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Teams Running for 130+ Yards Win Games


SkippyX

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6 hours ago, Malik said:

Can't assume that every time that's winning is solely piling up yardage at the end of the game. How many teams can you remember icing out a long 4th quarter drive by running the ball 50+ yards or so for 8min? I can't imagine it's that common.

It isn't just about piling up yardage late, though. It can also be about the inability to rush due to game situation. If you have 90 rushing yards through 3 quarters, but are down 10, you're going to pull back on the run game in the 4th to manage the clock. So you can have two teams with a similar early rushing performance, but different results in terms of other aspects (passing game, turnovers, special teams, opposition, etc.) may create a different game situation so one team keeps running and one stops.

For an example, look at 2018 Bills/Vikings. The Vikings ran the ball 5 times. Nowhere near 130 yards. This game is a part of Kirk Cousins without 130 rushing yards stat, which implies that Kirk Cousins lost this game because they didn't run well. But they were down 24 to 0, 18 minutes into the game. They stopped running because the game was basically lost. They didn't lose because they couldn't run.

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On 11/29/2019 at 10:05 PM, bucsfan333 said:

Are teams winning because they rush for so much, or are teams already winning so they run the ball enough to eclipse that threshold?

It is both causal and a direct result of winning 

 

Teams tend to win with a dominant run game 

Teams with a lead run the ball 

 

This thread proves nothing 

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Here is something to help support your point, which I put together using game play data from PFR. It shows that the running game matters from both a volume and rate perspective. Yds/rush in wins is higher than in losses until the 4th quarter, when it drops off significantly for fairly obvious reasons - most likely the team is ahead and is trying to run out the game, and the opposing defense is set specifically to stop that.

For the graphic below, yds/att is on the left axis while yds/quarter or yds/game is on the right. The far left data point is all quarters combined. You'll notice that yds/att for the whole game is similar in both wins and losses, but that the yds/att in wins in Q1-Q3 is significantly higher than in losses, while the yds/att in wins in Q4 is significantly lower than in losses.

w3Nvju5.png

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On 11/30/2019 at 6:05 AM, bucsfan333 said:

Are teams winning because they rush for so much, or are teams already winning so they run the ball enough to eclipse that threshold?

Yes, the 'you need to run x number of times' argument has been decimated time and time again. They are only important statistics for people who don't understand that scorelines impact offensive strategy. 

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46 minutes ago, ChazStandard said:

Is this a real cause/effect fact?  Are we sure it isn't "teams with the lead rush the ball more" coinciding with "teams with the lead tend to win"?

Oh and also...

Best record both times. Nice.

Someone could create an algorithm to analyze the play by plays of whatever dataset and analyze the run percentage and volume in 4th quarters when a team has a lead. For example of a recent game, Buffalo ran out the clock in the 4th quarter for 14 yards on their last 2 drives. They ran for 124 in the game. If you want to include the entire 4th quarter then it nets at 30 yards (including J. Allen's 6 yard scramble).

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4 hours ago, childofpudding said:

Here is something to help support your point, which I put together using game play data from PFR. It shows that the running game matters from both a volume and rate perspective. Yds/rush in wins is higher than in losses until the 4th quarter, when it drops off significantly for fairly obvious reasons - most likely the team is ahead and is trying to run out the game, and the opposing defense is set specifically to stop that.

For the graphic below, yds/att is on the left axis while yds/quarter or yds/game is on the right. The far left data point is all quarters combined. You'll notice that yds/att for the whole game is similar in both wins and losses, but that the yds/att in wins in Q1-Q3 is significantly higher than in losses, while the yds/att in wins in Q4 is significantly lower than in losses.

w3Nvju5.png

This would be more interesting if you had the passing game for comparison. I recommend if you do it, use ANY/A

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4 hours ago, Matts4313 said:

This would be more interesting if you had the passing game for comparison. I recommend if you do it, use ANY/A

It's plenty interesting in its own right and shows that winning teams tend to run the ball better in terms of both yards/game and yards/rush (which you disputed in your own thread).

However, I have posted several times before that ANY/A has the highest correlation to winning of any single offensive stat. I wonder if yards/rush in Q1-Q3 is comparable.

Edited by childofpudding
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3 hours ago, childofpudding said:

It's plenty interesting in its own right and shows that winning teams tend to run the ball better in terms of both yards/game and yards/rush (which you disputed in your own thread).

However, I have posted several times before that ANY/A has the highest correlation to winning of any single offensive stat. I wonder if yards/rush in Q1-Q3 is comparable.

I mean, I pulled like 6 different articles that had very detailed analysis (including Q1-3); and they all came to the same conclusion. I feel like I am going to naturally trust them over you - no offense to you or the work you did. 

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On 12/1/2019 at 8:58 PM, Matts4313 said:

I mean, I pulled like 6 different articles that had very detailed analysis (including Q1-3); and they all came to the same conclusion. I feel like I am going to naturally trust them over you - no offense to you or the work you did. 

No offense taken, but you're not adding to this thread. You're just referring to your own thread from months ago without linking either to the thread itself or any of the articles that you cited in that thread. I don't remember any articles in your thread that looked specifically at Q1-Q3 in the way that I have. I do remember you getting extremely defensive in that thread whenever someone would even suggest that running had any importance, even if they acknowledged that the passing game is clearly the more important facet of offense.

If you don't trust my data, please do to try to recreate it. I definitely could have made a mistake. However, if you find that my data is accurate, would it change your opinion at all in regards to the importance of the running game?

Q1 rushing in wins: http://pfref.com/tiny/Uj58I
Q1 rushing in losses: http://pfref.com/tiny/daPVw

Q2 rushing in wins: http://pfref.com/tiny/8OxaK
Q2 rushing in losses: http://pfref.com/tiny/vKSEb

Q3 rushing in wins: http://pfref.com/tiny/whJLt
Q3 rushing in losses: http://pfref.com/tiny/nOETG

Q4 rushing in wins: http://pfref.com/tiny/eg7IC
Q4 rushing in losses: http://pfref.com/tiny/LyCWU

 

Edited by childofpudding
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