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Over/Under 20 ppg defensive scoring


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Last year we were at 21.7 ppg which put us at 16th in the league.  20 ppg  would probably put us around 10th in the league generally speaking.

With the additions we've made in the draft and FA....could you see us holding teams to 20 ppg or below this year?

 

I think that's very attainable.  I think we got stronger in the middle, I think our pass rush will be better and it's another year in this defense.  

 

I think Murphy will be a huge addition.  Hughes I believe last year was top 20 in pressures but lacked the sacks because we didn't have any threat anywhere else on the DL.  Lorax was on WGR a while back and talked about how Star will help the pass rush....basically he won't allow the QB to step in the pocket because he's an immovable object in the middle.  I think Harrison Phillips provides more than what we had last year in the rotation.  

 

I'm really excited about Edmunds and Milano....we have speed at LB now it seems.  Lorax is a weak link at LB but I see him coming off the field a lot on 2nd/3rd downs.

 

Our secondary I expect will continue being great and might be better with a better pass rush.....better pass rush is the key.

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It's tough.

We may see a bump in turnovers on the offense, leading to worse field position and rest for the defense.

Davis may not be as good as Gaines anymore, but I do like Murphy, star, Edmunds, and Phillips as additions, plus Milano progression too.

We were a very turnover heavy defense last year, which is a very fluke stat, so realistically the influx of talent, another off-season under McD, combined with the fluke/delta of turnovers on both offense and defense, should combine to be about the same.

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I think it'll be close to last year, maybe a touch better. A big part of the equation is the teams you play. We've got some good offenses on the schedule but we've got quite a few that will probably be bottom half.

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Good topic and I’m hedging. I think that the defense will be better and possibly very good. I think that the increase in short fields will hurt them. Last year the Bills averaged 1.1 turnover a game. If you take away the Peterman nightmare half it would have been 11 total, the fewest in the league. If that doubles this year to 22 (middle of the league) the defense will face more short fields. I think that they will be better but the additional turnovers may hurt the scoring number. I’ll reluctantly take the over but think that they might be quite good.

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1 minute ago, Kirby Jackson said:

Good topic and I’m hedging. I think that the defense will be better and possibly very good. I think that the increase in short fields will hurt them. Last year the Bills averaged 1.1 turnover a game. If you take away the Peterman nightmare half it would have been 11 total, the fewest in the league. If that doubles this year to 22 (middle of the league) the defense will face more short fields. I think that they will be better but the additional turnovers may hurt the scoring number. I’ll reluctantly take the over but think that they might be quite good.

 

Am I a homer for thinking we won't increase short fields this year and that our offense will move the ball more consistently?  I don't see us being at 17.9 ppg on offense like we were last year.  We couldn't move the ball in the 2nd half at all in the last 8-9 games.  Correct me if I'm wrong but I think we only had I believe 3-4TD's in the 2nd half in our last 8 games?

 

Our offense was pretty much historically bad last year and I just don't see a repeat of that.  I don't think 21 ppg on offense is out of the question....that would put us around 18-20 in offensive scoring.

4 minutes ago, Ifartalot said:

That Royale w/Cheese never used the word "if" in his prognostication impressed me most.

 

I'm quite an impressive guy.  Kirby can tell you.

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I'm less concerned with the average and more concerned with the consistency, personally. I haven't updated my '24 points' spreadsheet for this past year, but maybe I'll dust it off. Over the past 3 years the big issue with the defense has been that it's jekyll & hyde even though it's overall average points allowed has been reasonable. I drew my line at 24 points per game previously, but here's a look at this past year using your 20 PPG barometer:

 

20 points or less:

Defense held opponents to 20 points or less 11 times in the 17 games we played last year.

In those games, the average points scored by the opponent in those games was 13.4

The Bills went 8-3 in these games.

 

Over 20 points:

Happened 6 times last year

Opponents averaged 37 points per game

Bills went 1-5 in these games

 

That 23.6 point swing is massive. The average swing in my study across the entire league over 2015 & 2016 was 10.4 and the highest over those 2 years was 17.1. Maybe the 20 point mark skews the data for a wider swing? Nope. Using the 24 point mark our averages move to 14.2 and 39.8, which is even worse at 25.6.

Edited by BuffaloHokie13
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17 minutes ago, Royale with Cheese said:

 

Am I a homer for thinking we won't increase short fields this year and that our offense will move the ball more consistently?  I don't see us being at 17.9 ppg on offense like we were last year.  We couldn't move the ball in the 2nd half at all in the last 8-9 games.  Correct me if I'm wrong but I think we only had I believe 3-4TD's in the 2nd half in our last 8 games?

 

Our offense was pretty much historically bad last year and I just don't see a repeat of that.  I don't think 21 ppg on offense is out of the question....that would put us around 18-20 in offensive scoring.

 

I'm quite an impressive guy.  Kirby can tell you.

Royale is absolutely an impressive guy!! He was like the sun in Jacksonville. The entire tailgate rotated around him :). Royale is so impressive that I’m changing my mind.

 

In terms of the topic I found some interesting stats. The Bills offense was 19th in average yards per drive last year at 27.88 yards per. The defense was actually 26th (which surprised me) at 32.47 yards per. The offense was 22nd in points per drive and the defense was 23rd in points allowed per drive. I was looking for average opponents starting field position but couldn’t find it (only saw after kickoffs). My assumption is that the Bills opponents had more field to go than most other teams. 

 

With that hat being said those defensive numbers were worse than I expected so I’m changing my vote to under. They will be much tougher to run on. The pass rush could be better and the secondary is still great. 

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I think this defense has Top10 talent and Top 10 coaching so I absolutely believe it’s attainable.  

 

The thing I love is that the staff saw we were very turnover reliant and did have weaknesses.  Some of that is scheme/talent but some of it is just the bounce of the ball.  They recognized that and brought in a pass rusher (Murphy) a DT (Star), drafted a stud LB (Edmunds) and scheme specific corner to replace Gaines in Davis.  Add in the DT/Secondary depth they drafted and I’m excited about the potential of this defense being elite. 

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Very nice topic!

 

I'm a glass half full guy, so I'm going to say under.

 

I don't think that we are going to go super aggressive on offense, and I think that the addition of Star on the D-line and Edmunds to the LB core, as well as a very solid looking backfield should clean up some of the problems we saw last year in run defense and getting pressure on the QB.

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Points allowed is a stat that relies on the performance of the whole team. Yeah, the defense gets the largest part, but it's probably somewhere around 65 - 75% of the responsibility.

 

This is why game managing QBs are so attractive if you can't find a really good one. At least they tend not to put the defense into bad situations as often. The likelihood of scoring is wildly different based on where you get the ball. It's why field position is something that brings out ulcers and high blood pressure in coaches.

 

Not to mention that points allowed includes points allowed on kickoff returns, punt returns, blocked punts that are run back, pick-sixes thrown by your own QB and your own fumbles that are run back for TDs by the opponent. Even though the defense has nothing to do with those plays, they'll be blamed for them by people looking at points allowed. 

 

My guess is that the defense will be significantly better than they were last year. 

 

Last year they were the 26th-ranked team, though I thought they were better than that showed. It's way way too early to guess but if I had a gun to my head I'd guess they'd leap up this year to somewhere around 13th.

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54 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

Good topic and I’m hedging. I think that the defense will be better and possibly very good. I think that the increase in short fields will hurt them. Last year the Bills averaged 1.1 turnover a game. If you take away the Peterman nightmare half it would have been 11 total, the fewest in the league. If that doubles this year to 22 (middle of the league) the defense will face more short fields. I think that they will be better but the additional turnovers may hurt the scoring number. I’ll reluctantly take the over but think that they might be quite good.

 

Agree. Especially with their scheme which is all about making teams put together long scoring drives.  The Bills were good last year at not giving up the big play and making teams convert multiple 3rd downs per drive. That is easier to do when you don't turn it over and you punt reasonably well.  If they turn it over more it might hurt their scoring D but in contrast it might help in YPG.   

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4 minutes ago, PeterGriffin said:

Under and by a lot, IMO.

 

Something like 15 - 18 ppg

 

 

So, between 1st and 4th ranked in the league? last year the team ranked #1 in scoring allowed came in at 15.8 PPG. Only the Vikings, Jags and Chargers came in with 18 points or less. The #4 team allowed 18.4, so we'd be ahead of that by around half a yard. 

 

In 2016 only the Pats and Giants allowed less than 18.2. In 2015, the Seahawks led the league with 17.3 and only the Bengals and Chiefs joined them at 18.0 or under.

 

Yeah, I'd guess the likelihood of 15 - 18 PPG is in lower single digits. 

 

 

1 hour ago, Royale with Cheese said:

Last year we were at 21.7 ppg which put us at 16th in the league. 

 

 

Hang on, no we weren't. The Bills allowed 22.4, which put us 18th. 

 

If you're subtracting out points not scored against the defense, did you do so for all the other teams as well?

 

 

 

 

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39 minutes ago, BuffaloHokie13 said:

I'm less concerned with the average and more concerned with the consistency, personally. I haven't updated my '24 points' spreadsheet for this past year, but maybe I'll dust it off. Over the past 3 years the big issue with the defense has been that it's jekyll & hyde even though it's overall average points allowed has been reasonable. I drew my line at 24 points per game previously, but here's a look at this past year using your 20 PPG barometer:

 

20 points or less:

Defense held opponents to 20 points or less 11 times in the 17 games we played last year.

In those games, the average points scored by the opponent in those games was 13.4

The Bills went 8-3 in these games.

 

Over 20 points:

Happened 6 times last year

Opponents averaged 37 points per game

Bills went 1-5 in these games

 

That 23.6 point swing is massive. The average swing in my study across the entire league over 2015 & 2016 was 10.4 and the highest over those 2 years was 17.1. Maybe the 20 point mark skews the data for a wider swing? Nope. Using the 24 point mark our averages move to 14.2 and 39.8, which is even worse at 25.6.

 

Really interesting stuff as ever BH.  Thanks for your time.  

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5 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

So, between 1st and 4th ranked in the league? last year the team ranked #1 in scoring allowed came in at 15.8 PPG. Only the Vikings, Jags and Chargers came in with 18 points or less. The #4 team allowed 18.4, so we'd be ahead of that by around half a yard. 

 

In 2016 only the Pats and Giants allowed less than 18.2. In 2015, the Seahawks led the league with 17.3 and only the Bengals and Chiefs joined them at 18.0 or under.

 

Yeah, I'd guess the likelihood of 15 - 18 PPG is in lower single digits. 

 

 

 

 

Hang on, no we weren't. The Bills allowed 22.4, which put us 18th. 

 

If you're subtracting out points not scored against the defense, did you do so for all the other teams as well?

 

 

 

 

 

I didn't do any math....I just used this website because it was the first that appeared in my google search.

 

https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/opponent-points-per-game

 

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25 minutes ago, Royale with Cheese said:

 

I didn't do any math....I just used this website because it was the first that appeared in my google search.

 

https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/opponent-points-per-game

 

 

 

"Team Opponent Points Per Game"?  That's a weird title. I could be wrong but I think that's looking at how much our opponents averaged over their whole schedules.

 

Try this:

 

http://www.nfl.com/stats/categorystats?seasonType=REG&offensiveStatisticCategory=null&d-447263-n=1&d-447263-o=1&d-447263-p=1&d-447263-s=TOTAL_POINTS_GAME_AVG&tabSeq=2&season=2017&role=OPP&Submit=Go&archive=false&conference=null&defensiveStatisticCategory=GAME_STATS&qualified=false

 

and click on Points per game.

 

And try this: 

 

http://www.nfl.com/stats/categorystats?archive=false&conference=null&role=TM&offensiveStatisticCategory=SCORING&defensiveStatisticCategory=null&season=2017&seasonType=REG&tabSeq=2&qualified=false&Submit=Go

 

That tells you how we scored our opponents scored points, showing that our STs didn't allow any scoring but that our offense allowed a pick-six and a fumble return for a TD (in the same game if I recall correctly).

 

EDIT: The title is weird, but I thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiink they maybe used points scored against the defense only. But even that's a bit hinky.

 

We had 359 scored against us last year. Subtract six points each for the two TDs scored against our offense and divide by 16 and you get 21.6875, which rounded up gives 21.7, the figure your site gives. But that's also weird because they should also subtract the two extra points. But if you do that the final total comes out to 21.5625. But they have us at 21.7, not 21.6. 

 

I don't know. Weird.

 

 

 

 

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16 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

"Team Opponent Points Per Game"?  That's a weird title. I could be wrong but I think that's looking at how much our opponents averaged over their whole schedules.

 

Try this:

 

http://www.nfl.com/stats/categorystats?seasonType=REG&offensiveStatisticCategory=null&d-447263-n=1&d-447263-o=1&d-447263-p=1&d-447263-s=TOTAL_POINTS_GAME_AVG&tabSeq=2&season=2017&role=OPP&Submit=Go&archive=false&conference=null&defensiveStatisticCategory=GAME_STATS&qualified=false

 

and click on Points per game.

 

And try this: 

 

http://www.nfl.com/stats/categorystats?archive=false&conference=null&role=TM&offensiveStatisticCategory=SCORING&defensiveStatisticCategory=null&season=2017&seasonType=REG&tabSeq=2&qualified=false&Submit=Go

 

That tells you how we scored our opponents scored points, showing that our STs didn't allow any scoring but that our offense allowed a pick-six and a fumble return for a TD (in the same game if I recall correctly).

 

EDIT: The title is weird, but maybe they've subtracted out those points scored against us but not against our defense, and maybe they did that for all teams, so the rankings would make sense. Horrible title, but if that's what they did, the figures make sense.

 

 

 

 

 

I generally use ESPN or NFL but for some reason, this site came first so I used it.  I'll keep this in mind next time I use a rankings website.

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