The Genius of Belichick and the Upcoming Showdown

[NorthCoast]

Came across this article on keys to winning NFL games. Easy to understand why Belichick's teams win year after year. It also suggests that the Steelers would be wrongly directed putting the ball in Bell's hands in order to win the game (running anyway).

Too long to post, but here's the intro:

How passing and rushing affect winning in the NFL

By Dr. Ed Feng (https://thepowerrank.com/author/admin/) 27 Comments (https://thepowerrank.com/2014/01/10/which-nfl-teams-make-and-win-in-the-playoffs/#comments)


(https://thepowerrank.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/bill_belichick.jpg)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.
(https://thepowerrank.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/nfl_pass_rush.png)

[NorthCoast]

And if you wanted to know, the Steelers rank 3rd in the NFL in yds/pass att differential at +1.9, trailing only LA Rams and ATL. (NE?... +0.7)

At the end of the season the strongest team will earn 2 to 2.5 yards per pass more on offense than their defense allows. Any team near +3 yards per toss will earn a Super Bowl invite.

[williar]

I agree with Bill - I'd prefer passing to set up the run. This offense never looked more lethal than when they went up against the titans. Ben was chucking it for 5-10 yards, moving down the field taking what the defense gave him, scoring points. Now that looked like a NE offense. I'd use Bell in the passing game more than running him from scrimmage.

[SteelCrazy]

If we come into that game trying to be the same ol Steelers, we will get kicked in the mouth again. I'm talking about the eventual playoff game with them. Bill won't show much during the reg. season game.

However, if pittpete is right, Butler has designed a Defense that no one can identify!

[pittpete]

You still sore?
I'm sure you never heard of pattern match zone either right?
I'll post in the other thread in case you want to learn something

[Captain Lemming]

The numbers are correct but your conclusions could not be more wrong.

Winning is tied to how well you pass true. But not at all related to how MUCH you pass, or centering the offense around the pass.

By the standards of that article, Bens best two seasons were his first two (8.9 YPA both seasons, and relatively modest sacks). And the team was extremely successful.
But these are by far his LEAST PROLIFIC passing seasons where we ran a ton.

[Slapstick]

Yep. It's about efficiency.

[feltdizz]

The numbers are correct but your conclusions could not be more wrong.

Winning is tied to how well you pass true. But not at all related to how MUCH you pass, or centering the offense around the pass.

By the standards of that article, Bens best two seasons were his first two (8.9 YPA both seasons, and relatively modest sacks). And the team was extremely successful.
But these are by far his LEAST PROLIFIC passing seasons where we ran a ton.

thank you... it's not about stats, it's about how the game plays out. So much nuance in an actual game. Stats don't really tell the whole story.

[Slapstick]

Stats can't, but there is a trend that can be determined...

For example, teams that use multiple personnel groupings extensively tend to score more points...

It may not work in every individual circumstance, but it works...

[NorthCoast]

The numbers are correct but your conclusions could not be more wrong.

Winning is tied to how well you pass true. But not at all related to how MUCH you pass, or centering the offense around the pass.

By the standards of that article, Bens best two seasons were his first two (8.9 YPA both seasons, and relatively modest sacks). And the team was extremely successful.
But these are by far his LEAST PROLIFIC passing seasons where we ran a ton.

I understand you can get a big number two ways. Early in his career Roethlisberger made his yds in big plays downfield. This isn't happening now. That means more attempts needing more yds. To keep the efficiency up.

[Steel Maniac]

The numbers are correct but your conclusions could not be more wrong.

Winning is tied to how well you pass true. But not at all related to how MUCH you pass, or centering the offense around the pass.

By the standards of that article, Bens best two seasons were his first two (8.9 YPA both seasons, and relatively modest sacks). And the team was extremely successful.
But these are by far his LEAST PROLIFIC passing seasons where we ran a ton.

Bingo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[SteelCrazy]

You still sore?
I'm sure you never heard of pattern match zone either right?
I'll post in the other thread in case you want to learn something

You are as goofy as a pet raccoon... lol Do you know what pattern matching zone is? The name is self explanatory, but if you want, I'll define it for you.