brees as examples of short QBs with a below average batted ball rate.
I thought, "But who cares about just batted balls? If we're looking at passes successfully made then don't we want to look at all passes? And even all attempted passes? Do shorter quarterbacks have more trouble finding the people they want to throw to?"
I think the answer is, "Yes, in general the taller a person is the more often they attempt to throw the ball and the more yards they throw for overall."
See also https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/122c5b2/american_football_starting_quarterback_pass/ in which I explored what relationship pass attempts has to overall yards (they're pretty closely correlated).
Exiled_From_Twitter t1_jdpudnh wrote
Such poor analysis. There are simply just more QB's who are "taller" and you don't take into account pass attempts in any meaningful way (bubbles aren't really taking it into account in the actual analysis, just noting it).