Saturday, July 14, 2012

Passing Charts FAQs. Updated 8/16/12

So remember back when Bob's Morning After would have those fancy passing charts for Romo? Well we are going to bring them back for the upcoming season and would like to get your thoughts on them. The way they look, things you like or don't like. Any Suggestions are appreciated.  We have come alongway from when these first started and are looking forward to see where these go.

I'm also going to use this post as the official FAQs.  It will be periodaclly updated, as the charts evolve.




Q: Whats the purpose of these charts?
Well that depands on what you're looking for, but I guess a simple answer would be to see patterns.  This is stricly about the pass.  We are not interested in rushing, or yards after the catch.

Q: How do I read the charts?
From bottom to top.  The paths are charted by point of release to the point of catch or incompletion.

Q: What do the different colours mean?
Blue=Completion
Red=Incompletion
Black=Interception
Yellow=Touchdown

Q: Is there a line of scrimmage?
Not neccisarly.  Part of the charts is to show the distance thrown, so for ease of seeing that we have the LoS at the zero yard line.  That way you can see how far the quarterback dropped back and the point to where he threw.

Q: What program do you use to chart all this?
None, there is no magic wand or fancy program that does this.  I sit with my computer and photoshop and stop and play every passing play.

Q: Is there a way to make the charts bigger?
Yes, just click on them and a new window will open with the larger version.  I just make it small so they don't clog the blog down.

Thats all I can really think of off the top of my head.  If you have any questions just leave a comment or message me on twitter.

5 comments:

Scaling the Complex Sale said...

I would get rid of the green grass field background. the hash marks and 10 yard markers are fine. But you're just adding another color that isn't really helpful and with all the clashing colors, it's kind of hard to look at. Maybe something muted? Yellow is very hard to see on a white back ground so you might need to make that some other color if you use white for the background.

I would consider making touchdowns and interceptions a slightly thicker line weight so that they were easier to see (since there aren't many of them).

It might be interesting to have quarterly snapshots to see the difference in patterns. love the concept, though.

wouldn't mind seeing something similar for running plays. where was the hand-off and where was the tackle. A different color for touch downs and fumbles.

Anonymous said...

A couple of suggestions. I would like to see the line originate from the area where the pass was thrown. If Tony rolls left and throws from just before the line of scrimmage, it would be helpful to show that on the graph.

also..It would be easier to read if it had an enlarge feature or just make it larger.

runtothedaylight said...

I'd ask for a different key...

Tim Krajewski said...

Hey guys I'm the intern helping Bob out with this and to just keep his blog getting spammed with chart posts any update on these I think I'm just going to post in this thread and keep it here.

I'm addressing some of the issues now such as the green being too powerful. I will post it sometime soon and see what you think. As far as the size goes I could be wrong but blogger allows the poster to change the size so they could be an easy fix.

Bevo- if I'm understanding you correctly the graph already shows that. Read it from bottom to top, it shows where the ball was thrown to the point of catch. We aren't concerned with YAC with these charts.

Ryan said...

Are you keeping this data just in this graphical format or also as some sort of numerical data? This is interesting by itself right now, but if you later decide you want to crunch some numbers on your data you'll need to have numbers on which to crunch.

For example you could calculate the expected result of a pass attempt where the quarterback throws outside the hash to the right or left, etc.

Seems cool though and I'll be watching to see if we can spot anything.