I’ve often said the more time that can be given to analyze something, the higher the probability it gets over-analyzed. My prime example is the two week period between the NFL Conference Championship games and the Super Bowl. During all this time to talk about who’s going to win the game, there are some of the national media I won’t specifically call out at this time who can over analyze the matchup to death that they are certain a huge underdog has no way they’re going to lose the game.

The bottom line is, if you’re given enough time, you can convince yourself of anything.

Last week I was taking my annual vacation. While sitting on the beach, I was checking Twitter/X when I saw a random tweet by Cam Heyward. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was in reference to (since it didn’t seem to be about the other horrendous take that the Steelers should trade Heyward before the stat of the season), so I had to do a little research just to make sure. Bottom line was, it was correcting a horrendously bad take.

Sacks>Pressures>no pressure

— Cam Heyward (@CamHeyward) July 2, 2024

I couldn’t believe this was even a discussion. I was even more disappointed to find out that it came from Trey Wingo, someone who I generally thought had a good grasp on the game of football. But then I remembered, teams have been away from the facilities for several weeks and there are still a few more weeks to go before training camp. People who report on the NFL are having to think hard about things to discuss and the outcome is not always good.

First, let’s talk about this particular take. Are pressures more valuable than sacks? To better understand this, we have to remember the definition of each item. A sack, an official individual statistic of the NFL since 1982, is when the quarterback tackled with no yards gained on a play that was intended to be a pass. It is not a sack if it was running play, but it is still a sack if there is no gain when the quarterback scrambles. Even if the quarterback goes out of bounds on his own at the line of scrimmage, the closest player would be credited a sack.

As for pressures, they are not unofficial NFL statistic. Don’t worry, plenty of things are talked about that aren’t official statistics such as tackles, missed tackles, dropped passes, and a variety of other things. But what makes a pressure? It’s actually a very subjective term. How it’s defined by NFL next General stats is:

“A pass-rush play where the rusher affects the quarterback before the pass is thrown. A pass rush becomes a pressure when pressure probability exceeds 75 percent. This includes sacks, QB hits, QB hurries and other plays where the pass rusher comes into close proximity with the quarterback; it will also include plays where the pass rusher has a free path to the QB or is winning the matchup with the blocker.”

That’s perfectly clear and concise, isn’t it? What is exactly considered “close proximity to the quarterback”? What is “pressure probability exceeding 75%”? That’s why I deemed it a very subjective statistic.

The other thing to remember is that there is more than one specific type of pressure. A quarterback hit is when the player hits the quarterback but he still passes the ball, where a quarterback hurry is the quarterback is deemed to thrown the ball because he was going to hit but did not actually get hit.

So why would pressures be more important than sacks?

I understand that not every pass rush will be able to get home to sack the quarterback. The more often a player is getting close, the greater the likelihood they will soon be able to complete the process.

But a pressure does not automatically create a negative play. Yes, as was the argument from the original terrible take, sometimes pressures can lead the interceptions and those are huge plays. But sometimes sacks can lead to fumbles and those are huge plays as well. But when a quarterback is sacked, he cannot complete a pass. A team cannot convert a first down on a sack. The team will lose a down and, at best, will not gain any yards. Many times teams will lose significant yardage. But for a pressure, passes can still be thrown and completed. What good is a pressure if the quarterback completes the pass for a touchdown? A quarterback is not completing a pass for a touchdown on a sack.

To me, I would take the more important play as one that cannot gain yardage, outside of the freak example of the quarterback fumbling the ball while being sacked and the offense recovering it and advancing the ball forward. That’s a very rare, although possible, play and the only way yardage can be gained. As for pressure, it can still lead to 90-yard touchdown receptions.

That’s all bout that. I probably shouldn’t have even had to make the case that this was such a bad take. My bigger issue is that these things more likely to occur during a time of the year when there’s nothing else to talk about in the NFL. And that time period is almost over.

I’m very grateful that teams are about ready to report to training camp. And even though bad takes can come at any time of the year, the time they are most front and center is coming to a close. This makes me happy, but there is still time for another bad take. Next week I am half expecting to hear how receiver drops are more indicative of the accuracy of a quarterback than receptions because a drop means the ball had to be put in the right spot and receptions could have been all the work of the receiver.

Why did I even bring it up? I’m sure someone could actually roll with that bad take as well.

We’re almost there. Bring on NFL football so the bad takes are at least about something we can see on the field.