Things like that don’t often get noticed but when you do, they can have a profound impact on an emtional level. They leave an impression on you; fill you with a sense of awe.

I had an experience like that too. It didn’t concern speed, but rather size. I’m going to date myself here but, oh well. This was back when the Broncos held their Spring training in Fort Collins (before Greely even). I remember going down to the training field just to get a closer look. I’m amazed to think at how relaxed security was back then, but I remember standing by the path the players used to walk from the practice fields to the dressing room. If I recall correctly fans made a corridor less than five yards wide. I don’t think the Broncos even used ropes to seperate the fans and the players, just an occassional, polite suggestion from what appeared to be assistants to “Please, step back.” Anyway, I recall several offensive linemen strolling by, waving and talking to the crowd.

Now, I’m not tall by anyone’s definition, but I’m also not so short that I call attention to myself. But I do remember looking at these human mountains as they walked by and I swear, their belly buttons were at my eye level. I was in awe. Any ridiculous fantasy I may have ever nutured about becoming a pro football player died quietly under that Colorado afternoon sun.

“. . . I’d be curious to see it.”

So would I. Not long after I wrote the piece I looked for rankings for 2007, 2006, etc. but was unable to find any. Don’t know if archives aren’t kept or if my search skills were deficient (or how long the category has been used). Perhaps I’ll try again after I’ve re-upped. It made sense that r/p recognition might roughly coincide with information processing speed, and that the relative success of someone like Hayden, who ranked high in it but much lower overall, might be telling, but any conclusion based on Hayden and (to a lesser extent) Thomas is necessarily tentative. About all I can say is the idea seems to make sense and the experience of Hayden and Thomas is at least consistent with it. That’s a long way from certainty, which is why I limited myself to saying it was intriguing enough to use as a way of looking for sleepers. If I can’t find an archive I’ll make a list of defensive linemen who rank relatively high in r/p recognition and relatively low overall this year and check after the season to see if as a group they seem to have exceeded expectations. “Expectations” and “exceed” will of course have to defined in advance. If overall ranking ends up corresponding roughly to draft position, and if they tend to be more successful by some objective criteria (making the team, getting playing minutes, etc.) than others similarly ranked and/or drafted, that would be revealing.

it seems to me that what I’ve termed information processing speed is a large part of what they mean.
What makes run/pass recognition so intriguing is it rates prospects in how good they are, relative to
one another, in a category that’s roughly equivalent to a major component of “instinct” or “football speed”.

you can say they weren’t awful. According to Football Outsiders opposing teams ran up the middle on us 48% of the time. I guessing opposing OC’s didn’t just do that at random. On runs between the guards we ranked 24th in defense. The only good news is that we were 10th in run defense on 3rd and short.

stated that Robertson didn’t play well as a one-gapper until late in the season. I guess if you’ve been playing two-gap it takes awhile to get comfortable with one-gap even if you prefer it and have played it before. I would still argue that Thomas played relatively well but not as well as an experienced DT, and while this means our play at that position was nothing special in 2008 it bodes well for the future. If we’d had a veteran (like Warren) at the position he’d have given us better play until Thomas developed to the point of being able to take the job away from him. Make that two veterans. In a better-stocked team Robertson (until he got up to speed with one-gap) and Thomas (until he got up to speed as a pro) would have been the reserves, not the starters. A factor in our dismal performance is that the guys relieving them must have been truly awful. The cupboard was simply bare of capable, experienced one-gap tackles. Mistakes made in previous years (letting Warren and Myers go) came back to haunt us.

and the categories by which they’re ranked vary by position. For DT and DE the categories are Initial quickness, Pass rush, Pursuit/tackling, Run/pass recognition, and Versus the run. For both ILB and OLB the categories are Blitz/coverage, Pursuit/tackling, Run/pass recognition, Vs. inside run, and Vs. outside run. For CB the categories are Ball skills, Closing speed, Coverage skills, Run support, and Run/pass recognition. Ditto for S. For each position the overall ranking is simply the order the players are listed on the page. Notice that Run/pass recognition is one of the categories for each of the defensive positions. It seems to me to be the one that corresponds most closely to read and react and thus to information processing speed.

Naturally, Run/pass recognition is not a category for any offensive position. Not that it’s going to be relevant to us for awhile, but the categories for QB are Accuracy/delivery, Arm strength, Field vision, Pocket awareness, and Running ability. For RB it’s Blocking, Durability, Hands/routes, Inside running, Outside running. The same categories are used for FB. For WR and also TE it’s Blocking, Hands, Patterns, Release, and Run after catch. Finally, for each of the listed offensive line positions, C, G, and OT, the categories are Initial quickness, Mobility, Pass blocking, Run blocking, and Strength. None of the offensive positions, with the possible exception of Field vision for QB, has a category that jumps out at me as possibly relevant to information processing speed, but we probably won’t be drafting many offensive players anyway.

Having just re-subscribed to The Sporting News Pro Football War Room, I see that none of the individual category rankings are up yet, just the overall ranking of each player at that position. At RB, for instance, the top 5 are Chris Wells, Knowshon Moreno, LeSean McCoy, Donald Brown, and Shonn Greene. At DT, which is what we’re especially interested in, the top 5 are B.J. Raji, Fili Moala, Peria Jerry, Jeff Owens, and Ricky Jean-Francois. The only players currently listed at over 320 lbs. are Raji, 1st, 334, Terrence Cody, 9th, 365, Antonio Dixon, 22nd, 326, Sammie Hill, 31st, 331, Terrance Knighton, 34th, 324, Ron Brace (also BC!), 38th, 329, and Jesse Bowman, 50th, 321. Peria Jerry is listed at only 290. Hopefully the individual write-ups, once they start appearing, will indicate whether some of the sub-320 might be able to add weight without adverse effects. The 40-yard dash times are listed but the other measurables, including the Wonderlic, presumably won’t go up until after the Combine.

That’s it. I don’t know how long it’ll be before within-category rankings start showing up. I also haven’t looked for an archive yet. It’d be great if there was one, because then we could do an analysis without having to wait for the end of the 2009 season. I’ll let you know when I have more.

the offensive categories don’t lend themselves to an IPS ranking, and even though all of the defensive positions include Run/pass recognition, which perhaps does, the players are ranked against each other in each category and overall only within each position type. We could list the top 5 in that category for DT, DE, ILB, OLB, CB, and S, for a total of 30 players, and we might even work out, amongst ourselves, a rough order among those 30, but there’d be plenty of room for disagreement. Might be fun, though.