In 2013, the Rams traded up to draft Tavon Austin with the 8th pick and Alec Ogletree at the end of the first round; the franchise also used third round picks on T.J. McDonald and Stedman Bailey.  None of those players, or any other player drafted in 2013 by the Rams, is still on the team. In free agency, St. Louis signed Jake Long from Miami and Jared Cook from Tennessee, and neither of those players — or anyone else signed by the Rams that year — are still on the team.

The 2014 Draft didn’t get off to a better start — St. Louis drafted Greg Robinson with the 2nd overall pick, one of the largest draft busts in recent memory.  But Les Snead — the same GM who traded up for Austin, whiffed on the rest of the 2013 draft, and then drafted Robinson — has been on a very hot streak ever since.  An hour after taking Robinson, the team took Aaron Donald with the 13th pick that year.  Then the Rams drafted Todd Gurley with a 1st round pick in 2015, and traded up for Jared Goff with the 1st pick in 2016.  Those are the team’s best three players, but the bulk of the current roster was acquired in 2017.

Seven starters were added in 2017: wide receiver Robert Woods, offensive linemen Austin Blythe, John Sullivan, and Andrew Whitworth were all veteran acquisitions for the team, while the Rams used 3rd and 4th round picks on LB Samson Ebukam, S John Johnson, and wide receivers Cooper Kupp (8 starts) and Josh Reynolds (8 starts as Kupp’s replacement). It was not the star-studded, Kamara-esque class the Saints had that year, but seven starters is still seven starters.

The graph below shows the amount of AV on the 2018 Rams that was added each year, both via the draft and overall: [continue reading…]

On Thursday, I looked at how the Patriots retooled their roster by using the 2015 Draft class. Yesterday, I showed that the Saints had a remarkable 2017 offseason, finding 7 starters in just one year.

If we do the same sort of analysis for the Chiefs, however, the results aren’t very interesting. There’s no one year that stands out for Kansas City; as you might suspect, the Chiefs have added a bunch of talent over the last three years, and were pretty good before then, too. Take a look at how much AV Kansas City added in each year to its 2018 roster, both via the draft (in black) and overall (in red): [continue reading…]

The 2017 Draft replenished the Saints roster.  New Orleans roster drafted CB Marshon Lattimore with the 11th overall pick, OT Ryan Ramczyk with the 32nd pick, S Marcus Williams with the 42nd pick, Alvin Kamara with the 67th pick.  Those four players have been incredible additions for the team: Kamara and Ramczyk are two of the four Saints with 15+ points of AV in 2018, while the two defensive backs each started 16 games.  In addition, LB Alex Anzalone — taken with the 76th pick — started 7 games this year.

In the 2017 offseason, the Saints also signed ex-Lions guard Larry Warford, ex-Panthers linebacker A.J. Klein, and ex-Cardinals pass rusher Alex Okafor. Those three players were all regular starters on the 2018 Saints.  In fact, 7 of the 16 Saints players with 6+ points of AV this year were added in 2017.   The Saints, in some ways like the Patriots, are here because of their famous quarterback/head coach combo.  Sean Payton and Drew Brees both came to New Orleans in 2006, but the Saints had just completed back-to-back-to-back 7-9 seasons at the end of the 2016 season.  From 2014 to 2016, New Orleans had been outscored by 76 points.  As good as Brees and Payton are, they wouldn’t be here today without what happened in the spring of 2017.

The graph below shows the AV on the 2018 Saints from players drafted by New Orleans (in gold) and drafted or otherwise acquired by New Orleans (in black) from each year since 2006.

Last year, New Orleans nearly made it this far on the backs of those seven players, Brees and Payton, too. It’s been a remarkable two-year run for the Saints, and a reminder that in one offseason, any team can turn it around (and that goes double if you have a Hall of Fame quarterback).

Let’s avoid the obvious: Yes, we know, Tom Brady and Bill Belichick are how the Patriots got here, with ‘here’ being their 8th (!!!!!!!!) consecutive AFC Championship Game appearance.

In 2014, the Patriots won the Super Bowl.  A few months later, the Patriots drafted Malcom Brown with the 32nd pick, and then hit a pair of home runs in the 4th round with DE Trey Flowers and guard Shaq Mason.  In fact, Flowers and Mason are two of the four players drafted in the 4th round or later of the 2015 Draft to have 24 points of career AV through four seasons (Minnesota’s Stefon Diggs and Tampa Bay’s Kwon Alexander are the other two).

Those three players are regular starters for the Patriots, and 3 of the 15 players to have more than 6 points of AV for the 2018 Patriots.  Of those 15 players, 10 came through the draft, but the 2015 Class is the only draft class with more than one of those players.  Four of the 15 players came from other teams, but a fifth is center David Andrews, who was an undrafted free agent signing by New England in 2015.  Andrews has been the best undrafted player from 2015, which means ignoring players that went in the first three rounds, the Patriots got 3 of the best 5 players in the 2015 draft class.  That’s pretty darn good.

New England players had 225 points of AV this year, and the two years where the team added the players responsible for most of that AV came in 2015 (40 points) and 2018 (41 points). Take a look: [continue reading…]

Pro-Football-Reference.com has released its initial set of 2018 Approximate Value numbers have been released by PFR. Thanks to the tireless work of Mike Kania and the P-F-R staff, PFR has now generated the Approximate Values for every player in the NFL this year. For the uninitiated, you can review how AV is calculated here. And if you’re so inclined, you can thank Mike and/or the PFR staff on twitter.

[continue reading…]

Two years ago, I wrote about how the Patriots under Tom Brady were on a remarkable streak. At the time, the Patriots had been favored in 33 consecutive games where Brady was the starting quarterback (during his suspension during DeflateGate, New England was a 9-point underdog against the Cardinals in a game Jimmy Garoppolo started, and a pick’em in a game against the Texans that Jacoby Brissett started; New England won both games).

Since I wrote that article, the Patriots were favored in all 19 games in 2017, and in all 17 games so far during the 2018 season. That brings the total up to an absurd 69 consecutive games that the Patriots have been favored in when Brady is the starting quarterback. And 70 games ago was Super Bowl XLIX, when the Patriots and Seahawks game was a pick’em. That means you have to go back to a game against the Packers in November 2014 to find the last time Brady took the field in a game the Patriots were underdogs.

The graph below shows every Patriots regular (in blue) and playoff (in red) game since 2010.  The non-Brady games at the start of the 2015 season are shown in black circles.  Since point spreads are typically displayed like “Patriots -7”, the Y-Axis shows the point spread but in reverse order (so the Patriots mostly occupy the top half of the graph).  The X-Axis shows the year. [continue reading…]

The graph below shows all 512 team games played in the 2018 season. On the X-Axis is the Game Script; on the Y-Axis is the percentage of plays that were passing plays for that team. As you can see, there’s a pretty clear correlation between Game Script — which is the average points differential over the course of the game — and Pass Ratio. The higher the Game Script, the lower the Pass Ratio:

Here is the best-fit linear formula to estimate a team’s Pass Ratio in 2018, assuming you know the Game Script:

58.76% minus 0.71 * Game Script

In other words, for about every 4 points of Game Script, you would expect a team’s Pass Ratio to decline by nearly 3 percent. A team with a Game Script of +8.0 would be expected to pass on 53.1% of plays, while a team with a -8.0 Game Script would be expected to pass on 64.4% of plays.

Once we know how often a team is expected to pass, we can then figure out which games were the biggest outliers. As it turns out, the Pittsburgh Steelers — playing the season without Le’Veon Bell — had the three most pass-happy games of the season. Playing the Broncos on November 25th, Pittsburgh had a Game Script of -1.5, so we would expect the Steelers to pass on 59.8% of all plays; instead, Pittsburgh threw on a whopping 78.9% of plays. That was the most pass-heavy game of the season once you account for Game Script.

The table below shows the Game Script, expected Pass Ratio, Actual Pass Ratio, and the difference between those two figures for all 512 team games in 2018. [continue reading…]

In late October 2017, I wrote an article about Adam Gase and the Miami Dolphins.  Here was the introduction:

Adam Gase was hired as the Dolphins head coach last year. His tenure with the team has been both successful and underwhelming, which is pretty hard to do. The Dolphins are 14-9 under Gase, tied with the Packers for the 8th-best record in the NFL. It feels hard to imagine, but Miami has a better record than Philadelphia or Denver since 2016, and has as many wins as the Falcons.

On the other hand, Miami has a -77 points differential, which is the 7th-worst in the league. That’s a very stark difference: most teams have records that are proportional to their points differential, but not Miami. Tennessee (11th in record, 20th in points differential) and Houston (14th, 23rd) are the next two biggest outliers in that direction, with winning percentage ranks that are 9 slots better than their points differential ranks; Miami is at +17.5, by being tied for 8th in record and 26th in points differential. The Saints (t-19th; 8th), Jaguars (29th; 19th), and Chargers (t-27th; 18th) are the biggest underachievers by this method.

That article was written following week 8 of the 2017 season, roughly the halfway point of Gase’s tenure with the team.  What happened since?  Miami went from 14-9 with a -77 points differential to 9-16 with a -166 points differential.  In some ways, though, the Dolphins still overachieved: the team ranked 29th in points differential from week 9, 2017 through the end of 2018, and 25th in winning percentage.

Gase was fired in Miami, but his legacy remains a bit complicated.  Miami finished with the 29th-best points differential among the 32 teams during his 3-year tenure, but the 18th-best winning percentage.  Now, you may say it doesn’t matter whether the Dolphins were the 18th best team or the 29th best team — neither is very good.  But I do think that is a large enough distinction that it merits review.

That, of course, is because the New York Jets decided to hire Gase to become the team’s next coach.  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 Case 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.

I tweeted this 10 days ago:

Tampa Bay’s passing attack was very good this year, and it was also very underrated last year. In 2017, Jameis Winston led all quarterbacks in percentage of pass attempts that picked up a first down. And while Winston and Ryan Fitzpatrick both had ups and downs in 2018, after Winston replaced Fitzpatrick in week 11, he played like one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL over the last two months (just like he did in 2017). Winston’s biggest problem has been turnovers, but given that he just turned 25 years old last week, I don’t think his career is set in stone. And we know that interception rates are pretty random from year to year, so there is a good chance Winston can bring his interception rate under control.

The big question, though, is can Winston keep being one of the game’s best players at picking up huge chunks of yards while limiting his turnovers? Well, his 2019 is off to a good start, as he just found his perfect coach: Bruce Arians has come out of retirement to coach the Bucs. It is telling that Arians only was willing to re-enter the NFL to coach the Browns and Baker Mayfield or Tampa Bay and Winston. And that is not too surprising, at least not to me: Winston is, in my opinion, capable of becoming the next Carson Palmer and playing at an All-Pro level under the right coach. And I am sure that Arians seems a lot in Winston that he saw in Palmer, particularly when it comes to the vertical passing game.

The graph below shows each quarterback season (with at least 224 pass attempts) since 2015. The X-Axis shows how many air yards (i.e., yards in the air the football traveled) each passer gained, on average, on all pass attempts. The Y-Axis shows how many air yards (which excludes yards gained after the catch) each passer gained, on average, on completed passes. The quarterbacks that stand out the most during the last four years are Palmer and Winston (and Fitzpatrick on the 2018 Bucs). [continue reading…]

In a regular season game against the Lions, Bears field goal kicker Cody Parkey missed 2 field goals and 2 extra points that was notable because all 4 misses hit the uprights. Last night, Parkey’s leg somehow vaulted another ball into the uprights (with a tip to Treyvon Hester, literally) in a much more painful situation.  The #3 seed Bears, at home against the Eagles, trailed 16-15 with 10 seconds remaining when Parkey lined up for a 43-yard field goal.  After Parkey’s kick hit the left upright, then bounced on the crossbar, and then landed in the field of play, the Bears magical season was over.

Parkey is not alone. Below are the most heartbreaking, last-second missed field goals in the postseason since 1990 — also known as since Norwood, which remains by a large margin the most heartbreaking miss in postseason history. To qualify, a kick must have been in overtime or in the final seconds of regulation, and the kicking team had to lose the game.

#10) Mike Vanderjagt (Colts) against the Dolphins (2000-12-30)

The Colts led 14-0 in the Wild Card round against the Dolphins before allowing Miami to send the game to overtime at 17 apiece. After a defensive stop, Indianapolis drove 51 yards to set up a game-winning field goal attempt from Vanderjagt, who had made 25 of 27 attempts during the regular season. But his 50-yard attempt was no good, the Dolphins drove down the field for the winning score. Two years later, Vanderjagt blamed his Colts teammates and coaches for the team’s lack of playoff success, and three years after that, Vanderjagt would strike again.

#9) No Field Goal Attempt (Giants) against the 49ers (2003-01-05)

You read that correctly: this one was so painful in part because Matt Bryant never even had a chance. The Giants blew a 38-14 lead to the 49ers, as San Francisco came all the way back to take a 39-38 lead with one minute to go. New York drove down the field and got to the 49ers 23-yard line with just six seconds remaining. There, disaster struck: Trey Junkin, signed by the Giants just days earlier, botched the snap, and the Giants never had a chance to kick the game-winning field goal. [continue reading…]

The 2018 season was the greatest offensive season in NFL history. Teams averaged a whopping 23.3 points per game, which technically ranks second behind the 2013 season (23.4). But there is no doubt that the 2018 season was the better offensive season:

In 2018, teams scored 1,286 offensive touchdowns; in 2013, teams scored 1,214 offensive touchdowns.

Field goal kickers were better 5 years ago; teams hit 863 field goals in 2013, and just 802 this season. And don’t forget about the effect of the rules changes on extra points: teams connected on 99.6% of extra points that year, compared to just 94.3% this year while kicking from much farther away. Had kickers had the same rate on extra points in 2018 as they did in 2013, the NFL would have seen 66 more points; meanwhile, teams scored just 33 more points in 2013 compared to 2018.

Teams also scored 20 special teams return touchdowns in 2013, compared to just 13 this year. In addition, teams scored a whopping 26 more touchdowns on defense (95 in 2013, 69 in 2018), and 9 other return touchdowns came in 2013, versus 4 other return touchdowns this year.

So yes, 2018 was the greatest offensive season in history, and it wasn’t particularly close. But that didn’t translate to the Wild Card round of the playoffs, where teams averaged just 18.1 points per game across four games. That’s pretty low by Wild Card round standards: take a look. [continue reading…]

Seattle rushed 24 times for 73 yards tonight against the Cowboys, averaging 3.0 yards per carry.

The Seahawks and Russell Wilson threw for 226 net passing yards on 30 dropbacks, averaging 8.1 yards per pass.

If you knew nothing else but that, you would assume the Seahawks won. After all, that’s a pretty efficient game from the quarterback, and a team would typically run on 44% of all plays in a game that they are winning.

But alas, that was not the case tonight.  Let’s look at the last 10 times a team averaged under 3.0 yards per carry, ran on at least 40% of their plays, and lost a playoff game (teams are 56-10 in the playoffs since 1999 when meeting the first two criteria, because teams usually only run that often if they’re running that poorly because they’re leading):

[continue reading…]

For the third time this season, the Colts and Texans will be sharing the same field. This is the rubber match: Houston won in Indianapolis in September 37-34, while the Colts won in Houston in December, 24-21. This is also just the third matchup — hopefully of many — between Deshaun Watson and Andrew Luck. So who has the advantage?

Houston Pass Offense vs. Indianapolis Pass Defense

The Texans have a good passing offense, with DeAndre Hopkins once again playing at an All-Pro level.  Hopkins was responsible for 38% of all Texans receiving yards and averaged 3.1 yards per Houston pass attempt (excluding sacks); both of those figures easily led the league.  By way of comparison, Julio Jones and Michael Thomas ranked 2nd and 3rd in those categories: both averaged 2.7 yards per team pass attempt and accounted for 34% of their team’s receiving yards.

Houston has two weaknesses in the passing game: the lack of a complement to Hopkins, and the enormous amount of sacks that Watson takes.  The Texans were sacked 62 times and were sacked on 10.9% of all pass plays; both were the worst figures in the NFL.  The Colts defense is pretty average in terms of both pass rush and pass defense.  The Texans have the edge here, although it is not enormous.

Slight edge: Houston

Houston Rush Offense vs. Indianapolis Rush Defense

The Texans have a pretty weird running game: they run a lot but not necessarily that well.   Houston ranked 4th in rushing attempts this year, but in terms of efficiency, finished 27th, and even that is inflated a bit by Watson.  Meanwhile, the Colts have a very good run defense: Indianapolis ranks 4th in rush defense efficiency and 8th in yards allowed.

Key stat: Texans running backs had 47 carries for just 134 yards and 7 first downs in two games against Indianapolis this year; Houston would be wise to lean heavily on Watson today.

Big edge: Indianapolis

Indianapolis Pass Offense vs. Houston Pass Defense

Andrew Luck had a unique year: he was remarkable at avoiding sacks (2.7% sack rate, best in the NFL) but also averaged just 10.7 yards per completion, the fewest of his career.  It was a more conservative version of Luck than we’ve seen in years past, although he still will throw more interceptions than your average top tier quarterback. On the plus side, Luck was outstanding as a passer on third down, which has been a key to the Colts great season.  Indianapolis ranks as the 10th best passing offense, while Houston ranks as the 12th-best passing defense.  This is likely where the game will be decided: J.J. Watt, Jadeveon Clowney, and Whitney Mercilus against the 3rd best offensive line this year (per Pro Football Focus).

Edge: Even

Indianapolis Rush Offense vs. Houston Rush Defense

The Colts have an average rushing attack, so let’s get to the key story: Houston has the best run defense in the NFL. And that was true in the Colts games, too: Indianapolis running backs had 31 carries for just 64 yards and 5 first downs. It would be surprising if Luck finishes with under 40 pass attempts today.

Big Edge: Houston

Special Teams/Coaching

Both of these teams have good special teams, although Houston’s is better.  The coaching matchup is tough to grade here, too.  Frank Reich is a first year head coach, while Bill O’Brien has a 1-2 playoff record.  I would give O’Brien the slight edge due to experience and the home field.

Slight Edge: Houston

Both Watson and Luck are high variance quarterbacks: at their best, they can be MVP-caliber players.  But my concern for the Colts is that they are unlikely to get anything going on the ground, and will force Luck to do too much.  On the road against a talented Texans team, it will take an A game from Luck to win.

Prediction: Houston 24, Indianapolis 14

Team Ratings

Yesterday, I looked at the top offenses in the NFL. Today, the top defenses, as I did last year. Let’s begin with pass defense.

Pass Defense

The Bears, as you would suspect, ranked as the best pass defense in the NFL. We use the same formula to measure pass offenses and pass defenses, and Chicago’s pass defense was nearly a full adjusted yard per dropback than any other team.

(Passing Yards (net of sack yards lost) + Passing Touchdowns * 11 + First Downs * 9 – Interceptions * 45) divided by (Attempts + Sacks)

The Bills, Ravens, Vikings, and Jaguars were all top-5 pass defenses; three of them missed the playoffs, and a fourth nearly did. That’s pretty remarkable but don’t misunderstood the value of a good pass defense. The bottom 5 pass defenses all missed the playoffs, and none came particularly close. [continue reading…]

Last year, I reviewed the top offenses and defenses from the regular season. I am updating that post in two parts this week for the 2018 season. We will look at how each team did in the four major categories: passing offense and rushing offense today, and then passing defense and rushing defense tomorrow.

Passing Offense

The base stat we use to measure passing offenses is Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt, but if we want to be even more precise, we should incorporate first downs. As a result, the formula is:

(Passing Yards (net of sack yards lost) + Passing Touchdowns * 11 + First Downs * 9 – Interceptions * 45) divided by (Attempts + Sacks)

The table below displays team passing yards, which already deducts sack yards lost from gross individual passing yards. And since every touchdown is recorded as a first down for official boxscore purposes, this means that all touchdowns are still worth 20 adjusted yards. But to not make them worth 29 yards, we have to only credit each touchdown with 11 yards.

Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs had the top passing offense by this measure, with the Saints, Rams, and Chargers all standing out as elite passing attacks. The Cardinals and Bills were, by a large amount, the worst passing offenses in the NFL, with the Jets, Jaguars, and Redskins rounding out the bottom five. [continue reading…]

Previously:

• • Week 1 Game Scripts
  • Week 2
  • Week 3
  • Week 4
  • Week 5
  • Week 6
  • Week 7
  • Week 8
  • Week 9
  • Week 10
  • Week 11
  • Week 12
  • Week 13
  • Week 14
  • Week 15
  • Week 16

Dak Prescott and Ezekiel Elliott arrived in Dallas in 2016. Since then, the Cowboys have always been a run-heavy team, and Prescott has alternated between being a very efficient passer on minimal volume and an inconsistent quarterback who has hamstrung the offense. Dallas rarely relies on Prescott to throw often unless the game gets out of hand. The most pass-happy game for Dallas in the last three seasons was a 42-17 blowout loss to Denver, when the Cowboys passed on 79% of plays. And Dallas lost by double digits in all of the other pass-happy (for Dallas) games of the Prescott ere, including against Seattle, Tennessee, and Indianapolis this year, and in Atlanta last year.

That is, until week 17. The Cowboys were tied with the Giants after the first quarter, led by 7 at halftime, by 3 after 3 quarters, and won by 1 point. If you average the points differential at the end of each quarter — here, 0, 7, 3, 1 — you get a result of Dallas +2.8 points. And the Cowboys passed on 69% of all offensive plays.

That number is the second highest in any game of the last 3 years for the Cowboys, but it’s even more remarkable when you consider the context. Until this game, the most often Dallas had passed in a game where they had a positive average points differential after each quarter was 62%, against the Giants (in a game Dallas lost) in 2016.

The graph below shows all 48 games in the Prescott era. On the Y-Axis is the percentage of plays in which the Cowboys passed (plotted from 30% to 90%, since on average teams pass around 60% of the time). On the X-Axis is the average points differential after each quarter for that game. I have put in a gray diamond with a blue outline the Giants week 17, 2018 game, which stands out as a pretty clear outlier: [continue reading…]

Post your playoff predictions in the comments. Here are mine:

Wild Card Round

(3) Houston over (6) Indianapolis
(4) Dallas over (5) Seattle
(5) Chargers over (4) Baltimore
(3) Chicago over (6) Philadelphia

Divisional Round

(1) New Orleans over (5) Dallas
(2) Rams over (3) Chicago
(5) Chargers over (1) Kansas City
(2) New England over (3) Houston

Conference Championships

(2) New England over (5) Chargers
(1) New Orleans over (2) Rams

Super Bowl

(2) New England over (1) New Orleans

Let’s start with the obvious: Patrick Mahomes was never bad.  He had 7 games this season where he averaged at least 10.0 AY/A, 11 games where he averaged at least 9.0 AY/A, and 15 games where he averaged at least 7.0 AY/A.  His worst statistical game of the season came against a good Jaguars defense in a game that got out of hand in Kansas City’s favor early.

The Chiefs also became the first team in history to score at least 26 points in every game; the 1998 Minnesota Vikings had been the previous champion in this category, having scored at least 24 points in every game.

Mahomes finished with 50 touchdown passes, 11 more than every other quarterback in the league. He averaged 8.13 Net Yards per Pass Attempt, a half-yard better than every other full-time starter in the league (Ryan Fitzpatrick has a way of mucking up these stats), and threw for over 5,000 passing yards.  Mahomes led the league with a remarkable 8.89 ANY/A average, the 6th best in modern history.

The table below shows the final passing leaders for the 33 quarterbacks who threw enough pass attempts to qualify for the passing crown. That’s all 32 teams plus both quarterbacks for Tampa Bay. The league average ANY/A this season was a remarkable 6.32, which tops 2015 (6.26) for the most efficient passing season in NFL history. Mahomes, with an 8.89 AY/A average over 606 dropbacks, meaning he provided 1,554 Adjusted Net Yards of value over average. That easily led the league: [continue reading…]

Arizona currently ranks last in each of the five major offensive categories: Points, Yards, First Downs, Net Yards per Attempt, and Yards per Carry. That is a remarkable run of futility due in no small part to the worst offensive line in football. Consider that through 15 games:

• Arizona has scored 201 points; Buffalo ranks 31st with 227 points.
• Arizona has gained just 3,667 yards, the fewest yards through 15 games of any team since 2008; Buffalo ranks 31st with 4,397 yards.
• Arizona has only 227 first downs; Miami is 31st with 235 first downs.
• Arizona averages 4.8 NY/A; Buffalo ranks 31st at 5.0.
• Arizona averages 3.8 YPC; the Bucs and Jets round out the bottom 3 at 3.9 YPC.

[continue reading…]

Previously:

• • Week 1 Game Scripts
  • Week 2
  • Week 3
  • Week 4
  • Week 5
  • Week 6
  • Week 7
  • Week 8
  • Week 9
  • Week 10
  • Week 11
  • Week 12
  • Week 13
  • Week 14
  • Week 15

In week 16, both New York teams fell to superstar quarterbacks. The big comebacks of the week were engineered by Andrew Luck and the Colts against the Giants and Aaron Rodgers of the Packers against the Jets. The Giants led 14-0 after the first quarter, 17-7 at halftime, 24-21 after the third, and 27-21 with one minute to go, before Luck threw the game-winning touchdown pass. The Jets led the Packers 35-20 entering the 4th quarter, before the Packers scored on three straight drives to take a 38-35 lead. The Jets forced overtime, but the Packers scored a touchdown on the opening possession of OT, Green Bay’s third straight clutch drive that ended with a TD. The full Game Scripts below: [continue reading…]

In 2013 and 2014, no running backs were selected in the first round. In 2015, Todd Gurley and Melvin Gordon were selected at 10 and 15, but the return of the highly drafted running back came one year later.

In 2016, Ezekiel Elliott was the 4th overall pick. He helped the Cowboys to a 9-win improvement.

In 2017, Leonard Fournette was the 4th overall pick. He helped the Jaguars to a 7-win improvement.

On their own, of course, neither player was worth that many wins. But that was part of the argument used when the New York Giants took a running back — Saquon Barkley in this instance — with the second overall pick, ahead of say, Sam Darnold. The thought process was that the Giants might have one last run in them under Eli Manning, and Barkley could have an Elliot- or Fournette-like impact for Big Blue. And there was evidence that drafting a top-5 running back typically leads to a big improvement in wins for a team; in addition to Elliott and Fournette, Reggie Bush and the three running backs selected in the top 5 of the ’05 Draft all added at least 5 wins to their teams.

On one hand, Barkley clearly didn’t lead to that sort of impact. In 2017, the Giants went 3-13; this year, New York is 5-10, pending a meaningless week 17 game against the Cowboys. On the other, Barkley has probably exceeded even the most optimistic of expectations, producing 1,884 yards from scrimmage through 15 games. Whatever you thought about Barkley the prospect, Barkley the NFL player certainly hasn’t disappointed.

But that only serves to underscore how a star running back isn’t worth a top-5 pick, especially in a draft with potential franchise quarterbacks available. Barkley has averaged 4.9 yards per carry (10th-best), rushed for 1,198 yards (3rd-best) and rushed for 10 touchdowns (5th-best): he has been a big improvement on the ground for an offense that relied on Orleans Darkwa and Wayne Gallman last year. And as a receiver, Barkley has lived up to the billing: he has 87 receptions on a 77.0% catch rate and has averaged 7.9 yards per catch. He hasn’t lost a fumble all season!

But the Giants, perhaps in part due to bad luck, have remained a bad team. New York is 2-4 in games decided by 3 or fewer points, and 4-7 in games decided by a touchdown or less, so maybe the Giants should have won 6 or 7 games already.  Barkley has made the Giants a better team — or, at least, a better offense — but there remains a limit to how much value a running back can provide in the 2018 NFL.

The biggest red herring, I think, comes in the terms of receiving yards.  Barkley has 688 receiving yards, which sounds great until you realize that Barkley has 21% of Giants targets and 24% of Giants receptions, but only 17% of Giants receiving yards and 15% of Giants first downs.  This isn’t a knock on Barkley as much as it is a knock on the position: for the most part, running backs don’t make a big contribution in the passing game, even when they have a lot of receptions.

Consider that Barkley had 113 targets.  Of those:

• 26 were incomplete passes;
• 16 were third down receptions that did not pick up a first down;
• 8 were first or second down receptions that gained negative or zero yards

That’s 50 of 113 targets that did not provide value, compared to 28 of 113 targets that gained a first down.  Again, this isn’t much of a knock on Barkley the player: for a running back, it’s extremely difficult to provide significant value in the passing game. ^[1]By way of comparison, let’s look at Le’Veon Bell in 2016, who is known for being a big boon in the passing game. He had 118 targets last year. 24 were incomplete passes, 7 were third … Continue reading  And in the modern NFL, there’s a very real cap as to the value a running back can provide in the running game, while passers are picking up first downs with relative ease.  By comparison, Barkley has gained a first down on just 18% of all rushing plays.

Barkley looks like he may be the next great running back, but it’s not looking like he was a great choice with the #2 pick.

Kansas City will likely defeat the Raiders on Sunday, capping an impressive 12-4 regular season. Those four losses, however, all came against playoff teams: in New England, in Seattle, in Los Angeles against the Rams, and at home against the Chargers. Meanwhile, Kansas City will have beaten just two playoff teams: the Chargers, and whoever winds up winning the AFC North (the Chiefs went 4-0 against the AFC North, beating Pittsburgh in week 2 and Baltimore in week 14).

Does this mean the Chiefs are less likely to succeed in the playoffs than if, say, they had gone 6-0 against playoff teams and 6-4 against non-playoff teams?

In 2005, the Steelers went 2-4 against playoff teams during the regular season, but went 4-0 in the postseason (with three wins on the road) to win Super Bowl XL.

Meanwhile, the 2011 Ravens did exactly what my hypothetical 2018 Chiefs did: that year, Baltimore went 6-0 against playoff teams and just 6-4 against non-playoff teams. The Ravens defeated the Texans in the Wild Card round before falling to the Patriots in the Division round.

A number of Super Bowl champions performed poorly against playoff teams during the regular season: the 1999 Rams went 0-2, the 2007 Giants went 1-5, the 1980 Raiders went 1-4, the 2011 Giants went 1-3, and the 2005 Steelers and 2012 Ravens both went 2-4. The 2008 Steelers are a Super Bowl champion that had a losing record (3-4) against playoff teams, but went undefeated (9-0) against non-playoff teams.

Where do the Chiefs line up historically? Kansas City is 10 wins above .500 against playoff teams, and 2 wins below .500 against non-playoff teams. Add those numbers together, and the Chiefs get a score of +12. There are 60 teams in the Super Bowl era who finished +12 or higher. The most extreme case belongs to the 2011 Bengals, who went 9-0 against non-playoff teams (+9) and 0-7 against playoffs teams (-7), for a total score of 16 (9 minus -7). The full list, below:

For Chiefs fans, the 2005 Steelers may be the most inspiring name on this list, but not the most memorable. The easy comparison is to Andy Reid’s first team in Kansas City in 2013: that Chiefs team went 10-0 against non-playoff teams but 1-5 against playoff teams and then lost its first playoff game. The big difference: that Kansas City team had to go on the road, while this Chiefs team should be home for the postseason.

Green Bay Packers running back Aaron Jones is on injured reserve with a sprained MCL in his right knee, so his 2018 season will end with the following stat line: 12 games played, 133 carries, 728 rushing yards, 5.47 yards per carry. And if the season ended today, Jones would be crowned the 2018 Yards per Carry king. But is that right? What makes Jones the winner? Let’s go into the fine print.

Johnny Townsend would be the YPC king if there was no minimum threshold involved: he has 1 carry for 42 yards this season.

Among players with more rushing yards than Townsend, Jarvis Landry (3-60-20.0) would be next in line.

Among players with more rushing yards than Landry, D.J. Moore (13-172-13.2) would be your YPC king.

Among players with more rushing yards than Moore, Raheem Mostert (34-261-7.7) is next up.

Among players with more rushing yards than Mostert, Josh Allen (80-536-6.7) would be the YPC king.

Now, should 500 rushing yards (or 80 carries) be enough to enable a player to qualify for the YPC title? It’s below the current threshold, which is set at an arbitrary 6.25 carries per game, or 100 carries in a 16-game season. So unless Allen has 20 carries next week, he’s not going to finish with enough carries to qualify for the crown. [continue reading…]

Another year, another Patriots AFC East title. With a Dolphins loss to the Jaguars today, the Patriots officially clinched the 2018 AFC East title (minutes later, the Patriots defeated the Bills, which also would have clinched the title). The Patriots have now won 10 straight AFC East titles — each year from 2009 to 2018 — and have won the AFC East in 16 of the last 18 seasons.

The only two years the Patriots didn’t win the division? That came in 2008, when Matt Cassel was New England’s starting quarterback for 15 games, and back in 2002. Yes, that’s right: when Tom Brady is the Patriots starting quarterback, the Patriots have won FIFTEEN STRAIGHT division titles. And it was nearly 17 straight: the Patriots lost to the Jets in week 16, 2002, which knocked the Patriots behind New York. New England finished 9-7, and lost a tiebreaker to the Jets after New York upset Green Bay in week 17 to win the AFC East.

No quarterback/team can come close to matching that streak. Otto Graham and the Browns are the only other team to win 10 straight division titles; after that, Fran Tarkenton and the Vikings are next with 6 straight (1973-1978). And the 16 division crowns for the Brady Patriots is a mark that will never be broken. Graham and the Browns won 10 division titles, but after them, Peyton Manning and the Colts and Joe Montana and the 49ers are third with 8 division titles. Think about that for a minute: the Brady Patriots have won as many division titles as the Manning Colts and Montana 49ers combined.

Oh, and the Patriots actually set a new record today, too. Even in 2002 and 2008, the Patriots still went 4-2 in the division. And every year that New England has won the AFC East under Brady, the Patriots had a winning record in the division. By beating Buffalo today, New England is now 4-1 in the AFC East, making 2018 the 18th straight year that the Patriots have posted a winning record in division games. That breaks a tie New England had with the Cleveland Browns, who posted a winning record in 17 straight years from 1957 to 1973. The Los Angeles Rams are third on the list, having gone 14 straight years with a winning record in division games from 1967 to 1980.

The Ravens have turned back the clock under Lamar Jackson. Baltimore has rushed it 40+ times for 194+ rushing yards in every game under Jackson.

In the last 30 years, only the Ravens and the 2016 Cowboys have rushed for 175 yards in five consecutive games. And Baltimore is the first team since the 1976 Steelers to rush for 190 yards in five straight games. The Ravens are seriously run-heavy.

The graph below shows the total yards for each team in the NFL over their last 5 games.  The black box shows the team’s rushing yards, and the white box shows the team’s passing yards: [continue reading…]

I am short on time today, so no commentary: below are the week 15 Game Scripts.

Under Lamar Jackson, the Ravens have become the most run-heavy team in the NFL.  Against the Bucs, Gus Edwards had 19 carries, Jackson had 18 carries, and Kenneth Dixon had 10 carries. This in a game that was tight throughout: Baltimore finished with a Game Script of just +2.2, yet ran on 2 out of every 3 plays.

The Chicago Bears have the best pass defense in the NFL this year. The Bears held (i) Aaron Rodgers and the Packers to 4.04 ANY/A in week 15, the worst performance by Green Bay this year, (ii) Jared Goff and the Rams to an ANY/A average of -0.38, the worst performance by Los Angeles all season, and (iii) the high-powered Tampa Bay offense to 3.24 ANY/A, the worst game by the Bucs all year. Chicago also held Kirk Cousins and the Vikings to their 2nd-worst game of the year.

On the other hand, Brock Osweiler — yes, that’s right — had the best performance by any quarterback this year against the Bears, averaging 7.95 ANY/A. I went ahead and calculated how each team fared in ANY/A in each game this year, and then ranked each team’s performance in each game.  Then, I looked to see how each defense did relative to those numbers: did they hold the opponent to their worst game of the year, second worst, third worst, and so on.

Here’s how to read the table below: on average, Bears opponents had their 5th worst game of the season against Chicago. That gives the Bears the top pass defense in the league. The individual ranks and games are listed: Green Bay, the Rams, and Tampa Bay had their worst games against Chicago, Minnesota their second worst, Buffalo, Detroit, and Seattle their third worst, and so on.

This is a fun table to examine: for example, the Jaguars are having a down year, but you can easily see that they had outstanding performances against three of the top QBs in the AFC.  The Colts, Steelers, and Chiefs all had their worst passing games of the year against Jacksonville. [continue reading…]

The Atlanta Falcons have a terrible pass defense, but no matter: Josh Rosen was still the worst passer in the league in week 15. He finished with just 90 net passing yards on 28 dropbacks, and two interceptions dropped his ANY/A to an even 0.00.  It has been a miserable year for Rosen and the Cardinals passing attack as a whole.  What’s truly remarkable is that the Cardinals are now nearly below the Bills this year in ANY/A for the season.

Buffalo, as you may recall, was one of the worst passing teams in the history of the NFL through 6 weeks.  And it didn’t get much better in weeks 7 through 9.  But since then, the Bills have improved significantly under Josh Allen, while the Cardinals have fallen.  Through 15 weeks, Buffalo is averaging 3.48 ANY/A, while the Cardinals are at 3.60 ANY/A (Buffalo is actually ahead in NY/A).  It will be a tight race to the bottom! The graph below shows the game-by-game ANY/A for both Buffalo (in blue and red) and Arizona (in red and yellow). As you can see, the Bills have been the much better passing team over the last five games. [continue reading…]

Nick Mullens was an undrafted free agent who was signed by the 49ers last year, but he never made it to the club’s official roster for the 2017 season. He was cut before the start of the 2017 season, and then cut again before the start of the 2018 season. Then, after Jimmy Garoppolo tore his ACL, the 49ers brought Mullens up to the active roster. He sat behind C.J. Beathard until a wrist injury knocked him out of the lineup, vaulting Mullens into an unlikely starting role.  Since then, he’s been a remarkable find: you would expect an undrafted free agent to operate at replacement level, but Mullens has actually been an above-average starting quarterback.

And he’s been the best rookie quarterback this season, in a year where five first round quarterbacks are playing. Your first question might be: is Mullens actually a rookie? The answer is clearly yes: he is on a contract that pays $480,000 per year, which is the rookie minimum; if he was treated as a second-year player, the CBA would mandate that he receive no less than $555,000 this season. Instead he is on a contract that mirrors what 2018 UDFA rookies are seeing.  He’s also the same age as Baker Mayfield; both graduated from high school in 2013 and played four years in college; the difference is Mullens graduated in ’17 and was on a practice squad last year, while Mayfield transferred in 2014 and sat out that season. But since Mullens wasn’t on an active roster last year, this is obviously his first season in the NFL, which I think makes him a rookie for just about every purpose. ^[1]Compare him with Jeff Driskel, who arguably is a rookie, too, since he never actually made it on to the field his first two years in Cincinnati. But he was actually on the roster during the regular … Continue reading [continue reading…]