Looks like Spagnuolo [favorite for] DC

[BleedingRed]

Originally Posted by Superturtle

You win games by points, not by yards.

Oh really?

So then by that measure we had the 24th best defense in the NFL.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Superturtle

You win games by points, not by yards.

Yards are more predictive over any appreciable timeline and a better demonstration of 'dominance' and/or duration that points surrendered.

Yes, in any given game, 'bend but don't break' can hold teams to field goals, keep the points down and win you a ballgame. But over the course of the season you're going to eventually run into that critical game where the red zone stops or 3rd down stops just don't come and you bend...then break.

Meanwhile if you're a team that excels at not giving up yards, statistically you're far more likely to be able to repeat that on a game to game basis.

That's why that 2016 season of his strikes me as a little bit of fools gold. His PPG was excellent but his YPG was merely above average. I believe the YPG was probably more demonstrative of the job he was doing and a lot of those cracks that were papered over in '16 surfaced in a big way in '17.

[O.city]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Yards are more predictive over any appreciable timeline and a better demonstration of 'dominance' and/or duration that points surrendered.

Yes, in any given game, 'bend but don't break' can hold teams to field goals, keep the points down and win you a ballgame. But over the course of the season you're going to eventually run into that critical game where the red zone stops or 3rd down stops just don't come and you bend...then break.

Meanwhile if you're a team that excels at not giving up yards, statistically you're far more likely to be able to repeat that on a game to game basis.

That's why that 2016 season of his strikes me as a little bit of fools gold. His PPG was excellent but his YPG was merely above average. I believe the YPG was probably more demonstrative of the job he was doing and a lot of those cracks that were papered over in '16 surfaced in a big way in '17.

Yeah, the yards don't matter crowd has kind of spoiled me here.

Technically, they don't. But you just can't rely on being great in the red zone. Stop teams before they get there.

[RunKC]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Yards are more predictive over any appreciable timeline and a better demonstration of 'dominance' and/or duration that points surrendered.

Yes, in any given game, 'bend but don't break' can hold teams to field goals, keep the points down and win you a ballgame. But over the course of the season you're going to eventually run into that critical game where the red zone stops or 3rd down stops just don't come and you bend...then break.

Meanwhile if you're a team that excels at not giving up yards, statistically you're far more likely to be able to repeat that on a game to game basis.

That's why that 2016 season of his strikes me as a little bit of fools gold. His PPG was excellent but his YPG was merely above average. I believe the YPG was probably more demonstrative of the job he was doing and a lot of those cracks that were papered over in '16 surfaced in a big way in '17.

I think yards mean a lot more to us now than they did before. The gameplan that the Patriots, Ravens and Seahawks used against us was gaining yards, using more plays and runing the clock to throw our offense out of rythym.

Mahomes didn’t even get on the field last weekend until damn near 30 minutes of real time had passed. That’s just a hell of a long way to get guys going.

I think that played a huge part in the offense stalling in the first half.

[FringeNC]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Yards are more predictive over any appreciable timeline and a better demonstration of 'dominance' and/or duration that points surrendered.

Yes, in any given game, 'bend but don't break' can hold teams to field goals, keep the points down and win you a ballgame. But over the course of the season you're going to eventually run into that critical game where the red zone stops or 3rd down stops just don't come and you bend...then break.

Yep, Bill Belichick seems like the only guy that year after year, the point ranking is substantially better than the yardage ranking. With everyone else, it's just noise. It's the yardage rank that truly measures a defense, and yards per play may matter more than total yards.