BradyManny
Pro Bowl Player
- Joined
- Mar 13, 2006
- Messages
- 11,103
- Reaction score
- 1,520
It may be obvious by now, but I consider efficiency per possession a very telling statistic.
I was challenged in another thread to look beyond per possession - what came up was: the question of who is to blame for the Patriots being 27th in Time of Possession? The theory patsfaninpittsburgh posited was that the Patriots hurry-up offense did the team no favors in the battle for time of possession, which maybe sounds like it had a ring of truth to it. So I wanted to look closer.
Just how much was the offense and defense responsible for poor time of possession? All of this doesn't take into account whether this matters at all, anyway, but that's for another post...
So, I took those drive stats, mangled together some numbers and tried to draw some conclusions from them. I'll sum up those numbers here and go into detail in another post.
Let me introduce two stats I cobbled together. They are simple Time per Drive (amount of time per possession the given unit was on the field) & Points Per Minute (both for offense and defense). Because of offense and defense, it's really four stats, and I think two of them don't matter at all (I'll explain later).
I'll give the caveat that all of these numbers are rounded, and based upon statistics I'm finding online, that I am assuming are valid. They all seem to add up when I do the math, so I'm assuming it's right.
Your 2011 New England Patriots:
Offensive points per drive: 3rd
Offensive yards per drive: 2nd
Time per offensive drive: 14th
Points per minute: 1st
Defensive points per drive: 21st
Defensive yards per drive: 32nd
Time per defensive drive: 30th
Points yielded per minute: 13th
The league average for Time per Drive was about 2:32. The Patriots offense averaged 2:38 per drive. The Patriots defense averaged about 2:53 per drive.
So, on average, when the Patriots offense took the field, it had the ball for six more seconds than league average. When the Patriots defense took the field, it had the ball for twenty one more seconds than league average.
A lot of this means a whole lot of nothing, but I find it interesting, and I think it definitively makes it clear that the Patriots woes in time of possession last year are obviously due to the defense not being able to get off the field. It isn't Earth-shattering, but I found it at least noteworthy.
Some larger observations to follow...
I was challenged in another thread to look beyond per possession - what came up was: the question of who is to blame for the Patriots being 27th in Time of Possession? The theory patsfaninpittsburgh posited was that the Patriots hurry-up offense did the team no favors in the battle for time of possession, which maybe sounds like it had a ring of truth to it. So I wanted to look closer.
Just how much was the offense and defense responsible for poor time of possession? All of this doesn't take into account whether this matters at all, anyway, but that's for another post...
So, I took those drive stats, mangled together some numbers and tried to draw some conclusions from them. I'll sum up those numbers here and go into detail in another post.
Let me introduce two stats I cobbled together. They are simple Time per Drive (amount of time per possession the given unit was on the field) & Points Per Minute (both for offense and defense). Because of offense and defense, it's really four stats, and I think two of them don't matter at all (I'll explain later).
I'll give the caveat that all of these numbers are rounded, and based upon statistics I'm finding online, that I am assuming are valid. They all seem to add up when I do the math, so I'm assuming it's right.
Your 2011 New England Patriots:
Offensive points per drive: 3rd
Offensive yards per drive: 2nd
Time per offensive drive: 14th
Points per minute: 1st
Defensive points per drive: 21st
Defensive yards per drive: 32nd
Time per defensive drive: 30th
Points yielded per minute: 13th
The league average for Time per Drive was about 2:32. The Patriots offense averaged 2:38 per drive. The Patriots defense averaged about 2:53 per drive.
So, on average, when the Patriots offense took the field, it had the ball for six more seconds than league average. When the Patriots defense took the field, it had the ball for twenty one more seconds than league average.
A lot of this means a whole lot of nothing, but I find it interesting, and I think it definitively makes it clear that the Patriots woes in time of possession last year are obviously due to the defense not being able to get off the field. It isn't Earth-shattering, but I found it at least noteworthy.
Some larger observations to follow...
Last edited: