MidwestHawker":bmcjjqe3 said:
Average opponent starting field position last year: 25.85 yard line (
http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/ ... atsdef2013)
Average opponent starting field position this year so far: 25.79 yard line (
http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/ ... atsdef2014)
Opponents are starting ever-so-slightly further back on average this year so far, so it's not a matter of the defense just dealing with shorter fields at all.
Thanks for linking these stats I haven't seen those yet.
So there's a few more points I have about our Defensive yards allowed and why it may be a bit misleading compared to our actual defensive performance.
We are ranked 28th in drives per game at 10.8
http://www.sportingcharts.com/nfl/stats/team-drives-per-game/2014/
This may be an over generalization but I would estimate that the less drives in a game you have the more each yard counts. So 300 yards in an 11 drive game may be sort of the equivalent to 354 yards in a 13 drive game in terms of determining the outcome.
In other words the more drives you have per game the value of each yard should theoretically decrease due to a wide range of factors not related directly to the total yards but influencing the total points.
If you have less drives per game you better make those drives count but you won't necessarily need a lot of yards to achieve this.
AND THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT TEAMS HAVE BEEN DOING TO US!
Teams have not been trying to gain a ton of yards on us! They really are not as strange as that sounds...
Opposing teams are trying to methodically burn the ball up the field. They value efficiency, time of possession, not letting our Defense have a chance at Takeaways (Dink and Dunk), with a big emphasis on the run game.
This kind of strategy does not generally translate to a lot of yards per game. So while we can all admire our #1 status, in reality we must remember that we have already lost 4 games to teams that AREN'T EVEN TRYING TO GET A TON OF YARDS... THEY JUST WANT ENOUGH YARDS TO WIN A GAME WITH A LOW NUMBER OF DRIVES.
FOR EXAMPLE:
3 of the bottom 6 teams in drives per game are:
- Dallas Cowboys (Ranked #6 in Yards Per Game, 401 yards VS Seahawks in 11 drives)
- San Diego Chargers (Ranked #20 in Yards Per Game, 377 yards VS Seahawks in 10 drives)
- Kansas City (Ranked #23 in Yards Per Game, 298 yards VS Seahawks in 9 drives)
So those 3 teams account for 3 of our losses. We also have:
- Rams (Ranked #28 in Yards Per Game, 275 yards VS Seahawks in 9 drives)
So on average in our 4 losses we are giving up 337.75 yards per game on 9.75 drives per game. That is 34.64 yards per drive for the opposing team which isn't much worst than our season average of 31.44.
So when judging our teams overall Defensive performance I really do think we need to account for the fact that TEAMS AREN'T EVEN TRYING TO RACK UP A TON OF YARDS ON US AS I EXPLAINED ABOVE.
The Chargers and the Cowboys happened to gain a ton of yards on us but they pretty much dominated us, that wasn't necessarily their goal.
In two of our losses we allowed an average of 286.5 yards, this is lower than our season average of 296.8 for rank #1!
So this whole concept is really hard to explain and seems counter-intuitive like "why would other teams not focus on gaining a ton of yards on us?!", but I think we just need to consider that there are many other factors contributing to why our Defense hasn't passed the eyeball test and why we already have 4 losses.
1) This year we are allowing 19.8 points per game, last season we allowed 14.4 points per game.
Before the Cardinals game we were allowing 21.5 points per game, that's 7.1 a.k.a. a full Touchdown more than last season!
2) We are RANKED #15 in yards per drive (31.44)
3) We are RANKED #19 in points per drive (1.97)
4) We are RANKED #22 in Turnovers per drive (.119)
5) We are RANKED #23 in Interceptions per drive (.059)
6) We are RANKED #22 in Plays per drive (6.04)
7) We are RANKED #26 in Time Of Possession per drive (2:53)
If teams are trying to slow down the game against us to limit the number of drives (and inflating the value of each yard) then each of these statistics can really shed some light on why our Defense has looked so bad even though the yards allowed does not reflect that.
In terms of our stats per drive we are an average to terrible defense!
LAST SEASON WE WERE RANKED #1 IN TURNOVERS PER DRIVE! That is the main reason why teams are beating us with this strategy, we haven't been able to get the turnovers!
SUMMARY:
Teams are not trying to gain a ton of yards on us, they want to be efficient per drive with a low number of drives. This inflates the value of each yard, so our league leading yards/game is very misleading to how effective our defense has actually been.
When broken down in this manner it is clear to see why we have lost 4 games and why our Defense has not passed the eyeball test and has looked at times terrible.
If we cannot consistently generate turnovers to counter the opposing offensive strategy then our yards allowed per game do not accurately represent our performance.
