Some questions on this topic of TOP.

Does a player sitting his butt on the bench for 35 or 40 seconds get any more or less rest if the clock is running or the clock is stopped.

NFL games usually last from 1 till some time after 4. Plus 3 hours. TOP of course is the actual time each team possesses the ball while the clock is running and should add up to 60 minutes. [Someone should call nfl.com and notify them that there are not 100 seconds in a minute]

Anyway you see games the TOP is 31-29 33-27 etc. Usually TS are on the big end of this. And it is generally accepted as absolute gospel that this contributes to the D's success. I must agree with this and also agree with the reason given which is they are more rested.

But after all, the games do not last 60 minutes. What if the other team throws 10 more incomplete passes than TS. Is that not at least 400+seconds their D is sitting watching the proceedings? That is almost 7 minutes they are also resting while TS are also resting I guess waiting for them to do something else but at least they are standing up. So I guess that would be another question. Is sitting down watching the action more restful than standing around watching the same thing? This is out of my area of expertise so I defer to more knowledgeable fans on this type thing.

Next year for sure when I am watching the games I am going to keep track of exactly how much "down time" each D really has in the 3plus hours the game is on. It is just possible that the team's defense with the lesser TOP number actually is watching more than TS. Good grief! If that actually is the case then what the heck is going to be the reason for the D's success then?

There are other consideration here also. What about timeouts. If TS call a defensive timeout doesn't the other teams D get an extra 30 seconds or so rest? There must be other factors which go into actual real time minutes and seconds each defense is supposedly resting. Can anyone think of any? Hmm! Not sure but maybe TOP as the reason for the success of TS D these past years is not solely based on this factor.