If the starters stay healthy will Bills have #1 D in 2019?

[Kirby Jackson]

I sort of took the easy way out. I went Top 5 but not 1 but believe that there is a real chance that they are 1. I wish that I was bold enough to say 1 but if it blows up this season I can hide in anonymity. 

[teef]

i'm going to put myself in that 6-10 range. that with an improved offense could get you into a wild card spot.

[Protocal69]

53 minutes ago, Dopey said:

With all due respect, Chandler#81 did mention turnovers inside the 20 and how that would lead to more scores by opponents quickly and without the need to accumulate a ton of yards, yet you give stats of a top 10 defense in terms of YARDS ALLOWED(not even his argument). 

No his point was quote “crappy offense and turnovers” so my argument is valid. You only just mentioned defense and no mention of the crappy offense reference. 

[Thurman#1]

On 7/25/2019 at 6:32 PM, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Sorry, man, no. Poor analysis.

 

When you are looking at scoring defense, drives on which a team scores count far far more than any other drive. Seven points is about 2% of the total points scored against you, though one drive is way way less than 1% of the drives faced. Scoring drives count more.

 

But when you are looking at yards, every drive counts the same as every other. Yeah, one drive might start on the opponent's 10. The next might start on the Bills one, 99 yards away. Since each drive counts the same, it's only the average that matters. Yeah, some drives start closer, but other start farther away. Only the average matters, and the average for every team is close. The Bills defensive average was to start on their own 31.36 yard line. The league average was to start three yards further away, on the 28.28 yard line.

 

Again, a crappy turnover-laden offense has very little impact on defensive yards. A ton on points, and very little on yards. If anything it has a bad effect on defensive performance, as the Bills faced the 2nd most drives of any NFL defense last year, due to that crappy offense.

 

 

On 7/25/2019 at 6:50 PM, Chandler#81 said:

Your 1st paragraph makes no sense. The 2nd paragraph is basically what I said, just stranger wording. 3rd paragraph goes to my poor analysis as well. It’s easier to stop an offense whose concentrating more on the clock ticking to zero than a team trying to score. These “drives” are anything but game changers. I think we’re talking about the same thing, except for the 1st paragraph. 

 

 

Sorry, man, no, you've completely misunderstood my post. And your point is incorrect.

 

You started off going on about how when your offense sucks and hands the ball to the other defense within the 20 your team won't lose many yards when the other team scores. Bad logic. You're talking about maybe 3% of the drives our defense faced, if that. Any argument based entirely on ignoring 97% of drives is just dunder-headed.

 

Seven drives started inside the 20. Three of the seven were against Baltimore, and two were against the Colts. Then there was one against the Chargers, Colts, and Jets. That's 7 drives out of 182, or 3.8%.

 

The key figures are two:  average drive start and number of drives faced.

 

Having a poor offense / STs doesn't help a defense have few yards allowed. It has a very small effect, but if anything that effect is to make it more difficult for the defense to make good YPG stats.

 

 

Since you don't seem to get this as stated, I'll use math instead. How many yards did the Bills defense have to protect over the course of the season? It's completely easy to figure ... if a drive starts on your 20, you're defending 80 yards. So you multiply average # of yards being defended by # of drives faced and you get an exact tally of how many yards the D defended over the course of the season.

 

(100 yards  -  AVG Defensive Drive Start)  x Number of Drives Faced

 

Bills ( 100 - 31.36) X 182 = 12,492.48

 

So, what about the other teams? Ranked here from 1st (fewest yards defended, which is the most favorable situation for a D to be in) to least favorable situation for the D.

 

 

1)  DAL 11,460.32  (MOST favorable situation for the D in terms of yards)

2)  TEN 11,811.28

3)  OAK 11,815.44

4)  LAC 11,825.55

5)  NO 11,859.26

6)  DET 11,949.3

7)  WAS 11,973.98

8   CAR 12,009.72

9) SF 12,014.7

10) ATL 12,031.8

11)  IND 12,180.0

12)  NYG 12,254.19

13)  SEA 12,309.96

14)  CIN 12,337.56

15)  GB 12,339.36

16)  PHI 12,387.24

17)  JAX 12,402.25

18)  BAL 12,402.37

19)  TB 12,405.75

20)  BUF 12,492.48

21)  KC 12,504.24

22)  MIA 12,684.28

23)  MIN 12,689.13

24)  PIT 12,742.23

25)  LAR 12,781.12

26)  NE 12,972.87

27)  ARI 13,029.6

28)  DEN 13,059.15

29)  CHI 13,208.94

30)  NYJ 13,243.94

31)  CLE 13,674.05

32)  HOU 13,769.55  (LEAST favorable situation for a D in terms of giving up yards)

 

Having a good or bad offense/STs group is horrible for a defense in terms of giving up POINTs. But in terms of yards, there's very little difference, and Buffalo certainly didn't benefit, as they were below average in terms of favorable starts.

 

Which yet again shows that yards isolates defenses a ton better than scoring does.

 

Edited August 3, 2019 by Thurman#1

[Bookie Man]

All depends on the pass. If they finish top 7 in sacks I think there is a chance. The secondary is very good and so are the LBs in coverage. If Oliver does what he did at Houston and Edmunds takes a big step, there is a good chance. 

[Chandler#81]

^  ^

Blah, Blah, Blah! Here’s a stat your computations fail to 

27 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

Sorry, man, no, you've completely misunderstood my post. And your point is incorrect.

...

You started off going on about how when your offense sucks and hands the ball to the other defense within the 20 your team 

Which yet again shows that yards isolates defenses a ton better than scoring does.

 

^ ^  ^

 Blah, Blah, Blah! Here’s a stat your computations fail miserably to explain, Professor. 6 & 10. The only reason for the 6 is ever improving play by a rookie QB. Deduce the record with 16 starts by Peterman & Anderson. They were incompetent and our glorious Defense was sieve which has led to early insurmountable deficits 2 years running. Allen began to provide a switch in this all too common theme. HE will be the best thing this defense has going for it. Total Yards Against be damned.

[richardb1952]

Five things that I believe have to happen for Bills to be a top 5 defense:

1.  Stop the run.  Bills had a hard time last year.

2.  Keep drives going on offense.

3.  Score

4.  Force teams into passing which is strength of Bills defense.

5.  Force turnovers.

 

Seems simple.  I know Bills were # 2 in some categories last year, but to be truly elite, these are the areas needing improvement.  If they can do these things, I won't care what their defensive ranking is.  I now they will be good and will be in most games next year.  

[Boca BIlls]

The Bills should have the best defense in the league. Having a better defense then last year, plus the offense HAS to be better the Bills will easily be #1.

 

[SCBills]

Hughes and Oliver on the DL with a solid 5 deep around them (Lawson, Murphy, Star, Harry, Phillips). 

 

Edmunds and Milano as young stud 3 down LB’s with Lorax.  Vosean Joseph is very intriguing in this defense.  

 

Secondary, no explanation needed.   In the top 5 of talent along with the most depth in the league. 

 

Top 5, with relatively decent health and #1 if we get legit EDGE production from Murphy/Lawson. 

[MDH]

On 7/24/2019 at 11:02 PM, GreggTX said:

. Besides, our D allowed 23.4 pts/gm even though other offenses didn't really need to put up more points in the late going. That ranks our D 18th in points allowed, which is a much better indicator than yards allowed.

 

Points allowed is more of a team metric, not strictly a D metric. Yards are strictly a D metric. 

 

If an offense turns the ball over consistently is it really the Ds fault that they allow more points than another team’s D whose offense holds onto the ball? If an offense

routinely moves the ball and pins opposing teams after a punt, is that D better because they don’t allow teams to drive 90 yards for a TD?

 

To me points allowed us much like batting average in MLB. It tells you something but is far from painting a complete picture.

 

A true indicator of how good a D is somewhere in the middle. Yards, points allowed,  turnovers caused, first downs allowed...combined they are all indicators of a Ds quality. I’m sure someone has a

new metric that combines these things into a rankings system. 

[Alphadawg7]

We were number 2 on yards allowed, but middle of the pack in the Redzone.  We can’t be number 1 until we get very good in the Redzone.  I do expect top 5 though, and while I am not expecting number 1, it’s still certainly possible if guys like Edmunds take a big step and Oliver can make an immediate impact.  

[GoBills808]

8 minutes ago, MDH said:

 

Points allowed is more of a team metric, not strictly a D metric. Yards are strictly a D metric. 

 

If an offense turns the ball over consistently is it really the Ds fault that they allow more points than another team’s D whose offense holds onto the ball? If an offense

routinely moves the ball and pins opposing teams after a punt, is that D better because they don’t allow teams to drive 90 yards for a TD?

 

To me points allowed us much like batting average in MLB. It tells you something but is far from painting a complete picture.

 

A true indicator of how good a D is somewhere in the middle. Yards, points allowed,  turnovers caused, first downs allowed...combined they are all indicators of a Ds quality. I’m sure someone has a

new metric that combines these things into a rankings system. 

Correct. Yards allowed, while not a perfect metric by any means, is still a better representation of total defensive quality than points against.

[Thurman#1]

On 8/3/2019 at 9:48 PM, Chandler#81 said:

^  ^

Blah, Blah, Blah! Here’s a stat your computations fail to 

^ ^  ^

 Blah, Blah, Blah! Here’s a stat your computations fail miserably to explain, Professor. 6 & 10. The only reason for the 6 is ever improving play by a rookie QB. Deduce the record with 16 starts by Peterman & Anderson. They were incompetent and our glorious Defense was sieve which has led to early insurmountable deficits 2 years running. Allen began to provide a switch in this all too common theme. HE will be the best thing this defense has going for it. Total Yards Against be damned.

 

 

 

Oh, you're one of those sad fellas that thinks that a team's record is due to the defense? Sorry, for a moment I thought you were worth taking notice of.

 

For anyone else interested, you can see that he has no answer ... for which you can't blame him one iota. Yards per game is the best way to isolate the defense, by far. Is it perfect? Nope. Is it the only thing you should look at? Nah. But it's the best way by far to look at the defense as separated as possible from the offense and STs.