Kerry Byrne, God love him, is dead wrong: says NFL has Always been a passing league

[AzPatsFan]

I think the point that Kerry was making, was that you have to be able to pass when you want to do so, and make the other team fear it. It is less impotant to be able to ground and pound.

But you do need to be able to run enough to provide some balance, that is all you really need with the revised rules.

 

[ATippett56]

CHFF Super Study: the evolution of NFL pass-run ratio

You can preach balance. You can have the running game assist you in winning. But the key to success in the NFL lies in passing the ball, and stopping the pass. And it did not just become that way overnight.

 

[ivanvamp]

vamp

There are many articles over in their archives on the matter. He really should have referred to the entire archive of material.

Yep. In one article in July of this year, he made reference to the NFL being a passing league as well, and used as evidence the fact that very few teams with the leading rusher win titles.

Of course, when was the last time a passing champion won a Super Bowl?

If my team throws four TD's on the first four plays and then runs the rest of the game with a lead...did "running the ball" cause me to win?

Well, did the running allow you to keep the lead? It's all part of the game. If your team passed its way down the field on those four TDs and then you ran them in from the one, did running the ball cause you to win? Or if you ran all the way down the field and then threw 1-yd TD passes, did running the ball cause you to win?

It's exceedingly difficult to say what "caused" you to win. Heck, maybe what caused you to win was the fact that you scored but your DEFENSE kept them out of the end zone, so you could say your defense caused you to win.

I just gave in my first post the actual stats for the actual champions from 1966-2011. And the trend is crystal clear: championship-winning teams pass a lot more, and to greater effectiveness, than they did years ago. Years ago they ran a lot more, and to greater effectiveness, than they do now.

That doesn't mean that passer rating differential (a favorite key stat for CHFF) is irrelevant or isn't even crucial. But it does mean that the NFL was predominantly a running league for a very, very long time and only relatively recently has become a pass-heavy league.

Mind you, even in a run-heavy league, if everyone runs the ball, the difference between a championship team and a non-contender may be how well you throw it. I mean, take two teams:

Team A: 40 rushes, 160 yds, 15 passes, 6 comp, 105 yds
Team B: 40 rushes, 160 yds, 15 passes, 9 comp, 158 yds

What Team B did with those 15 passes very well could be the difference in a game - those +3 completions leading to +53 yds may mean one more score for Team B, and thus a victory.

So it isn't like passer rating differential (passing and stopping the pass more effectively than your opponent) is irrelevant even in a run-heavy league. But that doesn't make it a "passing league". Byrne should choose different terminology.

CHFF actually has done work in a tranche, "situational football" format.

I don't have access to that...seems to be in their Insider file, which requires a paid membership.

 

[lamafist]

"It's a passing league" comes from the fact that teams do not run the ball to win......they run the ball because they are winning.

A whole line of stats can't tell you that.

Correlation and causation.

Failure to understand this is why so much of patsfans.com and mediot in general are so clueless in evaluating defense.

CHFF has done extensive work on the matter- turnovers and turnover differential are two greatest determining factors toward wins/losses.

Last year, the three teams with the greatest number of forced turnovers had the three best records. The two top teams had the "statistically worst" defenses...how does that work?

If you actually pre-determine something to be true...the logical follow on action is to compile numbers to "prove" you are correct.

Some of this work mirrors the "Moneyball" concept. Lots of people simply refuse to understand the point of this is to win games.

When you understand that, things click much easier.

Even turnovers and turnover differential aren't immune to the correlation/causation confusion.

Teams trailing late are forced to take risks. Having to throw more and deeper passes means both an increased chance of throwing interceptions, as well as an increased chance of the QB being strip-sacked. Receivers and RBs fighting to get to the sideline give defenders more time to pry the ball loose. And then you have the desperation Stanford/Cal-style lateral fest last play of the game that usually ends with a turnover.

And since there are usually only a handful of turnovers a game, it doesn't take much to skew the totals.

You also have to take into account the fact that turnovers are only partially predictive events. Forcing fumbles is predictive, in that teams that do it a lot tend to continue to do it a lot. Recovering fumbles, however, is pretty much random, depending mostly on where the fumble occurs (e.g. strip-sacks are recovered by the defense at a certain rate, WR fumbles at the sideline at a different rate.) While clean-caught interceptions are predictive, tipped-ball interceptions work pretty much the same way as fumble recovery -- teams tip passes at different rates, but once the ball is tipped, recovery is pretty much random.

So while it's correct to say that turnovers do have a causal relationship on the outcomes of games, it's a) not as strong as its correlative relationship, and b) not necessarily a strong predictor for future games.

 

[JJDChE]

it seems like you spent a lot of time and effort to trying disprove something that Byrne doesn't even believe. It's readily apparent that run/pass ratio has shifted considerably over the years. I'm pretty sure Byrne is well aware of that fact.

 

[ivanvamp]

it seems like you spent a lot of time and effort to trying disprove something that Byrne doesn't even believe. It's readily apparent that run/pass ratio has shifted considerably over the years. I'm pretty sure Byrne is well aware of that fact.

I would hope he is. I am contesting his statement that the NFL has always been a passing league. It hasn't. Passing and pass defense have always been very important, but it hasn't always been a passing league.

 

[JJDChE]

I would hope he is. I am contesting his statement that the NFL has always been a passing league. It hasn't. Passing and pass defense have always been very important, but it hasn't always been a passing league.

Depends how you define 'passing league'.

 

[ivanvamp]

Depends how you define 'passing league'.

A propos that Bill Clinton is speaking tonight at the DNC, as it was he who made famous the line, "It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is."

So yep, I guess if you want to define "passing league" as "being better at passing and defending the pass has always been important", sure, it's always been a passing league. If you want to define it as "teams prioritized and emphasized the pass more than the run" then it is demonstrably false.

 

[patsfaninpittsburgh]

Yep. In one article in July of this year, he made reference to the NFL being a passing league as well, and used as evidence the fact that very few teams with the leading rusher win titles.

Of course, when was the last time a passing champion won a Super Bowl?



Well, did the running allow you to keep the lead? It's all part of the game. If your team passed its way down the field on those four TDs and then you ran them in from the one, did running the ball cause you to win? Or if you ran all the way down the field and then threw 1-yd TD passes, did running the ball cause you to win?

It's exceedingly difficult to say what "caused" you to win. Heck, maybe what caused you to win was the fact that you scored but your DEFENSE kept them out of the end zone, so you could say your defense caused you to win.

I just gave in my first post the actual stats for the actual champions from 1966-2011. And the trend is crystal clear: championship-winning teams pass a lot more, and to greater effectiveness, than they did years ago. Years ago they ran a lot more, and to greater effectiveness, than they do now.

That doesn't mean that passer rating differential (a favorite key stat for CHFF) is irrelevant or isn't even crucial. But it does mean that the NFL was predominantly a running league for a very, very long time and only relatively recently has become a pass-heavy league.

Mind you, even in a run-heavy league, if everyone runs the ball, the difference between a championship team and a non-contender may be how well you throw it. I mean, take two teams:

Team A: 40 rushes, 160 yds, 15 passes, 6 comp, 105 yds
Team B: 40 rushes, 160 yds, 15 passes, 9 comp, 158 yds

What Team B did with those 15 passes very well could be the difference in a game - those +3 completions leading to +53 yds may mean one more score for Team B, and thus a victory.

So it isn't like passer rating differential (passing and stopping the pass more effectively than your opponent) is irrelevant even in a run-heavy league. But that doesn't make it a "passing league". Byrne should choose different terminology.



I don't have access to that...seems to be in their Insider file, which requires a paid membership.

It's highly evident a review of the evalution of the defense threads would show that patsfaninpittsburgh constantly advises that total yards passing is a basically useless statistic.

As such, what purpose does it serve to ask what Super Bowl Champion has earned that title?

Since wins and losses are determined by points, it's really not hard to figure out where points come from. Also, what part of situational football is confusing?

If you want to see what teams do with a lead....take a look at that scoreboard thingy. If they have more points....they have lead.

When those conditions are met....you can observe what they do.

 

[patsfaninpittsburgh]

Even turnovers and turnover differential aren't immune to the correlation/causation confusion.

Teams trailing late are forced to take risks. Having to throw more and deeper passes means both an increased chance of throwing interceptions, as well as an increased chance of the QB being strip-sacked. Receivers and RBs fighting to get to the sideline give defenders more time to pry the ball loose. And then you have the desperation Stanford/Cal-style lateral fest last play of the game that usually ends with a turnover.

And since there are usually only a handful of turnovers a game, it doesn't take much to skew the totals.

You also have to take into account the fact that turnovers are only partially predictive events. Forcing fumbles is predictive, in that teams that do it a lot tend to continue to do it a lot. Recovering fumbles, however, is pretty much random, depending mostly on where the fumble occurs (e.g. strip-sacks are recovered by the defense at a certain rate, WR fumbles at the sideline at a different rate.) While clean-caught interceptions are predictive, tipped-ball interceptions work pretty much the same way as fumble recovery -- teams tip passes at different rates, but once the ball is tipped, recovery is pretty much random.

So while it's correct to say that turnovers do have a causal relationship on the outcomes of games, it's a) not as strong as its correlative relationship, and b) not necessarily a strong predictor for future games.

Outside points, no stat is completely correlated.

However, if minus two in turnovers equates to 90+ percent losing...it's pretty correlated.

 

[ivanvamp]

Interesting article here: Advanced NFL Stats: Expect Even More Passing Yards, and Why It Matters

Author suggests that with the rapidly improving pass offenses, teams should be throwing even more than they do now...maybe even to the tune of 85% pass, 15% run.

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that this eventually happens. Let's say the SB champ throws 87% of the time, amassing 6500 yards in the air. From 1966-2003, the SB champ averaged 54% run, 46% pass. The theoretical 2020 champ may have a 13% run, 87% pass ratio. If that craziness ever happens, can we say that the league would be more of a passing league than it was in, say, 1967? If so, why? If not, what if teams only threw? Would it be then? At what point would the ratio be such that we can say that the game has pretty much fundamentally changed?

 

[PatsDeb]

I used to love Kerry Byrne when he was a local Pats homer and before he went national. His send-ups of Pete Prisco were hilarious. Now he just adopts a controversial premise and skews the stats to fit it (or maybe that's what he always did, but I didn't mind because he was skewing the stats to fit what the Pats were doing ). Back in '01 - '04 he routinely skewered Peyton Manning and his high passing offense and adopted the old "defense wins championships" mantra.

As I've gotten older I've learned to tune out all these media Bozos and just enjoy the games. They are the only things that count.