It’s a little late, but good news: I have the week 1 Game Scripts!
Regular readers know all about Game Scripts, but you can learn more about them here. Essentially, Game Scripts is the term I’ve used to represent the average margin of lead or deficit over the course of every second of a game.
In week 1, three won in week 1 despite having a negative Game Script: the Dolphins trailed by 1 point, on average, throughout the game against Washington, Dallas had a -2.7 Game Script against the Giants, and the Chargers came back from a 21-3 deficit to win, which produced a -4.8 Game Script.
Below are the results of every game from week 1.
| Team | H/R | Opp | Boxscore | PF | PA | Margin | Game Script | Pass | Run | Pass Ratio | Opp Pass | Opp Run | Opp Pass Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Titans | @ | Buccaneers | Boxscore | 42 | 14 | 28 | 23.4 | 18 | 32 | 36% | 37 | 26 | 58.7% |
| Bengals | @ | Raiders | Boxscore | 33 | 13 | 20 | 16.9 | 34 | 31 | 52.3% | 45 | 16 | 73.8% |
| Chiefs | @ | Texans | Boxscore | 27 | 20 | 7 | 13.5 | 35 | 32 | 52.2% | 52 | 21 | 71.2% |
| Bills | Colts | Boxscore | 27 | 14 | 13 | 11.3 | 19 | 36 | 34.5% | 51 | 17 | 75% | |
| Patriots | Steelers | Boxscore | 28 | 21 | 7 | 7.9 | 34 | 24 | 58.6% | 41 | 25 | 62.1% | |
| Jets | Browns | Boxscore | 31 | 10 | 21 | 6.5 | 24 | 36 | 40% | 35 | 28 | 55.6% | |
| 49ers | Vikings | Boxscore | 20 | 3 | 17 | 5.3 | 27 | 39 | 40.9% | 37 | 17 | 68.5% | |
| Falcons | Eagles | Boxscore | 26 | 24 | 2 | 5.2 | 35 | 35 | 50% | 52 | 16 | 76.5% | |
| Cardinals | Saints | Boxscore | 31 | 19 | 12 | 4.4 | 32 | 25 | 56.1% | 50 | 20 | 71.4% | |
| Panthers | @ | Jaguars | Boxscore | 20 | 9 | 11 | 4 | 33 | 35 | 48.5% | 45 | 21 | 68.2% |
| Packers | @ | Bears | Boxscore | 31 | 23 | 8 | 1.8 | 23 | 30 | 43.4% | 38 | 33 | 53.5% |
| Broncos | Ravens | Boxscore | 19 | 13 | 6 | 1.8 | 44 | 25 | 63.8% | 34 | 23 | 59.6% | |
| Rams | Seahawks | Boxscore | 34 | 31 | 3 | 1 | 29 | 26 | 52.7% | 47 | 32 | 59.5% | |
| Dolphins | @ | Redskins | Boxscore | 17 | 10 | 7 | -1 | 37 | 18 | 67.3% | 32 | 37 | 46.4% |
| Cowboys | Giants | Boxscore | 27 | 26 | 1 | -2.7 | 45 | 23 | 66.2% | 37 | 24 | 60.7% | |
| Chargers | Lions | Boxscore | 33 | 28 | 5 | -4.8 | 44 | 30 | 59.5% | 31 | 16 | 66% |
- The Chiefs/Texans game is a great example of why we need to use Game Scripts: sometimes, the points differential just isn’t that informative. Kansas City dominated that game, posting the third best Game Script of the week, but came away with just a 7-point win.
- Unsurprisingly, the Bills and Jets stood out as really run-heavy in week 1. But a team you might not have expected to be very run-heavy was… Green Bay. Don’t be fooled by the 8-point win: this was a very even game. The numbers are somewhat skewed by Aaron Rodgers having 8 carries — and also by Rodgers being so freakin’ efficient, as he averaged 10.83 ANY/A — but Rodgers had 23 pass attempts, while non-Rodgers players had 22 carries.
- Miami continued the team’s pass-happy ways: no winning team posted as high a pass ratio in week 1 as the Dolphins. Meanwhile, on the other side of the field, Washington was the only losing team that passed on fewer than half of the team’s plays.
- There has been a lot of lip service paid to how the Saints and Eagles would be run-heavy this year, but that didn’t play out in week 1. The Saints had a Game Script of -4.4 yet threw the ball 50 times! The Eagles were at -5.2 and threw it 52 times! Both teams have invested money at the running back position and let top passing targets move on in the off-season, but in week 1, neither team seemed focused on establishing the run.
- Another really pass-happy team on Sunday was Detroit. It might not look that way at first glance — the Lions lost and had 31 pass attempts, which almost seems low — but think of it this way: Detroit had just 16 rushes in a game the team led, at one point, by a score of 21-3. The Bengals were also pretty pass-happy, with 34 pass attempts and just 29 runs (excluding kneels) in a game that Cincinnati dominated from the start.