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Old 10-02-2020, 04:40 PM   #1
shanklingill
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Join Date: Sep 2018
Is the pass rush broken on this game?

Hey guys,

I have put together a pass rush defence that is so mean, it should only exist in the worst nightmares of offensive lineman while they are asleep. Yet despite this, I cannot generate anything worthwhile in terms of stats. To put it simply, I have a 4-3 under with 3 front Ds having PR strength or technique at least 88 (for both for each player) and a 75 rated overall NT with 100 run stop. I then have a WLB with strong pass rush capabilities too. Overall, my roster at the end of the year ranks 100/100, and the there is no weakness anywhere else in the secondary or LB corps (in fact, my lowest ranking starting defender is still ranked 59).

Having re-run the season a few times to check how random or replicable these results are they seem consistent. Never register double digit stats. Top sacker averages usually between 5-8 sacks for the season. In game analysis, any team with a half decent line tends to reduce the rush to very little impact. And sacks come in clusters, a bad line can give up 9 sacks in a game, then you go 6 games without registering a single one.

But there are some consistent things that dont make sense....

- my run stop linebacker who is set to never rush always gets high sack numbers.
- OLBs seem to always out perform LDEs/RDEs in ratio to quality. As an example my 89 rated LDE hardly is around equal or only slightly better to my 7th worst stat based rusher set never to rush.
- Substitute players taking a few snaps seem to get abormally large sack ratios compared to starters. This is despite my reserve LDE (who in the last test got 4 sacks, and always gets 2-3 a season) being only 27 current ability.
- Cornerbacks/Safeties seem to take a unbalanced ratio of sacks.


Is it actually possible to generate realistic numbers out of the game? Considering I have at least 3 all pro caliber sack masters, and that together youd expect a qb to be like a tackle pad facing that, is there anyway to generate like 10 sacks a season each? Or do I have to live with the fact this brilliant line is just hard coded to have zero effect on the game?

Id say its the playbook, but then reading round people indicate no formation has an advantage over another for pass rush. And running 4-3 under, the front 4 shoud be rushing every play, so why are they being outsacked by coverage or run stoppers who are inferior?

Unless someone has a decent play system recommendation for formation and good pass rush plays to run in game? Or can point me towards the right place.

Seems to me though the OL is totally overpowered on this game in pass (and weirdly underpowered on the run in my experience), and the DL is totally useless. May as well pick 4 run stoppers and just spend cap on a linebackers.


Last edited by shanklingill : 10-02-2020 at 04:44 PM.
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Old 10-02-2020, 06:47 PM   #2
stevew
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The more I play this game, the more I hate it. Stud RB getting under 3ypc. Teams that seem balanced continually going 7-9. Gameplanning that makes your head just shake.
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Old 10-03-2020, 09:08 PM   #3
finkellll
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I have no data to back this up, but from my experience there are DL that do nothing but fill holes, and there are DL that get good to great PR stats. My best DL in SP (tops in team history in all PR stats, plus some all time stats) was like 60 overall. In general I do get better luck with the 70+ ovr. Guys, but the general theory still holds up.

Also, on the OL side the sack against is assigned based on bar distribution, so the guy with the lower PB is most likely to give up the sack, regardless of who actually got the sack on the defensive side. Same thing is probably happening on def. And since all your DL are evenly amazing, the sacks are spreading out evenly instead of piling up on one guy.

If there is one thing I really love about this game its that bars don't guarantee stats, and we have to be able to let a stud walk because his production isn't worth his salary.

Last edited by finkellll : 10-03-2020 at 09:08 PM.
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Old 10-04-2020, 06:17 AM   #4
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I can't get good sack numbers anymore out of a 3-4 defense, but 4-3 has not been an issue. Most recently had 2 DEs playing concurrently who both retired with over 100 sacks each. I would say aim for technique over strength, but I am sure other's will have opinions too.
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Old 10-05-2020, 05:21 PM   #5
Ronmun29
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I have played from 1983-2008 seven times to test various stat outputs.
My top historic "sacker" during each of the run throughs got over 100 for career, with season highs running from 14-20...pretty realistic numbers. A lot depends on play calling though as well...I play called the defense 2 of those 7 run throughs, and the season pass rush totals for those were the best two...while somewhat curiously the five I let computer run had MUCH better interception and turnover rates on defense.
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Old 10-06-2020, 01:50 AM   #6
tzach
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shanklingill View Post

- my run stop linebacker who is set to never rush always gets high sack numbers.
- OLBs seem to always out perform LDEs/RDEs in ratio to quality. As an example my 89 rated LDE hardly is around equal or only slightly better to my 7th worst stat based rusher set never to rush.
- Substitute players taking a few snaps seem to get abormally large sack ratios compared to starters. This is despite my reserve LDE (who in the last test got 4 sacks, and always gets 2-3 a season) being only 27 current ability.
- Cornerbacks/Safeties seem to take a unbalanced ratio of sacks.

Is it actually possible to generate realistic numbers out of the game? Considering I have at least 3 all pro caliber sack masters, and that together youd expect a qb to be like a tackle pad facing that, is there anyway to generate like 10 sacks a season each? Or do I have to live with the fact this brilliant line is just hard coded to have zero effect on the game?

Id say its the playbook, but then reading round people indicate no formation has an advantage over another for pass rush. And running 4-3 under, the front 4 shoud be rushing every play, so why are they being outsacked by coverage or run stoppers who are inferior?

i'm quite surprised to hear all this as i cannot replicate what you say above. can you quantify some of your statements above?

'- my run stop linebacker who is set to never rush always gets high sack numbers.' -> what is high here? is he playing SLB or MLB (i presume he's not lined up at DE)? this is 43 under so he's gotta be blitzing, so it's not entirely true that he's never rushing the paser. the only way LBs don't rush is if you have no blitz calls.

'- OLBs seem to always out perform LDEs/RDEs in ratio to quality. As an example my 89 rated LDE hardly is around equal or only slightly better to my 7th worst stat based rusher set never to rush.' -> again this is surprising. how about total pressure numbers? hurries + knock downs + sacks.

'- Substitute players taking a few snaps seem to get abormally large sack ratios compared to starters. This is despite my reserve LDE (who in the last test got 4 sacks, and always gets 2-3 a season) being only 27 current ability.' -> there's two things happening here. the 27 cur ability doesn't mean he's bad, all that matters here is PRS for a situational guy. have a look at this guy http://www.fof-ihof.com/playercard.php?playerid=71965

'- Cornerbacks/Safeties seem to take a unbalanced ratio of sacks.' -> i get values similar to the nfl averages, with some high fluctuations due to low number statistics. what's unbalanced for you here?

'Is it actually possible to generate realistic numbers out of the game? Considering I have at least 3 all pro caliber sack masters, and that together youd expect a qb to be like a tackle pad facing that, is there anyway to generate like 10 sacks a season each? Or do I have to live with the fact this brilliant line is just hard coded to have zero effect on the game?' -> you will only get significant pressure if you are playing from the lead, just like in the nfl. pass rush is much less effective than what people think. Have a look at this interesting article Exactly How Much Does A Great Pass Rush Hurt An Offense? | FiveThirtyEight

'Id say its the playbook, but then reading round people indicate no formation has an advantage over another for pass rush. And running 4-3 under, the front 4 shoud be rushing every play, so why are they being outsacked by coverage or run stoppers who are inferior?' -> definitely the game plan and game situations that you are in. you're probably blitzing too much. the defensive front alignments are substantially different from one another.

Last edited by tzach : 10-06-2020 at 01:50 AM.
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Old 10-06-2020, 03:04 AM   #7
stevew
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Why do the passing stats in a mature career seem different than NFL ones that we've seen in the past several years? I'm not going to sit and deep dive, but the seasonal passing leaders in my careers don't throw for enough yards. They don't throw for enough ypa. They throw seemingly a lot more interceptions than IRL. Also routinely running backs running with cement boots, averaging a hair over 3ypc. Why?

I only play SP and none of this stuff looks right

I’m willing to accept that I may just suck at this game, but the other teams should still perform a lot better.

Last edited by stevew : 10-06-2020 at 03:09 AM.
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Old 10-06-2020, 07:58 AM   #8
Ronmun29
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I just haven't been able to duplicate any abnormal results over "career" or even "season" length. I've had a few abnormal "game" results,but so does the NFL, and by the length of a season ...at least '83-'08...the season numbers across the board are very in line..
even for the other teams I am not calling defenses for. For my own, played as the Raiders...and generally Howie Long, Alzado, Townsend etc all DEs...were dominant in their time each having a few double digit sack seasons...a few LBs came close, and other teams DEs also did well, Bruce Smith, Ed Jones, etc...
There are each season a handful of LBs that rank among the leaders...most from 3-4 defenses..but the plays called on defense matter a LOT too..not only the formation.
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Old 10-09-2020, 07:02 PM   #9
Front Office Midget
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I'm able to generate around 60 sacks a season running the 43 under with 2 stud DEs, 1 great pass rushing LB, good backup DEs, and paying mostly no attention whatsoever to DTs for pass rush. Typically run cover 2 or tampa 2, often blitzing 1, but sometimes not. Sometimes press 2. I'm pretty sure pass rush is not broken, but gameplanning for it helps significantly.

Another thing to check is are your DEs sized appropriately for the formation you are using.
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Old 10-09-2020, 07:05 PM   #10
Front Office Midget
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Quote:
Originally Posted by stevew View Post
Why do the passing stats in a mature career seem different than NFL ones that we've seen in the past several years? I'm not going to sit and deep dive, but the seasonal passing leaders in my careers don't throw for enough yards. They don't throw for enough ypa. They throw seemingly a lot more interceptions than IRL. Also routinely running backs running with cement boots, averaging a hair over 3ypc. Why?

I only play SP and none of this stuff looks right

I’m willing to accept that I may just suck at this game, but the other teams should still perform a lot better.

Dola

Passing stats in FOF8 ARE lower than the NFL average, that's well accepted and just part of the game. The ceiling in FOF8 is far beyond the NFL ceiling, but the averages are much lower.

For running- offensive line run blocking is arguably more important than RB ability. With a great OL and a RB with excellent hole recognition, strength, and elusiveness, 6.0 ypc and 2,000 yards is not out of the question at all.
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Old 10-26-2020, 09:23 AM   #11
garion333
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Front Office Midget View Post
Passing stats in FOF8 ARE lower than the NFL average, that's well accepted and just part of the game. The ceiling in FOF8 is far beyond the NFL ceiling, but the averages are much lower.

For running- offensive line run blocking is arguably more important than RB ability. With a great OL and a RB with excellent hole recognition, strength, and elusiveness, 6.0 ypc and 2,000 yards is not out of the question at all.

Exactly. Especially with the more recent patches where Jim made passing slightly harder, the average numbers are NFL-like, but not exactly like in the NFL.

As far as OP's concerns, it's hard to answer you about why your pass rushing isn't working without actually seeing what you're doing. This game is about more than "just get good guys" as you need to have cohesion to get the best from them (assuming you've got Chemistry turned on). Small things also help, like having your guys sized correctly for their positions. Then there's the playcalling. And so on.

FOF is a lot of little things that add up, so to answer your general question about why your pass rush isn't as effective as you'd think, I'd say it's about a lot of small things adding up that is impacting your performance.

I feel this way especially because you keep talking about individual players and individual players in any season can give you the wrong read on what's happening. Sometimes the "wrong" guy puts up big numbers. It happens. But how is you team of pass rushing crazies performing? Is your team successful at pass rushing?
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Old 11-19-2020, 07:19 AM   #12
shanklingill
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tzach View Post
can you quantify some of your statements above?

hey, Tzach. Thanks for taking the time to reply. To give you an indepth example, I just simulated a season from scratch using the same team. For honesty sake, I changed to a 3-4 front so its not 100 percent the same.

In game Team stats for year (league rank for year)

Sacks - 35 (t-5th)
Sacks per game - 2.18 (t-5th)
QB Hurries- 95 (1st)
Knock downs - 37 (not provided in the games team stats for comparison)
Sack percentage - 5.5% (5th)

Real life equivalents in 2019 season for pass rush stats corresponding to those rankings

Sacks - 50
Sacks per game - 3.1
Hurries - 95 (exactly the same)
Knockdowns of 37 ranks t-26th
Sack percentage - 8.17%


There is a clear discrepancy here between how many sacks and hits are registered in game to real life. The pass rush simply does not hit home fully at the same ratios as real life. Hurries do not transfer to knock downs/sacks as they should. I registered a realistic amount of hurries, but that transfers to laying hands on the qb at ratios to real life that are league worst levels (knock down percentage of under 6% is terrible).

Individual player analysis for my front line starting pass rush

Starting front lineman sacks/knockdowns/hurries (in game ratings)

Bosa -3.5/7/28 (Pass rush technique 98/Strength 99)
Garrett -7.0/1/11 (Pass rush technique 97/ Strength 100)
Weller - 6.0/12/15 (pass rush technique 100/ strength 91)

2019 real life equivalents

For sacks/knockdowns/hurries ranked in comparison to real life stats

Garrett - 44th/388th/35th
Bosa - 110th/41st/3rd
Weller - 60th/14th/17th

Linebackers in game stats for season

SLB Daugherty - 3.5/5/5 (Pass R Tech 64/Strength 93)
WLB - Durham - 3.5/3/16 (Pass R Tech 53/Strength 91)
SILB Wingfield- 0/0/0 (Pass R Tech 60/Strength 88)
WILB Joyner - 4/6/12 (Pass R Tech 78/ Strength 2)

Miscellaneous Replacements

Ragsdale NT 6/0/3 (Pass R Tech 56/ Strength 36)
Farrell RDE 1/0/0 (28/53)
Burgess SILB - 0/0/1 (58/36)
Secondary 1.5/0/0 (over two CBs)

So to answer your questions......

Quote:
'- my run stop linebacker who is set to never rush always gets high sack numbers.' -> what is high here? is he playing SLB or MLB (i presume he's not lined up at DE)? this is 43 under so he's gotta be blitzing, so it's not entirely true that he's never rushing the paser. the only way LBs don't rush is if you have no blitz calls.


Sack numbers relative to what you expect. In my team blitzing plan, the linebackers are set accordingly.

SLB - 9
SILB - 7
WILB - 2
WLB -3

You can see from the stats, that my worst rated linebacker set to blitz the least returned the best stats in every category apart from hurries. The second least blitzer ans second worst overall rated player returned the best stats.

The SILB slot registered one hurry spread over two players assigned to the role in a whole season, and not a single stat, despite a huge blitz bias in his favour and a much higher quality Blitzer.

These stats do not make any sense.

Quote:
'- OLBs seem to always out perform LDEs/RDEs in ratio to quality. As an example my 89 rated LDE hardly is around equal or only slightly better to my 7th worst stat based rusher set never to rush.' -> again this is surprising. how about total pressure numbers? hurries + knock downs + sacks.

Guess you can make your own conclusions by the stats above.But for me having the perfect on paper pass rush DE (by far the best on the game) return 38.5 pressures compared to 22 from a WILB with a pass rush strength of TWO set to TWO blitz frequency.... this is crazy.

Quote:
'- Substitute players taking a few snaps seem to get abormally large sack ratios compared to starters. This is despite my reserve LDE (who in the last test got 4 sacks, and always gets 2-3 a season) being only 27 current ability.' -> there's two things happening here. the 27 cur ability doesn't mean he's bad, all that matters here is PRS for a situational guy. have a look at this guy http://www.fof-ihof.com/playercard.php?playerid=71965

Again, see stats above. The reserve NT took 172 passing snaps to Bosa's 583, returned nearly double the sacks, and has rubbish stats. And his sack ratios to hurries/hits at this point are ridiculous.

The sack stats for the team are stupidly low for ratios to hits/hurries, this crappy NT mauls the QB everytime he gets anywhere near him. Every season I play, I have a back up who similarly seems to outperform a stud in this way. 6 sacks is extreme, its usually 3/4 ish, but still. The sack percentages are through the roof for crappy replacements, and terrible for stud starters.

Quote:
Cornerbacks/Safeties seem to take a unbalanced ratio of sacks.' -> i get values similar to the nfl averages, with some high fluctuations due to low number statistics. what's unbalanced for you here?

Not a good year to show that point. But the year before my CB Denziel Ward wracked up 3.5 sacks. Which seems ridiculous for a CB when Nick Bosa is managing that.

Quote:
you will only get significant pressure if you are playing from the lead, just like in the nfl. pass rush is much less effective than what people think. Have a look at this interesting article Exactly How Much Does A Great Pass Rush Hurt An Offense? | FiveThirtyEight

Ranked first in this season for points scored on offense/ranked 3rd in points allowed on defense. So if this in anyway is represented in the game, I would think it would be extremely helpful to my stats. And regardless of how sacks translate to overall defensive ability, the point was the amount of sacks seems nerfed.

Quote:
Quote:
'Id say its the playbook, but then reading round people indicate no formation has an advantage over another for pass rush. And running 4-3 under, the front 4 shoud be rushing every play, so why are they being outsacked by coverage or run stoppers who are inferior?' -> definitely the game plan and game situations that you are in. you're probably blitzing too much. the defensive front alignments are substantially different from one another.

Is that true in this game, because the manual seems to indicate the opposite?
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Old 11-19-2020, 07:30 AM   #13
shanklingill
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You have to also take into account the fact that for each capable person added to a pass rush, you would expect some proportionate improvement to those already there. Having one stud means an O line can rejig to account for it, being attacked by 4 studs would almost certainly have the effect of narrowing a QBs throwing window as each blocker is put under so much more pressure. The front line I have is ridiculous, so you would expect the QB to be under the gun literally all the time. And its worth noting I have CBs rated at 71/66 on either side, a FS and SS in the 50s. There is no secondary weakness, that QB is having to face an above average time to hold on for someone open. 35 sacks a season in facing that is pretty insulting.

I have a feeling that the game works the opposite. Adding to an already heavily stacked part of the team simply decreases the efficiency and output of the individual, and any improvements past a certain point are negligible. A front 7 of no obvious weaknesses and no obvious standouts returns about the same as with 7 HOFs. This can be seen I think a lot with O Line's.... O lines seem to default to the worst player available, if you have 4 HOFs and one terrible Guard, you will give up high sacks. Its better to have just above average all the way through. One really bad blocker just gets annihilated.

Interested to hear your take.

Very interested to hear ideas on how to gameplan this defense to maximise its potential.
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Old 11-19-2020, 07:32 AM   #14
shanklingill
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Front Office Midget View Post
I'm able to generate around 60 sacks a season running the 43 under with 2 stud DEs, 1 great pass rushing LB, good backup DEs, and paying mostly no attention whatsoever to DTs for pass rush. Typically run cover 2 or tampa 2, often blitzing 1, but sometimes not. Sometimes press 2. I'm pretty sure pass rush is not broken, but gameplanning for it helps significantly.

Another thing to check is are your DEs sized appropriately for the formation you are using.


I am open to be taught more about the game. Do you know any more indepth defensive takes on how to improve to get up to these levels?
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Old 11-19-2020, 03:45 PM   #15
finkellll
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Honestly I think you have a bunch of big bar players that don't translate to production. Bigger bars do NOT guarantee better production in this game.

Also, what is your defensive coordinator's scouting and playcalling bars?

How many guys do you blitz per play? Blitz 2 calls get torn up by dink and dunk offenses
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Old 11-19-2020, 05:02 PM   #16
shanklingill
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If your point is overall ratings do not mean a player is suited to a given role, yeah I'm aware of that. My point specifically demonstrates that these players are stud pash rushers, I don't expect them to be returning pick sixes, breaking up passes or crushing runners. What I do expect them to do is kill QBs.

If you are saying the stats themselves are meaningless, and that a guy rated between 98-100 in the pass rushing specific stats does not mean he outperforms someone else much lower, then what would be the point of a rating system at all? Such randomness would make the game unplayable.

You could argue randomness occurs in real life and scouting mistakes are made. But would a scout rate someone as a hall of fame level player for 7 years in a row and say he's perfect on every metric if he was sacking 3.5 people a year? No. Performance over time would be increase accuracy. And it's highly unlikely a scout would in the counter watch a player wrack up 50 sacks in 4 years on a rookie deal and rate him as being anything other than a pure stud. So other than for players like rookies or 2nd year, having a system like that would be frankly crazy.

The scouting system does fluctuate players values. Some rookies dramatically...but not after. I'm not sure I agree with the observation, I put more faith in the game not to be that crazy
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Old 11-20-2020, 09:23 PM   #17
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
I don't have much to add here, other than I have not seen or experienced odd results like you described.

As a meta-comment... if "the DL is totally useless" as you suggest, then wouldn't it be true that all teams would suffer from paltry pass rush totals? That doesn't seem to be the case, in either MP leagues or SP leagues I have played in and paid attention to. Overall pass rushing seems to be... roughly correct?

If you're saying "[investing in expensive talent along] the DL is totally useless" then your team would support that argument, I suppose. But without much to go on other than your frustration, I can't really come up with anything much. If you can save and reload, I'd try that roster with a 100% Recommend defensive setup, and see what that gets you. It's just a way to try to control for something weird in your gameplan that might be inadvertently sabotaging your outcomes.
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Old 11-21-2020, 07:20 AM   #18
Sharkn20
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shanklingill View Post
If your point is overall ratings do not mean a player is suited to a given role, yeah I'm aware of that. My point specifically demonstrates that these players are stud pash rushers, I don't expect them to be returning pick sixes, breaking up passes or crushing runners. What I do expect them to do is kill QBs.

If you are saying the stats themselves are meaningless, and that a guy rated between 98-100 in the pass rushing specific stats does not mean he outperforms someone else much lower, then what would be the point of a rating system at all? Such randomness would make the game unplayable.

You could argue randomness occurs in real life and scouting mistakes are made. But would a scout rate someone as a hall of fame level player for 7 years in a row and say he's perfect on every metric if he was sacking 3.5 people a year? No. Performance over time would be increase accuracy. And it's highly unlikely a scout would in the counter watch a player wrack up 50 sacks in 4 years on a rookie deal and rate him as being anything other than a pure stud. So other than for players like rookies or 2nd year, having a system like that would be frankly crazy.

The scouting system does fluctuate players values. Some rookies dramatically...but not after. I'm not sure I agree with the observation, I put more faith in the game not to be that crazy

You are making one big mistake here, and is thinking that the games does 1vs1 match ups, that´s not the case.

The game mainly uses "blocks" to determine outcomes.

In pass situations the check seems to be,

Total points of PRT + PRS of the players rushing to the QB vs total protection points PB + BS of player protecting the QB (PRT / PB being favored), then you add the QB sense rush and timing, including length of the pass (Short passes require less time to throw the football as you can imagine) to determine if there is Sack / Hurry / Unsuccesful pass rush.

If there is a Sack / Hurry, then it goes randomly to one of the rushers, having more possibilities the player with bigger bars.

Hence if the teams you are facing, have plenty protection to the QB, throw short and you are blitzing everyone, is really easy to break that defense of yours in pieces.
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Old 11-21-2020, 09:59 AM   #19
Hammer
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Join Date: Sep 2005
I think it probably is more down to lack of understanding as to what is necessary to build a great pass rush. I see a lot less time and effort put in to Defense in MP. Attention to detail tends to yield results in this game, all the little things add up.

I think putting an Offense in uncomfortable situations will be a strong factor in making a pass rush look good. I see stud DEs dominate on good teams much like I would expect. On weaker teams they don't tend to post such pretty stats.
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Old 11-24-2020, 02:18 PM   #20
Front Office Midget
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Manitowoc, Wisconsin
Quote:
Originally Posted by shanklingill View Post
I am open to be taught more about the game. Do you know any more indepth defensive takes on how to improve to get up to these levels?

I run a 4-3 under, not a 3-4, so take anything I say with that in mind.

In 3-4 in the past, it was all about one thing- your WLB's pass rush technique rating. I imagine this is still somewhat true, although it may be shared with your SLB.

In general, you want to be blitzing your SLB or your WLB, and you want them to have PRT's over 80.

Your DL looks great, but 3-4 sacks in this game tend to come more from the OLBs + one of your DEs (is it LDE?). I think RDE functions more like a RDT in a 4-3. They are more useful in stopping the run.

I use a 4-3 under, with 2 great pass rushing DEs, and 2 great pass rushing OLBs. (think "great" as in 80+ prt/prs). Usually blitzing a player. That works for me.

I can tell you are falling into one major trap that will limit your enjoyment of this game- comparing the numbers too closely to that of the real life NFL. The numbers are never going to line up exactly. It's even more extreme when you look at individual players- their statistics are not going to look like their real-life counterparts.

FOF needs to be taken for what it is. The numbers are within the realm of realism, BUT they are not going to model 2019/2020 numbers exactly (nor 2016 numbers, which is when the game came out).

DTs, and RDE (I think) in the 3-4 are not going to generate that many sacks, usually. Pass rush technique, usually, is more important than pass rush strength.


Finally, the single most important stat in determining whether a QB is sacked is the QB's sense rush rating.
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Old 11-24-2020, 02:23 PM   #21
finkellll
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Join Date: Jun 2019
I've got ~40 single player seasons of bars and Rex'ed stats in my sql server. I'll kick out some bars vs. Production graphs when I get a chance. Might be tonight, might be after Thanksgiving.
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Old 11-27-2020, 11:56 AM   #22
finkellll
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Join Date: Jun 2019
37 rex'ed SP seasons, 10940 individual entries, single season only data, here are some graphs.


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PRT has exponential growth in sack count, and linear growth in PR% (in game PR% formula is (sacks + hurries + blocks) / pass plays)


Current OVR has linear growth from 40-80 ovr. in sacks and some linear growth from 60-80 ovr in pr%, but it isn't that much of a change.


All sack #s and PR%s are averages for all entries at a specified PRT/current overall (for example, all single season entries at 85 PRT are averaged together for the 85 PRT data point, etc.)


We can see that there is in fact growth, but look at the sack numbers, less than 10 across the board for PRT numbers, and less than 10 for current overall where we have a good number of plays at that point (there are 16 or fewer players at each OVR point above 80, and single digit players at 90-95)





Here is the averaged PRT & PRS values against # of sacks per year. Again, low player counts above 80, but again you can see the scattering of results on the right. More players would tighten up this range to give us a better average, but that is exactly my point. Your max bar DEs could end up with 4-16 sacks per year based on this data, which is better than anyone with 60 or lower in PRT & PRS averaged together, but is much, much lower than the RL numbers you are expecting.


Based on the numbers you posted and the numbers I'm getting, I would say your results are expected for a Randomly simmed season.
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Old 12-03-2020, 07:20 AM   #23
shanklingill
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Originally Posted by Front Office Midget View Post
Finally, the single most important stat in determining whether a QB is sacked is the QB's sense rush rating.

This is an interesting point, I checked in the save and found Lamar Jackson has a sense rush of 98, the highest in the league. How that has translated to his sack counts are frankly ridiculous. Aside from one year in 2025 (Where his 23 SA would still rank joint best in the last completed NFL season), over 8 seasons the Baltimore line have beaten their Franchise record of 19 allowed in 7 of those. The lowest number (2019) is 8. Only one team in history have achieved that defense of the QB (1988 Dolphins). 5 of these seasons have sack percentages under 1.9 percent. It tops out at 1.5 in the 8 sack season.

Having checked back through NFL team stats available (only for the last 21 seasons could I find) only one team in the last 21 seasons has achieved a sub 2 percent sack percentage, the Denver Broncos in 2008 with 12 sacks allowed. It stood at 1.9 exactly. It might be wrong, but I have to kind of conclude on available stats that this line, aside from the Dolphins (The stat is available because its a record) is producing unprecedent pass blocking capabilities never seen in the history of the game other than a few isolated seasons here and there.

Now...... one would think that the O line might be crazy good. I can only work out the first and last season of the 8 where I have save files.

Baltimore in year 1 average line quality of 49
Baltimore in last year line quality of 52

This is a line with no standout quality. All the line in the most recent season are better rush blockers than pass blockers.

Going a bit further, I checked performance of my pass rush vs this line since signing Bosa. See stats in previous posts, but with 4 pass rushers almost having perfect stats in those 4 seasons I have played Baltimore 11 times (8 RS, 3 PS). In those 11 games I have got to Lamar 2 times.

Average O Line + max sense rush > the best pass rush ever existing + average line. It seems this rating stat is tremendously overpowered looking through my career data.

On a side note, I am not really sure how anyone would rank "sensing the rush" in a QB. Looking at sack percentages over careers, there is no convincing argument that it favours a player of any type really. There are as many good players as bad or average ones. Mobile quarterbacks who escape the rush more get seem in the modern day to get sacked more. Pocket passers who dont move well can escape sacks more, but then their sack ratios then dont seem to coincide with any noticeable play improvements. When Marino posts a few unbelievable years for esacping sacks in 1988-99 he threw 45 picks (1989 ranks his career high, 1988 ranks 2nd), his lowest career completion ratios and his worst yearly QBR.

So does sensing a sack mean rushing the ball out?
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Old 12-03-2020, 07:20 AM   #24
shanklingill
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Originally Posted by Front Office Midget View Post
Finally, the single most important stat in determining whether a QB is sacked is the QB's sense rush rating.

This is an interesting point, I checked in the save and found Lamar Jackson has a sense rush of 98, the highest in the league. How that has translated to his sack counts are frankly ridiculous. Aside from one year in 2025 (Where his 23 SA would still rank joint best in the last completed NFL season), over 8 seasons the Baltimore line have beaten their Franchise record of 19 allowed in 7 of those. The lowest number (2019) is 8. Only one team in history have achieved that defense of the QB (1988 Dolphins). 5 of these seasons have sack percentages under 1.9 percent. It tops out at 1.5 in the 8 sack season.

Having checked back through NFL team stats available (only for the last 21 seasons could I find) only one team in the last 21 seasons has achieved a sub 2 percent sack percentage, the Denver Broncos in 2008 with 12 sacks allowed. It stood at 1.9 exactly. It might be wrong, but I have to kind of conclude on available stats that this line, aside from the Dolphins (The stat is available because its a record) is producing unprecedent pass blocking capabilities never seen in the history of the game other than a few isolated seasons here and there.

Now...... one would think that the O line might be crazy good. I can only work out the first and last season of the 8 where I have save files.

Baltimore in year 1 average line quality of 49
Baltimore in last year line quality of 52

This is a line with no standout quality. All the line in the most recent season are better rush blockers than pass blockers.

Going a bit further, I checked performance of my pass rush vs this line since signing Bosa. See stats in previous posts, but with 4 pass rushers almost having perfect stats in those 4 seasons I have played Baltimore 11 times (8 RS, 3 PS). In those 11 games I have got to Lamar 2 times.

Average O Line + max sense rush > the best pass rush ever existing + average line. It seems this rating stat is tremendously overpowered looking through my career data.

On a side note, I am not really sure how anyone would rank "sensing the rush" in a QB. Looking at sack percentages over careers, there is no convincing argument that it favours a player of any type really. There are as many good players as bad or average ones. Mobile quarterbacks who escape the rush more get seem in the modern day to get sacked more. Pocket passers who dont move well can escape sacks more, but then their sack ratios then dont seem to coincide with any noticeable play improvements. When Marino posts a few unbelievable years for esacping sacks in 1988-99 he threw 45 picks (1989 ranks his career high, 1988 ranks 2nd), his lowest career completion ratios and his worst yearly QBR.

So does sensing a sack mean rushing the ball out?
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Old 12-03-2020, 08:10 AM   #25
shanklingill
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Originally Posted by Hammer View Post
I think putting an Offense in uncomfortable situations will be a strong factor in making a pass rush look good. I see stud DEs dominate on good teams much like I would expect. On weaker teams they don't tend to post such pretty stats.

Is there a link between top individual pass rushers by year and top teams with great win records? I think if you went back even 20 years, you would find a lot of the best pass rushers in a given year played for poor teams. Strahan got sack leader with a terrible NYGs team in 2003, and Allen did it with a Minnesota team about 10 years ago that barely won. And didnt Houston have like a 1-15 year around the time JJ Watt was at the peak of his powers.

Also worth looking as well at home many of those pass rush leaders came from better ranked teams, but how much of that overall team success boils down to defense. I think when you isolate both together, you are left with very few top pass rushers (if any) who played with dominant top ranked offenses. The current pass rush leader in 2019 played with an offense that had near historical levels of turnovers, and were often put in terrible field positions.

Quote:
Hence if the teams you are facing, have plenty protection to the QB, throw short and you are blitzing everyone, is really easy to break that defense of yours in pieces.

It seems a bit of a heavy assumption to say I am blitzing the hell out of teams. On the contrary, I dont feel it necessary to overtly blitz because the quality of my blitzers should be adequate to create pressures from more conversative approaches. I hardly ever use blitz 2 or overstack blitzers.

Also a bit of an assumption to think my defense is being taken to pieces, which it isnt. The question raised was specifically in relation to how my pass rush performs not my team.

Side note - I think Patriots had the most 5/6 plus man rushers last year on their play calling and topped the league defensive stats, so calling a proportionally large amount of heavy blitzes did seem to result in them getting torn to pieces.

Quote:
If you can save and reload, I'd try that roster with a 100% Recommend defensive setup, and see what that gets you. It's just a way to try to control for something weird in your gameplan that might be inadvertently sabotaging your outcomes.

Its not possible to change any dynamics of front line defenses in your game plan save from setting the base formation. Save from rare plays were FLDs drop into coverage in RL, they will be doing the same function irrespective of what happens behind them.

In RL last year, there was a strong correlation between being able to rush the quarter back without bringing additional blitzes (and 2018 I believe, stats after that are harder to come by in detail) and team defense performance. Teams like SF and SD were right at the top of the defensive rankings and also commited hardly any linebackers into blitz plays (think both adopted 4 man rushes about 80 percent of pass plays). And their front line D wracked up a lot of sacks. New England went the other way and were successful.

So really as long as I am generally conservative and not rushing everything at a QB or as long as my play calling isnt being shredded for being terrible, which it isnt, then I would expect my front line to perform. My whole defense in fact is pretty excellent, I have a slight weakness (52 ovr) in FS, but thats hardly a bad weakness. Ive invested hard and got very good draft picks, my Team ranking end of year is 100/100.

SO in short, I have a team/system capable of keeping a QB quiet in pass production and keep him in the pocket longer. It doesnt translate to pressures like it should.

Not really sure how my game plan can get my front line D to the QB more.
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Old 12-03-2020, 08:12 AM   #26
shanklingill
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Finkelll,

Thanks for posting those stats. Maybe a lack of data at the high end, but what it appears to me most is the more random boom/bust nature of the higher end performers. While lower ends seem consistent. There seems quite a large range as you get to the higher OVRs. Which to me doesnt make much sense, if a good player is maintaining a rating they should match consistency a bit more.... if you get older, the player ratings will drop and performance drop in some form of proportionality.
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Old 12-09-2020, 02:26 AM   #27
Front Office Midget
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Originally Posted by shanklingill View Post

SO in short, I have a team/system capable of keeping a QB quiet in pass production and keep him in the pocket longer. It doesnt translate to pressures like it should.

Not really sure how my game plan can get my front line D to the QB more.

The simple answer, since you run a 3-4, is to have OLBs with 80+ pass rush technique, and have them on the field consistently.

Doesn't matter how good the Cowboys D Line is in real life. In FOF, the OLBs are the key components of a 3-4 pass rush.

Last edited by Front Office Midget : 12-09-2020 at 02:27 AM.
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Old 12-10-2020, 03:14 AM   #28
Jops
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I'm not sure i've seen the same issue, I dont play SP that much anymore but in MP there are always 1 or 2 "freaks". There are so many factors to consider as well, youd need great man coverage corners in a 4-3.

I've seen players who get the stats:
http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=21322
This guys still active
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Old 12-18-2020, 05:41 PM   #29
JaqwonTheChef
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Had an absolute stud DE I drafted in the 3rd round, close to 90 OVR by his second season. 3rd season he CRUSHED the all-time single-season sack record at 27 in 2022. It's now 2031 and his record is still 4 sacks above the next guy. It's worth noting he also had 36 hurries and 4 blocked passes that same season. His next two seasons he was "only" able to put up 11 sacks on the season so I ended up trading him. His overall still showed high 80s, but I couldn't justify spending over 15M in cap space on a player that had clearly peaked very early and was on a steady decline.
Moral of the story I guess is that there are a multitude of factors going on that dictate how player perform, and scouting ratings doesn't always have the answers.
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Old 02-01-2021, 05:22 PM   #30
shanklingill
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Originally Posted by Jops View Post
There are so many factors to consider as well, youd need great man coverage corners in a 4-3


I keep hearing a lot about certain factors, but nothing that specific. I found this simple comment interesting about man cover corners.

Anyone else have any similar advice? Play calling approaches? Other defensive focuses to boost it?
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Old 02-01-2021, 10:56 PM   #31
triplykely
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From a play calling standpoint I tend to think in relation to forcing a 3rd and long. Generally I’m aggressive against the run with 8 in the box on 1st. The more 2nd and long the more 3rd and long. If I give up the 1st, no big deal, try to force the 3rd and long on this sequence.

Generally on 3rd and long I’ll blitz 1 with cover 2 or 3 depending on offensive personnel. While I do not always have great pass rusher careers I have hit 196 sacks with a DE and many over 150.

In the 34 put your best Blitzer at WLB, regardless of weighting they will blitz often. Your RDE generally will get more sacks than your LDE, skill discrepancy can negate this.

Like said above, don’t focus to heavily on matching real NFL numbers as FOF will always fall short. On the same hand, try skimming the same season over and over using different game plans. Make small changes and maybe start with only 1 play per situation. As you sim try to recognize patterns based on calls. I’m not explaining it well but I’m doing this I know you can get great numbers with your team. The ratings should yield multiple 10+ sack players

Edit: also worth noting synergy between your defense and offense. If you have a run heavy ball control offense the opposing offense will have fewer snaps and this fewer pass attempts to rush. Conversely a big play passing offense that scores a lot will force teams to abandon the run creating more pass rush opportunities.

Last edited by triplykely : 02-02-2021 at 01:14 AM.
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