There has been significant discussion, given the uncertain status of Andrew Luck's shoulder injury, of the Colts possibly signing Colin Kaepernick, in addition to previous possible signings of the former 49er in Baltimore (after Joe Flacco suffered a back injury of unknown severity, leading to open discussion with the community and no signing of a quarterback who could serve long-term in place of Flacco) and Miami (after Ryan Tannehill re-injured his knee; the Dolphins have since signed Jay Cutler). Kaepernick's status as a free agent has been cemented by controversy regarding his social activism, seeing quarterbacks with much less-impressive resumes signed by teams (*cough* Mike Glennon *cough*) while Kaepernick remains on the sideline (or, rather on a sideline of a field that does not contain NFL players). There are significant issues raised by teams hesitations (as displayed by the Ravens) to sign a player based on their activism, and I do not believe a blog where the phrase "*cough* <noun> *cough*" was just used is a suitable forum for the serious discussion of the place athletes should have in public policy discourse, and the specific issues Kaepernick has raised.
In terms of football, Kaepernick has struggled in recent years; after leading the 49ers to a Super Bowl in 2012 and the NFC Championship Game in 2013, the 49ers and Kaepernick have struggled since. The 49ers missed the playoffs in 2014, 2015, and 2016, leading to departure of three head coaches from the team. Kaepernick's individual performance has been declining as well, as seen in Figure 1, with points added and QBR as calculated by ESPN (1).
Figure 1, Colin Kaepernick Career in Points Added and QBR. Kaepernick was nor a qualified quarterback for QBR due to his limited playing time in 2012.
Kaepernick, averaged over his career, has produced points added that would placed him at 23rd overall in 2015 (approximately the performance of Andy Dalton and Cam Newton), and 13th among qualified passers in QBR (approximately the performance of Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota). While not necessarily among the elite in the NFL, Kaepernick has been a solid quarterback. Even in 2016, his performance was serviceable. And certainly better than Colt's backup Scott Tolzien, who in one start had a 31.8 QBR, which was worse than Kaepernick's dreadful 2015 campaign, in which he was benched for Blaine Gabbert (who was benched in 2016 for Kaepernick, because The Lion King apparently guides the San Francisco 49er's depth chart and there is a Circle of Life).
What would this mean for the Indianapolis Colts, were they to sign him? Would it keep the Colts in possible playoff contention were Luck to miss a significant part of the season? Would it make my Sundays of living outside the TV market of the team I actually root for bearable? To answer this, I am going to use the results in terms of points for and against for the 2016 NFL Season (2, 3) to estimate the Pythagorean expectation of wins for each team (4). For the Colts, the points added as calculated by ESPN (1) will be removed for starter Andrew Luck, and replaced with two different possibilities: Scott Tolzien (expected points of .6 in one game extrapolated to 9.6 for a 16 game season) and Kaepernick using his career averages. While not a perfect model (it assumes the team's performances will be similar to last year, minimizing the impact of rookies, free agents, and coaching changes), it should give a good idea of some expectation of team performance in each case.
In Figure 2, the results for the Colt's division, the AFC South, in such hypothetical cases (as well as the baseline from 2016 with Luck as starter) are shown.
Figure 2, The AFC South
So, one interesting surprise here regarding the baseline. The Pythagorean expectation slotted the Colts, who finished 8-8, as the best team in a division (granted, expected to win 8.45 games) won by a 9-7 Texans team would have been expected to win 6.48 games. Were Luck to miss the whole season and be replaced by Tolzien, the Colts would be expected to win 6.36 games, good for third in the division, and certainly out of the race for a playoff spot. With Kaepernick, the Colts would be expected to win 7.57 games, .5 games less than than the (in that case, first place) Titans would be expected to win. The Colts, even if Luck were to miss the whole season, could still be in the hunt for a division title and playoff spot, although would be an underdog in the division. And given the state of the Colt's defense and offensive line, it would not be expected for the Colts to go deep in the playoffs (especially with a stronger Wild Card opponent, as seen in Figure 3). Seven or eight wins would also be unlikely to be be anywhere near a Wild Card sport, given the conference looks like this:
Figure 3, The AFC
Given that two teams each of the AFC West and North would be expected to out pace the Colts, as well as the Bills, a Wild Card berth would be unlikely. And being host to the stronger Broncos or Raiders be unlikely to produce pleasant results in Lucas Oil Stadium. It would also mean a draft pick in the 20s for a team that desperately needs more talent on the defense and the offensive line. A playoff berth may not be the best thing for the Colts. Even if the Colts miss the post-season at 8-8, the the Colts could be in line to have a mid-first round selection, as in Figure 4 with all teams projected under 8.5 wins:
Figure 4, A Draft With Kaepernick Replacing Luck
Consider the road of Scott Tolzien. Yes, the Colts suffer in 2017. An expected win total of 6.36 would be the result, rather than 7.57. But, in the both the Colts would either not be in the playoffs or a major underdog as a team lacking in talent. But with fewer wins, the Colts would be in better draft position:
Figure 5, A Draft With Tolzien Replacing Luck
With six wins, the Colts would be in position for the top ten draft pick, with fewer wins putting a top 5 pick up for grabs, allowing either a high pick or a trade with significant value (5). The Colts could then build for a future with better talent on defense, and with an improved offensive line to protect Luck. This could then position later Colts teams to compete for championships.
In terms of football, the question on whether to sign Kaepernick comes down to a question of whether you should try and win a little now (and give up pieces to get cap space to do so), or forgo winning now to win bigger later. Granted, winning a little now will make the games that show up on my TV this season more watchable, but for Colts fans and not-fans-of-other-teams-who-happen-to- live-in-the-Indianapolis-metro area, the long term success of the franchise may be of greater importance. It comes down to the priorities of Chris Ballard and Jim Irsay. And given what 2011 looked like for the Colts, this may be an interesting year to be in Indy...
It should also be noted that Chrome's spellcheck believed that the following surnames were misspelled, and suggested the word in parenthesis: Kaepernick (Pumpernickel), Flacco (Flaccid), Tannehill (Annihilate), Glennon (Glen non), Tolzien (Tolkien), and Irsay (Ir say). I mean, the Colt's offensive line has played like they were hobbits...
References
(1) http://www.espn.com/nfl/qbr
(2) https://www.pro-football-reference.com/years/2016/#all_team_scoring
(3) https://www.pro-football-reference.com/years/2016/opp.htm
(4) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythagorean_expectation#Use_in_pro_football
(5) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Football_League_Draft#Rules_for_determining_draft_order
Comments
Post a Comment