Top 4 Scoring teams are in the Conference Champ games..

[Alphadawg7]

I love how everyone is acting like defense was NOT a major part of the victories this weekend.  Did you people even watch the games?  Chiefs D obliterated the Colts.  Eagles shut down the Saints offense most the game and had a shot to win a close game but their #1 WR with broken ribs let a ball go right through his hands for a game ending INT.  Pats D dominated the Chargers too.  Rams terrible run defense showed up big time and shut down Elliot in Cowboy game too.  And it was the Rams run game of their own that was the real factor in that victory.  There were no offensive shootouts lol

 

Funny how a week ago we were "doomed" for not hiring Reich or Lynn...both of them and their high powered offenses just got obliterated this weekend by the opponents defense.

 

Truth is, there are many ways to reach the SB, and life is easier when you are not a lopsided team.  Just ask Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Matt Ryan, Phillip Rivers, etc how life is when you are all offense and no defense.  They struggle to even make the playoffs when the D has been weak, let alone win a SB.  Bress won his only SB when he had a top Defense to go along with his offense, and it wasn't until the defense turned around last year that they were even getting back to having a winning record.  

 

No one has ever said that you need to be all defense to win a championship.  What was said, is that defense still matters and this weekends games proved it again as 3 high powered offenses got slowed down, causing 2 of them to lose and one (the Saints) to escape a potential loss by a self inflicted mistake by their opponent when Alshon let a pass go right through his hands.

Edited January 15, 2019 by Alphadawg7

[Jrb1979]

1 minute ago, Alphadawg7 said:

I love how everyone is acting like defense was NOT a major part of the victories this weekend.  Chiefs D obliterated the Colts.  Eagles shut down the Saints offense most the game and had a shot to win a close game but their #1 WR with broken ribs let a ball go right through his hands for a game ending INT.  Pats D dominated the Chargers too.  Rams terrible run defense showed up big time and shut down Elliot in Cowboy game too.  And it was the Rams run game of their own that was the real factor in that victory.

 

Funny how a week ago we were "doomed" for not hiring Reich or Lynn...both of them and their high powered offenses just got obliterated this weekend by the opponents defense.

 

Truth is, there are many ways to reach the SB, and life is easier when you are not a lopsided team.  Just ask Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Matt Ryan, Phillip Rivers, etc how life is when you are all offense and no defense.  They struggle to even make the playoffs when the D has been weak, let alone win a SB.  Bress won his only SB when he had a top Defense to go along with his offense, and it wasn't until the defense turned around last year that they were even getting back to having a winning record.  

 

No one has ever said that you need to be all defense to win a championship.  What was said, is that defense still matters and this weekends games proved it again as 3 high powered offenses got slowed down, causing 2 of them to lose and one (the Saints) to escape a potential loss by a self inflicted mistake by their opponent when Alshon let a pass go right through his hands.

No one said you don't need defense to win. The days of having a top rated defense being needed to win is over IMO. Having an average defense but top rated offense seems to be the norm now. The top 4  offenses are still left. 

[Alphadawg7]

Just now, Jrb1979 said:

No one said you don't need defense to win. The days of having a top rated defense being needed to win is over IMO. Having an average defense but top rated offense seems to be the norm now. The top 4  offenses are still left. 

 

No disrespect, but one season doesn't make a "norm".  Last year it was the top defenses left.  

 

And there is more than 1 way to win a SB, and having a top offense and average D is one.  Having a great defense and solid offense is another.  And so on and so on as its been proven over and over again.  I have heard this "defense is dead" argument for about 15 years straight and its never once proven to be true.  Just like I hear that Brady and Pats are over for the last 4 years and everyone has been wrong on that too. 

 

Top 5 scoring offenses in NFL history have 0 SB wins, including Brady's record setting offense that lost to the defensive Giants followed by Mannings record breaking offense in Denver (breaking the Pats record) where he got blown out by defensive Seahawks.  In fact, the 2 highest scoring teams in NFL history lost to defensive teams by a combined score of 58-21.  Only one of the other top 5 scoring offenses ever even made the SB, and also lost.  

 

Point is, there is more than one way to get there and win it.  This proclamation made by some that only offense matters because of one season is pretty silly.  Otherwise, you can make a new proclamation every single year related to the final 4 teams.  

[BillsFan130]

32 minutes ago, vorpma said:

You still play 17 - 18 games to get there!

Eagles and Pats had either the 1st and 3rd or top 2 offences last year.

 

Same thing a couple years ago with the pats and Atlanta.

 

Same thing will happen again this year

[iinii]

10 hours ago, row_33 said:

the consistency is the win-loss record is the only thing that matters in the regular season, top teams seek to gain HFA and then can relax

 

and in the playoffs you aim to win the game, hopefully easily so you can pull back and rest up for next week

 

 

 

Granted NE didn’t score as much in the second half, but they didn’t look like they were resting. 

And we see how valuable that week of rest was. That “late” season bye pays big dividends. Rest, no travel, win. 

[Alphadawg7]

2 hours ago, Jrb1979 said:

No one said you don't need defense to win. The days of having a top rated defense being needed to win is over IMO. Having an average defense but top rated offense seems to be the norm now. The top 4  offenses are still left. 

 

Why do people keep saying this?  It was literally said many times on this board over and over again all season that you don’t need defense to win. Just because you may not have said it doesn’t mean others weren’t.  

[vorpma]

10 hours ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

No disrespect, but one season doesn't make a "norm".  Last year it was the top defenses left.  

 

And there is more than 1 way to win a SB, and having a top offense and average D is one.  Having a great defense and solid offense is another.  And so on and so on as its been proven over and over again.  I have heard this "defense is dead" argument for about 15 years straight and its never once proven to be true.  Just like I hear that Brady and Pats are over for the last 4 years and everyone has been wrong on that too. 

 

Top 5 scoring offenses in NFL history have 0 SB wins, including Brady's record setting offense that lost to the defensive Giants followed by Mannings record breaking offense in Denver (breaking the Pats record) where he got blown out by defensive Seahawks.  In fact, the 2 highest scoring teams in NFL history lost to defensive teams by a combined score of 58-21.  Only one of the other top 5 scoring offenses ever even made the SB, and also lost.  

 

Point is, there is more than one way to get there and win it.  This proclamation made by some that only offense matters because of one season is pretty silly.  Otherwise, you can make a new proclamation every single year related to the final 4 teams.  

Exactly! 

[PlayoffsPlease]

10 hours ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

No disrespect, but one season doesn't make a "norm".  Last year it was the top defenses left.  

 

 

Two of the top offenses made it to the Super Bowl.  The four top defenses did not make it to the championship games last year. 

[PlayoffsPlease]

Correlation and causation are two different things.  It is simply a fact that top rated offenses win more championships than top rated defenses since the dawn of the 21st century.   This truth is not disputable.   Whether or not winning championships is caused by having a top rated offense can be argued, but when you have a statistical body of evidence to review over an extended period of time, it is reasonable to make conclusions such as "It is more likely the Super Bowl winner for the upcoming 2019 season will come from the top five statistical  offenses, than from the top five statistical defenses"
 

Having said that I struggle with using team defensive statistics to determine who the best defenses are.   I think teams with very good or very poor offenses end up skewing their defensive results considerably.  This results from a several reasons.  1) the pace of play, 2) starting field position 3) situational football (Look at NE's defense against the Chargers in the first half vs. the second half last week.  Same exact defense, completely different football situation.  very different statistical results)

Lets look at the Bills specifically.   In 2018 the had the #2 defense in total yards allowed:

  

 

and 18th in points allowed:

 

To my mind the "second best defense" would not give up the 18th most points.  Why the disconnect? And is there a stat that can capture the disconnect?   

To me the best defensive stat (no single stat captures everything) is points allowed per drive. In 2018, the Bills were 19th in points allowed per drive.  To me this is a better indication of where the Bills defense performed in 2018   https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/drivestatsdef2018  .  That link shows the drive stat. 

If you are curious the Bills were 30th in points per drive last year.  The top 3 teams in points per drive were KC , NO, LARams.  The Patriots were 8th.   

The top rated Chiefs had 163 drives with an average of 3.25 points per drive.   The Bills had quite a few more drives than the Chiefs, 191, but they only scored 1.4 points per drive, less than half as many.  

I suspect if you looked at the game by game analysis of the high powered offenses, you would see many examples conceptually similar to the NE-LA Chargers game last week.   If this is true, it renders the total defensive statistics for those teams more or less meaningless. 

 

 

[vorpma]

3 hours ago, PlayoffsPlease said:

Correlation and causation are two different things.  It is simply a fact that top rated offenses win more championships than top rated defenses since the dawn of the 21st century.   This truth is not disputable.   Whether or not winning championships is caused by having a top rated offense can be argued, but when you have a statistical body of evidence to review over an extended period of time, it is reasonable to make conclusions such as "It is more likely the Super Bowl winner for the upcoming 2019 season will come from the top five statistical  offenses, than from the top five statistical defenses"
 

Having said that I struggle with using team defensive statistics to determine who the best defenses are.   I think teams with very good or very poor offenses end up skewing their defensive results considerably.  This results from a several reasons.  1) the pace of play, 2) starting field position 3) situational football (Look at NE's defense against the Chargers in the first half vs. the second half last week.  Same exact defense, completely different football situation.  very different statistical results)

Lets look at the Bills specifically.   In 2018 the had the #2 defense in total yards allowed:

  

 

and 18th in points allowed:

 

To my mind the "second best defense" would not give up the 18th most points.  Why the disconnect? And is there a stat that can capture the disconnect?   

To me the best defensive stat (no single stat captures everything) is points allowed per drive. In 2018, the Bills were 19th in points allowed per drive.  To me this is a better indication of where the Bills defense performed in 2018   https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/drivestatsdef2018  .  That link shows the drive stat. 

If you are curious the Bills were 30th in points per drive last year.  The top 3 teams in points per drive were KC , NO, LARams.  The Patriots were 8th.   

The top rated Chiefs had 163 drives with an average of 3.25 points per drive.   The Bills had quite a few more drives than the Chiefs, 191, but they only scored 1.4 points per drive, less than half as many.  

I suspect if you looked at the game by game analysis of the high powered offenses, you would see many examples conceptually similar to the NE-LA Chargers game last week.   If this is true, it renders the total defensive statistics for those teams more or less meaningless. 

 

 

Try the Arena League, you will get what you are hoping for!

[row_33]

3 hours ago, PlayoffsPlease said:

Two of the top offenses made it to the Super Bowl.  The four top defenses did not make it to the championship games last year. 

 

The SB was a track meet with only one decent defensive stop all game

 

[Big Turk]

On 1/14/2019 at 10:17 AM, Mr. WEO said:

Only 1 is in the top 10 D for points allowed.

 

A lot of offense, and just enough D.  That's the formula for success.

It worked out that way, but that doesn't always happen...definitely shifting towards more offense tho and has been for a long time...a GREAT defense will still win against a great offense tho 9 times out of 10.

Edited January 15, 2019 by matter2003

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

17 hours ago, BillsFan130 said:

1. I am not saying you don’t have to have a respectful defence. But you can have an average one and still win. As all 4 teams in now have average defences at BEST

 

2. Bills defence was not average.... If you think that then I’m guessing you didn’t watch the other 31 teams much this season

 

3. I’m from Canada. We spell it with a C not a S

Lol 41-33 SB last year wouldn’t exactly qualify as “shutting an opponent down”.

 

And the year before that, 38-31 I believe was the score

1) pats defense is very good as alway this time of year. Saint defense, also solid and  better than average. 

 

2) Bills defense was dismantled by good offenses this year. They are extremely average.  that guess on teams watched is also incorrect. 

 

3) ok fine but when looking at defense with an ‘S’ the Bills were still just ok. They did well on yards against because of poor STs, mediocre offense and a run defense that was far easier to attack than passing defense. Ravens, chargers, packers, Colts, pats and bears all shredded this defense.

 

So Good (not great) against the pass, not very good at all against the run. They didn’t keep opponents to field goals, were near the bottom in generating sacks, average in allowed completion% and points allowed. 

 

They basically were good at tackling in the secondary and keeping the offense in front of them. That’s it. 

Edited January 15, 2019 by Over 29 years of fanhood

[vorpma]

1 hour ago, matter2003 said:

It worked out that way, but that doesn't always happen...definitely shifting towards more offense tho and has been for a long time...a GREAT defense will still win against a great offense tho 9 times out of 10.

The bottom line - good teams do what is needed to win consistently through a 16 game season followed by post season; offense - pass or run, defense blitz, man to man, or zone, special teams! Not one coaching staff in the NFL will go pass crazy if it does give a really good chance to win. And yes, the offense must score points and the defense must prevent points by any means possible; those that agree with us in this debate tend to be football purists that have followed the game for decades and can appreciate offense, defense and special teams with good coaching! 

[freddyjj]

2 hours ago, vorpma said:

To me the best defensive stat (no single stat captures everything) is points allowed per drive. In 2018, the Bills were 19th in points allowed per drive.  To me this is a better indication of where the Bills defense performed in 2018   https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/drivestatsdef2018  .  That link shows the drive stat. 

Not sure if you misread defensive chart but Bills were actually ranked 10th for Defensive Pts allowed per drive.

[Big Turk]

5 hours ago, PlayoffsPlease said:

Correlation and causation are two different things.  It is simply a fact that top rated offenses win more championships than top rated defenses since the dawn of the 21st century.   This truth is not disputable.   Whether or not winning championships is caused by having a top rated offense can be argued, but when you have a statistical body of evidence to review over an extended period of time, it is reasonable to make conclusions such as "It is more likely the Super Bowl winner for the upcoming 2019 season will come from the top five statistical  offenses, than from the top five statistical defenses"
 

Having said that I struggle with using team defensive statistics to determine who the best defenses are.   I think teams with very good or very poor offenses end up skewing their defensive results considerably.  This results from a several reasons.  1) the pace of play, 2) starting field position 3) situational football (Look at NE's defense against the Chargers in the first half vs. the second half last week.  Same exact defense, completely different football situation.  very different statistical results)

Lets look at the Bills specifically.   In 2018 the had the #2 defense in total yards allowed:

  

 

and 18th in points allowed:

 

To my mind the "second best defense" would not give up the 18th most points.  Why the disconnect? And is there a stat that can capture the disconnect?   

To me the best defensive stat (no single stat captures everything) is points allowed per drive. In 2018, the Bills were 19th in points allowed per drive.  To me this is a better indication of where the Bills defense performed in 2018   https://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/drivestatsdef2018  .  That link shows the drive stat. 

If you are curious the Bills were 30th in points per drive last year.  The top 3 teams in points per drive were KC , NO, LARams.  The Patriots were 8th.   

The top rated Chiefs had 163 drives with an average of 3.25 points per drive.   The Bills had quite a few more drives than the Chiefs, 191, but they only scored 1.4 points per drive, less than half as many.  

I suspect if you looked at the game by game analysis of the high powered offenses, you would see many examples conceptually similar to the NE-LA Chargers game last week.   If this is true, it renders the total defensive statistics for those teams more or less meaningless. 

 

 

 

Well points per drive is a bias stat as well. Every yard line on the field has an expected number of "points" a team should score based on where they are starting the drive from, so teams with better defensive drive starts should allow fewer points. I'm not sure where the Bills ranked for oponent drive start but I'm pretty sure it wasn't very good....

 

Also the Bills are ranked 10th in points per drive not 19th.

 

EDIT:  I was right...Bills ranked DEAD LAST in opponent drive start with the othe team averaging a drive start from the 31.36 yard line.

 

Bills ranked #1 in plays allowed per drive at 5.4

Bills ranked #2 in yards allowed per drive at 26.18

Bills ranked #3 in TOP allowed per drive at 2:33

Bills ranked #6 in Drive Start Success(number of drives allowed that resulted in a first down or touchdown)

Bills ranked #9 in Turnovers per Drive

Bills ranked #10 in points per drive

 

Anyway you slice it those are some Damn good numbers on a per drive basis and their league worst opponent drive start explains a lot regarding the points per drive.

 

Also their red zone defense was atrocious this year. Last year it was near the top of the league.

Edited January 15, 2019 by matter2003

[vorpma]

14 minutes ago, freddyjj said:

Not sure if you misread defensive chart but Bills were actually ranked 10th for Defensive Pts allowed per drive.

Not sure how you got that as my quote; somebody else posted that not me; regarding your post freddyjj - no argument from my friend!

[Jrb1979]

25 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

 

Well points per drive is a bias stat as well. Every yard line on the field has an expected number of "points" a team should score based on where they are starting the drive from, so teams with better defensive drive starts should allow fewer points. I'm not sure where the Bills ranked for oponent drive start but I'm pretty sure it wasn't very good....

 

Also the Bills are ranked 10th in points per drive not 19th.

 

EDIT:  I was right...Bills ranked DEAD LAST in opponent drive start with the othe team averaging a drive start from the 31.36 yard line.

 

Bills ranked #1 in plays allowed per drive at 5.4

Bills ranked #2 in yards allowed per drive at 26.18

Bills ranked #3 in TOP allowed per drive at 2:33

Bills ranked #6 in Drive Start Success(number of drives allowed that resulted in a first down or touchdown)

Bills ranked #9 in Turnovers per Drive

Bills ranked #10 in points per drive

 

Anyway you slice it those are some Damn good numbers on a per drive basis and their league worst opponent drive start explains a lot regarding the points per drive.

 

Also their red zone defense was atrocious this year. Last year it was near the top of the league.

Having those damn good numbers did very little for their record. I would rather have top rated offense and an average defense with the way the league is going. 

[vorpma]

25 minutes ago, Jrb1979 said:

Having those damn good numbers did very little for their record. I would rather have top rated offense and an average defense with the way the league is going. 

I would rather have a winning team with a top rated offense, defense, and special teams that hangs around for a decade than an Arena Football League Offense that supplies flash in the pan thrills for two years until some hot young DC figures out how to shut it down then gets copied by the rest of the league! Football is a team game and has been since the beginning and no matter how hard you guys wish for "showtime," you need to stop your opponent from scoring and eating up the clock at your expense! Funny how that works, score more points than your opponent and stop your opponent from scoring points!

[Jrb1979]

7 minutes ago, vorpma said:

I would rather have a winning team with a top rated offense, defense, and special teams that hangs around for a decade than an Arena Football League Offense that supplies flash in the pan thrills for two years until some hot young DC figures out how to shut it down then gets copied by the rest of the league! Football is a team game and has been since the beginning and no matter how hard you guys wish for "showtime," you need to stop your opponent from scoring and eating up the clock at your expense! Funny how that works, score more points than your opponent and stop your opponent from scoring points!

Yes you do need an all around team but if you look at the teams left. They all are high powered offenses with defenses that were ranked near the middle of pack. I hope it keeps going this way. High powered offense is fun to watch. It seems that only the fans from the days of the Rockpile hate high scoring games.