My colleagues Aaron Schatz and Doug Farrar are in Indy right now, and they'll be filing regular Combine reports for FOX this week. They are sure to be informative and interesting columns.

I was left behind. I have teaching responsibilities and a baby in the house, so it's hard for me to travel this time of year. Anyway, someone has to keep an eye on the Football Outsiders mainframe and make sure that the interns aren't stealing all the office supplies.

But just because I'm not in Indianapolis watching college kids running around in shorts doesn't mean I'm bitter. I can still provide in-depth Combine coverage from the comfort of my own desk. I just have to draw upon my five years of experience in sports journalism. Yeah, that's the ticket. Aaron and Doug may be able to do actual interviews, but they can't match my feverish imagination. After all, what's Combine coverage really all about?

1) Boilerplate General Manager Interviews

Heck, I don't have to be at a press conference to hear some team exec spout the party line. I can just write an outline and fill in the relevant names later:

Me: So, what do you guys think of Adrian Peterson?

General Manager X: Peterson's a heck of a player. We're happy with the running backs we have, but Peterson would obviously be a great fit on any team. We're going to pursue all of our options.

Me: Any truth to the rumors that you may trade up or down?

GMX: We will listen to all offers. We have some feelers out. Obviously, if the phone rings on draft day, we'll answer it. We're going to pursue all of our options.

Me: Are you going to sign any of your free agents?

GMX: We would like to keep all of those guys, but there are cap constraints. We plan to be active in free agency. We're going to pursue all of our options.

Heck, cut 'n' paste that 31 times and I have a whole article!

2) Boilerplate Prospect Interviews

These are even better than GM interviews. At least execs are articulate when they stonewall you.

Me: You showed up 60 pounds overweight, tripped during your 40-yard dash, and ate the Wonderlic pencil by mistake. Are you disappointed by your Combine experience?

Prospect X: Yeah, but I worked out. I showed I got nothin' to hide. I'll put on a show at Pro Day. And scouts see the tape, so they know what Prospect X brings to the field.

Me: You fielded a lot of questions about the 2005 incident in which you took 1,500 chewable aspirin tablets and crashed a blimp into a Trappist monestary. Do you think you convinced coaches that you've put that part of your life behind you?

Prospect X: I made some mistakes. But I've grown up. I put my faith in my parents and God and my coaches. That incident wasn't what Prospect X is about. I'll prove the haters wrong on the field.

Yeah, this is easy. What else am I missing?

3) Scout Banter

Now this is my forte. I don't have to be in Indy to sling the scout speak. Mr. Sulu, set phasers to "gibberish."

Interviewer: Tanier, you're a master draftnik. What makes Calvin Johnson so special?

Me: Johnson has great initial quicks and great ups, an extra gear in the open field and the ability to dial it down in and out of his breaks. He has a high motor but a low carburetor and an above average catalytic converter. He can run the smash route, the go route, the dig route, the skinny post, the voluptuous post, the pre-post, the post-post, and the Texas clown jet smoke samba route. And he looks the part.

4) Hob-Nobbing

There's no way to network with my fellow professionals while I'm stuck here in the office, but that's not such a big deal. After all, most interactions with other sportswriters go something like this:

Me: Hey, Mike Tanier of Football Outsiders and FOXSports.com. Pleased to meet you.

Other Writer: Bubba Jones, Frog Creek Courier-Bugle-Times. Charmed.

Me: Who's on the podium next? Bill Polian? A.J. Smith?

Other Writer: Dunno. Lost track two hours ago.

Me: I see ... so, is there any place to get a decent drink around here?

Other Writer: There's a flask of Early Times in my breast pocket.

Me: I must not have made myself clear. I was looking for a decent drink.

Other Writer: Like it or lump it, Jersey Boy.

(I take flask, gulp, and sigh)

Not exactly the stuff of career advancement.

5) Hot Tips

One thing I am surely missing here in my cubicle is the Deep Throat moment: the clandestine parking garage meeting with some team functionary at which I learn that the Vikings plan to trade up to get Calvin Johnson or the Raiders are offering Randy Moss for a ball of yarn and some belly button lint. Of course, I'm a scout/statistician/historian, not a tidbit guy, and if we were purveyors of hot insider info, we wouldn't be called the Football Outsiders.

But in the blog-o-sphere, no one can tell the difference between a rumor lifted directly from Jerry Jones' cocktail napkin and some stuff some sportswriter made up while feeding his seven-month old. Therefore, all I need to do is prefabricate some credible info and imply that it came from a confidential source:

- A source in New Orleans said that the Saints are very high on Adalius Thomas and will bid heavily on him at the start of free agency (the source in this case is a bartender in the Quarter).

- A source close to Bobby Petrino says that the Falcons coach really liked what he saw from Dwayne Jarrett (said source is Tommy Pestino, who is close to Petrino alphabetically).

- Arthur Blank spent a lot of time talking to free agent quarterback Aaron Brooks. Something about the plumbing section of a Home Depot in Oakland (okay, this is obviously just a stupid joke).

See? I can do the job, no plane ticket or hotel room necessary. Who needs a city filled with football power brokers or an atmosphere thick with rumors? Who needs the tension of a daily deadline or an agenda filled with press conferences and one-on-one interviews with future All Pros? Who needs long nights at the sports bar with other writers, talking football, swapping business cards and stories? Who really needs it? Who?

???

Aaron, please please please please bring me next year. Please? Please? Thanks boss!

post by Mike Tanier

I was talking to a friend the other day about the Giants and he brought up the questionable ratings given to Sinorice Moss in a popular video game franchise whose namesake is a particular commentator. I noted, rather astutely, that Moss should have been given a Hiding rating, since he didn't bother to show up for his first season in New York. While Jared Lorenzen actually disappeared for his entire rookie campaign on the Giants practice squad, the second-rounder was around but failed to make a difference on the Giants season. Some of the blame can be put on Moss' strained quadriceps, but Big Blue could have sorely used Moss to stretch out opposing defenses and create space for Jeremy Shockey and Plaxico Burress to work underneath.

A couple of days later, I was talking to another friend (yes, I'm quite popular) about Chad Jackson, the Patriots' second round pick. I retold the Moss story and remarked that Jackson should have also received a Hiding rating -- the Patriots were signing street free agents and Reche Caldwell was their number one wideout most of the year and Jackson still didn't get any burn! "Must have been a bad crop of wide receivers", my friend remarked. That got me to thinking -- was it a bad crop? Historically bad, or just unlucky bad? Or, alternately, do fans just expect too much of rookie wide receivers? The easiest way to find out is to take a look back at wide receivers

I crunched the numbers on the last ten years of wide receivers. Since I was talking about Moss and Jackson, I looked at second-round picks initially, but I spread it out to third and fourth-rounders to try and gain a broader sense of performance. I didn't include first-rounders because more is naturally expected of them.

Compared to other classes, the second, third, and fourth-rounders of 2006 were atrocious. The seventeen wide receivers selected averaged fewer than nine catches and 117 yards each for the season; the average year's average receiver catches fifteen balls and gains over 200 yards. The only other group that was in 2006's territory was even worse: the "class" of 1997.

1997's first round wide receiver crop may go down as one of the all-time worst hauls from a position in a draft, ever. Although it's outside the boundaries of our study, it's worth pointing out that this round saw Ike Hilliard, Yatil Green, Reidel Anthony, and Rae Carruth come off the board. It's not a good sign when your career consists almost solely of three entirely torn ACLs and you are still better off than someone else in your pool. The Florida pair of Hilliard and Anthony did not live up to their relative expectations. As you will see, their performance still blew away the receivers to come.

While 1996 saw Amani Toomer, Muhsin Muhammad, and Bobby Engram go in the second round, and 1998 gave out useful parts like Germane Crowell, Mickael Ricks and Jerome Pathon, 1997's second round offered no redeeming value whatsoever. Kevin Lockett, a college star at Kansas State, wasn't an NFL-caliber receiver. The fact that he lasted seven years in the NFL makes him the star of the group. Will Blackwell, drafted by the usually-reliable Steelers, made Troy Edwards' career in the black and gold look good. The third member of the class was Joey Kent, who had all of thirteen career NFL catches. Hooray.

The third round saw only one wide receiver get drafted: Dedric Ward, who went to the Jets. Ward was actually a useful receiver for a single season, which probably makes him the second-most valuable receiver of the entire group, after Hilliard, until you take a look at the fourth round.

The fourth round, well, it was surprising. It can bring good players into the league -- '96's fourth round brought Charlie Jones into the league, while '98 saw Tim Dwight, Donald Hayes, and Az-Zahir Hakim into pro football. These guys don't generally get much playing time, as fourth-rounders only average eight catches per player their rookie year (that is, if they even make it at all). Even so, '97's performance was below average; it's receivers only caught five passes each. Those receivers? A mix of good and bad. Macey Brooks didn't play until his third season, and was done in the league after his fourth. Keith Poole was developing into a solid receiver with 42 catches in his third year, but he was out of the league by 2002. Albert Connell also had a big third year, and saw himself joining Poole on the unemployment line in '02.

On the other hand, Marcus Robinson's enjoyed a solid professional career, with a big season his sophomore year and a few good weeks in 2003. He'll collect a pension. The other guy to go in Round 4? Derrick Mason, who did nothing until the fourth year of his career but hasn't let up since. Mason had 47 catches through his first three years.

After 1997's season finished, this group of receivers would have been hailed as an awful, awful crop of talent. Carruth had 45 catches, Anthony 33, and after that, Ward had 18 That's abysmal, even for a set of rookies. Furthermore, the guys who had the best NFL careers, Mason, Hilliard (who was injured and only played two games his rookie year) and Robinson, all didn't produce their rookie year. It brings up another question to look at: are the guys having big rookie seasons the ones who develop into future stars?

Going round-by-round, here are the biggest performances and what they boded for the future, as well as the biggest stars and how they did their rookie campaigns:

Second Round: Anquan Boldin's rookie-record 101 catches lap the field; Kevin Johnson's 66 are a runner-up, and he had the benefit of being the only threat on an expansion team that was always losing. Pathon's 58 catches are third, Chris Chambers' 48 fourth, and Antwaan Randle El and Keary Colbert are tied for fifth with 47.

That's an uneven group of receivers. Boldin's a stud. Johnson had a couple more big years but fell out of favor in Cleveland and his career never recovered; he's out of football. Pathon was perpetually expected to break out and never did. Chambers is perceived, at least, as a stud, while his performance has yet to match up. Randle El is yet to match his rookie numbers, and Colbert's lost his spot and on his way out in Carolina. Two (one for Boldin and a half each for Chambers and Randle El) isn't really a strong prediction rate.

The biggest stars from the timeframe that went in the second round would probably be Boldin, Amani Toomer, Chad Johnson, Deion Branch, and Muhsin Muhammad. Toomer had one catch his rookie year; Johnson, Branch, and Muhammad were all around or above the league average for second round wide receivers, but none of them stood out as future stars the way that Boldin did.

Third Round: The best year belongs to Darrell Jackson, whose 53 catches were 16 more than second-place Stepfret Williams. That's right -- the guy whose poster Patrick Crayton had on his wall. Number three is Terrell Owens. Fourth in performance their rookie year was Marvin Minnis, and fifth was friend of the law Chris Henry. Nate Burleson and Laveranues Coles also make appearances in the Top 10.

Maybe Williams did nothing, and Minnis suffered multiple injuries that forced him out of football. Jackson and Owens have had excellent careers, and Burleson, Henry, and Coles aren't doing poorly for themselves either. Stats seem to be a slightly better predictor for this round.

A top five based on career value would include Owens, Jackson, Coles, Steve Smith (10 catches his rookie year), and Hines Ward (15). A better group than the second-rounders, certainly.

Fourth Round: Again, someone steps out from the pack; it's the aforementioned Charlie Jones, who caught 41 passes for the '96 Chargers. He had a similar year in '98, but was out of football after '99. This group's top five finally sees some 2006 guys show up, with Demetrius Williams second in catches with 22, and Brandon Marshall fifth. Hakim is fourth, and Titans receiver Roydell Williams third. The jury is still out on three of these guys; Hakim benefited from being in the right place at the right time, and hasn't done much since he left said spot.

The best fourth rounders from the time period don't compare to the other rounds. Mason stands out, and there are plenty of guys who have had varying degrees of success, but pick four from Robinson, Hakim, Ernest Wilford, Brandon Lloyd, Jerricho Cotchery, Tim Dwight, Hayes, Justin McCareins, and Brandon Stokley and you'll be picking four guys who haven't really developed into anything beyond solid complementary receivers.

So, then, is there hope for the 2006 crop? I'd say so. It's not unprecedented for guys like Moss or Jackson to take big leaps forward as they learn more of the playbook and get more NFL game time in their sophomore season. The land of guys with five-catch rookie seasons, though, is littered with a lot more failures than the stratospheric heights reached by Boldin and Darrell Jackson. If you're a Giants fan (or administrator), hope Moss will get better, but don't depend on it; in the Patriots' case, hope that Bill Belichick's faith in Florida Gators works out slightly better than his previous obsession with guys from LSU.

post by Bill Barnwell

Let me say this as clearly and simply as possible: Norv Turner can't coach. He's an awful hire for the Chargers. He's going to undo everything that the team has accomplished over the last three years.

Turner's all-time record as a head coach is 58-82-1. That's bad. His teams have won 10 games exactly once in nine seasons. That's truly bad. Even a blind squirrel stumbles upon more than one nut per decade. Even Rich Kotite reached double-digits in wins two times. If Chargers fans are sick of Marty Schottenheimer because he always loses in the playoffs, they can take solace in the fact that Turner never reaches the playoffs. His all-time playoff record as a head coach is 1-1.

But Turner is a great offensive mind, you say? Turner the coordinator is only slightly more effective than Turner the coach. Since 1994, only one Turner-coached offense (head coach or coordinator) has finished in the top-10 in the NFL in DVOA: the 1999 Redskins. If you don't like DVOA, fine. Only one Turner-coached team has finished in the top 10 in points scored or yards gained: the 1999 Redskins. His teams - the 1994-2000 Redskins, the 2001 Chargers, the 2002-03 Dolphins, the 2004-05 Raiders, the 2006 Niners -- usually finish between 12th and 24th in the league in the major offensive categories. A 12th place finish isn't bad, but if offense is your strong point, you have to do better.

Turner's supporters point out that he often takes over terrible offenses, so his ability to take them from 32nd to 16th in the league is an accomplishment. I'd like to introduce those supporters to my friend Mr. Central Tendency. Mr. Tendency makes bad teams mediocre with the help of friends like Mr. Law of Averages and Mr. High Draft Choice. Once these misters have done their business, Turner doesn't have to do much to make a middling offense. His efforts with the Niners last season were typical. He took over a team that ranked dead last in offensive DVOA. Their rookie quarterback became a second-year quarterback, they spent a high draft choice on a tight end, they signed a veteran All Pro offensive guard, and Frank Gore emerged as a featured back. Thanks to all this and a little bit of Turner brilliance, the Niners climbed all the way to 24th in DVOA. Way to go Norv!

Of course, if a team climbed from 32nd to 24th to 12th to third on Turner's watch, that would be a sign of competence. But Turner never hangs around that long. If Turner were a business executive, he would take companies that were $20 million in debt, cut the debt to $12 million, and claim success. Then, after he left, the debt would go back to $20 million. Have you seen the Dolphins or Raiders offenses lately? That's the extent of Turner's post-Cowboys resume: he takes crappy teams, makes them slightly less crappy, then leaves before anyone notices that he hasn't coached a good offense since 1999. Then, the crappiness returns. Turner Boosters claim that the return to crappiness is a sign of Norv's genius: see, that was a 4-12 team before and after Turner, and only he could make them 7-9. You would think that such a great coach and developer of talent (more on that in a minute) would leave teams better off than they were when he arrived.

Oh yeah, the Cowboys. Turner made his name with Jimmy Johnson's Cowboys, of course, and those teams posted some impressive offensive totals. The trouble is that my mom could have coached that team into the Super Bowl. "Here, Troy, here's a football. Give it to Emmit a lot, throw it Michael a lot. Remember that the offensive line will only give you a minute or two to make your decision on most plays, so choose wisely."

Turner has milked every drop of mojo he could from his stint with the Cowboys. In fact, you will probably read an article by Troy Aikman on the main FOX site in the next few days praising Turner. I don't want to knock Aikman. Aikman's toenail clippings contain more football knowledge than is lodged in my entire cranium. But Aikman just isn't impartial when it comes to his former coach. Aikman will often say that Turner made him into a great player, but Aikman was always destined to be a great player. He has it backwards: Aikman turned Turner into a viable coaching candidate. Chargers fans will pay the price over the next few years.

Offensive stats tell just part of the story. Compared to Turner the Motivator, Turner the Offensive Guru is a genius. Turner lets the boys be boys, with predictable results. His teams generally fade down the stretch and descend into squabbling while he sends out applications for his next gig. His Redskins underachieved. His Raiders underachieved. The Chargers, coming off a 14-2 season, have plenty of room for underachievement.

And yet Turner keeps getting hired, thanks in part to the old boy network and in part to the Turner Boosters who incomprehensible excuse and rationalize his failings. Turner is a great developer of young talent ... you've heard that, right? In addition to Aikman and Irvin, he developed Trent Green, Terry Allen, LaDainian Tomlinson, Ricky Williams, Frank Gore, and more. Actually, that's about it, and it's a list that includes lots of players who would have been superstars unless a coach told them to bulk up to 400 pounds or cut out their ACLs in their sleep. Turner Boosters give their man credit for "developing" any player who ever did well on any of the teams he coached. The list looks pretty good because Turner coached all over the place and therefore rubbed shoulders with all sorts of top prospects.

Alex Smith is Norv's latest success story: Smith went from an awful rookie to a pretty mediocre soph (35th in the league in DPAR) in what looks like the standard career arc for a young quarterback. If Smith is an All Pro in two years, you can bet that Turner Boosters will put the feather in their man's cap.

Norv Turner is a lousy coach. He might be effective as a receivers or quarterbacks coach, where he can teach footwork and arm motion and never make a game-affecting decision. But he's awful as a coordinator and poison as a head coach. The Chargers made a stupid decision. He'll take them to 10-6 this season, miss the playoffs, and claim success. Broncos and Chiefs fans have reason to celebrate, and even Raiders fans can feel like the smart kids for a few weeks.

post by Mike Tanier

I was thinking about the strange case of Michael Turner. How many backup running backs average six yards per carry over three seasons? (5.99, to be precise.) San Diego will give their restricted free agent a sweet tender, so teams that want Turner have to give up either a first-round pick or a first and a third. Part of the question is what happens to Turner going forward, so I thought I would look for similar players using FO similarity scores.

Looking at a three-year span, one player stands out, far ahead of everyone else:

• 849: Stump Mitchell, STL (1981-1983)
• 807: Bill Johnson, CIN (1985-1987)
• 799: Hokie Gajan, NO (1982-1984)
• 781: Ron Rivers, DET (1996-1998)
• 780: Booker Russell, SD (1978-1980)
• 779: Najeh Davenport, GB (2002-2004)
• 778: Barry Redden, LA RAMS (1982-1984)

Everyone else is below 770.

Mitchell provides a fascinating look at what life might be like for Michael Turner if free agency did not exist. Like Turner, he was drafted by a team that already had one of the league's top running backs, Ottis Anderson. But unlike Turner, there was no threat that he would go anywhere, in restricted OR unrestricted free agency. He kept plugging along with 5.5 yards per carry each year, along with play on special teams. In his fourth season, 1984, he became a receiving threat, with more catches, yards, and touchdowns receiving than in his first three seasons combined.

Anderson started having some injury issues, so Mitchell's playing time finally went up in 1985. He gained 1,000 yards with just 183 carries, 5.5 yards per carry, with seven touchdowns rushing and another three receiving. In 1986, he had 174 carries and played well again, although he averaged a career-low (to that point) 4.6 yards per carry. For that to be a career-low, well, that shows you how good he was through 1986. By this point, he was sharing the job with Earl Ferrell rather than Anderson. 1987 was his career high, 203 carries, but actually his worst season, just 3.8 yards per carry. He rebounded with another good year as a part-timer in 1988, played a handful of games in 1989, and that was that. He's now the running backs coach in Seattle, where he's partly responsible for Shaun Alexander's MVP season.

Bill Johnson's third year is the strike year and he never played again, the strike means that's probably not worth looking at.

Hokie Gajan also had three great seasons but in the fourth year had injury problems. He also never played again, but that clearly was not an issue of talent. He's now the Saints' radio color guy.

Here's a look at two-year similarities:

• 839: Mitchell, 1982-1983
• 810: Charlie Garner, PHI, 1995-1996
• 803: Redden, 1983-1984
• 802: Russell, 1978-1979
• 798: Gajan, 1983-1984
  
• 795: Richard Huntley, PIT, 1998-1999
• 794: Maurice Morris, SEA, 2002-2003
• 786: LaMont Jordan, NYJ, 2003-2004

Once again, Mitchell is ahead of everyone else. If you are Michael Turner's agent, you like that Charlie Garner similarity second. We know Garner now as a pass-catching back, but he actually had only 32 catches in his first three seasons, and he averaged 5.4 and 5.2 yards per carry in 1995 and 1996. When he finally moved to San Francisco in 1999, he became a starter and one of the best backs in the league. LaMont Jordan also acquitted himself well once he got a starting job, especially considering the quality of the Oakland line. Huntley went to Carolina for a year, played well, but that was the end of his career.

All in all, I think this is another piece of evidence that Turner would be excellent as a starting back somewhere other than San Diego. Will that happen? Probably not this year, but I bet it happens in 2008. Maybe, if Shaun Alexander has more injury problems, Turner can go off to Seattle and be coached by Stump Mitchell.

Post by Aaron Schatz 

This is actually a leftover question from October that never ended up on Football Outsiders or this blog. Sorry about that.

Matt Heinzen: Are there any good football strategy books that the Football Outsiders staff would recommend? I've looked a bit but there don't seem to be very many. I have a copy of "Football's West Coast Offense," which I found to be mediocre, but I'd definitely like to expand my horizons a bit.

Doug Farrar: The strategy book I can recommend very highly off the top of my head is Coaching Team Defense by Fritz Shurmur, the late, great defensive coordinator for the Rams, Cardinals and Packers. It's a great primer (plus) in the inner workings of a defense. Shurmur also write The Eagle Five-Linebacker Defense and Coaching the Defensive Line, but the first of the three is the one for overall strategy. Bill Arnsparger also wrote a book about defense a long while back that I enjoyed when I read it.

Mike Tanier: I have Bill Nelson's How to Play Offensive Line and I also refer to Football's Best Offensive Playbook by Dwight Dee Hawkes. I use the Nike Coach of the Year Clinics series, but they come with a warning: they are transcripts of coaching seminars, so there are lots of typos, non-sequitars, and 10-paragraph intros that read "When I came to Big Square State, we had a lot of soccer players trying to play football..." There is no explanation of the jargon in those books, but since it is coach-to-coach talk, there are very detailed explanations of very specific plays.

West Coast Offense is a good desk reference. Just remember that high schools now run schemes as complicated as those detailed in that book. You can go down the rabbit hole with strategy books. Search the net and you will find 250 Great Inside Stunts for Use by 3-3-5 Defenses Against Zone Blocking Schemes. At some point, it all gets too precise for those of us who aren't actually applying the info on the field.

Bill Barnwell: Football's Best Offensive Playbook was pretty good, in that I was able to grasp pretty much everything in it when I was eleven or so. Real easy read, has plays from lots of different coaches, but it might have a little too much run in it.