I was excited to see how the 2 of these RBs would go Sunday night. I know they have a lot of respect for each other. I am super high on Barkley and never have been as impressed by Zeke as most are. I feel he is a very athletic RB with great instincts who benefits from a very good Oline.
I decided to go back and watch the film and look at each of there touches and crunch some numbers. What I was interested in was is not just the box score numbers i.e. 10 carries for 100yards etc etc. When you look at the box score it looks like Elliott had the better game with a TD and averaging 5 yards a carry to Barkleys 2. So I came up with a sabermetric game. So the rules to the game were as follows:
1. Watch every touch by each RB and only count the plays where the RB received the ball behind or very near to the LOS.
2. Determine when the RB was first encountered by a defender close enough to make a tackle and chart that.
3. After first encounter chart the amount of yardage after the first defender made or missed the tackle.
4. Keep track of how many plays the first defender missed the first tackle.
So what I came up with was this:
Barkley on average met his first defender -.7 yards behind the LOS
The first defender missed the tackle on 16 of 22 of those plays= 72%
After the first defender Barkley had 22 attempts for 86 yards = 3.9 ypa
Elliott on average met his first defender .5 yards in from of LOS
The first defender missed on 8 of 21 attempts=38%
After the first defender Elliott had 21 attempts for 68 yards= 3.3 ypa
Barkley is a rare rare RB and even if this season goes down the tubes atleast we have something to be excited for in the future.
The Giants should see if Howard Cross would like to come back.
As of right now, he’s drafted Hernandez. And right now, he looks to be on par with Pugh and Richburg. So id say it’s way too early to make that claim. But it’s safe to say all of Reese’s OL picks sucked ass and continue to suck after leaving the Giants. So it’s certain Reese’s picks suck. Jury is out on DGs pick.
then we wind up with a dak prescott/ezekial elliot/good offensive line situation and start to resemble a good nfl team again
this year proved to me that you cant depend on free agency to acquire good offensive linemen..there arent enough to go around the league now and if someone is any good, they're team isnt letting them go
Barkley reminds me of a combination of Sanders and Smith.. Barkley runs with much more power. Not sure anyone had Saunders juke ability though Barkley has some definitely.
Saquon looks like Berry. Bad OL, lots of 1-2 yard runs, then bust a big one. Lots of spins and cuts too.
It's soooo early, but this is what I'm reminded of, at this point.