"4WR" tight formation

The Packers and some other teams use a formation with (usually) 3WR and 1TE with everyone in tight, the inside receivers standing a couple steps back. How's everybody been marking this formation? I usually put 1/3/1, slot (left or right) all wr in tight. Is there some more common name for it?

lined up as wr...

Just one of those things...

you pause a play before it starts, see someone unusual lined up outside. Looking up the number on the roster you see its not a WR... is he close enough to the line or is it lined up as WR? You think about it a bit, look up some examples and finally mark it down, knowing you took the time and trouble to get the correct info in.

You put down the rest of the formation, unpause... and the guy motions back into his regular position...

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

Some helpful charting tips from watching certain teams enough:

Houston - WR Kevin Walter regularly is in tight with a hand on a ground. Obviously not a tight end, but can be easily mistaken.

Dallas - Tight ends, Tony Curtis and Martellus Bennett, regularly line up at fullback until near the end when Dallas is killing the clock. Then the actual fullback, Deon Anderson, starts seeing some playing time.

Jacksonville - Tight end, Greg Estandia, is split out as a WR commonly.

Tampa Bay - Only charted them one game, but hated it. They regularly shuffled Jerramy Stevens and Alex Smith in and out, and at any time, those two would be placed as a wide receiver. Earnest Graham is now done, but he was regularly put at WR in that game as well. Whoever regularly charts Tampa, I feel bad for you.

Arizona - Only charted once, but safety, Adrian Wilson, blitzed regularly.

General tip: something I find helpful before I start charting, is to go through a team's roster before I begin, and note in a notepad document the tight end's for each team.

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

When I chart a game, I always grab the Game Book from nfl.com ... occasionally they will list someone out of position because they "started" at a different position (like a TE lined up at WR or something), but it gives me all the numbers and players who were in the game on one page - it fits nicely on my laptop monitor, so I can flip back and forth between it and the Excel charting workbook. Eventually I'll set up the other monitor so I can see both at once ...

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

Has anyone used the NFL.com Game Rewind package?
http://www.nfl.com/gamerewind?campaign=Google_GameRewind

Looks like it might be a good way to chart games. I'd like to get some feedback from actual users before I buy it though.

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

Highlights of the 2008 charting season:

Easiest charting week:

2nd half of Houston-Minnesota. A ton of running plays, simple formations, no motion, and hardly any plays since nobody ran out of bounds or had an incomplete pass.

The charting week that made me want to email Bill Moore telling him to shove it:

2nd Half of the MNF game between SF-AZ. 146 plays, a ton of passes, 2 teams with whom I have no familiarity with except for maybe 6 players. Having to constantly look up player numbers on every play. Having to type 29-D.Rodgers-Cromartie too many times didn't help my psyche either. Arizona insisting on blitzing every other play, and making me look for numbers, then looking them up. Grrrrr...

Team I would hate to chart regularly:

Tampa Bay. Only charted them once, but way too many formations, random usage of tight ends and running backs at WR, and passing plays.

Game I would have given my left hand to chart:

1st Half of Week 17 Buffalo-NE. My god, 12 pass plays in the first half!?!?

Anyways, being this my first year of charting, it has been fun, and I hope to be back next year if Bill Moore allows it. I have learned more about football this year than I have in 25 years of watching my Pittsburgh Steelers every Sunday. Take it easy guys, we will need the break that is coming to us! Unless you're like me, and are coming back to chart the playoffs. The suckers for punishment that we are. Happy New Year everybody.

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

What does the color coding on the spreadsheet mean? Is that just for "office use" or should it be guiding us?

Michael Vick: QB or RB?

In the Eagles Vick packages I've been marking him as a QB. I think the convention for "Wildcat QB who is actually a RB" like Ronnie Brown is to mark them as a RB (so you end up with 6 RB/WR/TE on the Wildcat play). Any guidance on marking Vick, Pat White, and other option backs who are actually listed on the depth chart as QB?

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

A few questions/comments:

I've been marking uncovered for dumpoffs to RBs where the defender is 5 yards off. Should I do hole in zone instead? My rational for uncovered is that screens, a similar situation, are marked as uncovered.

Can we add a QB option to play design?

On a trips formation I marked 2 of the 3 as TEs even though they were the outside two members of the formation.

I also had an idea for an optional column where we can mark if a player did something special or something boneheaded. It would be interesting to see which players have the high totals in each column at the end of the season.

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

Sunday Ticket schedule is up for week 1. Also, I highly recommend using the506.com (http://www.the506.com/nflmaps/) or a similar site to check which games are televised in your area. Those of us relying on satellite can receive an unpleasant surprise if we don't check the locally-televised games first.

Games at 1:00 pm ET
Cleveland Browns at Tampa Bay Buccaneers 704
Miami Dolphins at Buffalo Bills 705
Indianapolis Colts at Houston Texans 706
Denver Broncos at Jacksonville Jaguars 707
Oakland Raiders at Tennessee Titans 708
Cincinnati Bengals at New England Patriots 709
Carolina Panthers at New York Giants 710
Atlanta Falcons at Pittsburgh Steelers 711
Detroit Lions at Chicago Bears 712

Games at 4:00 pm ET
Green Bay Packers at Philadelphia Eagles 713
Arizona Cardinals at St. Louis Rams 714
San Francisco 49ers at Seattle Seahawks 715

Help getting started for new charter?

Hi guys, really excited to be a part of this awesome project! Yet with the excitement comes a big overwhelming feeling too... I was hoping I could get a couple tips to get started. I feel quite comfortable with my ability to diagnose the goings-on during certain plays, etc., but here are my admittedly very simple, nearly embarrassing questions:

- To begin charting a game, should I simply start with a normal template, such as the example from the 2007 Jax/Pitt game?

- Will I have any issues charting with iWork for Mac? Has anyone used this?

- It seems that there are certain macros in the template which the notes and clarifications section mention (i.e., " Zone Blitz will be pink when the play might be a zone blitz"). Again referring to my first question, does this mean there are specific templates for each game or is this simply a macro built into the original charting template available on this page? And to my second question, could my ability not to figure these things out be due to using a Mac?

- For things such as the name of a zone (Back, Mid, Front, etc.), are these also fields which should also be auto-filled while charting? If not, is there a way to find the definition of these zones? Again, I suppose this could be a compatibility issue with the Mac, but I don't normally run into those issues with Excel...

- Lastly, the Game Commentary in the white fields of each template: Are charters supposed to manually input this section? How else would it work if not?...

Again, I'm sure these questions are quite Rookie-Level, but I would be incredibly appreciative for any help which can be provided by any veteran charters. Thanks so much, guys, and happy football season!

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

The link right above the schedule for week one is the spreadsheet with the proper play by play for Saints/Packers, but it lacks the pictures for formations that are in the link at the top of the page.

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

New charter here.
I'm getting an issue when I'm trying to open the excel 03 version of the week 2 charting sheet. It says "The file may be read-only, or you may be trying to access a read-only location. Or, the server the document is stored on may not be responding."
For reference, I'm using Excel 04 for mac, and didn't have this issue when I did the GB-NO game.

Formation Question

Is it considered "All Tight" whenever all the receivers are inside the numbers?

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

When we have questions, is there a particular place we should submit them?

Re: Football Outsiders Game Charting Project

Could we list these as collaborative Google Doc's files?