Louisiana Tech's 2017 Pro Football Focus Season Grades

We are excited to announce that the Rivals network has teamed up with Pro Football Focus, the go-to site for player grades and advanced analytics in both college football and the NFL. We will incorporate PFF data into stories going forward, and one thing you can look forward to each week is a grade for all of Louisiana Tech's players from the previous game.

Below is a grade card looking back at the top 10 offensive and defensive players according to Pro Football Focus during the 2017 season. But first, an explanation from PFF on how the grading scale works:

On every play, a PFF analyst will grade each player on a scale of -2 to +2 according to what he did on the play.

At the end of the scale you have a catastrophic game-ending interception or pick-six from a quarterback, and at the other a perfect deep bomb into a tight window in a critical game situation, with the middle of that scale being o-graded, or ‘expected’ plays that are neither positive nor negative.

Each game is also graded by a second PFF analyst independent of the first, and those grades are compared by a third, Senior Analyst, who rules on any differences between the two. These grades are verified by the Pro Coach Network, a group of former and current NFL coaches with over 700 combined years of NFL coaching experience, to get them as accurate as they can be.

From there, the grades are normalized to better account for game situation; this ranges from where a player lined up to the drop back depth of the quarterback or the length of time he had the ball in his hand and everything in between. They are finally converted to a 0-100 scale and appear in our Player Grades Tool.

Season-level grades aren’t simply an average of every game—grade a player compiles over a season, but rather factor in the duration at which a player performed at that level. Achieving a grade of 90.0 in a game once is impressive, doing it (12) times in a row is more impressive.

It is entirely possible that a player will have a season grade higher than any individual single-game grade he achieved, because playing well for an extended period of time is more difficult to do than for a short period. Similarly, playing badly for a long time is a greater problem than playing badly once, so the grade can also be compounded negatively.

Each week, grades are subject to change while we run through our extensive review process including All-22 tape runs and coaching audit, so you may notice discrepancies among grades published in earlier articles compared with those in the Player Grades tool until grade lock each week.

Takeaways: It is no surprise to see that Boston Scott graded out as Louisiana Tech's best offensive player in 2017. Boston was exceptional throughout the season which led to him being selected in the 6th round of the 2018 NFL Draft by the New Orleans Saints.

While Bobby Holly only saw 51 snaps in 2017, he graded out very well. Holly scored his first collegiate touchdown in the 2018 season opener at South Alabama and will look to continue that success going forward.

While J’Mar Smith did not appear to have the greatest season to the naked-eye, the signal caller did not grade out all that bad according to PFF. It will be interesting to see how he improves in 2018.

Takeaways: Darryl Lewis and Dae'von Washington were great throughout the 2017 season, and it shows up when you look at the 2017 PFF grades. Lewis and Washington will be counted on once again in 2018 for Blake Baker's Bulldog defense.

Secdrick Cooper finished 2017 as an All-Conference selection but only finished as Tech's 10th best defender according to PFF. If Jordan Baldwin and Daniel Lewis can play well at safety, perhaps the Tech defense can finish as one of the best in Conference USA in 2018.

Overall, Louisiana Tech's best offensive game of 2017 was in a week 12 win at UTEP when the Bulldogs graded out with a 74.5 and scored 42 points. The low point was in a week eight overtime loss to Southern Miss when the Bulldogs graded out with a 60.3

Shifting to the defensive side of the ball, the Bulldogs best week came in the bowl game win over SMU when they graded out with an 83.1. The low point came in the week two loss to Mississippi State when the defense graded out with a 55.

It will be interesting to see how these numbers evolve throughout the 2018 season. We have already taken a complete dive into the Bulldogs season opening win at South Alabama. You'll be surprised at the grades you will find.

If you are looking for the best inside information found nowhere else, join us at BleedTechBlue.com for only $9.95 a month. We will breakdown each Bulldog game with plenty of inside information that will include the strengths of both the offense and the defense each week. Know the Bulldogs better than ever before by joining us at BleedTechBlue.com!