The Best 2010 NFL Offense, Part 2

Here is Part 1.

Continuing on with my analysis of the best 2010 NFL offense we need to look a bit deeper than yards and points.  A good offense should also excel at protecting the ball and the QB, scoring touchdowns, and maintaining drives.  That is why things like converting 3rd downs and preventing sacks are crucial to an offense.  In my opinion, a successful offense should not only score, but they should take time off the clock.  Long sustained drives have a bigger impact than a quick strike offense.  That is probably up for debate, so I will not go into it much more.  Anyway, take a look at the tables after the jump.

Lets start off by looking at a few percentages.  The TO% (turnover percent) and TD% (touchdown percent) are per offensive play, Sk% (sack percent) is per passing play, and 3rdD% (3rd down percent) is obviously per 3rd down.  Again, the ranks are based on a "normalized" adjusted linear ranking (see Part 1 for a better explanation, 1st paragraph after the jump).

It is no surprise to me that the Patriots have the best numbers on this table, being the only team with all 4 under 10.  Their ability to score touchdowns is so much better than any other team that it creates a huge dispersion in the rankings.  In that category the nearest team ranks in at a little over 9.  Anyway, since the table does not have an average of the 4 rankings, I will tell you that the top 5 teams are the Patriots, Falcons, Colts, Saints, and Texans respectively.  The Steelers come in at about 12th with a 14.34 average, which is not too bad.  Their sack percentage is the category that is holding them back from being in the top 5.

Later this off season I plan on adjusting the Steelers numbers and eliminating the first four weeks of the year.  If I had to guess, I would say the 3rd down numbers would be near the top of the league, but the sack number would be worse.  Also, I believe that the other two categories would probably remain stagnant with little movement.  This is also a discussion for another day.

The next table displays a few other interesting categories that I chose.  I was torn for what number is the best to use for the RZ stat.  Ultimately, I chose points per trip because the goal of RZ trips is to score as many points as possible.  However, I think RZ success rate would also be interesting.

Again there is no average of the rankings, so I will tell you that the top 5 teams are Falcons, Colts, Chargers, Jaguars(???), and the Packers respectively.  The Steelers come in 15th with a 13.24 average ranking.  It surprised the heck out of me that the Jaguars rank that high in these 4 categories, yet had such a tough season.  I suppose, having the 2nd worst defense in the league is worth more than having an effective offense.  The Falcons take the number one spot in these 4 categories by a good margin.  Just like the Patriots in the last table, they are the only team to rank in the top 10 in all four.

Something that does not make sense to me, is that the Steelers rank very high in 3rd down conversion rate, but about average in 1st downs per drive.  That probably just displays their reliance on big plays relative to other teams in the league.  Also, I think the people who griped all year about our RZ woes will be glad to see that the numbers support us being an average RZ team.  Lastly, one thing that the Steelers clearly need to work on next year is penalties.  Players like Chris Kemoeatu need to play smarter or be held accountable for stupid penalties.

To be continued....