What do the advanced stats suggest about Allen Robinson of the Chicago Bears?
Digging beyond the box score stats we have been able to uncover a lot about the Chicago Bears in 2019. David Montgomery was better than the stats suggest, and Tarik Cohen was affected by losing Trey Burton the most. On top of that, we have learned that Mitch Trubisky has underlying questions beyond the pieces falling apart around him.
Now, it is time to take a look at Allen Robinson, and what his advanced stats say.
Robinson is one of the few players who took a step forward in the box score stats. He had 98 receptions for 1,1147 yards to go with seven touchdowns. In 2018 he had just 55 catches for 754 yards and four touchdowns.
What dot he advanced stats say.
Usage
To start, it helps to have a more productive season when you play more. Robinson missed four games in 2018, and went from 94 targets to 154. It also helps that Trey Burton, and Taylor Gabriel missed more time in 2019 than 2018.
With that in mind, 27% of the teams targets were directed to Robinson, which is up from 21.9% last season. His hog rate, which is targets per snap was up to 16% from 12.7%. That ranked 13th in the NFL. Dominator rating looks into the percent of total yards and touchdowns a player has compared to his teammates. In 2019, Robinson had a 33.6% dominator rating, which ranked 10th in the NFL. That is up from 19.7% last year. The offense was almost overly reliant on Robinson.
It also may have helped that he had 27 targets that went for 20 yards or more in 2019, compared to 29 in 2018. Considering the increase in targets, it is clear that Robinson was working the intermediate much more in 2019 which resulted in more success. His average depth of target was 12.5 yards down field in 2018, but 11.5 in 2019.
He also saw a huge increase in red zone usage. Trubisky was 4-11 targeting Robinson in the red zone in 2018, but was 11-20 throwing to Robinson in the red area in 2019.
Quarterback play
Overall, 77% of his targets were deemed catchable in 2019, compared to 68% in 2018. His true catch rate on catchable targets is down from 86% to 83%. A lot of that has to do with the average depth of target decreasing. When looking at pass quality which combines depth of target and catchable rate, his pass quality dropped from a 7.7 rating to 5.8.
His target accuracy, which factors how often he was hit in stride went down from 7.25 to 6.83.
Directional Passing
When throwing behind the line of scrimmage, Robinson was 10-10 for 47 yards. The year prior he was 5-5 for 19 yards. There was a shift to get the ball in his hands quicker, and it was successful.
From 0-10 yards Robinson had a 76 completion rate in 2019 which is down from 80% the year prior. His yards per attempt dropped in this area as well from 8.1 to 5.7 However, that is mainly because his attempts rose from 49 to 68. He was more involved in the intermediate and while it did not result in more yards, he did have more success because of it. He had three touchdowns to one pick when targeted in this area. Last year he had just one touchdown from 0-10 yards.
From 10-20 yards he had a 48% completion rate and 5.6 yards per attempt. Those numbers are up from 2018 when he had a 41% completion rate and 5.3 yard per attempt in this area.
Lastly, Robinson had a 48% completion rate and 13.6 yards per attempt from 20 yards or deeper. That is up from 44% and 13.5 yards per attempt.
When targets to the left side of the field he had a 54% completion rate and 7.9 yards per attempt. That is up from a 50% and 5.8 yards per attempt.
On the right side he had a 62% completion rate and 8.7 yards per attempt. He hd a 53% completion rate to this side, but 9.8 yards per attempt to the right.
What is significant is the middle. His completion rate dropped from 74% to 69% and his yards per attempt was down from 8.3 to 6.7. However, his attempts were up from 42 to 77.
This is ver similar to his rates from 0-10 yards. This is clearly tied to losing Trey Burton, who took a majority of his targets from 0-10 yards in the middle of the field. Robinson saw a lot more work in this area, and was less successful. We noticed with Tarik Cohen that he was cleared out of the middle of the field, and was hardly even targeted there in 2019 compared to 2018.
These two players were both impacted by the lack of Trey Burton, which created added attention to them.
Efficiency
Overall, Robinson was better overall and it has more to do than just seeing more volume. He is down in yards per target from 8 to 7.5, but that was covered in his lower depth of target.
Robinson averaged 2.19 yards per route run in 2019. That is up from 2.02 in 2018. This shows his overall effectiveness is not just volume.
On average he faced 3.5 yards of cushion pre-snap, which is down from 3.8, as cornerbacks creeped in on Robinson in 2019. However, he created 1.22 yards of separation per route run, which is up from 0.97 yards. He was pressed tighter, but created more space for his quarterback.
In 2019, he averged 8.9 air yards before each catch, which is down from 9.8. This adds up to his drop in air yards per target. However, his yards after the catch per reception is down as well from 3.9 to 2.8. This also can be shown in how he had more targets, but was less efficient in the 0-10 yard range. Defenses took Cohen out, and tackled Robinson quickly after the catch.
Robinson also saw an increase in drops from two to six, and an increase in drop rate from 2.2% to 3.9%.
However, it still resulted in a more efficient receiver. Trubisky had a 93.8 QBR when targeting Robinson in 2019, which is up from 85 in 2018.
Overall
Robinson has some flaws, but was much better in most areas than the year before. The Bears need to find a presence to take attention away over the middle of the field and need to take some of the load off of his shoulders.
It became easy for defenses to key in on Robinson and it limited what he could do with the ball in his hands. Still, the Bears have to be very happy with the progression they saw from one year to the next.