Something to keep an eye on: Point differential?

[Coach Tuesday]

6 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Again, if therapy and pretending I'm furious works for you, go ahead. Whatever works for you is fine.

 

But you're kidding yourself if you think you're worth getting angry about. Yeah, I'm consistent about pointing out bad logic. Got nothing to do with anger, though.

 

OK, so DVOA has us down for four games that were below average, right? KC, Arizona, Tennessee and the Jets? And you're trying to pretend that supports your argument? Yeah, that won't really work out for you when you started out saying "To be clear: the 'context' here is the defense - the offense did its job every week except against KC, basically." You've backed off that and now here's another obvious bad game being pointed out to you. One of the ones I already told you about, by the way.

 

Of course the Jets game was bad, by any standard. The Bills offense managed 18 points on 6 field goals, couldn't score even one TD against a team that averaged allowing 28.6 ppg. On the face of it, just plain bad. The first Pats game wasn't good either. Nor the Steelers game, really, where the offense rang up 19 points and gave the ball away twice. 

 

Well, point's been made at this point, whether you see it or not. Your beloved Football Outsiders lists four negative games for the offense, so they agree with me as well.

 

 

Hilarious.  To quote Samuel Jackson in Jackie Brown, “What happened to you man?  Yo’ ass used to be beautiful.”

[Scott7975]

OMG just stop Thurman.  You don't always have to be condescending and superior to everyone.  You been doing this since the other BBMB.  It's annoying.  You are not always right either.

[Matt_In_NH]

Remember the days when we prayed for a 1 point victory?  LOL  Now its a given the Bills will win its just a matter of by how much.  There will be a bloodbath if they lose in week1 around here.

Edited September 8, 2021 by mattynh

[Coach Tuesday]

11 minutes ago, Scott7975 said:

OMG just stop Thurman.  You don't always have to be condescending and superior to everyone.  You been doing this since the other BBMB.  It's annoying.  You are not always right either.

Every message board needs its “Angry Divorced Guy at the Memorial Day BBQ.”

[AuntieEm]

2 hours ago, MJS said:

In the NFL the margins of victory are usually pretty slim most of the time. Most games are decided by one score.

 

While it is concerning a little bit, I also think that it provides really good experience. If our players are involved in really close games and find a way to win, that is valuable experience for when they are in those situations again. It's similar to playoff experience. It's tough to go on a run in the playoffs until you have some playoff experience.

 

So, I have confidence that if the Bills are in a close game again this year, they will have the experience to draw from and will be able to push for the win. They'll be a tough team to beat.

 

Also, last year was a pretty tough schedule.

   

I agree that the experience and confidence they gain from succeeding in the close games I think is far better than had they blown out all those close games.  It's easier to have a letdown when things have been going your way so often even when its due to your talent.  It's why Mahomes and the Chiefs couldn't beat TB.   

 

When I was stationed in Fĺ in early 80's I was bowling alot  and I subbed on any league I wasn't actually in so I got in alot of practice. I'd constantly kept track of what I needed every game to hit 200 +.  It drove a number of people crazy they'd ask why I put the added pressure on myself by score watching so much.  Well I wanted to be used to coming thru  under pressure. And at times I messed up due to the pressure but I did succeed a good percentage of the time.  I bowled the first week of the WIBC State tourney and I started in 1st place in my division and I kept it throughout the 2 months it ran.  All the practice I had  as well as the pressure I added to myself preceeding the tourney had me peaking at the right time. 

   So by my personal experience I know the value of pressure situation experience. How many drought year teams  have we  seen shoot themselves in the foot and responded with a terrible effort and lost, many games they had no business losing as they were the better team (not talking bout the games we were lucky to be in against superior teams). That's why the 90's teams were so good they usually overcame their bad plays and once they knew they could it got easier to do. Success breeds success.

[Thurman#1]

1 hour ago, Coach Tuesday said:

Hilarious.  To quote Samuel Jackson in Jackie Brown, “What happened to you man?  Yo’ ass used to be beautiful.”

 

 

I totally understand, dude. Nothing to say which can make your point, so you pretend you got me angry.

 

Got it. And if it works for you, you go, boy!!

 

57 minutes ago, Scott7975 said:

OMG just stop Thurman.  You don't always have to be condescending and superior to everyone.  You been doing this since the other BBMB.  It's annoying.  You are not always right either.

 

 

Very true. I'm certainly not always right. I make my share of mistakes, and probably more.

 

But there really were 4 or 5 games last year where the offense wasn't good. That's all I was saying, and it's really pretty obvious. But I kept getting arguments.

 

 

Edited September 8, 2021 by Thurman#1

[BillsShredder83]

On 9/7/2021 at 12:44 PM, RyanC883 said:

 

Agree.  Go for the jugular as you stated.  Also, I'm fine running the score up.  Get a huge lead, then let the backups PLAY to get experience.  No putting a backup QB in to hand off the ball.  Put him in there to score.  

 

 

Especially when we're trying to showcase Mitch this year

[Thurman#1]

And to go back on point since this was taken so far out into left field, with me sharing the blame ....

 

 

 

 

As for how important point difference is ... it's important sometimes.

 

The 2015 SB Champion Broncos had a point differential below 4. So did the 2012 Super Bowl Champion Ravens. The 2011 Super Bowl Champion Giants actually had a negative point differential. The 2007 Super Bowl Champion Giants had a point differential below three points. The 2006 Super Bowl Champion Mannings, um, I mean the Colts had one of 4.2 points.

 

So that's far from a majority, but most stats that measure both offense and defense are going to look good for nearly all Lombardi winners.

[MJS]

36 minutes ago, AuntieEm said:

   

I agree that the experience and confidence they gain from succeeding in the close games I think is far better than had they blown out all those close games.  It's easier to have a letdown when things have been going your way so often even when its due to your talent.  It's why Mahomes and the Chiefs couldn't beat TB.   

 

When I was stationed in Fĺ in early 80's I was bowling alot  and I subbed on any league I wasn't actually in so I got in alot of practice. I'd constantly kept track of what I needed every game to hit 200 +.  It drove a number of people crazy they'd ask why I put the added pressure on myself by score watching so much.  Well I wanted to be used to coming thru  under pressure. And at times I messed up due to the pressure but I did succeed a good percentage of the time.  I bowled the first week of the WIBC State tourney and I started in 1st place in my division and I kept it throughout the 2 months it ran.  All the practice I had  as well as the pressure I added to myself preceeding the tourney had me peaking at the right time. 

   So by my personal experience I know the value of pressure situation experience. How many drought year teams  have we  seen shoot themselves in the foot and responded with a terrible effort and lost, many games they had no business losing as they were the better team (not talking bout the games we were lucky to be in against superior teams). That's why the 90's teams were so good they usually overcame their bad plays and once they knew they could it got easier to do. Success breeds success.

Yes. And there are teams that lose a lot of close games. They buckle under the pressure. I think it's a great sign that the Bills can overcome the pressure and close out close games.

 

Another area this Bills teams needs more experience is coming back in games where they are down multiple scores. That's next level experience and something that QB's and teams like Brady and the Patriots have experience. Mahomes and the Chiefs have also done that multiple times in the playoffs.

Edited September 8, 2021 by MJS

[Coach Tuesday]

21 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

But there really were 4 or 5 games last year where the offense wasn't good. That's all I was saying, and it's really pretty obvious. But I kept getting arguments.

 

"Not good" and "poor" are not the same as "statistically worse than average."  If the offense is within 1% of what an average offense is supposed to do in the same situation, I put that in the category of "doing its job."  

[AuntieEm]

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Coach Tuesday said:

 

"Not good" and "poor" are not the same as "statistically worse than average."  If the offense is within 1% of what an average offense is supposed to do in the same situation, I put that in the category of "doing its job."  

 

     I expect the games where they played poorly coincided with the games Allen was playing hurt or some of our receivers were nursing nagging injuries. Not making excuses just pointing out what caused the inferior play.

[Coach Tuesday]

3 minutes ago, AuntieEm said:

 

 

 

 

 

     I expect the games where they played poorly coincided with the games Allen was playing hurt or some of our receivers were nursing nagging injuries. Not making excuses just pointing out what caused the inferior play.

I think that’s right, though some of it was poor game planning / coaching not to lose, which they improved after the Arizona debacle.  Speaking of which, that game statistically was sub-optimal by the offense BUT the offense did what it had to do to win the game in a pressure situation (consistent with the aggregate numbers I posted yesterday) and the defense (specifically Addison) crapped the bed and lost the game.

[DCofNC]

14 hours ago, ScottLaw said:

Which is exactly what they did after the Arizona game…. Finally, they didn’t take their foot of the gas.(something a lot of people were screaming for them to do instead of constantly going into a shell) and it paid huge dividends….. some people are suggesting the games will be lower scoring this year because the defense will be better and the Bills will run it more in the 2nd half of games…. ***** that, why change what worked so well down the stretch last season?  Keep the pedal down and blowing teams out.

Amen, I say make sure the game is out of reach for the opponent, don’t mess around. I want to see the Patriot mentality, be up by 21 in the 4th with 10 mins to go before you even consider taking out your QB and primary weapons.  Every game counts, bury them.

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

14 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

Yeah, but I wasn't arguing that they didn't do their job overall. You said they did their every week though you excepted the KC game. I'm arguing that; it makes no sense to me.

 

And DVOA doesn't speak to that. It looks at the whole season together.

 

You said, "To be clear: the “'context' here is the defense - the offense did its job every week except against KC, basically.  So the issue was the defense letting the other team keep the game close."

 

And that wasn't so. The offense had some games where they had problems, including two games we won because the defense did a terrific job. Our 18-10 win against the Jets was a much better job by the defense than the offense. Scoring 18 against last year's Jets was not a good job, but holding even the Jets to 10 points is good defense. Scoring 24 against last year's Pats was OK, but holding those same Pats to 21, including that final Zimmer turnover was good defense.

 

The D holding the Chargers to 17, the Pats to 21 and 9 in those two games, the Ravens to 3 in the playoffs, the Raiders to

 

The offense didn't play particularly well - as I said - in several games Did they do their job when they scored 16 against the Titans? 18 against the Jets in Week7? 24 against the Pats? 19 against the Steelers (the other seven points came on Taron Johnson's pick-six)? 10 against the Ravens in the playoffs (the other seven points came on Taron Johnson's other pick-six)?

 

And again, as I said, they certainly were better than the defense. It isn't even a question. They were very good overall. But you said they did their job in every game except the Chiefs. I don't see how anyone could say they did their job in that Titans game. And they weren't good in two or three others either.

 

 

 

Each game has to be looked at individually. And even then each game can often be seen as a game inside a game. The Steelers game is a perfect example. The Bills offense was bad in the first half. Maybe even really bad. But in the second half they scored 17 points. They set the tone coming out of the half with the proper adjustments and scored TD's on their first two possessions of the second half. Then late in the game they get the ball back with over 7 minutes left in the game up 11 and never let the Steelers posses the ball again. Just running on them at will and eating up the clock.  They didn't score on every possession in the second half but the eye test showed a nearly perfect performance in the second half given the strength of opponent, tightness of the game coming out of the half and the adjustments that were made. 

 

Then you have the the first Patriots game. If I am not mistaken, that game saw 20+ mph winds like the Ravens game. You wouldn't expect an offense to perform it's best in such conditions. Just like both the Ravens and Bills offenses were far below their averages in similar conditions in the divisional round playoff game. I'm not sure why you think holding the Patriots to 21 was good though. The Patriots were held to far less than that a number of times. In fact, they were held to 20 or less in half their games last year.

 

The Jets game is another glass half full / half empty game for the offense. But looking at the game I think I can find more positives from the offense then I can negatives. They didn't punt all game. They were well balanced with over 300 yards passing and 126 yards rushing at over 5 ypc when you subtract Allen's two kneel downs. Sucks they didn't score a single TD but it was some pretty bad luck to not get at least one on the day when one is taken off the board by a pre snap penalty and the other by a turf monster that got Kroft. Also, of Bass's 8 FG attempts only one was over 50 yards in length and four out of the eight were 40 yards on less, meaning that the Bills were sustaining drives well into Jets territory most of the time.

 

When I look back at last season, none of the 3 games I mentioned above strike me as games where I have any kind of concern about the offensive performance with regards to predicting future success or lack of. 

 

Off the top of my head the three easily most concerning games offensively last year were both KC games and the Chargers game. The Titans game less so then these three because of many different factors from the schedule change, John Brown injury, fluke ball bouncing off of Roberts helmet for the INT play, and general uncharacteristic penalties and drops by a variety of players.

[Thurman#1]

12 hours ago, Coach Tuesday said:

 

"Not good" and "poor" are not the same as "statistically worse than average."  If the offense is within 1% of what an average offense is supposed to do in the same situation, I put that in the category of "doing its job."  

 

 

No. I get why you want to establish a random cut-off in a place where you can ignore a negative Bills performance and pretend it never happened. We all get it. Couldn't be clearer. Unfortunately, that's not how stats work, that you can randomly eliminate them because you feel like it. What you've got there is a negative DVOA performance.

 

And 0% in DVOA isn't "doing what it's supposed to do," as you say here. Nice spin there. In real life, mediocre performance isn't "doing what you are supposed to do." Your boss isn't going to come into the office and say, "Hey nice going, Coach Tuesday, half the people in the world could do better than you are doing. Great stuff!!! You're doing what you're supposed to do."

 

You don't get to randomly decide which numbers you'll ignore after checking out how you can gerrymander a way to exclude a game or two that you don't want to think about. You either use DVOA ... or you don't. If you don't, that's fine. If you do, you face up to the consequences of doing so.

 

The consequences of basing your argument entirely on DVOA (while desperately trying to avoid anyone noticing that the offense scored less than twenty points in four games), the system you love so much, is that according to that system, the Bills had four games where they were below average, sub-mediocre.

 

Football Outsiders don't say anything about a 1% cutoff. They don't attach any importance whatsoever to that. That's entirely your own made-up little attempt to justify leaving out the game that is inconvenient for your argument.

[GunnerBill]

33 minutes ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

No. I get why you want to establish a random cut-off in a place where you can ignore a negative Bills performance and pretend it never happened. We all get it. Couldn't be clearer. Unfortunately, that's not how stats work, that you can randomly eliminate them because you feel like it. What you've got there is a negative DVOA performance.

 

And 0% in DVOA isn't "doing what it's supposed to do," as you say here. Nice spin there. In real life, mediocre performance isn't "doing what you are supposed to do." Your boss isn't going to come into the office and say, "Hey nice going, Coach Tuesday, half the people in the world could do better than you are doing. Great stuff!!! You're doing what you're supposed to do."

 

You don't get to randomly decide which numbers you'll ignore after checking out how you can gerrymander a way to exclude a game or two that you don't want to think about. You either use DVOA ... or you don't. If you don't, that's fine. If you do, you face up to the consequences of doing so.

 

The consequences of basing your argument entirely on DVOA (while desperately trying to avoid anyone noticing that the offense scored less than twenty points in four games), the system you love so much, is that according to that system, the Bills had four games where they were below average, sub-mediocre.

 

Football Outsiders don't say anything about a 1% cutoff. They don't attach any importance whatsoever to that. That's entirely your own made-up little attempt to justify leaving out the game that is inconvenient for your argument.

 

So while I agree with you that negative is negative and means they didn't do their job that day, regardless of whether it was by a little or a lot I so disagree on the 0% point. To me that is met expectation. Now if all you are doing is meeting expectation every day over a year then yea I probably want a bit more from you to consider you a strong performer... but if you have 3 or 4 days a month where you just meet your expectation but you have another 10 where you are great I am not saying "hmm those days where you just meet your expectation are a problem."

[Thurman#1]

3 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

Each game has to be looked at individually. And even then each game can often be seen as a game inside a game. The Steelers game is a perfect example. The Bills offense was bad in the first half. Maybe even really bad. But in the second half they scored 17 points. They set the tone coming out of the half with the proper adjustments and scored TD's on their first two possessions of the second half. Then late in the game they get the ball back with over 7 minutes left in the game up 11 and never let the Steelers posses the ball again. Just running on them at will and eating up the clock.  They didn't score on every possession in the second half but the eye test showed a nearly perfect performance in the second half given the strength of opponent, tightness of the game coming out of the half and the adjustments that were made.

 

Very much agreed that everything should be looked at individually.

 

But saying that they really did well against the Steelers because even though they were really awful in the first half, they were pretty solid in the second half ... that doesn't make sense. Agree that that last drive was really nice. I loved it. But that doesn't mean that they performed well on offense.

 

 

3 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

Then you have the the first Patriots game. If I am not mistaken, that game saw 20+ mph winds like the Ravens game. You wouldn't expect an offense to perform it's best in such conditions. Just like both the Ravens and Bills offenses were far below their averages in similar conditions in the divisional round playoff game. I'm not sure why you think holding the Patriots to 21 was good though. The Patriots were held to far less than that a number of times. In fact, they were held to 20 or less in half their games last year.

 

Would I expect them to perform it's best? No. But to perform well? Yeah. Allen has had a number of games where he's thrown well in bad conditions, and the whole Bills offense has also. Those weren't awful conditions, just not very good. Not counting the final kneel-down and the halftime kneel-down, they had eight drives, and five of those went for five plays or less.

 

They weren't awful by any means. But they also weren't good.

 

 

3 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

The Jets game is another glass half full / half empty game for the offense. But looking at the game I think I can find more positives from the offense then I can negatives. They didn't punt all game. They were well balanced with over 300 yards passing and 126 yards rushing at over 5 ypc when you subtract Allen's two kneel downs. Sucks they didn't score a single TD but it was some pretty bad luck to not get at least one on the day when one is taken off the board by a pre snap penalty and the other by a turf monster that got Kroft. Also, of Bass's 8 FG attempts only one was over 50 yards in length and four out of the eight were 40 yards on less, meaning that the Bills were sustaining drives well into Jets territory most of the time.

 

Come on, man, in that Jets game the offense was not good.

 

And you can't use a pre-snap penalty as an excuse. Who committed the penalty? The Bills offense. It was their fault. Same with Kroft's almost-TD. The reason he finally fell down was that Allen had like 20 yards available to his inside, but instead threw it outside and high right next to the sideline, forcing him to attempt some unusual balancing steps to stay inbounds. Bad luck is sometimes a factor but those were both cases of the Bills having the results of their actions hurt them.

 

They killed themselves with penalties, and that's not luck, it's bad performance. They went 3 for 11 on 3rd downs.

 

They didn't score a single TD despite good field position, starting one drive in Jets territory and two beyond their own 40. The Jets didn't have any other game this year where the opposing offense scored less than two TDs. And in only two games was it less than three TDs.

 

 

3 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

When I look back at last season, none of the 3 games I mentioned above strike me as games where I have any kind of concern about the offensive performance with regards to predicting future success or lack of. 

 

 

"... with regards to predicting future success or lack of ..." you say? Well with those words, I'd have to agree. I haven't expressed any concern about future success with the offense. I made it clear that I think overall they're very good.

 

I have been responding to a somewhat nutty statement he made. He said, "To be clear: the 'context' here is the defense - the offense did its job every week except against KC, basically.  So the issue was the defense letting the other team keep the game close."

 

And that's nonsense. Yeah, the offense was better than the defense, though the defense really improved the last half of the year. But arguing that there was only one game where the offense didn't do its job doesn't make sense. They had some problems in several games, though again, overall they were certainly very good.

 

 

3 hours ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

 

Off the top of my head the three easily most concerning games offensively last year were both KC games and the Chargers game. The Titans game less so then these three because of many different factors from the schedule change, John Brown injury, fluke ball bouncing off of Roberts helmet for the INT play, and general uncharacteristic penalties and drops by a variety of players.

 

 

Permit me to drastically disagree about the Titans game. That was dreadful. Just went back and watched the whole thing a few days ago as I slowly work through last season. It was awful. On both offense and defense. But the offense absolutely killed themselves with penalties, two INTs and a lost fumble.

 

They couldn't get out of their own way.

 

Agree that the schedule change sucked and may have had an effect. That's not an acceptable excuse.

 

Agreed that the Chargers game was another one with some problems.

 

 

[Thurman#1]

1 hour ago, GunnerBill said:

 

So while I agree with you that negative is negative and means they didn't do their job that day, regardless of whether it was by a little or a lot I so disagree on the 0% point. To me that is met expectation. Now if all you are doing is meeting expectation every day over a year then yea I probably want a bit more from you to consider you a strong performer... but if you have 3 or 4 days a month where you just meet your expectation but you have another 10 where you are great I am not saying "hmm those days where you just meet your expectation are a problem."

 

 

His argument was that mediocre was living up to expectations. It's not.

 

As I've said a bunch of times in this thread, yes, over the course of the year they were a very good offense.

 

He said, "To be clear: the 'context' here is the defense - the offense did its job every week except against KC, basically.  So the issue was the defense letting the other team keep the game close."

 

You're trying to look at mediocre performance on one day through the lens of their overall very good season. He has consistently tried to argue that he was right, that they did their job every week except KC. NOT just that they did their job looked at in the context of the season.

[GunnerBill]

1 minute ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

His argument was that mediocre was living up to expectations. It's not.

 

As I've said a bunch of times in this thread, yes, over the course of the year they were a very good offense.

 

He said, "To be clear: the 'context' here is the defense - the offense did its job every week except against KC, basically.  So the issue was the defense letting the other team keep the game close."

 

You're trying to look at mediocre performance on one day through the lens of their overall very good season. He has consistently tried to argue that he was right, that they did their job every week except KC. NOT just that they did their job looked at in the context of the season.

 

I think mediocre, average, satisfactory, is meeting the minimum expectation. That is the very definition of it "acceptable but not good or outstanding."

[Coach Tuesday]

16 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

I think mediocre, average, satisfactory, is meeting the minimum expectation. That is the very definition of it "acceptable but not good or outstanding."

Apparently it’s “nonsense.”