NFL Combine Measurements and Projecting WR Success: Part I

The Importance of NFL Combine Measurements in Projecting WR Success 

 Part I: The Class of 2009

Projecting which high school hopefuls will succeed at the college football level is difficult.  You have young men who will not only have to adjust to a new coach and teammates, but will have to move away from home and family, contend with the challenges of independence and a new environment, while also having the pressures of being in the national spotlight on a weekly basis. Any number of issues, on or off the field, could almost instantly send a five star prospect and potential all-American back home to mom and obscurity.

But if a player can handle the challenges and is able to have a noteworthy college football career, then projecting success in the NFL, a billion dollar organization with endless resources, should not be any difficult task.  To make the matter all the more simple, the league's Combine, held annually in Indianapolis, is a forum for scouts to evaluate players' abilities in many ways.  The foundation for assessing athleticism is built from the results of several simple drills.    According to NFL Analyst Todd McShay, the drills of note for WRs are:

1. 40 yard sprint
2. Vertical jump
3. Broad jump

The other core drills (which, based on lack of WR benchmarks, McShay evidently does not feel is critical in WR evaluation) are:

• 20 yard Short Shuttle 
• The 3 Cone Drill 
• Bench Press. 

All drills are explained here. 

Just like any job fair (and that is exactly what the combine is) each employer has different core competencies they look for in a new hire.  A good part of evaluation relies on drill scores in determining the fastest, strongest, most agile players.  But, does being the most athletic guaranty NFL success?  Of course not, at there are no guaranties in anything. But, we would expect to find trends that show the better athletes go on to NFL success.  

This series will examine the Combine results of several NFL WR draft classes.  Players will be ranked based on Combine drill results several ways:

1. McShay's WR Relevant Drills - Based on McShay's article, the Combine invitees' will be ranked based on scores for each of three drills.
2. Total Participation - Players will be similarly ranked in all drills a player undertook. 
3. Adjusted Combine Performance - Player results for 1 & 2 above are adjusted for height and/or weight in an attempt to compare true athleticism.

The scores above will be mapped against each player's draft position as well as their overall performance in the NFL to get a glimpse into how accurate a projector of draft position and career production the Combine drills really are.

For now we will focus on the 2009 NFL WR draft class. 

The Class of 2009

Mockdraftable.com lists Combine Drill results for 35 players (many scores were recorded at Pro Day events and not at the NFL Combine).  Such household names as Jeremy Maclin and Julian Edelman were alongside other not so well known players as Taurus Johnson and Quan Cosby.  The class of 2009 will be the first class analyzed for this series.

McShay WR  Combine Drills 

This method takes a look at each players' 40 time, Vertical and Broad jumps.  Players will be ranked to peers in each category with an average of their scores being used to rank them.

Total Participation 

The analysis looks at player rankings in terms of his total drills participation and ranks players based average overall placing.  Prospects are not penalized for missing drills however, they need at least two scores to be ranked in this analysis. 

Adjusted Rankings

The two sets of rankings are adjusted (see below) to normalize body type differences and all four rankings (McShay Drills, All Drills, McShay Drills Adjusted and All Drills Adjusted) are averaged out to provide our final ranking for most athletic WR for that draft class.  Comparing this Composite  Athletic ranking to each players' career yards from scrimmage will give us an idea how reliable the combine results (based on our analyses) are at predicting player success.

Body Density

As previously mentioned, consideration of player size will also be tested for this analysis.  Consider this:  a 6 ft 193 lbs WR running a 4.56 second 40 yard sprint was average at the 2016 NFL combine for his group.  But a 6'3" 271 lbs DE running a 4.59/40 is top of the group.  While it's easy comparing across positions how about when the body types and position functions are closer?  

There are two adjustment types:  Speed Adjustment and Distance Adjustment.  

• Speed Adjustment - This ties in a players body "Density" to help rank performance.  Density is the ratio of weight in lbs divided by height in inches.  This "lbs per inch" factor attempts to normalize size so players can be better compared.  For our purposes, a 5'9" 196 lbs player is the same "size" as a 6'2" 210 lbs based on density (both have a 2.84 ratio).  When adjusting timed drills (the 40, the short shuttle,  3 Cone, etc), simply divide the result by the density to normalize.  It should be noted that speed is speed, so while this analysis could ding a low density player, if a guy runs a 4.3/40, it's really a no-brainer.  He's fast.  This is typically a good way to gauge "Functional" speed results for players within 1 standard deviation and those greater than 1 SD above the average.  
• Distance Adjustment - The vertical and broad jumps are adjusted the opposite way: by multiplying the Density number and the drill result in inches.  This number conveys athleticism as it gives an idea of how much power a player can generate.  

The Bench Press Adjustment simply divides the number of reps by the Density.  The bench is the drill most resistant to adjustment because they mirror the regular bench rankings so much as functional strength is fairly universal. 

The Class of 2009

The entire data table is here 2009 NFL Combine WR Data Tables with a tab presenting the raw data and analyses under several criteria and a tab presenting the results (I'd suggest focusing on this one).  Production rank is based on total points assigned assuming 1 point for each 10 receiving yards and 6 points for each receiving TD over the player's career.

Name	Athletic Rank	WR Draft Position	Production Rank
Mike Thomas	1	16	12
Darrius Heyward-Bey	2	1	8
Mike Wallace	3	11	1
Kenny Britt	4	6	5
Brian Robiskie	5	7	17
Andrew Means	6	Undrafted	35
Percy Harvin	7	4	6
Dominique Edison	8	26	35
Kevin Ogletree	9	Undrafted	14
Julian Edelman	10	29	7
Tiquan Underwood	11	34	15
Jaison Williams	12	Undrafted	35
Hakeem Nicks	13	5	3
Juaquin Iglesias	14	15	35
Taurus Johnson	15	Undrafted	35
Mohamed Massaquoi	16	9	13
Jarett Dillard	17	22	19
Marko Mitchell	18	31	23
Brooks Foster	19	23	35
Louis Murphy	20	18	10
Ramses Barden	21	12	20
Johnny Knox	22	20	9
Jeremy Maclin	23	3	2
Quan Cosby	24	Undrafted	22
Kenny McKinley	25	21	35
Demetrius Byrd	26	27	35
Deon Butler	27	Undrafted	16
Austin Collie	28	19	11
Aaron Kelly	29	Undrafted	35
Brian Hartline	30	17	4
Quinten Lawrence	31	24	35
Jeremy Childs	32	Undrafted	35
Sammie Stroughter	33	30	18
Darius Passmore	34	Undrafted	35
Derrick Williams	35	14	21

 Here are the highlights:

• Five of the top 10 most athletic testers are also in the top 10 for the class in terms of career Production (Wallace, Britt, Harvin, Edelman and Hayward-Bey).
• Of the top 10 most athletic, only 3 were first round picks ( Heyward-Bey, Harvin and Britt) and Edelman was the 29th selected WR (taken #232 overall in the 7th round). 
• Only two of the top 10 went undrafted (Means and Ogletree) and only two had no production (Means and Edison).
• Mike Wallace, the 3rd most athletic WR in 2009 was the 11th WR taken (#80 overall in the 3rd round).  He ended up generating the most receptions,  yards and touchdowns in the class (number one in Production).
• The most athletic player, Mike Thomas, was the 16th WR drafted (#107 overall in the 4th Round) ranked 12th in Production for the class. 
• Kenny Britt meet expectations as he was the 4th most athletic, the 6th WR selected (#30 overall) and is the 5th most productive player in the class. 

And here are the most telling items:  

• Players in the top half of the athletic rankings were, on average, about 92% more productive over their careers than those in the bottom half.  

Breaking Up the Rankings

The results above are based on the average of four different rankings: the "McShay" rankings based on drill results from the 40, vertical and broad jumps, Total Participation based on including drill results from all the combine tests in which each respective prospect participated and, finally, the  rankings for each of the other two measures but using adjusted results to attempt to normalized body "Density".  But on a stand alone basis, which would have been most successful in predicting success?

The McShay rankings would have resulted in the following Top 10 most athletic:

1. Mike Wallace
2. Tiquan Underwood
3. Mike Thomas
4. Darrius Heyward-Bey
5. Jarrett Dillard
6. Percy Harvin
7. Johnny Knox
8. Kevin Ogletree
9. Brian Robiskie
10. Dominique Edison

In this case, the top half of the list only out produced the Bottom half (on average) by 9% compared to 92% based on the combined analysis. 

Adjusting the McShay results for "Density"  shuffles the top 10 somewhat (please see the Data Tables link, above) but at this point we see the Bottom half of the list actual outperforms the Top half in terms of production (by 9%)!

Looking at the Total Participation method, the names float around in terms of Top 10, but the most interesting stat is the Top half outpeformed the Bottom by 282%!  

Adjusting the Total Participation for "Density", the Top   half is still dominant at a 70% increase in Production from the Bottom, good for second in terms of our methodology.

Let's rank each method based on how strongly the Top half (in terms of measured athleticism) performed compared to the Bottom half.

1. Total Participation: 282% greater performance.
2. Total Participation - Adjusted:  70% greater performance
3. McShay Method:   9% greater performance
4. McShay - Adjusted:  Top athletes perform 9% worse than the Bottom half. 

The results of this analysis concluded that working the numbers for combine drills can provide a great tool in predicting which players are most likely to succeed at the next level.

But, we only looked at one year.  Next, we will continue to look at recent NFL WR draft classes to see if any of the performance methods conducted today will develop into trends or if the next class leads us down a road far different than the class of 2009. 

Feel free to send any questions or comments @boombearjr on Twitter. 

Thanks!