Mike Iupati and the Tragedy of Getting What You Wish For
“By adding guard Mike Iuapti, Steve Keim and Bruce Arians got what they wanted.”
–Josh Weinfuss, ESPN
“Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.”
–Old proverb
Introduction:
On March 10th, 2015 the Arizona Cardinals signed Mike Iupati to a lucrative 5 year/40 million dollar contract, 22 million of which was guaranteed money. Well regarded as one of the elite players at his position, Iupati was considered a top tier free agent this offseason. Pro Football Focus ranked Iupati as the NFL’s 14th-best overall guard and many Cardinals fans were happy about the reprieve his signing offered them from realizing they root for one of the sorriest franchises in professional sports history.
However, not all was kosher in the desert. Despite being ranked by PFF as the second-best run blocking guard in 2014 Iupati was also ranked 55th out of 78 NFL starting guards as a pass protector. To many 49ers fans this was not a surprising bit of information. They had watched many a snap where Iupati either wiffed or was blown pass by his man on clear passing downs as part of an offensive line which surrendered a disgraceful 55 sacks. During the press conference Iupati was specifically asked about this deficiency.
His explanation was rather peculiar….
Iupati claimed that his abysmal performance as a pass protector last year was because he played with a foot he’d broken in the 2013-14 NFC Championship game against the dirtiest team in the league. This excuse for poor pass protection in 2014 begs a careful examination. A 331 pound offensive guard with chronic foot problems is not the kind of guy I’d want to overpay 22 million guaranteed dollars to in a 5 year/40 million dollar deal. It seems rather odd that he would admit to such a serious injury as an excuse for his failures in pass protection. My article demonstrates Iupati’s problems exceed his “broken foot” and his signing isn’t what Cardinal sycophants crack it up to be.
Iupati’s Lie:
One thing needs to be understood about Mike Iupati’s “broken foot” defense – its full of pure crap. If one looks at his PFF scores you will see that Iupati’s gotten progressively worse as a pass blocker in his NFL career without the help of broken foot.
Notice that his worst pass protection grade was in the regular season of 2013, before any foot injury…hmmmm….
Other Cardinals sycophants have asserted that protecting a mobile quarterback like Kaepernick was the reason for Iupati’s inconsistency as a pass blocker. According to this rationalization not knowing which way Kaepernick’s happy feet would take him was the reason Iupati struggled protecting his quarterback. But look, at his pass grade before Kaepernick. He was still ranked as a terrible blocker (41st and 43rd in the league). He’s also allowed over twenty or more QB hurries in 4 of his 5 professional seasons.
As if this information wasn’t enough look at how poor his pass protection in motion.
http://i.imgur.com/QlT7BIi.gif
Kaepernick’s fault? Please.
The Larger Problem
Cardinals homers will counter this brilliant analysis with two rebuttals. First they will retort that despite his struggles as a pass protector, Iupati still ranked as Pro Football Focus’ best run-blocking left guard in 2014, making him a worthwhile addition to an offense ranked 31st in the league in rushing yards per game. Secondly, they will remind us that while he did struggle in pass protection, Iupati still ranked higher than Ted Larsen, the man who he is replacing on Arizona’s offensive line. Whereas Iupati’s pass blocking figure was -7.5, placing him 55th among NFL guards, Larsen’s season mark was -15.7, the third-worst mark in the league among the 78 guards rated by PFF.
While such points are valid on the surface both must be taken with a grain of salt for how they ignore a key variable – the structural difference between San Francisco’s and Arizona’s respective offenses. Sam Monson, a writer for Pro-Football Focus, makes this point evidently clear in an ESPN Insider article where he categorizes Arizona’s acquisition of Iupati as the mismatching of a one-dimensional talent with an offensive scheme ill-suited to minimize his blatant deficiencies:
Arizona passes far more than San Francisco does, and when they pass it tends to be a deep shot on a deep dropback — the toughest assignment for a pass protector. In 2014, the 49ers passed on 58.1 percent of their plays on offense, 25th in the league, and Iupati surrendered seven sacks, the most in the league at the position. While some of that can be explained by Iupati carrying an injury much of the season, he has never earned a positive grade at PFF over a season for pass protection, grading below average every single year as a pro. The Cardinals needed to upgrade at guard, but they have done so by bringing in one singularly unqualified to fit their offense.
As Monson perceptively notes, Iupati’s run blocking dominance is nullified by his woefulness as a pass protector in a more pass-oriented offensive scheme than the one he left behind in San Francisco.
To further contextualize this tradeoff in absolute terms one must account for a major comparative difference – Arians’ offense is much more pass-oriented than San Francisco’s power-run oriented attack. Iupati led all NFL guards in surrendering an atrocious 7 sacks last year despite the fact that San Francisco passed the football at the 4th lowest rate in the NFL. With this second factor considered Iupati’s superior pass protection grade as a left guard relative to his predecessor’s doesn’t seem so hot. In fact, one is left to wonder if Iupati’s already abysmal pass protection grade last season would’ve devalued even more had he blocked in a far more balanced offensive attack like the one Arizona runs (15th in pass volume).
Moreover, within this difference between both offensive approaches lies a more specific difference regarding the nature of each team’s passing offenses. During his two and a half years as an NFL starting quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers Colin Kaepernick has ranked among league leaders in percentage of dropbacks using play action fakes. The pulling Mike Iupati to fake a run play was very important in aiding pass protection schemes for the 49ers offense through using misdirection to hide his deficiencies as a pass protector. Not coincidentally, when the percentage of Kaepernick’s play action pass plays diminished from 28% in 2013 to 21% in 2014, Iupati’s sack totals allowed almost doubled from 4 to 7. Now with Arizona, Carson Palmer’s tendency to play action pass just 15% of the time, one of the lowest rates in the NFL, could even further expose Iupati’s weakness as a pass blocker, leaving the far less mobile and far more fragile Palmer to fend for himself.
Conclusion
In the probable eventuality of being personally attacked as a “homer”, a “troll”, or whatever 5th grade insult my critics will conjure for my daring to detail the facts about Iupati, I wish to state that his costly acquisition is clearly not without its merits. For now this move improves Arizona’s offense in the overall. Reports say Steve Keim is making a major move to acquire aging child abuser Adrian Peterson. Iupati clearing running lanes for Peterson to accelerate through with the ball is the type of brutality that haunts defensive fronts the way Papa Adrian’s lashes haunt his children’s nightmares. Combining this fallen hero with the formerly great Larry Fitzgerald and a twice reconstructed Carson Palmer, Arizona will field a “Wrong Side of Thirty Core” which, if they can be resuscitated, will make Arizona one of the most balanced offenses in the NFL for the few weeks all three will probably be able to play together healthy.
But there are other variables to consider. Fact remains that Arizona is committing 8 million dollars a year for five years to field a guard who does one thing really well (run blocking) in an offense which will expose the other thing he does very poorly (pass protection) at a greater rate than ever before. Considering that Arians is coach who traditionally uses the run to set up a downfield passing attack as the foundation of his offense I just hope Carson Palmer has a full-exoskeleton body-brace available, he’s going to need it. Add to this that he’s a 331 lbs. man with a history of foot problems and you wonder how long his body will be able to hold up. But such is the tragedy of getting a “good thing”, you also get the bad that comes along with it. Only time will tell which one outweighs the other.
