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Main - General MFN Discussion

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By setherick
12/14/2021 5:07 pm
raymattison21 wrote:
I saw some play overuse last game. He has no speed /real weapons to throw to either and his oline is young. Really the whole offense is young. The low ratings and low experience Combined with familiarity and play overuse did it. I bet they do much better in a few seasons with similar players but no overuse..... maybe a true weapon or two. His drops are high as well ...like my young 55 accuracy QB. 4.6 is So sensitive to accuracy modifiers like pressure and tight coverage ....maybe even fatigue.


The problem is if you're a new player (I know this owner isn't) -- but if you are a new owner -- and you get a QB that looks like he should be an average QB to get by a year, you expect something better than 0 - 44 using plays that "look" like they should work.

Maybe I just care about the average player that's playing this game for fun since your league is going to be made up of 80-90% people like that and <10% of people like me that are going to dive the data to figure out how to win. I feel like I'm the only person that cares about your average "here's my auto-pilot offense because I'm playing this game as a roster management game" player.

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By Smirt211
12/14/2021 5:55 pm
I pulled up the last game and I see the problem.

Last time I checked in on Qwex I saw a battler whom was present and wildly swinging to get better. I'd have to look at his production in other leagues. You're not getting true results with him here because he is tanking.

32:2 pass/run ratio. The QB is +/+ and went up in camp, therefore, if you carefully finessed him you wouldn't have 0 and 44.

He's purposely wildly throwing into the poor accuracy and letting the sim have it's way with him.
Last edited at 12/14/2021 5:58 pm

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By Smirt211
12/14/2021 6:01 pm
Alright, I pulled him up in MFN-23, too. He's still trying to learn the game but that tactic has to be tanking, which I never get bothered by.

If someone is tanking - cool - one less competitor.
Last edited at 12/14/2021 6:02 pm

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By setherick
12/14/2021 6:19 pm
Smirt211 wrote:

He's purposely wildly throwing into the poor accuracy and letting the sim have it's way with him.


Even if he's doing it purposefully, this is kind of my point. The sim is going to have its way with any casual player right now because passing - especially medium and long passing - is so bad because of sacks and drops. But the person that should care the most about the casual players that make up the majority of players seems to be absent.

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By Smirt211
12/14/2021 6:25 pm
Oh, yeah. He goes on week long sabbaticals now and then parachutes in for 15 minutes (of fame lol) at a time....here and there.

But yeah, it's broken. The moment you fling a torrent of passes at the engine, especially medium and long ones it'll shut you down and have every play fail.

nods

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By jackals
12/15/2021 1:49 pm
Smirt211 wrote:
The moment you fling a torrent of passes at the engine, especially medium and long ones it'll shut you down and have every play fail.


And this is a good thing. That QB's YPC is high because of the medium passes, but his Y/A is abysmally low mostly from sacks (>10/gm), slow-*** WRs who probably rarely get any kind of lasting separation, and low accuracy (I don't consider any QB with accuracy under 70 to be serviceable).

I also looked through his passing play choices -- they aren't even good plays to begin with. Singleback Empty 4 Slot Crosses, which he uses 3-9 times per game (usually 5-6, getting sacked on about 3/4 of dropbacks), is one of the worst medium passes, not even considering the data from that league.

There are definitely issues with passing in 0.4.6, but that QB is a terrible example. I'm top 5 in passing yards/gm and YPA in both of my 0.4.6 leagues, but my raw numbers went down in one of them for 0.4.6, though many other teams suffered much worse drops in production because they couldn't spam FL Hitch and HB Blast.

Medium/long passing definitely needs a slight boost in either blocking or the QB's ability to scramble more effectively to buy time to make the throw. I'd like to see QBs step up in the pocket more and blockers attempt to push edge rushers around past the QB. But the short passing game is just fine -- if anything, I prefer 0.4.6 since a crazy catch-and-run from the safety jumping and missing a short pass doesn't happen as frequently.

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By setherick
12/15/2021 2:25 pm
jackals wrote:
I also looked through his passing play choices -- they aren't even good plays to begin with. Singleback Empty 4 Slot Crosses, which he uses 3-9 times per game (usually 5-6, getting sacked on about 3/4 of dropbacks), is one of the worst medium passes, not even considering the data from that league.


I'm going to call out the bolded play as the only interesting point in your response.

Here's where the point I've been making about passing and the point the "but 4.6 is awesome because I win" folks have been making really comes into focus.

This play should work, and not only should it work, it should be highly effective against a Cover 1, 2 or 3 defense because it forces the defense to make a decision. The two outside WRs run go routes, so the safety has to decide if playing Cover 1 or 2 whether to trail the WR deep and leave the under open or not. If the safety goes with the outside WR, then the under slants should be open or at least have one-on-one coverage with the slant WR. In a Cover 3 or Cover 4, the outside DBs take the WRs deep, and the slant routes have one-on-one cover under. And the play should take less than 3 seconds for the outside WRs to run a 20 yard go and the inside WRs to run a mid-slant.

And this is exactly how the play did work until 4.5. It was one of the best medium passing plays in the game.

Now, WRs take 7 seconds to run a 20 yard go route and the QB doesn't throw outside even when there is one-on-one coverage. The QB almost always targets the middle routes, but because passing velocity is so unrealistic, the QB is always throwing into a pack of defenders because of the insta-read-the-play-and-teleport-to-the-ball "coverage" that we have on defense now.

So, yes, that play is one of the worst plays now because all of the changes that have been made have made it one of the worst plays.
Last edited at 12/15/2021 2:28 pm

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By Smirt211
12/15/2021 2:43 pm
That play was deadly and if the opposing GM paired it with the wrong Dime or Quarter coverage (I won't say which) you'd get clowned for huge yardage.

Part of watching the games and taking notes. If an opposing GM went the wrong way on the Dime or Quarter option - you'd nail 'em.


Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By TheAdmiral
12/15/2021 2:53 pm
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1iWls1ZVLzNlnqbY_gh2OphrV8FfebGKB-EyYTewDzf0/edit?usp=sharing

Power Rankings and Player Stats after week 9.


Points of note, just over halfway through the season and points per game is down year on year by almost a point per team, passing yards are down approx 10 yards per team per game year on year, with yards per attempt also down year on year. I think this is a direct result from people throwing much less medium and long passes as passes per week has remained fairly stable.

The early conclusion from that? if you want your passing to be more effective (over 6 yards per attempt and around 10 yards per completion) you need to include medium and long passing plays. In my opinion, your team should take 3 or 4 deep shots per game and 8 to 10 mid range passes.

It would appear that overuse of short passing plays severely reduces their effectiveness. This often shows up when a QB will hit 10-14 passes in a row from the start of a game, then maybe hit around 40% of passes for the remainder of the game. On the other hand, if you go to wild to try and force the ball downfield you might get to halftime with less than 50 yards passing.

So, whilst I appreciate the effort Setherick (in particular) and others have put in. I disagree with his findings to abandon the medium and deep passes completely. There's a fine line between efficiency and effectiveness. In My opinion, by attempting medium and deep passes during a game it will increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the short passes as the Defense will get a little bit of extra room/time either from calling plays where the secondary sits off or from beating the blitz.




*The data is from League of Legends which has been running BETA (which is now 4.6) for several seasons.

Re: 4.6 Passing Issues by the Data

By Infinity on Trial
12/16/2021 9:22 am
Attention all opponents: You should definitely take Admiral's advice and throw long passes against me. He's been right about 4.6 at every step.

Seriously, though: Where in your spreadsheet is there evidence that long passes are valuable? (Nobody has said you should never throw medium passes.)

Here's what long passes look like in Big Data:



Source: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VQrD9zECcyvLOHeE-Bvb1b8KPliqtOTs/view

If the data is really different in advanced leagues, please show us comparable data.