To recap, in case you missed some of the early posts on the Nike SPARQ rating we've adjusted for use with Seattle's player prosects, here's some background:
The Nike SPARQ Rating has been tweaked over the last ten years, and was develop...
To recap, in case you missed some of the early posts on the Nike SPARQ rating we've adjusted for use with Seattle's player prosects, here's some background:
The Nike SPARQ Rating has been tweaked over the last ten years, and was developed inside Nike. Both Davis and I have speculated that Pete Carroll was involved in the development of the system. As Davis put it, "In the early days of SPARQ, Carroll was the highest profile coach in college football. Carroll was consumed with recruiting the best athletes and football players in America to USC, and he was very successful in that endevour. The SPARQ team included Andy Bark, Peter Ruppe and Matt James. Per Scott Enyeart, Andy Bark developed the Elite 11 High School QB Camps, of which Carroll is highly involved. Peter Ruppe is a famous Nike sneaker marketer (including Brand Jordan), and Matt James is an athletic trainer, and all three of these men have ties to Pete Carroll and WinForever. I have seen Ruppe and James speak, in-person, at Carroll's WinForever events."
Further, Seahawks Strength and Conditioning Coach Chris Carlisle has had a big part in the development of the SPARQ program, - as Scott Enyeart put it - 'Carlisle is the "Master Trainer" for SPARQ,' and likely works in conjunction with Nike to design Seattle's offseason program.
According to this Nike SPARQ Offseason Training Program Manual:
The Nike Football SPARQ Training Pre-Season Program was developed in conjunction with Chris Carlisle, the current Strength and Conditioning Coach of the Seattle Seahawks. Prior to coming to the Seahawks, Carlisle was an integral part of Pete Carroll's staff at USC and is credited with developing the explosive style of play that enabled the Trojans to become the most dominate program in college football over the past decade.
So, while we're simply dot-connecting, it seems very likely that the Seahawks use some variation of the SPARQ system, not only for their 'testing' numbers, but also for their offseason training. It's a big part of their program, and likely a big reason they've seemed to focus so closely on the 'rare' types of athletes in the Draft.
This system works well for Seattle: Carroll and Carlisle are always looking for that explosive play, and are matched up with John Schneider and his Al Davis style of evaluation - both Schneider and Director of College Scouting Scot McCloughan are part of the Ron Wolf/Al Davis coaching tree that espouses the 'bigger, faster, stronger' philosophies. Outside of turnovers, the most telling statistic to the Seahawks' front office & coaching staff, in both our opinion, is counting explosive plays. Limiting explosive plays is paramount to Pete Carroll on defense, and creating explosive plays is equally important to Carroll on offense and special teams.
GM John Schneider has hinted that based on their studies, a team that wins BOTH the explosive play and the turnover battle (hits a "daily double" as it's called at the VMAC) in a single game wins almost every time. How much? Davis has speculated that a team that hits a "daily double" wins 85-90% of the time on Sunday, if not more.
This leads to the question. How does a team create explosive plays? Perhaps, by finding explosive players. That's where this SPARQ series comes in.
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Luke Willson was the 9th tight end selected in the 2013 NFL Draft. He went a full three rounds later than his college teammate Vance McDonald, whom the Niners chose in the 2nd round. John Schneider, after selecting Willson, made it a point to say that the 6'5, 251 pounder was the 'second-best tester' at the tight end position this year. It's worth noting that our numbers say that he was the best tester, and while it's certainly likely our metrics are slightly different than the Seahawks' front office, it's also possible the first-best tester was some guy we didn't plug in to the equation.
For reference on that, you'll also possibly remember that Schneider also said at one point that Ricardo L
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