scrapple

Cowboys at Eagles Post Mortem

2009-11-09T18:02:00.003-05:00

Tough loss.

Ranked reasons why we lost:
1) Sheldon biting on the double move. That 7 points is why the Eagles lost.
2) Offensive turnovers. 1 was 5's fault, other Maclin's.
3) Poor game plan.
a) Didn't call the right pass plays early and did nothing in 1Q.
b) Running game was working when they tried it, but took too long to get there.
4) O-line regressed back to OAK game.
5) Defense didn't create any turnovers.

Additional Comments on the Game:
I don't mind Reid calling for a FG there at the end. He was playing to win. He needs 2 scores and had 4th and long in FG range. You take that and lean on your D.

Tough to say where the fault for the dismal offensive performance truly lies. I'd say equally with 5, o-line, WRs, and game plan.

Upcoming posts:
1) Outlook for the 2nd half of the season.
2) Fake Life.

FO says what?

2009-11-06T22:15:00.003-05:00

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/teameff

For some reason, the Eagles always end up highly ranked by their stats. The really interesting thing currently though is that they're #2 because their D is #1 in DVOA, while the offense is only 12th. Gotta love those turnovers.

Cowboys at Eagles Preview

2009-11-06T19:03:00.002-05:00

Reasons why Dallas will win:
Eagles are awful against TEs and Witten is a top 3 TE.
DAL can get great pressure from DEs.
Romo is on a roll.
PHI is getting a lot of points of turnovers - is this sustainable?
DAL has very good running game.

Reasons why Philadelphia will win:
Westbrook is coming back.
OL is getting healthy and starting to gel.
DeSean is consistently making big plays.
PHI defense has been playing well over past month.

Keys to the game:
PHI wins if they can make Romo look like Eli did last week.
DAL will win if they can exploit PHI's linebackers.

This game could easily play out like last week's game. I like the Eagles' upside here but they have to start fast. If McNabb starts a little slow, the Dallas D could make it really hard for PHI to catch back up.

It's not an Age thing

2009-11-02T21:10:00.004-05:00

OK. Here are the stats for the average age of NFL teams. Hey, guess who's the oldest?

Average Age	Birth Date	Team
28.1	10/03/81	WASHINGTON
28.06	10/19/81	NEW ORLEANS
27.84	01/05/82	ARIZONA
27.84	01/06/82	DETROIT
27.77	01/31/82	SEATTLE
27.74	02/12/82	CLEVELAND
27.69	03/01/82	DENVER
27.63	03/25/82	NEW ENGLAND
27.62	03/28/82	SAN FRANCISCO
27.61	03/30/82	PITTSBURGH
27.59	04/08/82	MINNESOTA
27.58	04/10/82	ATLANTA
27.53	04/29/82	TENNESSEE
27.51	05/06/82	NEW YORK JETS
27.24	08/14/82	Average
27.18	09/04/82	SAN DIEGO
27.16	09/12/82	OAKLAND
27.12	09/25/82	Median
27.09	10/07/82	PHILADELPHIA
27.08	10/11/82	CHICAGO
27.02	11/03/82	INDIANAPOLIS
27.01	11/05/82	HOUSTON
26.98	11/17/82	BUFFALO
26.97	11/19/82	BALTIMORE
26.95	11/26/82	NEW YORK GIANTS
26.9	12/14/82	DALLAS
26.86	12/28/82	CAROLINA
26.77	02/02/83	JACKSONVILLE
26.75	02/10/83	CINCINNATI
26.68	03/06/83	MIAMA
26.66	03/14/83	TAMPA BAY
26.52	05/03/83	KANSAS CITY
26.5	05/09/83	GREEN BAY
26.43	06/05/83	ST. LOUIS

Couple observations:

1) There's only an 18 month difference between the oldest and the youngest teams. And the standard deviation is 6 months. These are pretty small numbers if you ask me. Is there a material difference between a 26 1/2 year old and a 28 year old? Um, not in my opinion.

2) Philly's about as close to the middle (median) as you can get.

3) Giants and Cowboys are only 2 months younger than the Eagles so for all basically the same age.

I started to look at wins per age group but didn't see much correlation outside of the bottom 4. Also tough to make material judgments considering some teams have had byes and others have not. Oh, and we're not even halfway through the season.

I considered looking at these numbers only on a starting or skill position basis but thought it might be too much work vs. benefit for the following reasons:
a) A material portion of any game is special teams, which are all the young guys.
b) Only looking at skill positions leaves off the O and D lines (which win games if you believe the talking heads).

So I guess my take away from this information is that age is not a determining factor.

Giants at Eagles Post Mortem

2009-11-01T16:13:00.002-05:00

Just what I said. More upside. What an enjoyable game to watch. There weren't many things that I disliked about this game so let's go straight to what I liked:

Big plays to DeSean, McCoy, Maclin, and Weaver for crying out loud.

No Wildcat plays! Vick in for one play, but a decent call with him running wide. He's lost at least 1 step if not 2 while in prison. Does not bode well for the rest of his career.

Very solid special teams play outside of the botched kickoff late in the game. Great returns, long punts with limited returns, Akers has no missed FGs.

Won the turnover battle. And still converted most into points.

I hate to say that the Giants lost this game rather than the Eagles winning it, but it just seemed too easy. Boom and they're up by 16 points. Then just when NY tried to make a game of it late in the first half, 14 more points. I really think the mark of a good team is making games look too easy. And Philly definitely did that this week.

All in all, a very tasty win.

Giants at Eagles Preview

2009-10-31T12:57:00.003-04:00

Ugh. This is going to be one of those agonizing slugfests that are painful to watch. I haven't watched much of NY yet this year, but my gut says they've got the better team . . . on average. I like Philly's upside more though. What I mean by that is that if these teams played 10 games, then NY probably wins 6 of them all by close scores, while Philly would win 2 or 3 of them in blowouts.

10 things I want to see from this game (ranked in order of preference):

10. Solid special teams coverage.
9. Another good game from Witherspoon. I really hope Monday night wasn't a 1 game fluke.
8. Good game from Akers with several touchbacks and no FG misses inside 45 yards.
7. No Wildcat plays.
6. Consistant pressure from the D-Line.
5. No more dumb penalties on 3rd downs - especially personal fouls and offsides.
4. Gotta win the turnover battle.
3. McNabb in an early rhythm.
2. Long TDs by DeSean "Action" Jackson
1. Some tasty sausage!

Sausage Fest

2009-10-29T20:07:00.003-04:00

There are two kinds of people in this world. There are the kind of people who love the taste of sausage and don't really care how or with what it's made. And then there are the people who like the taste of good sausage, but will never fully enjoy it because of what goes into the making of it.

Personally, I love my Eagles sausage. I don't care how many penalties are included. Run/pass ratio under 40%? Meh. Is my sausage now made without my favorite defensive player? Different flavor, but it still goes down the hatch pretty well. Heck, that flavor was mostly expired anyway and was already starting to cause some indegestion (remember all those blown coverages last year?). At the end of the day, I really don't care what goes into making my sausage as long as a Win is coming out in the end.

I've come to realize over the years though that most Philly fans care more about what goes into their sausage than the taste. And that's baffling to me. I really can't understand why the ingredients should count more than the taste of the product. If you're really an "entertainment" gourmet, then shouldn't you be ingesting something a little higher quality than sausage in the first place?

I think we all agree that there's no such thing as a moral victory in professional football. Losing a well fought game is still a loss and makes it that much tougher to reach the playoffs, which is where any team has to get to in order to win a championship. But if that's the case, then there shouldn't be any such thing as a moral defeat either. If you have one, you have to have the other.

So if there are no moral defeats, then let's stop holding our noses when we watch this team. Let's stop critiquing ever little coaching gaffe or execution blunder and focus on what is truly important: This team has won twice the number of games than it's lost so far this year. And I LOVE the taste of that sausage!

World Series Scouting Reports

2009-10-28T12:28:00.002-04:00

good scouting reports on the lineups at the ny daily news

Eagles at Redskins: Post Mortem

2009-10-27T20:40:00.003-04:00

Good win. Any time you go on the road to a division rival and win by 10 points is a Good Win. For those who would disagree with this statement, check back later this week for my Sausage Fest post.

What I disliked about the game:

1) Wildcat plays.
2) All the penalties. They realize this isn't the preseason anymore, right? All the personal fouls are just killing this team. Along with the offsides and defensive holding and . . .
3) 36 goes down again. Stop me if you've heard this one before. And McCoy didn't jump out at me as having a great game. Not that he had a bad one, but I didn't see much burst.
4) McNabb was a little off. Several passes seemed to be well off the mark. Tough to say how much of this was the offensive line not helping him out a whole lot. I thought he looked really good scrambling around and buying time. It's night and day between him and Campbell as to how well they look when the pocket starts collapsing around them. For those who think we need an upgrade at this position, there are many, many worse QBs starting in this league than the one we've got right now.
5) ESPN's commentators (though this isn't really an ESPN gripe). OK, we get it. The Redskins have some coaching issues. And "execution" is more important than the play calling. They must either think we're the dumbest humans on the planet and need to be told something 15 times in order to understand it or that their audience is turning over every 4 plays (or waking up in the Ed Wade household).

What I liked about the game:

1) They won.
2) DeSean Jackson. I love that the law of averages with Eagles drafting WRs early finally caught up with the team. Even with the "he loves him some him" pregame bit, this kid is a whole truckload of "wow". He's an early version of Brian Westbrook. And since the shelf life of WRs is about twice that of RBs, we could be in store for literally dozens more games like this. His average TD catch is 50 yards!
3) Turnover battle wins them this game. Scored on all the of the early game turnovers.
4) Akers knocks in all his FG attempts and seemed to have decent distance on his kickoffs.

What this game tells us about the future:

1) Not a lot. The Redskins suck.
2) Not a very disciplined bunch of guys right not. My hope is that this is because it's a lot of young guys and they'll grow out of it.
3) This offense could be ridiculously good. That has got to be about the worst looking 20 points, I've ever seen an offense score. Imagine if the Eagles had been halfway decent? WAS isn't a good team, but still that has to give some cause for optimism.
4) This offensive line needs to get better fast because this is the only way #3 directly above is going to happen.

The Wildcat is Roadkill: Let it Die

2009-10-26T23:04:00.002-04:00

This is the first of 11 regular season pleadings to outlaw the Wildcat (or Spread Eagle depending on your terminology). It's not working. They're not getting the big plays so effectively they're capping themselves out at 5-7 yards per Wildcat attempt.

So why the heck would you want that with DeSean Jackson as an option?!?!

Eagles vs. Redskins Preview

2009-10-25T10:45:00.003-04:00

The Eagles opponent this week:

Storied franchise? Check.
Dysfunctional coaching staff? Check.
Underachieving QB? Check.

Ladies and gentlemen, it's Eagles vs. Raiders: Part II

After last week's total brain fart of a game, there's no way any fan can not be extremely nervous about this game. After last week's game, there's no way this team doesn't come out and blow the Redskins off the field.

Any neutral observer has the Eagles as the more talented team as demonstrated by Vegas having them as a TD favorite on the road. There's no way Reid goes into a division game with half a game plan like last week. And I would imagine the players' pride is wounded enough to come out with several chips on their shoulders.

Eagles on MNF

2009-10-25T10:41:00.002-04:00

How is it the Eagles only get 1 MNF game this year? As one of the four best teams from the prior year, shouldn't they rate 2 or 3? Granted they've got 3 Sunday night games, but still. Or maybe SNF is now the new MNF?

Guess who got the keys to daddy's old, unused car?

2009-10-24T10:39:00.002-04:00

TMG decided this blog needed some fresh blood, so he invited the only Eagles optimist left to help him out. So much of Eaglesdom is doom and gloom that I feel it's my personal mission to help bring a little light to the topic of being an Eagles fan. While I'll generally focus on the positives of this team (and being a fan of them), I will be critical when needed and as objective as possible about the play on the field. But never in a WIP-fashion.

But more importantly, I promise fresh posts and new content at least weekly!

2009 - Game 1 Thoughts

2009-09-13T20:04:00.002-04:00

wow. i am ecstatic with today's win. even if i thought i had a feel for the team coming into this season (i didn't), i don't think there is any way i'd have predicted that the birds would totally dominate a 12 win team in such devastating fashion.

a few things that were plainly evident today:

- this team can rush the passer. wow, can this team rush the passer. cole, parker, abiamiri, clemons, howard -- holy smokes. those guys combined with our two great fat guys clogging up the middle to just dominate what is supposed to be a very good o-line. good omen for the season if this is what the defense can do.

- desean jackson is so f-ing fast. when he runs, we might as well be the guys chasing him. everyone looks like they're running in quicksand. he scares me when he starts celebrating 20 yards from the endzone though... "don't drop the f-ing ball!"

- i only noticed winston justice once today -- on the peppers sack when mcnabb rolled left and probably should have let the ball go or run the ball. he played well.

- peters mashes people off the line. tra was a great pass blocker, but he was never a particularly good run blocker. if peters gets his "timing and cadence" down, big red's proclaimation that peters is the best left tackle in the game might not be too far off. (though i don't really understand why it's taking so long for him to get the timing down on the silent count)

- the panthers had 169 total yards today (about 50 of them on the first drive after that fluky parker facemask). 2.9 yards per rush, 2.4 yards per pass. are you kidding me. this was a team that won 12 games last season!

- quintin mikell trucked a running back on a safety blitz. i had to rewind the dvr to see which "linebacker" had done the pancaking, only to be surprised to see it was a safety. i've never seen a safety do that before.

- the birds can rush the passer, and they have 4 starting caliber cornerbacks. they've consistently been 3 deep on corners, but never this deep. also, how professional is sheldon brown? lito doesn't get his new contract, he pouts, whines, and fakes injury. sheldon takes it like a man, and uses it as motivation. he looks primed to have a pretty damn good season. if he plays like this for the rest of the season, i'd give him his new contract.

- akers must have gone on the lenny dykstra vitamin routine this offseason. he never kicked the ball further than he did today. his opening kick was 4 yards deep in the endzone and his 48 yard field goal would have been good from 60 easily (it was 2/3 of the way up the net when it hit). whatever it takes baby.

- really happy to see the birds have a legitimate nfl fullback on the roster. haven't had one since poor jon ritchie blew out his knee.

some things not to lose sight of in the euphoria of the win:

- drops, it never changes with this team. donovan just throws the ball too hard i guess. don only threw 18 passes today and 3 of them were drops on balls that hit the receiver in the numbers.

- westbrook did not show any explosiveness. coming off injury, probably not in game shape, doesn't have his timing, etc. all of those are probably factors, no doubt, but westbrook's first two steps were s-l-o-w compared to a couple of seasons ago. the good news is that mccoy looked active and spry.

- kevin kolb has no pocket awareness right now. i'm being tough on him too, but let's not be too rough on him. he's basically never played in the nfl. i don't think he's doing any worse than don did his first few games. kolb just doesn't have the athleticism to keep stuff alive while he gets his bearings. that being said, this defense better come prepared to play if don is out next week. there is a pretty darn prolific offense coming to town.

one interesting note: while trying to educate myself a little on the upcoming season over the last week and i read a few things that surprised me, one of them was that darren howard and chris gocong were among the leaders at their positions for "defeating" the opposing player in one on one situations.

i'd be interested to see how our fat guys stack up. i'm really happy with how bunkley and patterson control the middle. i know everyone was very worried when bradley went down, but do you think it's possible that the play of the fat guys possibly made him look better than he actually was? just a thought. i thought he was a good player, but didn't really understand why everyone was panicking when he went down. the guy is not the second coming of ray lewis.

what a way to start a season!

Tickets Arrive!

2009-07-22T21:38:00.002-04:00

happy day! my eagles tickets arrive in the mail. a little bittersweet though. all of the miserable seasons i've experienced being of fan of these underperforming professional sports teams of ours, and i'm too busy these days to enjoy the best run we've had since the late 70's/early 80's glory years.

Eagles Trade for Peters

2009-04-18T08:00:00.004-04:00

eagles trade for one of the top left tackles in the league. needless to say, i'm very happy with this move. on paper, adding this one anchor piece to the line makes this the best o-line they've had heading into a season. they have size, youth, and versatility like i haven't seen in previous o-lines, and two guys who are top 3 at their positions.

my brother and i were talking a couple of months ago and this was the move i was hoping the birds would be able to pull off. i'm ecstatic that they did.

a large portion of the eagles fanbase will be urging the birds to trade for anquan boldin as well. i'm not sure that is such a great idea. first, he's a good wideout, but not a difference making wideout. i don't think you bring a guy like that in and overpay him, it screws up your teams entire pay structure (if you need an example, just take a look at how many bad contracts the sixers have).

i'd gladly give a one and a three for larry fitzgerald, but i wouldn't give a one and a three for boldin. they're not in the same class. if the eagles do go after a receiver, the best one out there is braylon edwards. he's no larry fitzgerald, but he's better than both boldin and roy williams.

Sad Days for Eagles Nation

2009-03-01T13:34:00.003-05:00

i gotta admit, this is hurting worse than i thought it would. i'm usually able to react pretty clinically whenever a favorite player departs -- reggie white, seth joyner, allen iverson, charles barkley, steve carlton, eric lindros (i know i'm in the minority) -- but this has been tough to handle.

some more brian dawkins videos:

Farewell to Brian Dawkins?

2009-02-28T00:29:00.003-05:00

profootballtalk.com is reporting that brian dawkins has signed with denver. brian dawkins is my all-time favorite eagle and it will be odd to see anyone else lining up at safety for the birds.

odder still will be seeing him in a denver uniform at the linc (denver is one of the home opponents this season).

all good things must come to an end, i guess. i enjoyed watching you play mr. dawkins, and it was a pleasure rooting for you. i wish you only good fortune as you move onto your new team!

UPDATE: the inquirer is reporting this morning that the dawkins deal is not done and that he may still be talking to the birds

If Eagles Fans Had Done This...

2009-01-15T12:19:00.004-05:00

it would be a lead story on the national news

here are giants fans smashing up a porsche in the parking lot after seeing their team lose

and when they're finished with that one, they move onto the next car

not the first time, here's how giants fans celebrated the superbowl win earlier this year

ever hear a peep about this crap in the media?

Divisional Playoff Game Thoughts

2009-01-11T19:28:00.005-05:00

what a freaking game today. it was ugly, it was physical, it was wonderful. to go on the road for the second week in a row and take it to the defending champs. phew! what a thoroughly enjoyable run this team is having.

there were many good performances today, but i think the big difference between these two team was QB play. i have no doubt that if you swapped manning and mcnabb, you'd be looking at a giants win right now. mcnabb may not have the physical tools he did when he was younger, but he's playing better than he has in a long time.

today wasn't a very good day for him statistically but he made all the plays the eagles needed to win. he made a number of clutch throws -- especially the stunning 3rd and 20 pass to avant -- but the play that stood out to me was a short pass to kevin curtis for the first down late in the third quarter just after carney missed a 47 yard field goal. the eagles had just gotten the ball back and needed a nice long drive to take some time off the clock. on first down around mid-field, the play call was a quick slant to curtis on right. the giants called for a zone blitz with justin tuck dropping into that passing lane -- the exact right defense for the play. i'm not sure how, but mcnabb saw tuck dropping into that lane and double clutched, waiting for curtis and tuck to run by each other and then threw a dart for a 15 yard catch and run. most QBs throw it right into tuck's belly on that play, heck i've seen don throw it right into a defender's belly in that exact situation before. maybe you can't read too much into a single play, but i'm impressed that he appears to be still growing and learning as a QB.

other thoughts:

- kudos to the coaching staff. they went with a balanced approach in the first half -- lots of running followed up with deep drops looking for a big play -- but the giants were getting way too much pressure on mcnabb and the offense was completely out of sync. the second half was a completely different story -- pass, pass, pass, pass -- but mostly quick drops and underneath routes. halftime adjustments.

- love that we continue to see the QB sneak! how about the difference between a mcnabb sneak and a half-hearted manning sneak?

- the defense played a terrific game today but they sold out to stop the run and there were guys running free in the secondary. thankfully, eli manning was the opposing QB and almost all of those guys were missed badly.

- bunkley and patterson were simply awesome today -- especially on those two stuffs on 4th and short.

- does asante samuel exert some sort of gravitational pull on footballs? asante, my apologies for thinking that the biggest difference between you and lito was your ability to stay healthy/play in pain. you're twice the corner that lito ever was. also, i really enjoyed how you ran the pick back right at eli, even though eli obviously had no desire or intent to get in on the tackle.

- the play mix today was 45 called passes and 23 called runs -- 66% passing

- fox flashed back-to-back stats during the game -- apparently the giants and eagles were ranked first and second this year in points scored during the last 2 minutes of the first half. did everyone see that? how do we reconcile that with the notion that the eagles suck at the 2 minute drill? is it possible that my contention that there are no teams who are "good" at the 2 minute drill is accurate? what causes that disconnect? i'm not sure exactly, but i don't think anyone can complain today, the 2 minute drill at the end of the first half was a thing of beauty.

- footballoutsiders are feeling pretty good about themselves today. the eagles finished at the top of their ratings this year (first time ever for them and first time ever for a wild card team). makes a lot more sense now than at the end of the regular season.

- thank goodness eli manning still stinks. this myth that's been growing about him ever since he happened to be on a team that won a superbowl has been annoying.

- andy opened himself up for a lot of criticism when he continued to pass (and pass downfield) with the lead. lot of guts andy.

- does anyone think that playing on the road has been good for this team? that the pressure of winning in front of the home crowd might have made the birds play a little tighter?

next up, the cardinals. eagles open up as 3.5 point favorites on the road...

E-A-G-L-E-S.... EAGLES!

JC Romero Thoughts

2009-01-07T11:27:00.005-05:00

most of philadelphia is up-in-arms about the "injustice" of jc romero being given a 50 game suspension for "unknowingly" taking banned substances from a supplement he bought at a GNC.

i can certainly understand where people are coming from, because i was thinking the same way until i looked at the product he purchased. some facts, as reported, that would lead you to side with jc are:

- this product wasn't on the banned substances list

- jc asked multiple nutritionists if the ingredients in the supplement were ok to take

- jc asked the trainer if the supplement was ok to take (trainer said he didn't know)

- jc asked the union if it was ok to take (union said it was ok)

based on these widely reported facts, i initially thought that the suspension seemed unfair -- that he never intended to violate the drug policy and that he took the "supplement" in good faith.

then out of curiosity, i googled the product he supposedly took. here is the first google link that came up:

http://anabolicminds.com/store/1347.html

it's not a popular stance, but i'm on record as saying that i think this whole notion of cheating makes no sense to me. if a grown man wants to take something that makes him a better player -- thereby increasing my entertainment -- so be it. (note: i understand the argument that allowing pros to take steroids encourages kids to take it. it's potentially the only valid reason to ban the stuff.)

however, for good or bad, the rules are in place... and it's clear to me that romero's intent was to artificially boost his testosterone levels via these "supplements". so while in his mind, he may not have technically violated the doping restrictions. to me, his intent to circumvent the spirit of the rule is clear.

here is some text from the advertising for the "supplement":

We undertook the due testing to prove to ourselves that this product had the ability to stimulate testosterone levels beyond even the range of upper normal - indeed it stimulates levels well into the supraphysiological range.

i don't know. sounds like steroids to me.

Wild Card Game

2009-01-04T17:40:00.000-05:00

in case anyone is online during the game

Characteristics of Winning Teams (2004-2008)

2009-01-02T17:02:00.005-05:00

following up on the previous post, here are the regressions for team stats over the last five seasons. whereas last time, i listed tried to eliminate duplicates (e.g. attempts and attempts per game) and limit the list to only the variables i thought were important (e.g. i removed 4th down conversions and pcts). this time, i thought it would be best to just post all the data so everyone can make their own assessments.

i've done a little more formatting than i typically do on this minimalist blog due to the increased amount of data.

so just to recap, the following tables display the correlation coefficient between all of the basic team stats from nfl.com over the last five seasons and the number of wins earned by the team that generated those stats.

cells highlighted in yellow represent a correlation coefficient between .5 and .65.

cells highlighted in orange represent a correlation coefficient between .65 and .8.

cells highlighted in red represent a correlation coefficient greater than .8.

not sure exactly what this tells us, but here are some initial observations:

- clearly the strongest correlation for defense is to not get run on. not to "stop the run" necessarily (though obviously forcing 3 and outs would limit the number of rushes against), but the number and percentage of carries against were the strongest relationships on either side of ball.

- against the rush, the aggregate stats (attempts, total yards, number of 1st downs) appear to correlate much stronger than the efficiency stats (avg/YPC, 1st down pct)

- against the pass, the reverse is true as the efficiency stats (avg/YPA, QB rating) show much stronger correlation than the aggregate stats (completions, yards, 1st downs)

- on offense, we see a similar pattern with aggregate stats mattering for rushing (attempts, number of TDs, number of 1st downs) and efficiency stats mattering for passing (QB rating, avg/YPA, 1st down pct)

- i continue to be shocked how little YPC seems to correlate to the win totals of the teams

- turnovers showed a much stronger correlation with the broader data set

here are a couple of scatterplots to show you how recent eagles teams compare against the league over the last five seasons.

first wins vs. point differential for the whole league over the last five seasons. the last five eagles teams are shown as large red points. this is a pretty obvious relationship, but it's interesting to see just how much this year's team has underperformed relative to their overall point differential (point differential has a .917 correlation with wins).

next is one of the stronger offensive stats -- percentage of passes that result in a first down. this had a correlation coefficient of .601.

Characteristics of Winning Teams

2008-12-30T15:09:00.002-05:00

somehow, brian burke and i ended up independently writing about establishing the run on the same day. he looked at whether or not running the ball early/more really does tend to wear down a defense using the premise that if a defense really was wearing down, you'd see yards per carry increase as the number of runs increased -- that the YPC would be higher for the 30th carry than the 1st carry. turns out that conventional football wisdom may be wrong about this as well.

in fact, if you look at his graph, it actually looks like it has a slight downward slope -- that the early runs tend to be more effective than the late runs. though that could be impacted by other factors, e.g. teams that have a 40th carry are probably protecting a big lead forcing the other team to stack the line trying to get the ball back.

so, i wanted to take a look at what team stats correlated strongly with winning this season -- it's been done before, but i may be the first to do it with this year's numbers. here is what i came up with (correlating the following stats for each team with that team's number of wins this season):

Stat	Corr
PF	0.692
PA	-0.784
Net Pts	0.909
TO	0.430

so this basically makes sense, points scored correlates pretty well with the number of wins, but not as strongly as points against (defense wins championships, you know). though neither of them as strongly point differential, validating what we already know -- that you need both offense and defense to win. interestingly, turnover differential isn't that strong of a predictor.

here are some of the individual offensive and defensive stats (from nfl.com)

Category	Stat	Corr	Category	Stat	Corr
TotOff	Yds/G	0.561	TotDef	Yds/G	-0.726
TotOff	Yds/P	0.477	TotDef	Yds/P	-0.682
TotOff	3rd Pct	0.552	TotDef	3rd Pct	-0.480
TotOff	Pen	0.004	TotDef	Pen	0.192
TotOff	Pen Yds	0.029	TotDef	Pen Yds	0.178
TotOff	RunPct	0.373	TotDef	RunPct	-0.715
OffPass	CmpPct	0.488	DefPass	CmpPct	-0.405
OffPass	Att/G	-0.087	DefPass	Att/G	0.426
OffPass	YPA	0.483	DefPass	YPA	-0.689
OffPass	Yds/G	0.297	DefPass	Yds/G	-0.424
OffPass	1st%	0.652	DefPass	1st%	-0.580
OffPass	20+	0.169	DefPass	20+	-0.378
OffPass	Sck	-0.473	DefPass	Sck	0.562
OffPass	QBRate	0.561	DefPass	QBRate	-0.594
OffRush	Att/G	0.547	DefRush	Att/G	-0.775
OffRush	Avg	0.149	DefRush	Avg	-0.532
OffRush	Yds/G	0.484	DefRush	Yds/G	-0.722
OffRush	1st%	0.201	DefRush	1st%	-0.509
OffRush	20+	0.301	DefRush	20+	-0.591

some interesting stuff here. for the 2008 season, there were only five offensive team offensive stats that correlated fairly strongly with wins, they were (in order):

- percent of passes resulting in a first down
- total yards per game
- team QB rating
- third down conversion rate
- number of rushing attempts per game

of course, this doesn't tell us which of these factors are causative and which merely correlate, but here's how i interpret what this is telling us -- winning teams move the ball up and down the field via efficient passing games to score points and then protect them by running the ball.

there were lots of decent to good defensive predictors of success, the top 10 were (in order):

- rushing attempts per game against
- total yards against per game
- rushing yards against per game
- run/pass play mix against (more runs against = fewer wins)
- yards per pass against
- yards per play against
- QB rating against
- big rushing plays against (20+yards)
- percent of passes resulting in first down
- yards per rush against

a lot of these defensive stats overlap, but it's clear that stopping the run correlates strongly with winning. the question is, does stopping the run cause winning or does winning cause other teams to not run? it's not clear cut, but yards per rush against (i.e. defensive success against each running play) is a much weaker correlation than rushing attempts per game and total rushing yardage against which may indicate that that forcing teams to pass is slightly more important than stopping the run.

a few surprising things that conventional wisdom says are important, but don't in fact seem to correlate strongly with wins are:

- number of penalties (for or against)
- penalty yards (for or against)
- offensive rushing yards per carry

Myth of Establishing the Run

2008-12-29T10:26:00.006-05:00

i'm on record as being a fan of the power running game and not a big fan of the worst coast offense, but this ongoing notion of needing to establish the run to win continues to baffle me. i keep hearing every tv and radio talking head pointing to yesterday's win as proof that you have to run to win. i just don't understand why this perception sticks in people's minds or how you can point to yesterday as proof that running leads to winning.

the game was won in the early part of yesterday's game -- game over at 17-3. let's review the eagle drives leading to that point.

drive 1
1 run for 2 yards
4 passes for 27 yards
drive ends on westbrook fumble

drive 2
4 rushes for 29 yards
2 passes for 3 scramble yards
drive ends in FG

drive 3
2 rushes for 8 yards
2 passes for 59 yards
2 QB sneaks
drive ends in TD

drive 4
2 rushes for 8 yards
1 pass resulting in sack
drive ends in punt

drive 5
5 runs for 6 yards
6 passes for 65 yards
drive ends in TD

totals for first five drives
14 called runs leading to 53 yards -- 3.8 yards per play
15 called passes leading to 145 yards -- 9.7 yards per play

i know people are looking at that at the number of called plays and thinking "see that's balance", but the runs were not meaningful in building that 17-3 lead. that lead was built entirely on 2 big plays -- mcnabb scramble and pass to buckhalter and mcnabb floating a ball over tight coverage to desean jackson.

just for sh*ts and giggles, let's compare the playcalling for this game to the first five real drives of the washington game.

drive 1
2 rushes for 2 yards
4 passes for 13 yards
drive ends in punt

drive 2
3 rushes for 16 yards
3 passes for -3 yards
drive ends in punt

drive 3
1 rush for 4 yards
3 passes for 13 yards
drive ends in punt

drive 4
1 rush for 2 yards
2 passes for 7 yards
drive ends in punt

drive 5
not counting since end of first half
2 rushes for 11 yards
drive ends at halftime

drive 6
2 rushes for 10 yards (though the birds also ran an end around called back for holding)
4 passes for 6 net yards
drive ends in fumble

totals for first five real drives
9 rushes for 34 yards (10 called rushes) -- 3.8 yards per play
16 called passes for 36 yards -- 2.25 yards per play

was playcalling mix or establishing the run really a meaningful difference in these two games? doesn't seem like it to me.

yes, the eagles called a few more runs in the dallas game than in the washington game, but the real difference was execution in the passing game. correlation does not necessarily mean causation.

forget what the talking heads are telling you. if the eagles are to win in the playoffs, they must execute consistently in the passing game.

UPDATE: i didn't come up with this notion and my rudimentary analysis above is not intended to prove that passing is more important than running, my intent is only to counter the popular current theme that the eagles won "because the playcalling was more balanced". however, here are some links that cover the topic in more detail:

- usatoday - myth #1
- cnnsi.com - myth #1
- nytimes
- benjamin alamar - passing premium puzzle
- aaron schatz - myth of the run

finally, there is brian burke (i've linked to these before and they're definitely a lot to digest but worth a read). brian covers the topic across three posts finally concluding (correctly i believe) that to think about it as run vs. pass oversimplifies the analysis. we need to determine what each team happens to be good at and determine the proper mix accordingly (similar to my contention that it isn't what kind of play a team calls, only that it is successful).