FanPost

Points Per Pass Metric, Results Through Week Six

My passing offense metric, updated with last week's results. See below an explanation of the statistical details:  It's the same text I've posted in previous weeks.  The only difference is the minimum cutoff for making the list is 60 pass attempts.

The most interesting thing to me this week, is that last week's game left Romo and Brady's points per pass value essentially unchanged.  Brady had a monster game when looking at his yards per pass, but the three sacks and the fumble tempered his overall success.

On the other hand, I was curious how Romo would play after his brainlock game against Buffalo, against a defense coached by a legendary mastermind.  Bearing in mind that Dallas showed that the Patriots defense has some significant holes in it (as Patrick Crayton pointed out, what stopped Dallas' offense was penalties, not the Patriots), Romo still acquitted himself pretty well.  The reason I was so interested in this game was because Romo appeared to be slipping into the same pattern he showed last year.  He started out great, and his first five starts were phenomenal.  However, taken as a whole, his last five regular season games were unremarkable, with too many turnovers.  After he got off to a great start in his first four games this year, and had a poor game against the Bills, I started wondering, does he lose concentration after five games?  Is he slipping into the same pattern he showed last year?

The encouraging news is that for the time being, it looks like he hasn't fallen into the same rut.  New England's defense lives to eat up quarterback who make mental mistakes, and Romo did a good job of playing smart.  With each week, we have more data on Romo's performance, and I'm going to be watching it very closely.  For now, I think we can feel pretty confident about his future performance...but we already knew that, didn't we?

Other notes:  Neither Garcia nor Gerrard have thrown an interception to date, which is extraordinary, and a big part of why their teams are playing so well.

Derek Anderson of Cleveland has been as effective thus far as Romo.  Amazing.


Here's the intro I've posted on previous weeks:

I've been using a passing offense metric for many years now to gauge how well a QB is doing.  Inspired by baseball SABRmetrician Bill James, I performed linear regressions of NFL statistics and concluded from a big picture point of view, only two statistics mattered:  Yards gained from scrimmage, and turnovers.  The best fit to matching points scored came when assuming the following coefficients:

Ten yards gained from scrimmage = +1.0 points; and
One turnover lost = -6.0 points.

Simply put, teams that score points rack up yardage and don't commit turnovers.  Note how powerful turnovers are:  A team can, for example, gain 55 yards of offense, but if they turn it over the next play, they actually ended up hurting their team.

With that in mind, I created the points per pass metric, which calculates the effectiveness of quarterbacks.  The above two coefficients are used to determine, on average, how many points a quarterback (and his offensive teammates, since everyone else contributes to his success or failure) creates with each passing attempt.  It takes the simple yards per attempt metric we're all familiar with, adjusts it for sacks, and further adjusts it for turnovers.  One interception equates to minus six points; one fumble equates to minus three points.  I treat fumbles as half a turnover, since there's essentially a 50/50 chance of recovering or losing a fumble.  The results will probably be unsurprising for the most part, but sometimes they can appear odd.  One of the things that may cause these oddities are fumbles.  Most people, when looking over a QB's stat line, don't think about fumbles; they just look at yardage, attempts, touchdowns, interceptions, and maybe sacks.  But fumbles are very important, since they are essentially half a turnover.

Garcia, TB                                      0.76
Brady, NE                                      0.73
Manning, Ind                                 0.70
Garrard, Jax                                  0.62
Warner, Ari                                   0.57
Delhomme, Car                             0.54
Schaub, Hou                                 0.52
Hasselbeck, Sea                           0.52
Romo, Dal                                     0.52
Anderson, Cle                               0.51
Favre, GB                                      0.46
Roethlisberger, Pit                        0.46
McNabb, Phi                                  0.46
Palmer, Cin                                   0.43
Harrington, Atl                              0.43
Campbell, Was                             0.42
Cutler, Den                                   0.41
McNair, Bal                                    0.40
Manning, NYG                               0.38
Huard, KC                                     0.38
Rivers, SD                                     0.36
Holcomb, Min                                0.36
Boller, Bal                                     0.35
Pennington, NYJ                           0.34
Leinart, Ari                                   0.33
Kitna, Det                                     0.31
Green, Mia                                   0.31
Bulger, StL                                   0.30
Edwards, Buf                               0.29
Lemon, Mia                                  0.29
Smith, SF                                      0.28
Griese, Chi                                   0.28
Carr, Car                                      0.26
Brees, NO                                    0.25
Culpepper, Oak                           0.23
Jackson, Min                                0.20
Young, Ten                                  0.19
Grossman, Chi                             0.09
Frerotte, StL                               -0.04
McCown, Oak                             -0.09

Another user-created commentary provided by a BTB reader.