Even without analytics or counting stats, anyone watching on Sunday afternoon would likely agree they saw New York Giants rookie right guard Francis Mauigoa have arguably his finest performance yet.
Tell that to Pro Football Focus, which both concurs and believes the No. 10 pick had another underwhelming outing. What should sound contradictory instead becomes reality when you get PFF involved.
Let’s start with the good: PFF credited Mauigoa with no sacks or quarterback hits, and three hurries on Jameis Winston were the only black marks against him across 89 snaps. Common sense suggests that the former Miami Hurricanes standout would have rated extremely high, right?
Not quite, as Mauigoa only recorded a 64.8 pass-block grade. PFF was also significantly down on his run blocking, giving him a career-worst 43.7 grade.
Pro Football Focus clearly has an issue with New York Giants rookie offensive lineman Francis Mauigoa
Nearly every class I took from K-12 and my four years in college viewed 65 percent as a passing grade. The occasional college class required at least a 70 percent, but those were the exception, not the norm.
We bring this up because PFF grades are notoriously subjective, and a human is typically who assigns them. They’re not as simple as a running back averaging over four yards per carry because he had 102 yards on 20 attempts. Pro Football Focus also lacks a standard formula, like baseball’s slugging percentage, which is determined by dividing total bases by total at-bats.
If you understand how someone can go 86-of-89 but still finish with a sub-65 score, please step forward and share with the class. Pro Football Focus narrowly failed Mauigoa as a pass protector despite the eye test and their own statistics indicating he deserved a far better score.
Remember back in Week 1 when PFF drew significant pushback for an overly harsh grade on Bears quarterback Caleb Williams? When the company published a follow-up article, analyst Mark Chichester explained the grading process as such:
“PFF grades were built to be box-score agnostic and to capture everything the box score misses. Every play is evaluated on what the player did with it, independent of what the stat line says happened afterward. And that works in both directions.”
So in theory, Mauigoa should have graded significantly higher than he did because he didn’t allow a sack or pressure. But hey, there’s a reason why NBC Sports stopped including PFF grades during player introductions.
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