The common belief that "defense wins championships" is challenged by data, which suggests that while defense is crucial, offense is more stable, predictable, and potentially more influential in winning games and championships.
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Offense wins games.
>> Defense defense
>> defense wins championships.
>> This isn't just cliche. It's gospel.
>> Defense wins championship.
>> Defense wins [music] championships.
>> On its surface, this doesn't make a
whole lot of sense. Not just because
Nico [music] Harrison traded Luca Donuch.
Donuch.
>> You can imagine how surprised I was.
>> Clearly, both sides of the ball here are
important. But I think we know what
people mean when they say this. Offense
is valuable, but it's defense that is
more valuable when you get to the playoffs.
playoffs.
>> The Eagles are going to win the Super
Bowl because of their defense.
>> It's defense that gets you over that
final hump to win a Super Bowl.
>> Eagles fly in Super Bowl.
>> This isn't just folklore. There have
been several research pieces that have
furthered this belief, the importance of
defense being vital to winning a Super
Bowl. But I've always been curious which
side of the ball is more important. So I
wanted to look into it further and it
surprised me.
>> First, let's establish the obvious. A
good defense limits points. A good
offense scores points. You don't need to
venture far to find a good example of this.
this.
>> Touchdown Detroit Lions.
>> The Detroit Lions scored more points
than any other team in the 2024 regular
season. The Eagles allowed the second
fewest points in the 2024 season. The
Lions crashed out in the divisional and
the Eagles won a Super Bowl. Go
>> defense wins championships.
>> It's over.
>> But rather than just settling for last
year's result, let's widen our lens to
include a few more years. Okay, so there
are many different ways to look at this,
but let's start with the unbiased, often
worshiped nerd standard, EPA. 84% of the
top five offensive teams made the
playoffs and 64% of the top five
defensive teams made the playoffs.
Expanding it out to the top 10, similar
pattern. 75% of the time you'd make the
playoffs with a top 10 offense. Elite
and good offensive teams are more likely
to make the postseason. Let's continue
with the regular season, but look at
something slightly different. The point
of this graph is to view the predictive
power of various measurements for a
team. For example, offense. How
predictable is a team's offense based on
past performance? How predictable is a
team's offense in game three based on
the first two games? Not very
predictable. The higher we are
vertically here, the more predictable
the variable. So, when we're just two
games into the season, no one really
knows what will happen in week three.
There just isn't enough sample size.
There are frauds and teams that probably
haven't found their rhythm yet. AND THE
49ERS CLOSING THE DOOR ON THE SEAHAWKS.
>> SO, a team's offensive production
through two weeks [music] tells us
basically nothing, only about 3%. As the
season progresses, this line rises, and
that makes sense. We have more games
under our belt and more offensive data.
So, we can predict what will happen with
more certainty in the following week. If
you don't know what R 2 is here, the
Yaxis, don't worry. The gist is easy to
understand. If R square was 100% we
could say with 100% certainty we can
predict how the offense will perform
based on how the offense performed in
previous games. That obviously is not
the case. Football is chaotic and fairly
unpredictable. Now if it was 0% we would
not be able to predict anything based on
how the offense performed in previous
games. Again that is not the case. A
[snorts] great offense is likely to be
great in the following game. As we get
further into the season, the R squared
rises and that intuitively makes sense.
[music] We have a larger sample of games
played and thus a better idea of how the
offense will perform based on how they
performed in previous weeks. Again, this
is an average. If you lose Patrick
Mahomes in week 15, you can probably
throw any offensive predictive power out
the window.
Now, offense is only one element. What
about defense? First, quick shout out to
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Okay, again, how predictable is a
defense? After 2 weeks into the season,
we're around the same predictive power
as offense. We basically have no idea
how a team will perform in week three
based on how their defense performed in
week one and two. What about mid-season?
Oh, uh, far far less than the offense.
In fact, defense becomes less predictive
as the season goes on. All the way to
about week 10. At this point, we have
about 17th the predictive power for our
defense in comparison to our offense. In
other words, how the defense performed
in previous games doesn't really tell us
If you've played fantasy football,
you probably understand this feeling.
Defense and special teams is highly
unpredictable week to week. As the
season progresses from week 10, [music]
we start to see this rise though,
meaning the defense is getting a little
bit more predictable based on how
they've performed in previous games.
Offense is much more predictable though
by season's end about four to five times
as much. Is anything else more or less
predictive than offense? Well, point
differential tracks with it pretty well
all the way until about week 12. How
about the run game? We hear all the time
that establishing the run is something
that is consistent where passing is
maybe more variable. That's not the case
here. Offensive EPA per run is actually
less predictive than defense by the end
of the season. Win percentage also
doesn't really tell us a whole lot. In
fact, it's less predictive than point
differential, meaning you can tell more
about a team [music] probably based on
their point differential than their win
percentage. Lastly, [music] let's look
specifically at passing EPA per
dropback. This is more predictive than
anything besides offensive EPA, meaning
that a team's passing game is more
predictive and stable than their
defense. I think this runs contrary to
what a lot of us maybe believe
intuitively. A defense is a stable part
of a team's game while the passing is
variable. You maybe hit some home run
shots certain games, but a lot of games
you don't. >> Intercepted.
>> Intercepted.
>> Offense is variable week to week, but
defense is something you can always rely
on. As the saying goes,
>> it's loose. The Eagles have it.
>> So, if the offense is more predictable,
does that mean it's more valuable? Not
necessarily. All we're saying here is
the defensive production is more random
week to week. In other words, if you're
convinced your team has an elite defense
around week 10, I wouldn't bank on it.
For example, the Lions and the Bucks
were both in the top five about
midseason this year. OFFICIAL SAYS LIONS
FOOTBALL that changed dramatically.
However, if your offense, especially the
passing attack, has been playing great
through 10 weeks, it's much more likely
to continue. So, our coaches here are
still safe. I mean, the Lions won a lot
of games last year. They were the one
seed in the NFC, but they fell apart in
the playoffs. While the Eagles rolled
with a great defense,
>> offense wins games, the defense wins championships.
championships.
>> All right, man. We get it. But what goes
into a great defense? When we talk about
great defensive plays, there is a
gradient. Stopping the run.
>> He is going to be stopped.
>> An incompletion. >> Incomplete.
>> Incomplete.
>> A sack.
However, what is by far the most
valuable play for a defense, a turnover.
>> Rivers down the middle of the field and
it is intercepted by Kobe Bryant.
>> Yes, football is a game of inches, but a
single turnover is much more likely than
these plays to change the course of a
game. For comparison purposes, the
average fumble recovery is worth about
3.5 times as much as a sack and about
six times as much as an incompletion.
Fumbles tend to be more valuable for a
defense than an interception. And we
know that defenses can cause fumbles.
They can force them. But we also know
there tends to be a lot of randomness
with fumbles.
>> 19 yd field goal. Oh, it is fumbled. The
ball is going to be tackled. Gets hit.
The ball is loose. I think it hit the helmet.
helmet.
>> He can't handle the football.
>> No, it just came out.
>> Oh, he fumbled again.
>> THE MOST SANE, UNBELIEVABLE, absolutely
impossible dream of a play.
It might not be the defense making the
play, but instead the offense failing to
secure the rock. If you think there is
skill when it comes to forcing fumbles,
there might be. There just isn't much
evidence for it. The only real
difference seems to be teams that get to
the quarterback a lot tend to force more
fumbles. But even then, this
relationship is really weak. It's
unlikely that any team is better at
forcing fumbles. Rather, they maybe just
get more sacks and that causes more
fumbles. There's even less correlation
when it comes to fumble recoveries. And
when I say less, I mean there's
basically none. If you think [music]
that some teams want a fumble recovery
more when the ball hits the ground, some
teams just want it more. That Cam Newton
play maybe comes to mind. Well, there's
just no evidence that that exists over
the course of a season. As you can see
here, there isn't really any
correlation. Tom Bliss and I went
through this a few years back for a
video on the role of luck in a football
game. Not all fumbles are created equal.
For example, about 50% of fumbles that
occur in the back field are recovered by
the defense, but 75% of the fumbles
downfield are recovered by the defense.
This makes sense. A strip sack in the
back field is about 50/50. But
downfield, away from more offensive
players, closer typically to more
defensive players, the defense is more
likely to recover. The luckiest team so
far in terms of fumble recoveries, the
2023 Kansas City Chiefs, who had several
fortuitous fumble recoveries.
>> Flowers fumbles the ball. The Chiefs
RECOVER IN THE END ZONE.
>> They had a total of.56 WPA off of those
fumbles. That's enough to win a game. In
other words, they were incredibly
fortunate as highlighted by this foot.
Enhance it. Enhance it. It hit the back
of the foot of a teammate. How about
>> A defense loves championship staple.
They had three fumbles of their own and
recovered all three. They forced four
fumbles and recovered all four. And they
also recovered another gift from John
on a handoff. I think if we were to
simulate that playoff format a hundred
times, we'd maybe see the Giants win
once or twice. And we're not even
talking about the catch. caught by
Tyrie. But
>> hey, it was fun to watch. Pause and
think about this. The most valuable play
for a defense is a fumble. At the same
time, perhaps the most random outcome is
a fumble recovery. They are the golden
snitch of football. Elusive and
unpredictable, yet the pinnacle of value.
value.
>> Gryffindor wins.
>> Fumbling has huge ramifications. So, I
wanted to look into this further. What
was the turnover margin for Super Bowl
winning teams and [music] what was the
fumble margin? First, let's look at
interceptions and fumbles. Consider this
for a moment. Of the last 25 Super Bowl
champions, 21 of them have won the
turnover battle. Absolutely incredible.
We know turnover is important, but this
is kind of astonishing. And it gets
wilder when we look at the average
playoff margin, 4.04. In other words,
the average Super Bowl champion won the
turnover margin in the playoffs by four.
Super Bowl teams are dominating the
turnover margin. But what about just
fumbles? Again, forced fumbles are
almost completely random. And when we
adjust for player tracking, fumble
recoveries [music] are completely
random. Of the previous 25 Super Bowl
winners, only four had a negative fumble
recovery margin. Five was zero and 16
positive. the average team was a
positive 1.4 [music] in the fumble
recovery margin. In other words, if you
won the Super Bowl, the ball was
probably bouncing your way. And that
very well could have made the
difference. [music] Now, it isn't that
defense is unimportant or completely
random. It just seems to be more random
than offense. And well, humble
recoveries are a big [music] part of that.
that.
In a way, this furthers our belief that
offense is more stable and predictable
than defense. But the ultimate goal is a
Super Bowl. So, let's continue by
looking at the postseason. If you had a
top five offense, 10% of the time you
would go on to win the Super Bowl. But
if you had a top five defense, it's 12%.
>> Alas, told you
>> the coach's coveted cliche is complete.
>> Yep. Yes, offense wins games, [music]
but it's defense who wins championship.
>> Uh, not quite. Unfortunately, this
sample is very small. We can't really
infer much from men. For example, until
the Eagles won last year with a top five
defense, technically top five offenses
were more likely to win a Super Bowl.
So, why is this the case? Why does this
narrative persist that it's defense who
wins championships? Every yard gained by
an offense is a yard given up by the
defense. These zero out. Similarly, the
EPA has to be the same magnitude for a
game and for a season. These are zero
sum relationships. But zero sum
relationships only tell you that the
total cancels out. They tell you nothing
about how the total is distributed. Here
we have our defensive distribution and a
very normal bell-shaped curve emerges.
On the left, we have really bad
defenses. And on the right, we have
really good defenses. Next, let's look
at our offense. Interesting. Similar
pattern, but flatter shape and fatter
shape, fatter tails. Let's zoom in on
the right tail here. This is where we
would expect to see our playoff teams.
Great offenses and great defenses.
Interestingly, there are more great
offenses than great defenses.
Likewise, if we jump over to the left
side, we find bad offenses [music] and
bad defenses, except there are more bad offenses.
offenses.
The tails are fatter for the offense.
Basically, defenses tend to be more
centered around the average, while there
is more variance to an offense. What
does this tell us? Well, zooming back in
on the right side here again, great
offenses are slightly better than great
defenses, [music]
and there tend to be more of them. This
difference in distributions helps
explain part of why offense is a more
predictive element of a team. And I
think if we had a larger sample, we
would probably find that elite offenses
are slightly more likely to win Super
Bowls than elite defenses. To recap,
offense is more stable, predictable, and
there [music] tend to be more elite
offenses in comparison to defense. Point
being, offense seems to be more of a
skill, whereas defense seems to be
slightly more random. And for that
reason, I give the edge to offense in
terms of importance in the regular
season. However, once we make the
playoffs, almost everyone has a great
offense. And we haven't had enough Super
Bowls to conclusively say if it was
offense or defense that was more
important. My assumption, [music]
offense would retain an even smaller
edge in the playoffs in terms of
importance because it's more stable than
defense. All of this tells you
something. Elite defenses are rare and
maybe that's what makes them more memorable.
memorable.
>> Similar to how we remember great
quarterbacks, I think we remember great
defensive units, except it's not the
individual, it is the collective. It's
not Patrick Mahomes, Tom Brady, or maybe
Joe Montana. It's the 85 Bears, the
Steel Curtain, the Legion of Boom. But I
think there's something that goes beyond
all of the numbers we've talked about
today. And that is, think of what
football fans and coaches covet more
than anything, toughness. And what is
the ultimate symbol of toughness?
A great defense. Hope you enjoyed this
video. Make sure [music] to subscribe if
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