Bills have underperformed this year by 2+ wins

[RyanC883]

22 hours ago, HamptonBillsfan said:

Why is there condemnation of 2nd year rbs, when the O-line was inept. Motor couldn't do anything for most of the season. Dabol didn't call running plays for entire halves of games(Tampa), yet you inexplicably want to play a guy who they cut a week ago and who hasn't played this year, instead of Moss. If you taped the Atlanta game, Moss ran well with the few carries he had. He ran better against Carolina as well. The O-line is playing better with different blocking schemes, and Motor ran wild for 120.

 

 Motor is much better than Moss, we need an actual 2nd RB.  And Motor and Moss are 3rd year guys.  Yes, the OL has been bad, but Motor seems to have compensated for that more than Moss.  Moss is seemingly less physical in his play than Motor.     

22 hours ago, Big Turk said:

 

And they lead the NFL in net point differential even after the 2nd place team just went +40 in their game last week (NE).

 

Moss had a couple of good runs last week but I agree Motor looks like he has taken over.

 

Now he just needs to not drop easy catches in the playoffs...he has had brutal drops in each of the last 2 years in the playoffs.

 

oh, yes, the brutal drops.  Not sure how that happens.  Hopefully that's fixed.  He could be a 3 down back.  I'd still bring another in during the offseason, as well as tell Daboll to run the ball more.  It helps everyone to be more balanced.  

[Nextmanup]

On 1/6/2022 at 10:33 AM, Big Turk said:

Based on the Expected win/loss totals, the Bills should be 12.2-3.8...obviously can't have a fraction of a win or loss so 12-4 would the rounding points...

 

Which would be good for first overall seed right now...frustrating to be in this position when they had so many winnable games they should have taken care of business in.

Hey!  One less slip by Josh Allen in Nashville and a converted 1st down followed by a TD in the dying seconds of that game, and we are the number 1 seed RIGHT NOW.

 

We didn't miss by much.

 

Also: look at all those 1 score games we lost....combined with all those blowout wins.

 

And the best news of all: A PLUS 177 point differential, good for THE BEST IN THE NFL.

 

Signs like this are arguably better indicators of quality than actual record, even though that may seem counter-intuitive to some fans.

 

As long as the offensive line can find a way to get it done--even if ugly--and Josh can do his thing, the only team in the AFC I see keeping up with us is KC.

 

It's also why I think we will face KC in the championship game again...just as all the pundits predicted pre-season!

 

The more things change, the more they don't change.

 

 

[HamptonBillsfan]

25 minutes ago, RyanC883 said:

 

 Motor is much better than Moss, we need an actual 2nd RB.  And Motor and Moss are 3rd year guys.  Yes, the OL has been bad, but Motor seems to have compensated for that more than Moss.  Moss is seemingly less physical in his play than Motor.     

 

oh, yes, the brutal drops.  Not sure how that happens.  Hopefully that's fixed.  He could be a 3 down back.  I'd still bring another in during the offseason, as well as tell Daboll to run the ball more.  It helps everyone to be more balanced.  

Motor looked timid and soft for most of the season until Tampa. He was not part of the offense. All I'm saying is that now ,in the elements, with the O-line playing better, we can judge Moss as the run will be featured. 

[Maine-iac]

On 1/7/2022 at 11:07 AM, HamptonBillsfan said:

Motor looked timid and soft for most of the season until Tampa. He was not part of the offense. All I'm saying is that now ,in the elements, with the O-line playing better, we can judge Moss as the run will be featured. 

Motor was on pace for 1,000 yards as of week 4.  The problem was never Motor they just went away from him and took way too long to come back.  Now they are running more and getting better at it the more they do it.  Yes Moss will benefit from that also but Moss is the epitome of a one cut runner where as Motor has a lot more wiggle.  As far as us nonperforming by two wins we are were in the red zone and came up short of putting the game away at least 3 times.  We are probably 3 plays in those games from having 3 more wins. 

[Ed_Formerly_of_Roch]

On 1/6/2022 at 10:33 AM, Big Turk said:

Based on the Expected win/loss totals, the Bills should be 12.2-3.8...obviously can't have a fraction of a win or loss so 12-4 would the rounding points...

 

Which would be good for first overall seed right now...frustrating to be in this position when they had so many winnable games they should have taken care of business in.

 

Yeah but the Bengals shouldn't have lost to the Bears and Jets and the Titans shouldn't have lost to Jets (hmmm Jets won only 4 games, but beat Titans and Bengals) and Texans so give them each two more wins too then. 

 

That puts Bengals back at 12 wind and Titans at 13

[Cash]

On 1/6/2022 at 3:38 PM, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

I’m not sure what the league average is in one score games but it’s most certainly not O-5  or anywhere close to that. It’s probably somewhere close to 2-3 or 40%.
 

Yeah if the bills just somehow found a way to win two out of their 51 score games they’d be leading the conference. That’s not asking the world of the team.

 

We can likely view this as a positive going into next season in that it’s unlikely they will duplicate a 0–5 record in the same games.

Every one score game (except ties) has exactly 1 winner and 1 loser. So the league average is inherently .500 every year. 
 

So yeah, we’ve underperformed. The good news is that historically, there’s not much stability in whether a team overperforms or underperforms on this*. So there’s no reason to think the Bills will keep underperforming in one score games. Not in future seasons, and not necessarily the rest of this year either. 

 

*I’ve heard Aaron Schatz say that both Brady’s and Manning’s teams consistently overperformed, but haven’t seen him back that up with real evidence. I’m theoretically an analytics guy, but I’m also a skeptic so I don’t accept anything based only on word of mouth. 

[Evian]

The Bills did underform. They had an extra game and an easy schedule.

 

11 wins should be 13. I think the Jaguars and Steelers are the two we would want back.

 

Does it matter though? Teams win Superbowls from the the #1 seed through the #7 seed. The regular season is  irrelevant come playoff time. Teams win on the road all the time. Ask the Bucs of last year.

Edited January 9, 2022 by Evian

[Man with No Name]

1 hour ago, Cash said:

Every one score game (except ties) has exactly 1 winner and 1 loser. So the league average is inherently .500 every year. 
 

So yeah, we’ve underperformed. The good news is that historically, there’s not much stability in whether a team overperforms or underperforms on this*. So there’s no reason to think the Bills will keep underperforming in one score games. Not in future seasons, and not necessarily the rest of this year either. 

 

*I’ve heard Aaron Schatz say that both Brady’s and Manning’s teams consistently overperformed, but haven’t seen him back that up with real evidence. I’m theoretically an analytics guy, but I’m also a skeptic so I don’t accept anything based only on word of mouth. 

yeah. would love to see qb w-l records in 1 score games

[Man with No Name]

1 hour ago, Cash said:

Every one score game (except ties) has exactly 1 winner and 1 loser. So the league average is inherently .500 every year. 
 

So yeah, we’ve underperformed. The good news is that historically, there’s not much stability in whether a team overperforms or underperforms on this*. So there’s no reason to think the Bills will keep underperforming in one score games. Not in future seasons, and not necessarily the rest of this year either. 

 

*I’ve heard Aaron Schatz say that both Brady’s and Manning’s teams consistently overperformed, but haven’t seen him back that up with real evidence. I’m theoretically an analytics guy, but I’m also a skeptic so I don’t accept anything based only on word of mouth. 

I can't find much, but here's an interesting article showing how teams with several "lucky" wins regress the next season, and teams with several "unlucky" losses end up winning big the next year. 

 

The two exceptions, Manning's colts in 06 and 08 had SEVERAL "lucky" wins, but then outperformed those years the next season anyway. Manning's teams were the only exception to this rule from 06-17. that is going both ways. 

 

http://www.optimumscouting.com/news/nfl-s-close-game-analytics-how-lucky-wins-or-losse

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

4 hours ago, Cash said:

*I’ve heard Aaron Schatz say that both Brady’s and Manning’s teams consistently overperformed, but haven’t seen him back that up with real evidence. I’m theoretically an analytics guy, but I’m also a skeptic so I don’t accept anything based only on word of mouth. 

 

Yeah. For some reason I have found it incredibly difficult to find team win/loss records in one score games. A google search has only come up with complete season data for the 2019 season. Seem like something that would be easier to find.

2 hours ago, Evian said:

 

 

11 wins should be 13. I think the Jaguars and Steelers are the two we would want back.

 

 

 

I'm greedy. I want them all back! 16-1!

[Man with No Name]

4 minutes ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

Yeah. For some reason I have found it incredibly difficult to find team win/loss records in one score games. A google search has only come up with complete season data for the 2019 season. Seem like something that would be easier to find.

 

I'm greedy. I want them all back! 16-1!

we do know that both Brady and Manning have a TON of 4th qtr comebacks (top 2 of all-time according to pro-football-reference) and game winning drives, which would typically be 1 score wins. i guess that jives with "overperforming" 

[TBBills]

The only game that really hurt this team was the Jaguars game.

[BillsFanSD]

Anybody who watched this team this year knows we underperformed a bit.  We lost every one-score game were involved in.  Statistically, that's hard to do.  As a ton of other people have noted, we're one Josh-Allen-slip-on-fourth-down away from playing for the #1 seed, which just goes to reinforce a) it's a game of inches and b) this team has been exceptionally unlucky this year.

 

The good news is that this team is good enough that it can take a bunch of tough losses and still win its division and be well-positioned for a deep playoff run.  And next year we can look forward to "regression toward the mean" working in our favor.

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

4 minutes ago, TBBills said:

The only game that really hurt this team was the Jaguars game.

 

Titans is the biggest one. They win that they currently hold the #1 seed.

[BillsFanSD]

4 minutes ago, TBBills said:

The only game that really hurt this team was the Jaguars game.

Nope.  If you could pick one game to flip -- that actually does go the other way about 85% of the time -- it's the Titans game.  The Jags game didn't really matter.

[ArtVandalay]

1 minute ago, BillsFanSD said:

Anybody who watched this team this year knows we underperformed a bit.  We lost every one-score game were involved in.  Statistically, that's hard to do.  As a ton of other people have noted, we're one Josh-Allen-slip-on-fourth-down away from playing for the #1 seed, which just goes to reinforce a) it's a game of inches and b) this team has been exceptionally unlucky this year.

 

The good news is that this team is good enough that it can take a bunch of tough losses and still win its division and be well-positioned for a deep playoff run.  And next year we can look forward to "regression toward the mean" working in our favor.

No offense but I'm tired of the slip narrative.  His guard got thrown in his lap off the snap and they were on the 3 yard line, that play was a horrendous call and blown up of the snap, zero chance to sneak it in from the 3 yardline. Just a baffling call.

[BillsFanSD]

1 minute ago, ArtVandalay said:

No offense but I'm tired of the slip narrative.  His guard got thrown in his lap off the snap and they were on the 3 yard line, that play was a horrendous call and blown up of the snap, zero chance to sneak it in from the 3 yardline. Just a baffling call.

Sorry -- not being critical of Allen here.  Just emphasizing that we were really unfortunate to lose that game.  We were set up really well for a win and picked a bad time to botch a relatively-straightforward play.

[ArtVandalay]

6 minutes ago, BillsFanSD said:

Sorry -- not being critical of Allen here.  Just emphasizing that we were really unfortunate to lose that game.  We were set up really well for a win and picked a bad time to botch a relatively-straightforward play.

It's not critical of Allen, it's just mischaracterizing a play that has zero chance.  Allen didn't slip he got a lineman thrown into him. 

 

Straightforward play? A QB sneak under center from the 3 yard line? Your chance of scoring is next to 0. Our offensive line was getting manhandled all game too. 

 

I don't mind going for the TD but go for the TD, they were trying for a first down with 20 seconds left and then still needed a TD after that. 

[Dr. Who]

Just now, ArtVandalay said:

It's not critical of Allen, it's just mischaracterizing a play that has zero chance.  Allen didn't slip he got a lineman thrown into him. 

 

Straightforward play? A QB sneak under center from the 3 yard line? Your chance of scoring is next to 0. Our offensive line was getting manhandled all game too. 

 

I don't mind going for the TD but go for the TD, they were trying for a first down with 20 seconds left and then still needed a TD after that. 

Allen is usually very good on the qb sneak, but in that critical situation on the goal line, an RPO gives you more room to diagnose and choose the best option. It wasn't a great call.

[TBBills]

23 minutes ago, BillsFanSD said:

Nope.  If you could pick one game to flip -- that actually does go the other way about 85% of the time -- it's the Titans game.  The Jags game didn't really matter.

I am talking game they didn't show up for. The Titans game was a banana peel slip.