How does passing efficiency and running efficiency affect winning - Analysis by The Power Rank

[stitches]

Since I'm sick of the arguments in the form "but this team with a good runner was good", "yeah but that team with good runner was bad", etc. anecdotal evidence type of argumentation, here's a comprehensive analysis of how passing offense and running offense affects winning in the NFL as a whole rather than in singular examples where it's hard to pin point the reason for a team's performance:

https://thepowerrank.com/2014/01/10/which-nfl-teams-make-and-win-in-the-playoffs/

 

 

Quote

 

How passing and rushing affect winning in the NFL

By Dr. Ed Feng 

 

Before the Super Bowl, Bill Belichick told his Giants defense to let Thurman Thomas rush for 100 yards.

As David Halberstam writes in Education of a Coach, it was a tough sell before the 1991 Super Bowl against Buffalo. The New York Giants played a physical defense that prided itself on not allowing 100 yard rushers.

No matter, the short, stout coach looked straight into the eyes of Lawrence Taylor and Pepper Johnson and said, “You guys have to believe me. If Thomas runs for a hundred yards, we win this game.”

Just in case his players didn’t listen, Belichick took it upon himself to ensure Thomas got his yards. He took out a defensive lineman and linebacker and replaced these large bodies with two defensive backs. In football lingo, the Giants played a 2-3-6 defense designed to struggle against the run.

Did Bill Belichick go insane? I certainly thought so when I first read this story years ago.

However, analytics is on Belichick’s side. Let me explain.

 

Visual shows the importance of passing over rushing

When it comes to winning in the NFL, passing is king. Rushing hardly matters.

To quantify this, our football obsessed culture must look past misleading statistics such as rush yards per game. Teams with the lead run the ball to take time off the clock. Any team can rush for 100 yards if they run it 50 times.

To measure true skill, it is better to look at efficiency metrics like yards per attempt. A team can’t fake their way to 5 yards per carry by running the ball more.

Here, efficiency for passing and rushing is defined as yards gained per attempt on offense minus yards allowed per attempt on defense. Higher values indicate more team strength. Sacks count as pass attempts, and these negative yards lower pass efficiency on offense.

The visual shows the pass and rush efficiency during the regular season for all NFL playoff teams from 2003 through 2012.

From the left panel, playoff teams excel in passing, both throwing the ball on offense and preventing the pass on defense. Only 15 of 120 playoff teams in this era allowed more yards per pass attempt than they gained.

The visual also highlights teams that played in the Super Bowl. Eight of the ten Super Bowl champions were among the NFL’s elite in pass efficiency. However, excellence in the air does not guarantee playoff success. The New York Giants in 2007 and Baltimore in 2012 won the Super Bowl despite subpar pass efficiency.

 

Rushing hardly matters in the NFL

While the importance of passing in the NFL will not surprise anyone, the insignificance of rushing might. The visual for rush efficiency shows playoff teams as a random scatter of positive and negative values for their regular season statistics. A strong run game on offense and defense does not help a team make the playoffs.

Moreover, teams with a high rush efficiency do not suddenly become clutch in the playoffs. Almost half of the teams that played in the Super Bowl allowed more yards per carry than they gained. In 2006, Indianapolis won the Super Bowl while having the worst rush efficiency in the NFL. Green Bay in 2010 and the New York Giants in 2011 weren’t much better.

 

A guessing game of a team’s wins

Running the ball does not affect winning as much as you think. To illustrate this point, consider this guessing game. Suppose you want to guess how many games a team will win during the regular season. Without any other data, it makes sense to guess 8, the average number of wins in a 16 game season.

From 2003 through 2012, this estimate would be wrong by 3.1 wins. In technical jargon, 3.1 is the standard deviation of actual wins from the guess of 8. In normal people language, it says 2 of 3 teams will be within 3.1 wins of the guess. About two thirds of NFL teams won between 5 and 11 games between 2003 and 2012.

With the rush efficiency for each team, how much better does your guess get? The right panel of the visual below shows how rush efficiency relates to wins for every NFL team from 2003 through 2012. Simple linear regression gives the best fit line through the data.

The regression line gives a new guess about the number of games a team will win. For example, suppose a team has a rush efficiency of 0.6 yards per carry. Instead of guessing 8 wins for this team, the line gives 8.7 wins for this team.

How much better are these new guesses? Not much. The error only drops from 3.1 wins to 3.03 wins. In technical jargon, rush efficiency explains only 4.4% of the variance in wins. You might as well guess randomly.

The results get better using pass efficiency, as shown in the left panel. The error in estimating wins drops from 3.1 to 1.96. Pass efficiency explains 62% of the variance in wins in the NFL. The strong relationship is clear from the visual.

In college football, rush efficiency correlates more strongly with wins than in the NFL. Teams like Alabama, Stanford and Wisconsin have won with a power running game and a physical front seven on defense. The insignificance of running the ball is unique to the NFL.

 

Analytics gives a broad view of how passing and rushing affect winning. But to dig deeper, let’s look at specific teams and their strengths in these areas.

 

Indianapolis Colts

Under the leadership of GM Bill Polian and QB Peyton Manning, the Colts had a remarkable run from 2003 through 2010. They won at least 12 games each year before slacking off with 10 wins in 2010.

They achieved success through the air, ranking in the top 8 in pass efficiency each year. Peyton Manning and his offense played the bigger role, but the pass defense helped out some years. The Colts ranked in the top 10 in pass defense (yards allowed per attempt) from 2007 through 2009.

However, Indianapolis was really bad in the run game. Only once in this era (2007) did they gain more yards per carry than they allowed. As mentioned before, they were dead last in the NFL in rush efficiency in 2006 when they beat Chicago in the Super Bowl.

 

New England Patriots

New England won 125 games, 2 Super Bowls and played in 2 others during the 10 seasons covered by the visual. They followed the same script as Indianapolis: strong in passing, weak in rushing.

From 2003 through 2012, New England ranked in the top 10 in pass efficiency in each year except 2008 and 2012. In 2008, QB Tom Brady got hurt in the first game of the season. New England ended the season 13th in yards gained per pass attempt and did not make the playoffs, the only time this happened during these 10 years.

However, New England has never cracked the top 10 in rush efficiency. Coach Bill Belichick might not have seen the data presented here, but he gets the futility of rushing in the NFL. This understanding extends as far back as his days as defensive coordinator for the Giants.

Indianapolis and New England have built their teams around passing at the expense of rushing. They, along with New Orleans of recent seasons, have had success in winning games and Super Bowls. Now let’s look at teams that excel at rushing.

 

Minnesota Vikings

More than any other team, the Vikings dominate the ground game. They feature RB Adrian Peterson on offense and have tackles Pat and Kevin Williams clogging up the middle on defense. For the 6 years between 2007 and 2012, Minnesota has finished 1st in rush efficiency 4 of those years.

However, this strength has led to ups and downs in wins. Minnesota went 3-13 in 2011 despite leading the NFL in rush efficiency. The next season, they led the NFL again behind a monster season from Peterson, who made a remarkable return from knee surgery. The Vikings had 10-6 record that season.

The Viking’s best season over this stretch came in 2009. They finished 12th in rush efficiency that season. The difference? A QB named Brett Farve came out of retirement to play for Minnesota. The Vikings finished 7th in yards gained per pass attempt. They went 12-4 and came within a late turnover against New Orleans of playing in the Super Bowl.

 

San Francisco

The Niners started winning games when coach Jim Harbaugh became coach in 2011. However, they had their strengths before he arrived. Behind DE Justin Smith and LB Patrick Willis, San Francisco had an elite run defense. From 2007 through 2012, they never finished worse than 8th in yards allowed per carry.

This run defense didn’t help them win much the first 4 seasons, as the Niners won only 26 games. The pass defense never finished better than 15th during this time.

When Harbaugh arrived in 2011, San Francisco drafted LB Aldon Smith, a pass rush monster out of Missouri. They also signed CB Carlos Rogers, who had his first Pro Bowl season in 2011. The Niners have finished 9th and 3rd in pass defense in 2011 and 2012 respectively. This resulted in 24 wins during these two seasons.

 

How to evaluate NFL statistics

In Super Bowl XXV, Bill Belichick’s plan to let Thurman Thomas rush for 100 yards worked, maybe too well. Against a small defense designed to slow down the pass, Thomas ran for 135 yards on 15 carries, a staggering 9 yards per carry. In the second half, he broke off a 31 yard run for a touchdown.

The game ended when Bills kicker Scott Norwood sent a field goal attempt wide right. The Giants won the Super Bowl 20-19.

The Giants did not win the game solely because of Belichick’s defensive plan. The offense generated two long scoring drives in the second half that took time off the clock. And I would bet my life savings Belichick did not want his defense to allow that 31 yard touchdown run to Thomas.

But, as Halberstam discusses in Education of a Coach, Belichick did want the Bills to pick up small gains on the ground if it meant keeping Jim Kelly from throwing the ball. He understood that rushing means almost nothing to winning in the NFL.

If you’re going to remember anything from this article, it should be this: look at a team’s passing instead of rushing numbers to determine whether they will win games.

 

 

 

Here's the tl;dr version:

 

Quote

In technical jargon, rush efficiency explains only 4.4% of the variance in wins. You might as well guess randomly... Pass efficiency explains 62% of the variance in wins in the NFL. The strong relationship is clear from the visual.

 

In other words - if you want your team to win, the best way is to improve your passing efficiency on offense and you pass disruption on defense, NOT the running game. 

[Mr. Irrelevant]

Very interesting. Thanks for finding and sharing that, stitches! 

[tweezy32]

Thats by the opposite team being afraid of the run game that they prepair to stop the run and they get killed by the pass game. 

[Shadow_Creek]

ohhh the irony. lol its kinda funny how years later he would allow Bradshaw to rush in the final TD that would hurt the pats later on. 

[neug3246]

So what your saying is we should sign T-Rich again instead of drafting Saquon Barkley??? 

[LockeDown]

Hey, we can allow 100 yard rushers easily.

[jskinnz]

1 hour ago, Shadow_Creek said:

ohhh the irony. lol its kinda funny how years later he would allow Bradshaw to rush in the final TD that would hurt the pats later on. 

 

That really makes no sense.  At that time of the game, letting Bradshaw score was the only chance they had to win the game. Otherwise the Giants run the clock to almost zero and kick the winning field goal on the last play of the game.  

[jskinnz]

@stitches a great read.  Thanks.

 

Among many things that is something I like really about McDaniels.  If the path to victory in a single game is to throw it 60 times, he will do that.  And I am not talking about throwing once they get down.  From the opening kick.

 

He will not be held hostage about the old NFL theory of running the ball and stopping the run.

[stitches]

It's not that it's not a good thing to stop the run and run the ball. If I had to guess you still need to keep the threat of running the ball on offense to keep defenses honest so they wouldn't cheat and crowd the secondary. And same goes for defense - you still need to have some modicum of run defense so you don't get trampled. But if I had to guess, as long as you can guarantee you have exceptional pass defense and exceptional pass offense, the threshold for how good your run defense and run offense needs to be is probably low.

 

There is a reason why passing has been getting more and more prominent as time passes. I would compare it with 3p shooting in basketball. It was non-supported mantra for the talking heads that jump shooting team cannot win. This one is laughable nowadays but commentators used to parrot that one regularly. I think it's similar with the running game in the NFL.  And BTW this doesn't mean you need to abandon running the ball - again just like in basetball - the well-spaced teams have exceptional finishing in the paint as well - why? because the paint is no longer crowded and there are more open lanes to the basket when you spread the floor 5 out. I think a great and creative passing game in football can have similar effect on the running game - teams will try to sell out to cover the secondary, which will make it easier to run, when you actually decide to run... 

[csmopar]

Yet another reason to not draft a RB in the first round

[Str8himalaya]

13 minutes ago, csmopar said:

Yet another reason to not draft a RB in the first round

Exactly. Not many teams (recently) have gotten to the SB on the strength of their ground game. It simply is an old philosophy that doesn't hold weight with statistics (actual statistics like the above article). Get a franchise QB (and protect him), get a decent pass rush and you have a chance. 

[dodsworth]

Ok after reading this we need to draft pass rush and covering linebackers.

[TheRustonRifle#7]

7 hours ago, stitches said:

Since I'm sick of the arguments in the form "but this team with a good runner was good", "yeah but that team with good runner was bad", etc. anecdotal evidence type of argumentation, here's a comprehensive analysis of how passing offense and running offense affects winning in the NFL as a whole rather than in singular examples where it's hard to pin point the reason for a team's performance:

https://thepowerrank.com/2014/01/10/which-nfl-teams-make-and-win-in-the-playoffs/

 

 

 

 

Here's the tl;dr version:

 

 

In other words - if you want your team to win, the best way is to improve your passing efficiency on offense and you pass disruption on defense, NOT the running game. 

Thank you for the info and I remember that Super Bowl well!

[chad72]

That is why I felt that Peyton, even though our running game was going in the 2006 SB run, had to convert several critical 3rd down passes throughout the playoff run to guys like Dallas Clark, Reggie Wayne, that "know it all" TE Fletcher  to keep drives going. That is why people who focus on just TDs and INTs do not get the whole picture of the QB playing efficient to get points on the board, especially when the opponent is playing D vs the pass all the way. 3 TDs and 7 INTs and he won a SB. 6 TDs and 2 INTs ending in a pick six vs the Saints in the SB, which one will you take all day?

 

A lot of times, QBs test the Ds early on during the game to keep the D honest the rest of the game, thus helping the safeties play deep, and an INT that does not cost field position happens more often than we know. Plus, Flacco threw an INT in that Broncos-Ravens playoff game in 2012 but his D responded with a 3 and out and the Broncos got nothing out of it. When Big Ben had a D, his D responded so many times with aggressive play to force the issue and give him the ball back and not let his turnover cost the team. As recently, the Jaguars got the Dion Lewis fumble turnover, and the Patriots' D responded with a 3 and out and the Jaguars got nothing out of it. Complementary football, it is called. 

 

One chart I have never seen is defensive support following a turnover. I am sure that is definitely a thing. Drew Brees did not have a good game in the NFCCG vs the Vikings but his D kept getting turnovers from Peterson and Harvin fumbles to keep it close to enable them to win at the end. Eli did not do MUCH in the 2011 NFCCG vs the 49ers but his ST got 2 turnovers, one before regulation to tie it and another in OT to win it. We, the Colts, played complementary football in 2006, and that is why we won it all. That is the most underappreciated aspect of a team's performance, that does not get quantified in the playoffs, IMO.

 

This is also why I'd not get hung up on an RB in the first round, even if he is the second coming of Barry Sanders. 

[Andrew Luck fan club]

Yuup..

[Flash7]

If a RB Gains 100 yards in a particular game, we would consider that a good game. Usually, 100 yards is the threshold for a RB. (Considering yards only)

 

If a QB throws for 300 yards in a game, we would consider that a good game. Usually 300 yards is the threshold for a QB. (Considering yards only)

 

Already, that’s a 3:1 difference in ratio. Having a good passing game is arguably 3 times as important as having a good running game. 

 

Defensively, having a good passing defense is also that much more important. That’s why the Patriots sign top CBs like Talib, Revis, Gilmore, etc.. If you’re going to pay top dollar, pay to affect the passing game.

[throwing BBZ]

2 hours ago, csmopar said:

Yet another reason to not draft a RB in the first round

 

You still don't get it.
Of course drafting a great runner at 3 can be a Great pick.
The player just needs to Excel in the passing game also.
Like Le'veon Bell, Marshall Faulk, and a few others. Hmmm! I don't like those odds.
Barkely may turn out to be as good in the passing game as a rusher. Especially under our new coach.

 I remember Tom Landry believing yards per pass attempt was the top priority to winning,
 Ahead of his time.
 I'm intrigued by the potential and value of Tremaine Edmunds as a sideline to sideline run and pass defender.

A Kuechly with more size?

[Smonroe]

Great read @stitches    Obviously, the QB is the most important player on O and if you can stop/disrupt him you’re probably going to win the game.  

 

But as far as the draft, in general, we want to pick the BPA, right?   So, hypothetically, if a team has Barkley rated highest on their board at their pick, who should they take?  I think we all know that answer.  

 

What we we don’t know is what our board looks like.  

[csmopar]

1 minute ago, throwing BBZ said:

 

You still don't get it.
Of course drafting a great runner at 3 can be a Great pick.
The player just needs to Excel in the passing game also.
Like Le'veon Bell, Marshall Faulk, and a few others. Hmmm! I don't like those odds.
Barkely may turn out to be as good in the passing game as a rusher. Especially under our new coach.

 I remember Tom Landry believing yards per pass attempt was the top priority to winning,
 Ahead of his time.
 I'm intrigued by the potential and value of Tremaine Edmunds as a sideline to sideline run and pass defender.

A Kuechly with more size?

What teams in the last decade have won a superbowl with a superstar RB

[Narcosys]

So the patriots have  +.6 passing efficiency and the eagles have a +.5. 

 

The patriots have a 0 on rush efficiency and the eagles have a +.7 efficiency.

 

So who wins? Looks like the eagles have the edge.

 

Also, this means we don't need barkley, but rather chubb to bolster our defense.

[Four2itus]

2 hours ago, chad72 said:

One chart I have never seen is defensive support following a turnover. I am sure that is definitely a thing. 

I agree. This is one aspect of the NE's team game that they are very good at. In addition, they concentrate on the last two minutes of the first half to catch players getting ready for the half break. Lastly, they really excel at upfield blocking/pics in second & third and long.  

[shasta519]

This is why slow downhill ILBs that can't cover are pointless. Thank god Ballard is going to fix this.

 

I also wouldn't write off Ballard going with a secondary pick first...after a trade back. 

[ClaytonColt]

1 hour ago, Smonroe said:

Great read @stitches    Obviously, the QB is the most important player on O and if you can stop/disrupt him you’re probably going to win the game.  

 

But as far as the draft, in general, we want to pick the BPA, right?   So, hypothetically, if a team has Barkley rated highest on their board at their pick, who should they take?  I think we all know that answer.  

 

What we we don’t know is what our board looks like.  

Yes but what is the "best" player? 

 

To me the "best" player is the one who has the most impact on the results of games. 

 

Given that the chart indicates that the passing game is most important on both sides of the ball and we're pretty poor at stopping the opposition quarterback it's not hard to imagine that a pass rusher will have more impact than a running back.

[aaron11]

1 hour ago, csmopar said:

What teams in the last decade have won a superbowl with a superstar RB

seattle.  he may not have been one of the best backs ever, but ML was one of the best at the time.  he was a first round pick too, though traded by buffalo after some pretty minor legal stuff 

[stitches]

2 hours ago, Smonroe said:

Great read @stitches    Obviously, the QB is the most important player on O and if you can stop/disrupt him you’re probably going to win the game.  

 

But as far as the draft, in general, we want to pick the BPA, right?   So, hypothetically, if a team has Barkley rated highest on their board at their pick, who should they take?  I think we all know that answer.  

 

What we we don’t know is what our board looks like.  

BPA is a bit of a misnomer. IMO when people say 'best player available' they really should mean 'best VALUE available'. Just to make the example extreme(not saying the value is actually this similar) - you would never take a punter no. 3 right? Like... even if he was the best punter to ever live and punted every single punt to the 5 yard line? I think similar consideration should be given to all other positions as well(RBs, OGs, etc) - a consideration about the value they provide to the team, even if the player is the best in the draft... Lets say you give Barkley a grade of 7.5 and Chubb a value of 7.2(those are the grade Lance Zierlein has given them). Even if Barkley is clearly better at his position than Chubb is, it is very likely Chubb will provide MUCH more value to your team than Barkley would. This is not just about RBs... IMO the team should have some evaluation about the value of the position to their own team. For example, a 7.2 EDGE might provide more value to you than a 7.7 off-ball linebacker, etc.

[Smonroe]

1 hour ago, ClaytonColt said:

Yes but what is the "best" player? 

 

To me the "best" player is the one who has the most impact on the results of games. 

 

Given that the chart indicates that the passing game is most important on both sides of the ball and we're pretty poor at stopping the opposition quarterback it's not hard to imagine that a pass rusher will have more impact than a running back.

 

You're talking about how the board SHOULD be built, with position being a very important factor.  No argument there.

 

Still, there’s no way they’d rank a lesser player at a position of need higher than a greater player at a statistically less important position.

 

Its going to be an interesting three months my friend!

[stitches]

2 minutes ago, Smonroe said:

 

You're talking about how the board SHOULD be built, with position being a very important factor.  

IMO yes. Position should be factored in when stacking the board... 

[Smonroe]

6 minutes ago, stitches said:

BPA is a bit of a misnomer. IMO when people say 'best player available' they really should mean 'best VALUE available'. Just to make the example extreme(not saying the value is actually this similar) - you would never take a punter no. 3 right? Like... even if he was the best punter to ever live and punted every single punt to the 5 yard line? I think similar consideration should be given to all other positions as well(RBs, OGs, etc) - a consideration about the value they provide to the team, even if the player is the best in the draft... Lets say you give Barkley a grade of 7.5 and Chubb a value of 7.2(those are the grade Lance Zierlein has given them). Even if Barkley is clearly better at his position than Chubb is, it is very likely Chubb will provide MUCH more value to your team than Barkley would. This is not just about RBs... IMO the team should have some evaluation about the value of the position to their own team. For example, a 7.2 EDGE might provide more value to you than a 7.7 off-ball linebacker, etc.

 

Yeah, I think we’re all sort of saying the same thing.  Chances are one or two QBs are valued higher, but we’re not taking them.  By the same token, say Chubb is gone at two.  We probably aren’t taking Key.

[stitches]

3 minutes ago, Smonroe said:

 

Yeah, I think we’re all sort of saying the same thing.  Chances are one or two QBs are valued higher, but we’re not taking them.  By the same token, say Chubb is gone at two.  We probably aren’t taking Key.

Yeah. Depends on your evaluation of Key compared to the other available prospects. 

[csmopar]

1 hour ago, aaron11 said:

seattle.  he may not have been one of the best backs ever, but ML was one of the best at the time.  he was a first round pick too, though traded by buffalo after some pretty minor legal stuff 

So just 10 percent?

[superrep1967]

7 hours ago, csmopar said:

Yet another reason to not draft a RB in the first round

I heard Matt Bowen on JMV yesterday and he said that there have only been two teams with pro bowl running backs win the super bowl in the last 17 years. They were Baltimore with that great defense and Seattle with a very good defense they were Lynch and Rice. If passing wins a super bowl on offense It makes the most sense to select a pass rusher. 

[csmopar]

18 minutes ago, superrep1967 said:

I heard Matt Bowen on JMV yesterday and he said that there have only been two teams with pro bowl running backs win the super bowl in the last 17 years. They were Baltimore with that great defense and Seattle with a very good defense they were Lynch and Rice. If passing wins a super bowl on offense It makes the most sense to select a pass rusher. 

Yep I agree. Either pass rush or OL. I'd be okay with a stud at CB as well

[aaron11]

2 hours ago, csmopar said:

So just 10 percent?

well he should have had two 

[csmopar]

34 minutes ago, aaron11 said:

well he should have had two 

And Peyton should have had more than 2.... should have doesn't count. Fact is that not even Edge won a title and he's nominated for the HoF and played with The greatest QB EVER yet no title. Just proves you don't need some super star RB to win a title.