Talking Stats: Returning Pac-12 Offensive Firepower

Previously we took a look at the returning offensive firepower in the ACC, Big 12 and the SEC. Now it’s time to look at the Pac-12 (that’s what we are calling it now, right?) and find out who has the most ammunition coming back from last year.

*TPY= 2010 total passing yards

*RPY= Passing Yards from 2010 for players returning in 2011

Two-thirds of the conference is in good shape in terms of passing production returning. Of course, the guy Stanford has coming back is a little better than some of those other guys. Of the teams with less than 50% of production returning ASU might be in the best shape as they think they have their man in Brock Osweiler. Cal and Washington will be breaking in a new gun but both coaches have a lot of experience in that department. Senior Tyler Hansen should be the choice for Colorado where he completed 68% of his passes last year despite throwing as many picks as TDs. Overall, the QB position is a position of strength in the Pac-12.

*TRY= 2010 Total Rushing Yards

*RRY= Rushing Yards from 2010 for players returning in 2011

Half of the field brings back over 80% of production including some real talent in LaMichael James (Oregon), Chris Polk (Washington), Stepfan Taylor (Stanford), Rodney Stewart (Colorado) and Jonathan Franklin (UCLA). Cal and Utah are the only teams so far in the bottom 5 of for both returning passing and rushing (but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem for Utah from a QB perspective unless Wynn goes down). Out of the 4 conferences we’ve looked at so far (ACC, Big 12, SEC, Pac-12) Oregon State has the lowest percentage of rushing yardage back this year.

Utah is in the bottom two in both receiving and rushing which could spell trouble for them in their first year in the conference. The next four on the bottom all return experience at QB which should somewhat negate their loss of receivers. Arizona is the team to watch here as they return a ton of passing yards and a ton of production at both the WR and QB positions. Despite being second to UCLA in percentage of receptions returning they return almost twice as many receptions. ASU, Cal and Washington fans will all be glad to see that they have a lot of production returning at receiver to help out their new QBs.

RETURNING OFFENSIVE FIREPOWER RANKING:

Taking into account the three metrics above (passing yards returning, rushing yards returning and receptions returning) as well as the overall percentage of the metric the team returned (for example: Oregon returned the 6th highest percentage of rushing yards but overall had the most rushing yardage returning so that factored them in as the top team in terms of rushing) I have compiled a “firepower” ranking which tells us which teams have the most offensive statistics returning from last year. What does this mean? I think it means different things for different teams but for consistency sake it means a lot for teams that have guys coming back. This is an interesting tool to use in conjunction with who teams having coming to challenge for playing time.

1. Arizona

2. Oregon

3. UCLA

4. Stanford

5. Arizona State

6. Washington State

7. Colorado

8. USC

9. Washington

10. Oregon State

11. California

12. Utah