As many readers know, Pro-Football-Reference.com produced remarkable search tools that let readers access that remarkable database to answer all sorts of trivia questions. PFR has now migrated that function to Stathead, and I thought I’d help my readers get use to the Stathead tools, too. So let’s go around the NFL and use the Stathead player and team tools to examine some of the interesting stats through three weeks of the 2020 season. [continue reading…]

Previously:

• Week 1 Game Scripts

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You may have heard that the New Orleans Saints have now gone 45 straight games without allowing a 100-yard rusher. That’s very impressive: it includes 40 straight regular season games since Samaje Perine of Washington rushed 23 times for 117 yards in an overtime loss when Kirk Cousins was still the team’s quarterback; it also includes 5 straight playoff games (including three losses, naturally).

The defense with the longest streak without allowing a 100-yard rusher, since at least 1950, appears to be the Cleveland Browns. On opening day of the 1951 season, Verl Lillywhite of the 49ers rushed 17 times for 145 yards, including runs of 20, 28, and 33 yards. But from 1951 to 1955 — a span of 60 games during the 12-game era — no other player rushed for more than 83 yards against the mighty Browns. No player rushed for 100 yards in any of the Browns five playoff games during that era, too, although Doak Walker came very close. During Cleveland’s streak of 59 straight games without allowing a 100-yard rusher, the other 11 teams allowed 109 different 100-yard rushing games.

A few years ago, I looked at longest streaks without allowing a 100-yard rusher. At the time, I didn’t have individual player rushing data from the ’50s, so the longest streak was 53 straight games by the early ’90s Eagles. If the Saints go the full season without allowing a 100-yard rusher, that would bring them to 54 straight games, breaking the modern era record.

The table below shows all regular season streaks since 1950 of at least 33 games, along with the individual rusher who broke the mark. [continue reading…]

Previously:

• Week 1 Passing Stats

Kirk Cousins had a very bad day on Sunday. He averaged -1.38 ANY/A against the Colts, an unspeakably bad performance from an above-average quarterback most weeks. Since 2010, there have been just 22 other times where a quarterback finished with below -1.00 ANY/A, and most of those quarterbacks were very bad.

It was bad on all fronts. He threw 3 interceptions and took 3 sacks, so there were plenty of negative plays. He also threw for only five first downs. His completion percentage was bad, too, and he only averaged 10 yards per completion. The passing offense gained just 95 net yards, and obviously negative adjusted net yards.

How bad was it? Carson Wentz was a disaster on Sunday, throwing for only 242 yards on 43 pass attempts, with 0 TDs, 2 INTs, and only 13 first downs. But in terms of passing value added relative to average, Cousins’s performance was twice as bad as Wentz’s was.

How bad was it? The Vikings finished with a passer rating of 13.0. The last time a team won with a passer rating under 15.0 and their opponent did not have a passer rating under 15.0, was way back in 2008, when the Panthers and Jake Delhomme threw 4 INTs but still beat the Andrew Walter-led Oakland Raiders. If you are wondering why that previous sentence had to be so clunky, it’s because yes there was in fact a game where both teams had passer ratings under 15.0 in recent memory: a 2010 disaster of a game featuring Todd Collins, Matt Moore, and Jimmy Clausen.

On the plus side, we have Bills quarterback Josh Allen, who had the best passing game of his career in week two. The 2018 first round pick finally had his first 300-yard game in week 1 of the 2020 season, and promptly followed that up with his first 400-yard game on Sunday. The 2020 season represents just 6.7% of Allen’s career games played to date, but 12.3% of his career passing yards. Allen became just the 20th player to throw for 400+ yards and have a passer rating of 145.0+ in NFL history; of course, just one of those games came before 1984, with the majority coming in the last ten years.

Below are the full week 2 passing stats. As a reminder, the new formula to calculate Adjusted Yards per Dropback is (Passing Yards + 9 * Pass 1st Downs + 11 * Pass TDs – 45 * INTs – 50 * Fumbles Lost) divided by (Pass Attempts + Sacks). In week 2, the average was 9.37, slightly up from 9.20 in week 1. So for each passer, we multiply his number of dropbacks by the difference between his AdjYd/DB average and 9.37 to create a passing value.
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I’ve written several histories of NFL career records, but the history of the career receiving touchdowns record is the most fascinating to me. Twelve men held the receptions title, and eleven held the receiving yards record. Seven different players held the record for rushing yards and for rushing touchdowns. Eleven quarterbacks held the passing yardage crown, while ten captured the touchdown title. This record is different. Thanks, primarily, to Don Hutson and Jerry Rice, only four players have held the record for receiving touchdowns since the NFL started keeping official statistics in 1932.

Receivers to Hold the Career Receiving Touchdowns Record

Johnny Blood (7 years as record-holder)

By the end of 1932, the first season in the official NFL record book, Blood had scored 25 receiving touchdowns. Most of those occurred in the “pre-stat” era, with 22 of his scores coming between 1926 and 1931. That includes a career high (by far) eleven touchdowns in 1931—he never had another season with more than five touchdowns. He played until 1938, slowly racking up touchdowns and retiring with 37 through the air.

Don Hutson (49 years, 3 months as record-holder)

Huston finished the 1939 season with 36 receiving touchdowns, just one shy of Blood’s record. To begin 1940, he tied the record in the third quarter of a blowout loss to the Bears, and he broke it in the opening quarter of a blowout win over the Cardinals. He got a fortunate break when WW2 took much of the talent from the NFL; during the war-depleted years, Hutson had by far his most productive touchdown seasons (1941-43 were his only three season with double-digit receiving scores). He ended his career with 99 receiving touchdowns, a number that wasn’t approached for decades.

Steve Largent (3 years as record-holder)

Largent was two touchdowns shy of the record coming into the 1989 season. Things looked dim for the receiver, who scored in week one but followed with ten straight weeks in which he failed to find the end zone. However, he was able to tie the record in game twelve and subsequently break it in week 14. The last touchdown of his storied Hall of Fame career was the one that gave him sole possession of the record. He didn’t hold the record for long, because the most prolific player of all time was already on his heels.

Jerry Rice (27 years, 10 months as record-holder, so far)

Through seven seasons (1985-91), Rice had already compiled 93 receiving touchdowns. ^[1]He did this despite a slow start, hauling in just three touchdown passes as a rookie. Rice then scored 15, 22, 9, 17, 13, and 14 receiving touchdowns, averaging a touchdown per game over that span. In week 12 of 1992, Rice tied Largent’s record in a victory over the Eagles. The following week, in a dominant win over the Dolphins, World gained sole possession of the record, becoming the first player in history to top the century mark. He added an incredible 96 touchdowns after that, walking away with 197 and a distant lead over anyone before or since. ^[2]The second and third place receivers, Randy Moss and Terrell Owens, were incredibly productive for several years. Moss finished with 156, and Owens finished with 153. The two of them have a sizable … Continue reading

Future of the Career Receiving Touchdowns Record

This record seems like it’s going to last for a pretty long time. As of today, the top ten active leaders in touchdowns are:

Larry Fitzgerald – 120
Rob Gronkowski – 79
Jimmy Graham – 75
Antonio Brown – 75
Jason Witten – 72
A.J. Green – 63
Demaryius Thomas – 63
Greg Olsen – 60
Julio Jones – 57
DeSean Jackson – 55
DeAndre Hopkins – 55

Fitzgerald is 37 and is still 77 touchdowns short of the record. Gronk needs 118 to tie, which would more than double his career output to date. Given his injury history, it’s a little outlandish to expect him to come anywhere close. Graham is 122 shy and is just not very good anymore, and he hasn’t been for some time now. Brown is also 122 away, and he is both 32 years old and out of the league for being a total head case.

Witten has looked and played like an old man since he entered the league. Green looks like he aged a decade overnight. Thomas can’t find a team, and Olsen looks his age. Jones famously doesn’t score touchdowns, while Jackson is 33 and not the threat he once was.

Looking for younger players on the right track, I don’t see anyone. But let’s discuss a few anyway. How about DeAndre Hopkins, Mike Evans, Odell Beckham Jr., Davante Adams, and Travis Kelce.

Hopkins is 28 and has 55 touchdowns. His career high was 13 in 2017. For reference, Rice had eight seasons with at least that many touchdowns (and six with more). He’d have to replicate his best season eleven times to own the record!

Evans is just 27, and he has 50 scores. He has also only had two seasons in which he played the full 16 games. With 9 touchdowns per 16 games over his career, he’d have to reproduce his career average—without missing a game—for over 15 more years. Or average 14.7 touchdowns a year over the next decade.

Beckham started his career on fire, scoring 35 touchdowns in his first three seasons. He’s one of just six players in history to accomplish that. But from 2017 to present, he has played in just 34 games and scored a mere 14 touchdowns. That means after his tremendous start he is now 148 touchdowns short of the record with no signs of reclaiming past glory.

Adams is 28 and has 46 touchdowns. Most of that came from 2016-28, during which time he scored 35 times. He had a down year in 2019, scoring just five touchdowns. That might not seem like an issue, but things have to go perfectly to take the crown from the king. Rice started slow with three touchdowns, but after that, he didn’t have a season as low as five until he was 35 years old and played in just two games. During his “peakiest” peak, from ages 24-33, his touchdown output looked like something from a video game: 15, 22, 9 (his down year), 17, 13, 14, 10, 15, 13, and 15.

Kelce will be 31 in a few weeks. He’s a scoring machine for a tight end, but with 38 touchdowns he is still 159 shy of Rice. If he was guaranteed to match his career high every year until he broke the record, he’d have to play until he was 47.

Maybe Reek Hill is a sleeper. He is a big play threat and a favorite target of a guy who throws a lot of touchdown passes. I don’t think he stands a chance. At 26, he’s already older than he seems. And he has just 33 touchdowns. Rice had 49 by that age and added 97 over the following seven seasons. Then he threw in another 51 just for funsies.

What I’m saying is this: I don’t believe any active player will break Rice’s record, even with expanded schedules.

When the Jets decided to hire Adam Gase as head coach, I noted that it was an unusual hire because Gase’s teams had been outscored significantly when he was the Dolphins head coach.  His record in Miami was 23-25, the result of winning a number of close games.  So what did that mean for Gase’s prospects going forward?

And we could look at this two ways: did he coach a terrible team that got lucky to have a few more wins than they should have (in which case Gase should be considered a bad coach), or did he oversee a talent-poor team and coached them up to win more often than they should have (in which case Gase should be considered a good coach)?

From 2016 to 2018, Miami went 18-5 in games decided by 7 or fewer points, and 20-6 in games decided by 8 or fewer points.  Both records were comfortably the best in the league.  So, is that sparkling record in close games a positive for Gase — hey, he’s a great coach who wins when the talent level is close! — or a negative for Gase (he’s a terrible coach who is lucky his teams won as often as they did).

Unfortunately for Jets fans, nearly all the research on this subject suggests that a team’s record in close games is not reflective of skill, but of luck.  The Jets have been terrible in close games in recent years, while Gase has been great: you would expect some regression to the mean in either instance, and I would project the Jets to be about .500 in close games during Gase’s tenure.

The bigger cause for concern, then, would be this: Gase went an almost unfathomable 3-19 in games decided by more than 8 points during his time in Miami.

A few months later, I dove even deeper into Gase’s weird splits in close and non-close games. Over his three years in Miami, Gase’s teams had the best record in the NFL in close games, and the second-worst record in non-close games.  Based on how the other highly-regarded coaches fared in this split, I wrote that “if Adam Gase is a great coach who was overachieving with a bad roster, he’s pretty unique in that regard.”

Fast forwarded 18 games later, and the evidence is more convincing than ever that Adam Gase is not a great coach.  The evidence is also still there that Gase has this weird split between close and non-close games. In New York, Gase is 2-9 in games decided by more than 8 points, and 5-2 in games decided by 8 or fewer points.  And that includes a game where the Jets trailed the winless Dolphins by 11 points with 20 seconds left, and kicked a field goal to cut the lead to 8 in the hopes of recovering an onside kick, scoring a touchdown, converting a 2-point attempt, and outscoring Miami in overtime.  If not for that meaningless field goal, Gase would be 2-10 in non-close games and 5-1 in close games with the Jets.

But ultimately, Gase is 5-28 in games decided by more than 8 points in his now 4+ year head coaching career.  He’s also 25-8 in close games!  The graph below shows the points differential for Gase’s teams in each of his 67 games as head coach.  If you think this graph looks like an iceberg, you are right: most of the action takes place below the surface.

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The Jets and Eagles both lost division games in week one by the same 27-17 score. But don’t let the final score deceive you: these two games were as different as can be. With 5 minutes left in the 2nd quarter of both games, the Jets trailed Buffalo 21-0 while the Eagles led 17-0 over the Washington Football Team. The final scores were not at all indicative of how the game unfolded: the Bills dominated the game start to finish, and only a late Jets touchdown kept the final score respectable. Buffalo finished with a +12.4 Game Script, meaning the Bills led — on average — by 12.4 points over every second of the game. Meanwhile, Washington had a -5.3 Game Script — trailing big early, trailing entering the 4th quarter, and only taking a lead with less than 7 minutes remaining — in the comeback win.

Every year, I calculate the game scripts each week for each NFL game. The Game Script is simply the name I assign to the points differential over every second of the game. Last year, Baltimore had the highest Game Script of week 1, and they repeated that feat on the opening weekend of 2020. There were several notable comebacks in week 1 of the 2020 season, but Washington and Chicago stood out with huge comebacks. The full Game Scripts data below. [continue reading…]

In week 1 of the 2019 season, Lamar Jackson had a breakout performance that foreshadowed his MVP season. And while his performance in week 1 of the 2020 season wasn’t quite as dominant, it still was the most effective passing performance — at least, statistically — of any quarterback in week one.

I like to post the weekly passing numbers and analyze which quarterbacks had the most valuable stat lines. I am going to tweak the formula a bit this year. The normal formula is based on Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt, which is (Passing Yards + 20*Passing TDs – 45*INTs – Sack Yards Lost) divided by (Pass Attempts + Sacks). But this year, I will make a couple of changes. I will incorporate a first down bonus of 9 yards, and since all touchdowns are also first downs, that means the multiplier on touchdowns will be 11 instead of 20. In addition, I am going to include a penalty of 50 yards for fumbles. So the new formula is (Passing Yards + 9 * Pass 1st Downs + 11 * Pass TDs – 45 * INTs – 50 * Fumbles Lost) divided by (Pass Attempts + Sacks).

Baltimore’s third-year quarterback went 20/25 for 275 yards with 3 TDs and 0 INTs against the Browns, while taking 2 sack and losing 14 yards. That means Jackson had 429 Adjusted Yards on 27 dropbacks, or 15.89 Adjusted Yards per Dropback. Overall, passers in week 1 averaged 9.20 Adjusted Yards per Dropback. To calculate passing value, we multiply that difference (15.89 – 9.20) by Jackson’s 27 dropbacks. Therefore, Jackson added 181 adjusted yards over average this week, the best of any passer. The way this formula works, all passers will sum to zero value over the week, since we are measuring value compared to average.

That means some quarterbacks will have to fare poorly, and nobody did worse than Carson Wentz. The Eagles passer went 24/42 for 270 passing yards, with 2 TDs, but that’s where the good stats end. Wentz threw 2 INTs and lost a fumble, and was sacked a whopping 8 times and lost 62 yards, and only picked up 13 first downs on his 50 dropbacks. Wentz averaged 4.14 Adjusted Yards per Dropback, which means he produced -253 Adjusted Yards relative to league average.

The full week 1, 2020, passing stats below: [continue reading…]

This is an update and revision to a post I wrote after Peyton Manning’s retirement following the 2015 season. I originally penned it to celebrate Manning’s triumph over the record books and look back at the history of the record. Since then, Drew Brees and Tom Brady have broken that record, and both look to push it to new heights as they battle for the crown. Brees beat Brady to the mark and hasn’t looked back yet. The Saint has a history of beating the odds. He has been lauded by an adoring media and legions of fans, and deservedly so. However, with all the attention given to modern players, we often fail to properly remember former greats – legends of the game who paved the way for the sports celebrities of today.

More than relics from days past, these men were trailblazers who helped legitimize the sport we have grown to love. Unlike the iconic sports figures of today, many of these players were actual heroes, serving in the military and coming home to work full-time jobs to support their families. Before quarterbacks were millionaires, they were mostly indistinguishable from the everyman. Except on Sundays. On Sundays, they became giants. [continue reading…]

Get ready for part 16 in my neverending series The Grand List, or: the top 1000 players in history in the opinion of one guy on the internet. This is an offense-heavy section of the list, with 37 of the 50 players on that side of the ball. There are quarterbacks whose own fans didn’t seem to care for them, a stylistic variety of running backs, receivers spanning nearly the whole of the league’s history, a group of underrated tight ends, and something for everyone along the offensive line. While there aren’t many defenders, each main corps is represented. Maybe you’ll like it.

Previous articles in the series

The Grand List, part 1: Includes honorable/special mentions and players 1000-990.
The Grand List, part 2: Includes players 989-965.
The Grand List, part 3: Includes players 964-940.
The Grand List, part 4: Includes players 939-901.
The Grand List, part 5: Includes players 900-876.
The Grand List, part 6: Includes players 875-851.
The Grand List, part 7: Includes players 850-810.
The Grand List, part 8: Includes players 809-780.
The Grand List, part 9: Includes players 779-750.
The Grand List, part 10: Includes players 749-700.
The Grand List, part 11: Includes players 699-650.
The Grand List, part 12: Includes players 649-600.
The Grand List, part 13: Includes players 599-550.
The Grand List, part 14: Includes players 549-500.
The Grand List, part 15: Includes players 499-450.

Let us go then, you and I.

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It’s time for the fifteenth installment of The Grand List, or: the top 1000 players in football history. Or something like that. This is an ideal post for long ball fetishists, nose tackle aficionados, and fans of linemen who were underrated because of the skill players for whom they blocked. Please send all hate mail to Chase. He loves reading that stuff.

Previous articles in the series

The Grand List, part 1: Includes honorable/special mentions and players 1000-990.
The Grand List, part 2: Includes players 989-965.
The Grand List, part 3: Includes players 964-940.
The Grand List, part 4: Includes players 939-901.
The Grand List, part 5: Includes players 900-876.
The Grand List, part 6: Includes players 875-851.
The Grand List, part 7: Includes players 850-810.
The Grand List, part 8: Includes players 809-780.
The Grand List, part 9: Includes players 779-750.
The Grand List, part 10: Includes players 749-700.
The Grand List, part 11: Includes players 699-650.
The Grand List, part 12: Includes players 649-600.
The Grand List, part 13: Includes players 599-550.
The Grand List, part 14: Includes players 549-500.

Enjoy.

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