Ryan Tannehill

Ahhhhh Ryan Tannehill....

over-occupying the minds of Dolphins fans for nearly a decade.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

This had been addressed on a yearly basis during the time period, especially as it relates to the OL. You, in fact, argued that the repeated change over in personnel argued in favor of Tannehill being the problem, since, you were certain that there was no way that a team could repeatedly fail to solve a problem. I was certain the the replacements sucked, their replacements sucked, and their replacements sucked, and so on......

Finally, Tannehill goes to a new team in 2019 and he excels. The Dolphins, OTOH, continued their thrashing on the OL. Again, they had 8 different linemen play 44% or more of the offensive snaps. 5 of them had 0 snaps for Miami in 2018. Predictably, the line sucked again.

Yes I will give you that one.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

LOL. You believe the Patriots were more likely than not average.

No what I said was that the strongest probability is that any one team in the league, in any way, is average. There are lesser probabilities that teams are other than average, good or bad, and the Patriots 2001-2019 happen to be one of the teams that occupy an other-than-average position. And again that is readily objectively supported.

In other words, if you don't know how good or bad a team was in a certain way, the default belief should be that it was average in that way. If it's objectively supported that the team is different from average, however, then that belief should change on the basis of that objective support.

"The Guy wrote:

I've brought facts -- the strongest probability is that any team in the league, in any way, is average. That is a fact. Therefore my belief is that Tannehill's surroundings on the 2012-2018 Dolphins were more likely than not average.

If you're arguing the 2012-2018 Dolphins were significantly worse than average, well then you're asserting something different from that fact, and then the onus is on you to support that.

Again, being "average" doesn't tell you anything. However, you didn't provide any stats, you are talking probability, and drawing broad conclusions from that.

"The Guy wrote:

No what I said was that the strongest probability is that any one team in the league, in any way, is average. There are lesser probabilities that teams are other than average, good or bad, and the Patriots 2001-2019 happen to be one of the teams that occupy an other-than-average position. And again that is readily objectively supported.

In other words, if you don't know how good or bad a team was in a certain way, the default belief should be that it was average in that way. If it's objectively supported that the team is different from average, however, then that belief should change on the basis of that objective support.

LOL. Go to a Patriots message board and demand they prove they were better than average......

"resnor wrote:

Again, being "average" doesn't tell you anything. However, you didn't provide any stats, you are talking probability, and drawing broad conclusions from that.

That is his new method to discredit. Tannehill is average and you must prove otherwise. He has previously stated that he feels there are a few elite QBs and a few terrible QBs at any one time and everyone else is average. He then dares you to call Tannehill elite, and if you won't then you are admitting he is average.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

LOL. Go to a Patriots message board and demand they prove they were better than average......

Anybody there with a shred of analytical ability would do that in about five minutes.

"resnor wrote:

Again, being "average" doesn't tell you anything. However, you didn't provide any stats, you are talking probability, and drawing broad conclusions from that.

What we're talking about are Tannehill's surroundings 2012-2018. The strongest probability is that any QB's surroundings in the league are average. When people propose that Tannehill's surroundings were significantly worse than average, they're making a claim that is improbable. Not impossible, but improbable.

My only point in that regard is that a consensus of the team's most ardent supporters shouldn't determine the validity of that claim, especially when the claim is improbable to begin with. It's possible the consensus is wrong.

"The Guy wrote:

What we're talking about are Tannehill's surroundings 2012-2018. The strongest probability is that any QB's surroundings in the league are average.

This statement is ambiguous enough to be completely worthless. Even if there were a way to precisely measure "the surroundings" of a QB, you've already shown an arbitrary definite of average in a similar context.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

This statement is ambiguous enough to be completely worthless.

And because of that I'm fully comfortable concluding that we don't know the caliber of Tannehill's surroundings 2012-2018. I'm certainly not going to let a consensus of the team's most ardent supporters determine that.

In other words, we shouldn't analyze the cause of his change in performance in 2019 as though we know for certain his surroundings 2012-2018 were bad, simply because a bunch of the team's most ardent supporters believe that.

The change in the quality of Tannehill's surroundings from 2012-2018 to 2019, if any, is unknown.

"The Guy wrote:

No what I said was that the strongest probability is that any one team in the league, in any way, is average. There are lesser probabilities that teams are other than average, good or bad, and the Patriots 2001-2019 happen to be one of the teams that occupy an other-than-average position. And again that is readily objectively supported.

In other words, if you don't know how good or bad a team was in a certain way, the default belief should be that it was average in that way. If it's objectively supported that the team is different from average, however, then that belief should change on the basis of that objective support.

Miami is tied for the 10th worst W/L record and the 6th worst margin of victory (or loss) since 2012. Their margin of loss was -4.2 which is larger than 1 standard deviation from the mean. Below average.....

"The Guy wrote:

And because of that I'm fully comfortable concluding that we don't know the caliber of Tannehill's surroundings 2012-2018. I'm certainly not going to let a consensus of the team's most ardent supporters determine that.

In other words, we shouldn't analyze the cause of his change in performance in 2019 as though we know for certain his surroundings 2012-2018 were bad, simply because a bunch of the team's most ardent supporters believe that.

The change in the quality of Tannehill's surroundings from 2012-2018 to 2019, if any, is unknown.

Okay, then we can only base it on Tannehill's performance using the most widely used measures - passer rating or YPA. He finished first in both. Coincidentally, that's rare, so even more evidence that Tannehill was the best QB last season.

"The Guy wrote:

What we're talking about are Tannehill's surroundings 2012-2018. The strongest probability is that any QB's surroundings in the league are average. When people propose that Tannehill's surroundings were significantly worse than average, they're making a claim that is improbable. Not impossible, but improbable.

My only point in that regard is that a consensus of the team's most ardent supporters shouldn't determine the validity of that claim, especially when the claim is improbable to begin with. It's possible the consensus is wrong.

I'm not sure why you're so hung up on probability. You're saying that probability says that the most likely scenario is that most teams are average, but YOU haven't:

1. Proven that most teams are average
2. Proven that the Dolphins were average

But yet you're drawing the conclusion that people on here are wrong, even though they've been giving you facts and stats to back up What they've been saying for years. You're going further, and actually dismissing every fact or stat posted in these discussions over the years, then asking people to prove that something that didn't happen was actually the most logical thing to have happened.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

Okay, then we can only base it on Tannehill's performance is the most widely used measures - passer rating or YPA. He finished first in both. Coincidentally, that's rare, so even more evidence that Tannehill was the best QB last season.

Right, but that doesn't tell us whether his surroundings went from 1) bad to average, 2) average to good, or 3) bad to good.

"The Guy wrote:

Right, but that doesn't tell us whether his surroundings went from 1) bad to average, 2) average to good, or 3) bad to good.

Take a break from Tannehill and figure out the precise credit to give every other QB in the league, past and present.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

Miami is tied for the 10th worst W/L record and the 6th worst margin of victory (or loss) since 2012. Their margin of loss was -4.2 which is larger than 1 standard deviation from the mean. Below average.....

OK, so here are the z-scores for the Dolphins from the time period 2012 to 2018:

Win%: -0.33
Points scored: -1.04
Points surrendered: 0.34
Point differential: -0.84

So, if we're using those measures to determine whether Tannehill's surroundings were significantly different from league average, the assertion that the Dolphins were significantly worse than league average 2012-2018 isn't supported objectively. They functioned within the average range overall, in terms of those measures.

If you want to use one standard deviation as the cutoff in that regard, then you could argue that they were significantly below average in points scored, but the z-score there is so close to one standard deviation that it certainly doesn't paint the picture that the team was horrendous.

https://www.pro-football-reference.com/play-index/tgl_finder.cgi?request=1&match=combined&year_min=2012&year_max=2018&game_type=R&game_num_min=0&game_num_max=99&week_num_min=0&week_num_max=99&temperature_gtlt=lt&c5val=1.0&order_by=points_diff

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

Take a break from Tannehill and figure out the precise credit to give every other QB in the league, past and present.

The only point I'm making here is that when we're figuring out how to explain the change in Tannehill's performance in 2019, we shouldn't take it as a given that his surroundings in Miami were bad in comparison to the league average, simply because many people on a message board convinced each other of that for seven years.

His surroundings in Miami may have indeed been bad, but we need to determine that more objectively if we're going to have more certainty about how to explain the change in his performance in 2019.

"resnor wrote:

I'm not sure why you're so hung up on probability. You're saying that probability says that the most likely scenario is that most teams are average, but YOU haven't:

1. Proven that most teams are average

Here are the z-scores for win percentage throughout the league from 2012 to 2018:

NWE 2.44
SEA 1.58
PIT 1.17
DEN 1.14
KAN 0.89
CAR 0.77
GNB 0.73
DAL 0.65
NOR 0.57
CIN 0.57
MIN 0.57
IND 0.57
BAL 0.33
PHI 0.33
ATL 0.25
ARI 0.12
HOU 0.00
STL / LAR -0.04
SDG / LAC -0.08
DET -0.25
MIA -0.33
BUF -0.41
CHI -0.56
SFO -0.61
WAS -0.61
NYG -0.73
TEN -0.89
NYJ -1.14
OAK -1.30
TAM -1.46
JAX -1.95
CLE -2.31

If we define average as z-scores between -1 and +1, 23 of the 32 teams in the league were average during that period of time.

So 72% of the teams in the league were average in terms of win percentage 2012-2018. Teams had only a 28% probability of being something other than average (good or bad) during that period of time. Teams had only a 16% probability (5 of 32 teams) of being worse than average during that period of time.

Can you see now why being average is what's probable? Can you see why being worse than average is highly improbable?

Making the argument that Tannehill experienced significantly worse than average surroundings, for seven straight years, is certainly a stretch.

Why do we define it like that?

Seems like again, you set the parameters to get the definition you need, to get the result you need.

"resnor wrote:

Why do we define it like that?

Seems like again, you set the parameters to get the definition you need, to get the result you need.

exactly

"resnor wrote:

Why do we define it like that?

Seems like again, you set the parameters to get the definition you need, to get the result you need.

Again, here we go with my exploring the objective support (or the lack thereof) for a claim you're making.

Define the thing yourself and then we can investigate it in the way you've defined it!

This is why I started this back-and-forth with you by insisting that you define your terms, but here we are once again with my doing the objective exploration of the issue, only to have you say the method of exploration doesn't hit the target.

Then you do it!

"The Guy wrote:

Again, here we go with my exploring the objective support (or the lack thereof) for a claim you're making.

Define the thing yourself and then we can investigate it in the way you've defined it!

This is why I started this back-and-forth with you by insisting that you define your terms, but here we are once again with my doing the objective exploration of the issue, only to have you say the method of exploration doesn't hit the target.

Then you do it!

I already did it. Margin of victory. You ignored it because it didn’t support your agenda.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

I already did it. Margin of victory. You ignored it because it didn’t support your agenda.

The Dolphins' z-score for point differential (i.e., margin of victory ) was -0.84 from 2012 to 2018 (Tannehill's tenure with the team).

Please help me understand how that supports the assertion that the team was significantly below average during that period of time.

"resnor wrote:

Why do we define it like that?

Seems like again, you set the parameters to get the definition you need, to get the result you need.

"FinFaninBuffalo wrote:

exactly

The problem you're both having here is that you've proposed that a team was below average in the league for seven straight years.

As I've said before, in a league geared toward parity among teams, it's highly unlikely that any team remains significantly below average for that length of time.

This is why 72% of the teams in the league are between -1 and +1 z-scores in terms of win percentage from 2012 to 2018. Given the parity in the league, only 28% of the teams could achieve something significantly different from average during the entirety of those seven years. Only 16% of them were below average over that period of time.

So, think of the claim you're making here and whether it has any basis in reality. It very likely doesn't.

Once again, the fact that many people convince each other of something on a message board doesn't mean it's valid.

"The Guy wrote:

The Dolphins' z-score for point differential (i.e., margin of victory ) was -0.84 from 2012 to 2018 (Tannehill's tenure with the team).

Please help me understand how that supports the assertion that the team was significantly below average during that period of time.

That is close enough to -1 for me.