by Chase Stuart
on March 21, 2014
Shorts makes a meaningful catch.
Which player led the league in meaningless receiving yards last year? Wait, what
are meaningless receiving yards?
I am defining a meaningless receiving yard as one where:
- On third or fourth down, a player gained fewer yards than necessary for the first down.
- The receiving yard(s) came in a loss and when the player’s team trailed by at least 28 points.
- The receiving yard(s) came in a loss and when the player’s team trailed by at least 21 points with fewer than 15 minutes remaining.
- The receiving yard(s) came in a loss and when the player’s team trailed by at least 14 points with fewer than 8 minutes remaining.
- The receiving yard(s) came in a loss and when the player’s team trailed by at least 9 points with fewer than 3 minutes remaining.
This definition is not perfect — Le’Veon Bell had a 29-yard reception on 3rd-and-30 last season against the Patriots, and then rushed for a first down on 4th-and-1 — but I think it gets us close enough to perfect that I feel comfortable using it. The results aren’t too surprising — two Jaguars ranked in the top three, separated by the player who led the league in receiving yards — but that doesn’t have to be the end of the analysis. [continue reading…]
Tagged as:
Cecil Shorts,
Josh Gordon
{ }
by Chase Stuart
on May 14, 2013
Shorts made the most of his one catch against the Colts.
One of the surprising success stories of the 2012 season was the breakout performance of second-year Jacksonville wide receiver
Cecil Shorts. With a cap value of $729,000 in 2013, Shorts is probably the
best value on the Jaguars roster. But he’s one of the more confusing players to project.
The optimistic outlook on Shorts is simple. He missed two games with a concussion and took a couple of weeks to become a key part of the Jacksonville offense (he didn’t record a catch in week two, for example): in his final 12 games, Shorts averaged over 75 yards per game and scored 6 touchdowns. That would put him on a 1200-yard, 8-touchdown pace over a full slate of 16 games as a starter.
But there are other factors to consider. Shorts was only a fourth round pick and gained just 30 yards as a rookie, so he doesn’t have much of a resume beyond 2012. And while he may have produced impressive numbers, Jacksonville ranked 29th in ANY/A last year, making Shorts the co-star (along with Justin Blackmon) of a really bad passing offense. And what’s impressive about that?
So which view should carry more weight? The productive season he had as an individual or the fact that he’s a low-pedigree player who was only responsible for 26.1% of the receiving yards on a terrible passing team?
[continue reading…]
Tagged as:
Cecil Shorts,
Jaguars,
Justin Blackmon
{ }
