Steelers sign Suisham through 2018

[Stallworth16]

2018 sounds like the Sci-Fi Future
Flying Cars, Advanced Technology, and Suisham.


[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XcGSJ6Of9g[/youtube]

[Scunge]

What I go back to is his performance in the playoffs for his career. Has played in 7 playoff games and has made 9 of 14 field goals. 64% accuracy is not good, missing 5 FGs in 7 playoff games is not good. Winning 3 of those 7 games is not good.

He has 45 yard range, maybe, and he will miss 30 yard chip shots. His kickoffs get worse and worse as the season progresses and you see him have to make tackles more and more as the season progresses, that is not good.

Just not a fan of this player, think he is barely adequate and don't understand the Steelers at least trying to bring in serious competition. Love the Adam Podlesh/Brad Wing competition at punter. I saw Ozzie Newsome dump Cundiff and find an UDFA in Tucker so I know it is possible. The contract is not horrible or out of line but I just see the Steelers really happy with Suisham when they should be concerned and looking to upgrade.

[Stillerz Bar]

Here's some FG analysis over the last 3 years... I kept it to a minimum of 60 FGA (about 2 full years). 31 total kickers. The quick summary is there's nothing special about Suisham inside 50 - there's little differentiation (aside from a handful or two who are "bad" and won't be kicking long). He's the kicking version of the mediocre QB - good enough to be a 10-yr starter, but hanging around mainly because risk-averse teams don't want to risk getting a below average guy who won't survive in this league.

30-39: Suisham ranks 20th at 53/58 (91.4%). There are effectively 5 guys at the bottom who've missed 1-2 extra from there, and probably 13 who've missed a 2-3 less than Suisham. So very average for Suisham.

40-49: Suisham ranks 12th at 26/31 (83.9%). 5 guys at the top who've missed 2-3 less, Might be two tiers a the bottom of about 7-8 kickers each that missed 2-3 more (and the 7-8 below that who really probably be out of the league). So above average for Suisham, but not by a lot. This is where most guys kick themself out of the league, but it's not the money stat (50+) and more of the "standard". Suisham is comfortably in the top-half.

50+: At 2/5 (40%), Suisham is basically bottom-5 both in accuracy and attempts.

Bottom line: adjust for Heinz as you see fit, though I think we overrate it quite a bit (at least inside 50). Outdoors and weather is probably a bigger deal, but PIT probably plays in nice weather and/or a dome abou 6 times a year. Even if you don't care about 50+, Suisham has been fairly average in accuracy. Factor in Heinz and weather, and might argue he's top-10 (barely). Factor in kick-offs and I think it's pretty clear he's not a top-10 kicker.

Suisham looks a lot like Jeff Reed to me. Reed hit a cold streak and without a 50+ leg no longer looked like an NFL kicker.

To be fair, he had a pretty awful year in 2011 (3 years ago) hitting FGs at under 75% but has been over 90% each of the last 2 years. That means he was dead last in accuracy in 2011 but 7th in 2012 and 3rd in the league last year trailing only the kickers from the 2 Super Bowl teams (Prater & Hauschka). As such, including 3 years of stats pulls the numbers down significantly when he has clearly figured something out.

I still don’t like the fact that they have no viable option for long FGs (maybe as someone stated earlier our punter could be a long FG option) and I do think there should be competition each year but overall he is above average and I don’t have a problem with them locking him in for a few years.

[Kodiak]

He's over 90% the last two years because he rarely attempts kicks over 45 yards.

A bit above average (again, you see very little differentiation until you get into 40+) accuracy wise and poor distance...pretty average any way you slice it...and if and when he has a slump he will probably be done in this league just like Jeff Reed was.

[Stillerz Bar]

He's over 90% the last two years because he rarely attempts kicks over 45 yards.

A bit above average (again, you see very little differentiation until you get into 40+) accuracy wise and poor distance...pretty average any way you slice it...and if and when he has a slump he will probably be done in this league just like Jeff Reed was.

Perhaps that is the case but when you say he is average any way you slice it, including the 2011 numbers makes it look like you are trying to slice it to show him in an unfavorable light - not unheard of as we all have our biases but still skewed to support your position rather than providing a balanced analysis. I've already stated that I am not happy with his FG distance but he is 20/20 at 40-49 over the last 2 years so "any way you slice that number", he has to be at least tied for 1st in accuracy from that distance and he is 21-23 at 40+. As a comparison, Hauschka is 16/17 at 40-49 and 20/24 at 40+ so there isn’t much in 40+ kicks attempted between Squeezer and the kicker for the Super Bowl champs.

I don't have time to compile league wide stats and if you want to "slice it" differently and compare only the last 2 years, if the numbers show he is similarly middle of the pack then I'll concede that he is average. However, until I see something showing that his accuracy doesn’t stack up favorably with the better kickers in the league, I will stick with my quick numbers check and my perception that he is above average (which the Steelers apparently also believe).

[Kodiak]

I took the last 3 years because he's been the kicker for 3.5 years. Kickers have some variation in their performance, missing or making a few extra every year. I don't think it skews the numbers - other guys had good or bad years over that time as well. The more years you have, the more you get a better estimation of a kicker's true "accuracy" because they don't take the "same" kicks every year and there is performance variability.

Like I said, inside of 40 pretty much the only differentiation is 10 or so kickers who probably aren't long for the league. There are 25 kickers who attempted at least 50 FG's over the last two years:
Suisham is 13th inside 30 (1-2 misses more than the best). But there's little differentiation here.
Suisham is 100% in 40-50 (T-1st with 3 others). Call it 2-3 extra makes, maybe 4...over 2 years. So while he's hit perfect, it's not nearly the marginal value you think.

Combined inside 50 Suisham is 3rd at 95%. But only 2 makes separates the top-10, and that's not statistically significant.

When we look at 50+, all 10 of them are better than Suisham, 5 significantly so. So if we say Suisham gave us 4 extra makes inside 50, there's not a lot of value there when you get virtually nothing from him 50+...factoring that in you get another 5 as good or better than Suisham

He's an average kicker, even when you stack the deck to be most favorabe for him. To say nothing of kick-offs, again.

Let me state it another way. Of these 25, 6-7 have been head & shoulders above the rest the past two years. Then there's Vinateiri and Janikowski. Maybe 5 who have been obvious laggards. That puts Suisham in a large middle group of about 11 guys. Alternatively we might say at his best Suisham is only an average kicker.