THIS MAY BE A LONG RANT SO BE PREPARED........ :-)

I'm a big stat guy, always have been. I never realy paid much attention to defensive stats because I'm an offensive guy. Now that my son is playing and he plays defense, I've been looking at them more and more. I've always did stats so I know enough to make me dangerous. I know that on any given play there can ONLY be 1 solo tackle or 2 Assisted tackle. This is universal from high school on up. Every stat program, including HUDL, only allows this.

 

So, looking over MAXPREPS stats for the state of kentucky I came across this gem.

The leading tackler in Kentucky has 32 solo tackles in 2 games. So i decide to check out his and his teammates stats.

So looking at the box score for their first game they lost 27-8. The team they played ONLY ran 52 total plays. They scored on 4 of those plays so that leaves 48 plays that there could be a tackle. They do not have the passing stats but lets just assume he did not have any incompletions, highly unlikey but what the heck, so there are 48 plays left to make a tackle. They did punt the ball 6 times and kick off twice so that makes 56 times there could be a tackle. The coach has entered into their official stats that his team has 71 solo tackles for that game. Lets repeat that, 71 SOLO tackles on 56 PLAYS??????????

The second game was just as bad, 54 plays, not including however many incompletes the QB threw, and his team has 53 solo tackles.

 

Puts a damper on his kids stats because they are not beleivable. So in 2 games EVERY tackle has been a solo and no assists.

 

OK, rant over. Sorry so long. :-)

There is only one HS "stat" more inaccurate and misleading than "tackles"...

 

...40 time.

Any assists recorded?

If #2 gets to the ball carrier first and then #13, #25 and #71 help bring the ball carrier down how is that scored for tackles?

If #13 helps with bringing the ball carrier down, then #2 and #13 should get credited for the assisted tackle. Normally it's rare to award an assisted tackle to more than 2 players.

But it is up to the home team statistician to how they award it.

Don't get me going on one of my largest pet peeves in high school football. Tackle numbers get out of control with some school's reporting. Just because a player jumps on a pile, it doesn't mean they get an assist on a tackle.

If #2 gets to the ball carrier first and then #13, #25 and #71 help bring the ball carrier down how is that scored for tackles?

More needs to be known with the scenario. If progress is fully halted and the others contribute, I would award it to #2 solo; but, in the same scenario, player #2 may grab a jersey from behind to slow a ball carrier, but the others help which is when 1/2 (or assisted) tackles may be awarded.

If # 13 gets to the ball carrier and helps bring him down in any way then it's an assisted tackle. If #2 is in the process of bringing him down, and #13 is the first on scene and pretty much just helps the mop up, then it should be awarded as a solo tackle for #2. Because of pile on's, is why it's rare to award an assisted tackle to more than 2 players.

And I am not trying to call out any stat takers. It is a challenging job and these are often volunteers wanting to help out a program :thumb:

If play #1 makes the initial contact and holds on, than #2,#3 hit him but he's still up and #4 cleans him up than the 2 Assisted tackles go to #1 and #4. #2 & #3 do not get any stats. Pete from Fern Creek can probably add a little more detail to this.

Also, I do stats live and then go back and watch the video and correct them. With slo-mo and a big screen, it's a little easier to see who actually made the tackles

This is good information to know. I help keep defensive stats and this will allow me to be more accurate going forward.

My 9 year old nephew loves football. The Christian School he attends outside of Athens, GA was coached last year by a guy named Coach Herron. Great coach...you may now know him as the new Head Coach at Georgia Powerhouse Grayson High School. Anyways Coach Herron adores my nephew and always wanted to make sure he was on the sidelines every game. Not sure if it was about superstition or the fact my nephew always could make him smile no matter how stressed he was.

 

I bring this up because last year, my 9 year old nephew had a job all season. He was the official spotter for tackles. He stood beside the statistician on the sideline and told him the number of who made the tackle.

 

My point is this... I trust my 9 year old nephew's judgement on tackles more than 99% of these statisticians.. and even then I say he probably got assisted tackles right at best 35% of the time.

Now don't get me wrong there are some people who are very good at their job and I think give fair and accurate totals..but for each one of those I think you will find 3 to 4 who are either taking a wild guess or giving tackles to their cousin's kid even though he wasn't even 10 feet from the ball HAHA