Why Turnovers don't kill the Bills(or Chiefs) like they do normal teams

[Big Turk]

So there is a lot being made across the media about how much the Bills turn the ball over and why they "can't keep winning" if they don't stop doing it.

 

I believe they are wrong and the reason they are wrong is the Bills and Chiefs are simply not like other teams. 

 

Firstly, the Bills get a lot of takeaways, so in most games even if they have 3 turnovers, they likely are at least getting 2 of their own. They are a net 0 on turnover differential for the season. The important stat isn't how many turnovwrs you have, it's what is the net turnover differential (ie, how many times you get takeaways - how many times the other teams get takeaways). 

 

Bills rank tied for 13th with 0, KC is -3 on the year. 23 giveaways versus 20 takeaways.

 

Secondly, the Bills rarely punt, so in the drives they are not turning the ball over, they score at the 2nd highest points per drive rate in the NFL, next to of course, Kansas City. 

 

The league average for punts is somewhere around 65 for the year. Bills came in at 45, fewest in the NFL in both total and punts/game. That's 20 extra possessions where we either scored points, went for it on 4th down or turned the ball over versus a normal team. If you take our 2.64 points per drive stat and multiply it by 20, that led to an extra 53ish points for the Bills versus a normal team.

 

The Bills have turned the ball over 3+ times on 5 occasions this year(including last week). They are 4-1 in those games. The only game they lost was to the Vikings in OT where they were -2 in TOs instead of the -1 or 0 in the other 4 wins. And that extra TO came on a game ending INT in the RZ in OT.

 

All of their losses have come when they have lost the TO battle in a game, but they are also 6-3 in the 9 games that has happened, so they still win twice as often as they lose, it just makes it a little tougher.

 

I think fans and the media need to start viewing turnovers differently with the Bills and Chiefs. It still matters, but it matters far less than it does for most teams.

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Big Turk

[US Egg]

Didn’t someone graph this out very recently?

 

If not, you got one? They help those like me.

Edited January 18, 2023 by I am the egg man

[BeastMaster]

I generally agree with this sentiment 

 

 

 

I also think that when and where the turnovers take place, as well as what the result of the turnover is makes a huge difference.

 

It's lazy analysis to say turnovers will lose you the game without dissecting if it costs you points, or if it's early in the game when you are ahead, etc

[Fleezoid]

Kinda like the lights on a drag racing tree. Bills gotta handicap a light or two to even out the race. 

[GunnerBill]

You know when they matter most for Buffalo and KC? When they play one another. Because in the 5 meetings in the last two seasons the 3 times that the turnover battle was even the Chiefs won. The two occasions when the Bills won the turnover battle, they won the game. 

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

25 minutes ago, Big Turk said:

So there is a lot being made across the media about how much the Bills turn the ball over and why they "can't keep winning" if they don't stop doing it.

 

I believe they are wrong and the reason they are wrong is the Bills and Chiefs are simply not like other teams. 

 

Firstly, the Bills get a lot of takeaways, so in most games even if they have 3 turnovers, they likely are at least getting 2 of their own. They are a net 0 on turnover differential for the season. The important stat isn't how many turnovwrs you have, it's what is the net turnover differential (ie, how many times you get takeaways - how many times the other teams get takeaways). 

 

Bills rank tied for 13th with 0, KC is -3 on the year. 23 giveaways versus 20 takeaways.

 

Secondly, the Bills rarely punt, so in the drives they are not turning the ball over, they score at the 2nd highest points per drive rate in the NFL, next to of course, Kansas City. 

 

The league average for punts is somewhere around 65 for the year. Bills came in at 45, fewest in the NFL in both total and punts/game. That's 20 extra possessions where we either scored points, went for it on 4th down or turned the ball over versus a normal team. If you take our 2.64 points per drive stat and multiply it by 20, that led to an extra 53ish points for the Bills versus a normal team.

 

The Bills have turned the ball over 3+ times on 5 occasions this year(including last week). They are 4-1 in those games. The only game they lost was to the Vikings in OT where they were -2 in TOs instead of the -1 or 0 in the other 4 wins. And that extra TO came on a game ending INT in the RZ in OT.

 

All of their losses have come when they have lost the TO battle in a game, but they are also 6-3 in the 9 games that has happened, so they still win twice as often as they lose, it just makes it a little tougher.

 

I think fans and the media need to start viewing turnovers differently with the Bills and Chiefs. It still matters, but it matters far less than it does for most teams.

 

 

Interesting thought that I've has as well. There has to be a cost/benefit element to it. Old school Parcells thought process of don't be so aggressive as to make mistakes may not be as relevant to a game where the rules are skewed as they are.

[dorquemada]

I think I've mentioned before that years back i had done a game predicting algorithm in SAS then SPSS.  The first thing I did was to feed it data and look for correlations between specific stats (net turnovers, point differential, passing vs running,etc), and W/L record.  Long story short, at least in the early 90s, there was, in fact, a correlation between turnovers and W/L but it was weak

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

6 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

You know when they matter most for Buffalo and KC? When they play one another. Because in the 5 meetings in the last two seasons the 3 times that the turnover battle was even the Chiefs won. The two occasions when the Bills won the turnover battle, they won the game. 

Overall the Chiefs are 3-2 in those games but turned it over 8x to Bills 3x. All but one of the games, when Chiefs went -4 and Bills won 38-20, were either neutral or +/- 1 so not a big difference. As a matter of fact three of games were dead even 0/0 or 1/1, not  a huge difference. 

[mjt328]

3 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

You know when they matter most for Buffalo and KC? When they play one another. Because in the 5 meetings in the last two seasons the 3 times that the turnover battle was even the Chiefs won. The two occasions when the Bills won the turnover battle, they won the game. 

 

Exactly.

Turnovers are important, because most of them result in either a lost score (3 or 7 points) or an easier score for the other team (3 or 7 points).  Bills turnovers on Saturday led to a Field Goal (only needed 18 yards), a Touchdown (only needed 18 yards) and a Defensive Touchdown.  A total of 17 points.  We got lucky, because the Dolphins also had two turnovers which lead to touchdowns for us.

 

Teams like Buffalo and Kansas City are generally good enough to overcome those point swings, because they are usually 10-14 points better than the opposing team.  That is not the case when they play each other.

[BillsVet]

Regular season statistical analysis projected for use in the playoffs is asinine because the majority of Buffalo's games (11) contributing to +/- came against non-playoff teams.  Sure, you can beat up on bad to mediocre teams turning the ball over a few times because Josh can make up for that against those defenses.    

 

No sane mind believes that turnovers aren't as big a deal in the playoffs where number of possessions matter against better competition.  And that is especially the case going up against strong offenses that score quickly.  A team like CIN or KC having one less possession and Buffalo getting another increases a favorable result.   

[SoCal Deek]

Not to get too into the weeds here but also matters where we turn the ball over. Sunday we turned it over on our side of 50 yard line. Those ones really hurt, and one of course was returned for a touchdown. While we all get upset when Josh turns it over in the opponent’s red zone, I’d be interested to see how often those resulted in the opponent scoring points. 

[D. L. Hot-Flamethrower]

6 minutes ago, BillsVet said:

Regular season statistical analysis projected for use in the playoffs is asinine because the majority of Buffalo's games (11) contributing to +/- came against non-playoff teams.  Sure, you can beat up on bad to mediocre teams turning the ball over a few times because Josh can make up for that against those defenses.    

 

No sane mind believes that turnovers aren't as big a deal in the playoffs where number of possessions matter against better competition.  And that is especially the case going up against strong offenses that score quickly.  A team like CIN or KC having one less possession and Buffalo getting another increases a favorable result.   

LOL. a little harsh but.....Of course no one believes in throwing caution to the wind. But, I think both teams play a certain style and much of it depends on the QB and playmakers making off schedule plays. The mindset of both is there can and will  be  some turnovers and they  let their guys be themselves. Correct and move on.

People have been getting their panties in knots because we had some turnovers but still won last week and if we do that this week we won't win. No kidding, I still want my guy to play his game this week and I bet he doesn't make the same mistakes this week.

Edited January 18, 2023 by D. L. Hot-Flamethrower

[strive_for_five_guy]

I get the point that we’re not punting, but I think we’ve gotten lucky in overcoming turnovers, and eventually could come back to bite us.  For instance, is a turnover in scoring position good?  We’re forgoing at least a potential FG in that instance (there wasn’t going to be a punt).  And if the Bills turn the ball over in non-scoring position, we are likely giving the opposing team better field position than if we had eventually punted.  

Luckily, we have been able to overcome turnovers in many games, because we have dominated other parts of the game.  That’s not necessarily going to be the case as the competition gets tighter.

[Big Turk]

3 minutes ago, strive_for_five_guy said:

I get the point that we’re not punting, but I think we’ve gotten lucky in overcoming turnovers, and eventually could come back to bite us.  For instance, is a turnover in scoring position good?  We’re forgoing at least a potential FG in that instance (there wasn’t going to be a punt).  And if the Bills turn the ball over in non-scoring position, we are likely giving the opposing team better field position than if we had eventually punted.  

Luckily, we have been able to overcome turnovers in many games, because we have dominated other parts of the game.  That’s not necessarily going to be the case as the competition gets tighter.

 

I don't think it's lucky as much as the Bills have the largest margin for error in games of any team in the NFL.

[papazoid]

bills have 3 losses.....they lost the turnover battle in all 3

 

 

[strive_for_five_guy]

15 minutes ago, Big Turk said:

 

I don't think it's lucky as much as the Bills have the largest margin for error in games of any team in the NFL.

I agree that we have the ability to dominate games, which isn’t luck.  Aside from turnovers, we dominated Miami the other day.  And yet Skylar Thompson had a chance to carry his team to victory in the last few minutes against us last week, with turnovers being a key factor.  I consider the Bills a little lucky to have survived the scare, largely caused by the turnovers in that game.  It will be harder to dominate games against the Bengals or Chiefs, and our margin for error will be less then.

 

[Drew21PA]

Ok look

 

if/when Allen wins a superbowl this while he throws too many picks thing is done

 

even going to a Super Bowl it becomes a moot point

 

jist like Mahomes - I feel he and Allen both are extremely careless and wreckless

 

magomes no look passes ?  Yeah have Allen try that one ….

[Beck Water]

1 hour ago, Big Turk said:

So there is a lot being made across the media about how much the Bills turn the ball over and why they "can't keep winning" if they don't stop doing it.

 

I believe they are wrong and the reason they are wrong is the Bills and Chiefs are simply not like other teams. 

 

Firstly, the Bills get a lot of takeaways, so in most games even if they have 3 turnovers, they likely are at least getting 2 of their own. They are a net 0 on turnover differential for the season. The important stat isn't how many turnovwrs you have, it's what is the net turnover differential (ie, how many times you get takeaways - how many times the other teams get takeaways). 

 

Bills rank tied for 13th with 0, KC is -3 on the year. 23 giveaways versus 20 takeaways.

 

Secondly, the Bills rarely punt, so in the drives they are not turning the ball over, they score at the 2nd highest points per drive rate in the NFL, next to of course, Kansas City. 

 

The league average for punts is somewhere around 65 for the year. Bills came in at 45, fewest in the NFL in both total and punts/game. That's 20 extra possessions where we either scored points, went for it on 4th down or turned the ball over versus a normal team. If you take our 2.64 points per drive stat and multiply it by 20, that led to an extra 53ish points for the Bills versus a normal team.

 

The Bills have turned the ball over 3+ times on 5 occasions this year(including last week). They are 4-1 in those games. The only game they lost was to the Vikings in OT where they were -2 in TOs instead of the -1 or 0 in the other 4 wins. And that extra TO came on a game ending INT in the RZ in OT.

 

All of their losses have come when they have lost the TO battle in a game, but they are also 6-3 in the 9 games that has happened, so they still win twice as often as they lose, it just makes it a little tougher.

 

I think fans and the media need to start viewing turnovers differently with the Bills and Chiefs. It still matters, but it matters far less than it does for most teams.

 

 

 

You've done a very workmanlike job of laying out your arguments

 

In the end, though, I don't buy it.  I think we've mostly gotten away with a negative turnover differential against not-very-good teams like the Rams and Bears, or incomplete teams like the Dolphins we just faced.  Against a playoff team like the Vikings, it bit us in the ass to turn the ball over 4x vs 2 takeaways.  Against a top-tier D like the Jets, we couldn't generate enough points to overcome it.

 

I think it's something we need to address, particularly when we're in our own territory and a strip-sack can mean 6 points in a couple of plays.

 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Beck Water

[jletha]

Allen is #1 or #2 (depending on model) for total EPA over the season even with the turnovers. EPA is really all that matters at the end of the day, since the goal is to score points.

[Beck Water]

2 minutes ago, jletha said:

Allen is #1 or #2 (depending on model) for total EPA over the season even with the turnovers. EPA is really all that matters at the end of the day, since the goal is to score points.

 

Can you explain EPA in detail, please?

 

How has it fared as a predictive model in the last, oh, 3-5 championships?  Has the team whose QB had the highest EPA won?