Against Colin Kaepernick, Pick Your Running Poison

[JonLP24]

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But, even if the Falcons can stop Kaepernick out of the pistol or zone read or other designed runs -- and they haven't stopped quarterbacks running yet this year -- they still have to deal with his legs after he drops back to pass.

Kaepernick's passing ability is dangerous enough -- including the playoffs, his 6.7 AYPA leads the league. Add in his legs and it makes truly covering the field nearly impossible. Kaepernick has busted out of the pocket 29 times for 244 yards, picking up 8.4 yards and 0.39 EPA per scramble.

Kaepernick's scrambling results don't differ much from the league at large, which picks up 7.2 yards and an equal 0.39 EPA per scramble. But unlike most quarterbacks, Kaepernick is able to use it relatively often (nearly three times per game) and without taking sacks. Kaepernick has been sacked just 17 times, or once for every 1.7 scrambles. The typical quarterback takes a sack once every 0.6 scrambles.

As clearly as the designed runs hurt the Packers in the divisional round, Kaepernick's ability to scramble seemed to change the game's dynamic the most. If the Packers brought pressure, he could run past it. If the Packers held coverage throughout his progressions, even more of the field would open up. And, of course, when neither occurred, Kaepernick would just beat them through the air.

http://www.advancednflstats.com/2013/01/against-colin-kaepernick-pick-your.html

I snipped out a lot of good information to post that so I recommend reading the full article.

If you don't know what EPA is -- http://www.advancednflstats.com/2010/01/expected-points-ep-and-expected-points.html

[Auggie]

1. Interesting post. Thanks.

I keep going back to that Week 16 loss against the Seahawks. Play more guys in the box, hit hard, and Atlanta may be able to rattle Kaepernick.

[JonLP24]

2. Fortunately for the Niners

Atlanta doesn't have a great D(they give up the most rushing yards to QB of any team) and the Seahawks probably have the toughest environment to play in though Atlanta's place is incredibly tough place for opponents. According to the first link I posted Ryan has the second highest home winning percentage in the Super Bowl era. The 9ers defeated the person who has the highest -- Brady. They also won in NO where Drew Brees 32-11 since 2008.

Interestingly, Atlanta's penalty rate (lowest in the league) gives them a better chance of winning (combined w/ home field advantage) than they otherwise would have.

Don't Overlook the Effect of Penalties

This Sunday's conference championship games feature teams on opposite sides of the penalty spectrum. ATL has by far the league's lowest team penalty rate at 0.21 penalty yards per snap. For context, the league average is 0.41, and the next best team is NYG at 0.29. ATL is 3.9 standard deviations better than the 2012 mean! SF is third worst in the league 0.46 penalty yds per snap.

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How important a consideration is penalty rate on the outcome of a game? As it stands, the game probability model has the SF-ATL game at 55/45(59/41 when you factor only Kaepernick's stats) in favor of SF and the BAL-NE game at 33/67. If I set all four team's penalty rates to the league average and rerun the probabilities, we can directly see how they're affecting the prospects for each team.

The SF-ATL game becomes a 61/39 contest(not sure what it would be w/ Kaepernick-only stats), representing a swing of 6 percentage points. The BAL-NE game becomes a 36/64 match up, representing a smaller swing of 3 percentage points. The swing is larger in the NFC game partially because it begins closer to a 50/50 game, where smaller changes have bigger leverage.

http://www.advancednflstats.com/2013/01/dont-overlook-effect-of-penalties.html