EDIT: THIS IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT FOR QBs!
What it all means... my "thesis" on RS, RP and MS on Offense:
How are they actually related? No one has ever written a formal document on this, so I thought I'd actually do my part to give to the community
.
I've heard many theories over the past couple of years, including...
- "RS is a player's speed around corners"
- "RP is acceleration"
- "MS is obviously max speed"
Well, these generalized statements are correct to a degree. However, I looked at the relationship between these attributes about a year and a half ago, when I was taking basic kinematics as a frosh engineer... One thing that I found after looking up from my physics book to check something on a tecmo rom I was rating - there had to be an obvious mathematical relationship between those numbers - could it relate to physics at all?
Synopsis
Surprisingly, it did. RS is not an offensive players speed around corners. RP is indeed acceleration. MS is indeed max speed. But there was a missing variable... I randomly plugged in values to this equation,
V = Vo + at
and found how long (in seconds) it took for offensive players like bo jackson to accelerate.
V = MS
Vo = RS
a = RP
t = time in seconds
when I reduced RP to a low level and timed with a stopwatch how long it took for a player to get from his RS to his MS, it was very similar to the theoretical calculated value retrieved from the basic kinematics equation.
of course, being a computer game, there are limits of the programming... for example, I dont know the exact absolute value equation needed to calculate relations that use negative acceleration.
Here are some basic points you should know about the relationship
1) Every offensive player will start at whatever RS is given
2) Every offensive player will eventually end at the given MS (unless tested at the boundaries and extremes)
Here are the effects of RP
1) When RS is lower than MS, a high RP will cause a player to nearly immediately accelerate to his MS
2) When RS is lower than MS, a low RP will cause a player to gradually accelerate to his MS
3) When RS is higher than MS, RP doesn't really matter that much; the equation above doesn't hold true, and the player will start out at his RS and almost instantly fade to his MS.
Practical Applications
Bruddog and I have discussed using these above effects of RP to exhibit drastic differences between starters, backups, deep-threat receivers, etc... for example, in a previous thread bruddog showed that in his 1990 rom he is rating Bo Jackson as such:
25 RS
25 RP
63 MS
This is due to the fact that Bo had an amazing yards per carry and was known to be very fast... however, he was only a split-time back with Marcus Allen. He only had 500 yards on the season I think.
What this rating scheme would do is outlined above in my observations of RP: Bo would start at 25 S and gradually accelerate to 63 S. He would be an effective runner, but nowhere nearly as effective as a "normal" 38RS, 69RP, 63MS back - let along a 56MS back.
Finally,
RS is not "speed around corners". However, you need to remember that your player will indeed be reduced (or increased) back to his RS if your motion is broken (non-fluid) on the play. That is, if you stop and start again or change direction 90 degrees or more.
by kingsoby1 on Sat Jan 08, 2005 5:11 pm 
