Terrell Davis

Guest Post: Adam Harstad On Why Terrell Davis Should Be In The HOF

by Chase Stuart on February 5, 2016

in HOF, Rushing, Statistics

Today’s guest post comes from Adam Harstad, a co-writer of mine at Footballguys.com. You can follow Adam on twitter at @AdamHarstad.

On Saturday, the Hall of Fame selection committee will meet, lock themselves in a room, and debate the relative merits of the 15 modern-era finalists for induction. After an intense discussion, the results will be announced nationally as the final event in the festivities leading up to Sunday’s Super Bowl.

While the list of 15 finalists includes several names who have been waiting longer than they should for their call, the one that stands out the most to me is Terrell Davis, who has been a semi-finalist more than anyone else in this year’s class, reaching the top 25 ten times in his ten years of eligibility.

Hopefully the Hall of Fame committee can manage to make room for him in what could easily be a stacked class. Whatever they do this Saturday, however, will not change one simple fact: Terrell Davis should have long ago been elected to the Hall of Fame. [continue reading…]

Tagged as: Adam Harstad, Guest Posts, Terrell Davis

{ 69 comments }

Checkdowns: Career rushing stats in wins and losses

by Chase Stuart on December 30, 2012

in History, Rushing, Statistics

Trent Richardson thinks this guy was an average running back in losses.

Yesterday, I noted that Adrian Peterson is averaging nearly two more yards per rush in losses than wins. He’s also averaging a nearly identical number of rushing yards per game in wins and losses.

As you’re about to see, that’s pretty rare. We all know that wins are correlated with rushing yards, so it should come as no surprise that running backs generally gain more rushing yards in wins than in losses.

I looked at all games, including playoffs, from 1960 to 2011, for all players with at least 3,000 rushing yards over that time period. The table below lists the following information for each player:

— His first year (or 1960, if he played before 1960) and his last year (or 2011, if still active)
— All the franchises he played for (which you can search for in the search box)
— His number of career wins, and his career rush attempts, rushing yards, rushing yards per carry, and rushing yards per game in wins
— His number of career losses, and his career rush attempts, rushing yards, rushing yards per carry, and rushing yards per game in losses

The table is sorted by rushing yards per game in wins. Again, for players like Jim Brown or Peterson, they are included but only their stats from 1960 to 2011 are shown. The table only shows the top 50 players, but the search feature works for the entire table, which includes 281 players. In addition, you can click on the drop arrow and change the number of rows shown.

As always, the table is fully sortable. If you click twice on the far right column, you see the career leaders in rushing yards per game in losses. You probably aren’t surprised to see Barry Sanders at the top, but the presence of the running back formerly known as Dom Davis up there is a bit surprising. Steven Jackson is one of the few players who have averaged over 70 rushing yards per game in losses, which jives with the sixth post in Football Perspective history. In addition, Jackson (at least through 2011) and LaDainian Tomlinson form an interesting example of Simpson’s Paradox: Jackson has a higher career rushing yards per game average in both wins (93.9 to 89.9) and losses (71.1 to 63.2), while Tomlinson has the higher career average overall (78.6 to 78.3).

entries per page

Search:

Rk	Player	Years	Teams	Pos	W	Rsh_W	Yd_W	YPC_W	Yd/G_W	L	Rsh_L	Yd_L	YPC_L	Yd/G_L
1	Jim Brown	1960--1965	cle	FB	55	1176	6590	5.6	119.8	25	384	1706	4.44	68.2
2	Terrell Davis	1995--2001	den	RB	58	1415	6867	4.85	118.4	28	444	1880	4.23	67.1
3	Barry Sanders	1989--1998	det	RB	75	1670	8526	5.11	113.7	84	1483	7129	4.81	84.9
4	Eric Dickerson	1983--1993	ram-clt-rai-atl	RB	74	1776	8411	4.74	113.7	78	1368	5572	4.07	71.4
5	O.J. Simpson	1969--1979	buf-sfo	RB	43	950	4818	5.07	112	92	1442	6351	4.4	69
6	Earl Campbell	1978--1985	oti-nor	RB	50	1209	5409	4.47	108.2	70	1113	4418	3.97	63.1
7	Adrian Peterson	2007--2011	min	RB	38	792	4002	5.05	105.3	38	685	3018	4.41	79.4
8	Chris Johnson	2008--2011	oti	RB	36	772	3776	4.89	104.9	28	426	1941	4.56	69.3
9	Clinton Portis	2002--2010	den-was	RB	58	1281	6051	4.72	104.3	59	1019	4086	4.01	69.3
10	Arian Foster	2009--2011	htx	RB	20	428	2077	4.85	103.9	16	282	1305	4.63	81.6
11	Emmitt Smith	1990--2004	dal-crd	RB	135	3036	13198	4.35	97.8	108	1722	6743	3.92	62.4
12	Jamal Lewis	2000--2009	rav-cle	RB	74	1653	7193	4.35	97.2	63	1019	3840	3.77	61
13	Walter Payton	1975--1987	chi	RB	113	2460	10975	4.46	97.1	86	1558	6383	4.1	74.2
14	Larry Johnson	2003--2011	kan-cin-was-mia	RB	40	813	3842	4.73	96.1	43	627	2413	3.85	56.1
15	Edgerrin James	1999--2009	clt-crd-sea	RB	99	2251	9469	4.21	95.6	62	995	3629	3.65	58.5
16	Billy Sims	1980--1984	det	RB	30	603	2861	4.74	95.4	32	554	2378	4.29	74.3
17	Curtis Martin	1995--2005	nwe-nyj	RB	96	2235	9134	4.09	95.1	82	1465	5762	3.93	70.3
18	Frank Gore	2005--2011	sfo	RB	47	939	4422	4.71	94.1	55	743	3366	4.53	61.2
19	Jamaal Charles	2008--2011	kan	RB	16	218	1504	6.9	94	34	290	1605	5.53	47.2
20	Steven Jackson	2004--2011	ram	RB	37	769	3473	4.52	93.9	80	1388	5688	4.1	71.1
21	Shaun Alexander	2000--2008	sea-was	RB	73	1506	6607	4.39	90.5	59	850	3410	4.01	57.8
22	LaDainian Tomlinson	2001--2011	sdg-nyj	RB	104	2048	9346	4.56	89.9	76	1257	4806	3.82	63.2
23	Corey Dillon	1997--2006	cin-nwe	RB	72	1391	6460	4.64	89.7	86	1347	5289	3.93	61.5
24	Rudi Johnson	2001--2008	cin-det	RB	41	901	3672	4.08	89.6	52	629	2363	3.76	45.4
25	Eddie George	1996--2004	oti-dal	RB	90	2094	7863	3.76	87.4	60	977	3354	3.43	55.9
26	Wilbert Montgomery	1977--1985	phi-det	RB	55	1016	4766	4.69	86.7	54	652	2513	3.85	46.5
27	Fred Taylor	1998--2010	jax-nwe	RB	89	1588	7674	4.83	86.2	72	1075	4634	4.31	64.4
28	Jamal Anderson	1994--2001	atl	RB	37	767	3189	4.16	86.2	47	632	2423	3.83	51.6
29	Gale Sayers	1965--1971	chi	RB	29	426	2492	5.85	85.9	36	510	2122	4.16	58.9
30	Barry Foster	1990--1994	pit	RB	35	704	2997	4.26	85.6	23	275	1230	4.47	53.5
31	Curt Warner	1983--1990	sea-ram	RB	55	1133	4704	4.15	85.5	48	636	2389	3.76	49.8
32	Matt Forte	2008--2011	chi	RB	35	661	2985	4.52	85.3	27	395	1398	3.54	51.8
33	Cookie Gilchrist	1962--1967	buf-den-mia	FB	34	625	2871	4.59	84.4	31	372	1381	3.71	44.5
34	William Andrews	1979--1986	atl	RB	43	749	3609	4.82	83.9	42	586	2439	4.16	58.1
35	Marshall Faulk	1994--2005	clt-ram	RB	99	1774	8307	4.68	83.9	89	1227	4574	3.73	51.4
36	John Henry Johnson	1960--1966	pit-oti	FB-HB	32	589	2682	4.55	83.8	38	435	1718	3.95	45.2
37	Tony Dorsett	1977--1988	dal-den	RB	121	2237	10137	4.53	83.8	68	1001	3985	3.98	58.6
38	Jerome Bettis	1993--2005	ram-pit	RB	111	2333	9274	3.98	83.5	93	1345	5062	3.76	54.4
39	Priest Holmes	1997--2007	rav-kan	RB	61	1093	5077	4.65	83.2	49	729	3316	4.55	67.7
40	Ricky Watters	1992--2001	sfo-phi-sea	RB	91	1823	7552	4.14	83	63	963	3720	3.86	59
41	Jim Nance	1965--1973	nwe-nyj	RB	30	571	2455	4.3	81.8	62	680	2585	3.8	41.7
42	Robert Smith	1993--2000	min	RB	63	1039	5146	4.95	81.7	41	517	2262	4.38	55.2
43	George Rogers	1981--1987	nor-was	RB	53	1009	4326	4.29	81.6	45	772	3128	4.05	69.5
44	Jim Taylor	1960--1967	gnb-nor	FB	81	1468	6576	4.48	81.2	31	401	1582	3.95	51
45	Travis Henry	2001--2007	buf-oti-den	RB	36	672	2906	4.32	80.7	52	816	3180	3.9	61.2
46	Willie Parker	2004--2009	pit	RB	55	977	4436	4.54	80.7	27	403	1413	3.51	52.3
47	Ray Rice	2008--2011	rav	RB	45	792	3627	4.58	80.6	22	274	1194	4.36	54.3
48	Maurice Jones-Drew	2006--2011	jax	RB	45	776	3616	4.66	80.4	50	722	3286	4.55	65.7
49	Deuce McAllister	2001--2008	nor	RB	50	913	4017	4.4	80.3	47	543	2240	4.13	47.7
50	Thurman Thomas	1988--2000	buf-mia	RB	130	2373	10378	4.37	79.8	71	843	3138	3.72	44.2

[continue reading…]

Tagged as: Adrian Peterson, Jim Brown, Simpson’s Paradox, Steven Jackson, Terrell Davis

{ 4 comments }

Career Rushing Yards over 50 yards in each game

by Chase Stuart on October 10, 2012

in History, Rushing, Statistics

www.notacompiler.com.

Career statistics can be very misleading, since a player can hang around for a bunch of meaningless years but really pad his totals. Six years ago, Doug came up with a system that only counted the receiving yards a player recorded after his first 1,000 receiving yards each season.

I’m going to do something similar for running backs, but instead will focus on individual game performances. I have game logs for every running back (post-season included) for every game since 1960. What I did was zero out all rushing yards in games where a player had 50 or fewer rushing yards; in the remaining games, I only gave those runners credit for the rushing yards they gained after their first 50 rushing yards. The “RYov50” column shows the running back’s career rushing yards after removing the first 50 rushing yards he had in every game; the next column shows each player’s career rushing yards (since 1960, including post-season), and the first “Perc%” column shows the ratio of the “RYov50” column to the career rushing yards. A higher percentage means the player spent most of his time as the lead back for his team, while a lower percentage indicates that the player spent significant time in a committee and/or stuck around for several years past his prime. Obviously for still active players, the percentage column could be misleading as they may not have entered the decline portion of their careers just yet.

The #50YG column shows how many games the player had over 50 rushing yards, and the next column shows what percentage of games the running back gained over 50 yards. For players like Jim Brown, this study only includes his seasons starting in 1960, and for active players, 2012 data is *not* included:
[continue reading…]

Tagged as: Barry Sanders, Jim Brown, Running backs, Terrell Davis

{ 11 comments }