Does Defense Win Championships?

[Carmen Cygni]

4 minutes ago, PapaShogun said:

You should look into DVOA. The Patriots may have ranked 6th in points allowed in 2001, but their defensive DVOA was 19th.

I don't believe in silly advanced metrics like DVOA. You can only play who you are scheduled to and every team and game is different from week to week and it's dependent on that particular matchup.

The '01 Patriots held their opponent to a very respectful 17 pts/g. in the regular season and to just over 15 pts/g in the playoffs. 

[Carmen Cygni]

16 minutes ago, biletnikoff said:

It' just a stupid illogical,meaningless,  sports cliche.

Until a defense out scores an offense, it means  nothing.

A defense  can keep another team from scoring but still only in a passive aggressive manner. It can can help field position  for an offense but nothing extreme enough to matter  unless the offense  scores any points.

Defense doesn' win championships. It just hopes to keep the other team at bay long enough...as long as the offense scores points

Well have to start another thread explaining the fundamentals of the sport and maybe title it "Football 101" to address this nonsense. 

Never mind. I remember you. Is there an ignore feature on this forum?

[Carmen Cygni]

8 minutes ago, Jlowe22 said:

There's also the fact that historical defenses that manage to carry the Trent Dilfers of the world to a superbowl don't last for twenty years like Brady, Manning, etc.  You want a dynasty, you need an elite QB.  You need to also give that elite QB help, but it's almost impossible to keep a historical defense together for that long.

There's no one magic formula for success, but if I were building a team, my main goal in life would be to find a franchise QB. 

I wouldn't argue against that logic but that's another subject than the one being discussed here. 

[Jlowe22]

2 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

I don't believe in silly advanced metrics like DVOA. You can only play who you are scheduled to and every team and game is different from week to week and it's dependent on that particular matchup.

The '01 Patriots held their opponent to a very respectful 17 pts/g. in the regular season and to just over 15 pts/g in the playoffs. 

There's a place for advanced metrics, it just shouldn't be the only thing you use to judge a team.  Points/game is a good straightfoward way to see whether or not your defense....gives up points.

 

[Soko]

21 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

Contrar mon frere. 

An offense can carry the team thru the regular season (offense wins games), but the majority of these defenses turned it on when it mattered most in the postseason (defense wins championships).

You have the exception ('12 Ravens) and the other arguable oddity ('09 Saints) listed above but all the others played top defense in the post-season. 

'06 Colts allowed 16 pts/g in the playoffs.

'07 Giants allowed 16 pts/g in the playoffs and shut down the most prolific offense in NFL history in the SB. 

'11 Giants only allowed 14 pts/g in the playoffs. 

A strong argument can be made against this adage for the '09 Saints that allowed over 19 pts/g but they also produced a phenomenal 8 takeaways in 3 playoff games including 5 in the game in which they surrendered 28 points to the Vikings. 

The one true exception to this axiom is the '12 Ravens who allowed 22 pts/g that was lead by a man on fire in Joe Flacco, and a strong running game. Though there is also something to be said about a defense led by HOF'ers Ray Lewis and Ed Reed. 

Well hold on there, Fred! I was just using the metric you did (PA during the regular season, shown by using the Pats’ PPG ranking). 

If you want to make it the post season, then that changes things quite a bit. If a defense does largely poorly in the regular season, but turns it on in the post season, then were they really a top defense or just one that overachieved? If you say that means they were the top, then you then must say Flacco and Eli were elite QBs, which I don’t think anyone would say. If a bad offense puts up good numbers in the playoffs, that doesn’t solidify them as a top offense for that season. 

You can’t use a post season performance to say they were really a top defense all along when regular season statistics say otherwise. 

[Carmen Cygni]

1 minute ago, Yin-Yang said:

Well hold on there, Fred! I was just using the metric you did (PA during the regular season, shown by using the Pats’ PPG ranking). 

If you want to make it the post season, then that changes things quite a bit. If a defense does largely poorly in the regular season, but turns it on in the post season, then were they really a top defense or just one that overachieved? If you say that means they were the top, then you then must say Flacco and Eli were elite QBs, which I don’t think anyone would say. If a bad offense puts up good numbers in the playoffs, that doesn’t solidify them as a top offense for that season. 

You can’t use a post season performance to say they were really a top defense all along when regular season statistics say otherwise. 

It changes nothing. I explained and clarified that thought process within my first few posts. It's also, in a way, built in to the adage itself.

An offense can carry a team through out the regular season, but when push comes to shove and you're facing the best teams of the year in the playoffs, it's the defense that must rise to the occasion to acquire the Lombardi. 

[TecmoSuperJoe]

23 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

I don't believe in silly advanced metrics like DVOA. You can only play who you are scheduled to and every team and game is different from week to week and it's dependent on that particular matchup.

The '01 Patriots held their opponent to a very respectful 17 pts/g. in the regular season and to just over 15 pts/g in the playoffs. 

Yeah you only play who you are scheduled, but the sample size in football is so small that you can't always get a clear indication of what teams are truly dominant, and what trams happen to have a good amount of luck on their side for several games. The point total of a defense doesn't take into account things like field position from offense or special teams either. There just isn't as much context as one would like from "total points allowed".

That Patriots defense that year isn't really seen as a memorable unit. Even by basic stats they ranked 24th in yards given up and were 19th in YPA via the pass and 21st in YPA via the run.

I don't know, dismissing it all as silly comes across to me as either a lack of understanding or unwillingness to look at a broader picture.

[biletnikoff]

11 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

Well have to start another thread explaining the fundamentals of the sport and maybe title it "Football 101" to address this nonsense. 

Never mind. I remember you. Is there an ignore feature on this forum?

Lol you just don' like actual logic. I explained in full what a pointless cliche it is.  Defense has never won one single championship ever. Only offenses  that score more points win. Its simple math.

Defenses can't help offenses score points. They can only help in hopefully  giving decent field position so a offensive drive is shorter..

People have already shown the many  average defenses that have won championships. It' just another stupid, invented sports bar argument to waste time on

 

 

[jrry32]

Teams win championships.

[Jlowe22]

6 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

It changes nothing. I explained and clarified that thought process within my first few posts. It's also, in a way, built in to the adage itself.

An offense can carry a team through out the regular season, but when push comes to shove and you're facing the best teams of the year in the playoffs, it's the defense that must rise to the occasion to acquire the Lombardi. 

If you want to get it down to the details, oftentimes it's the QB that has to march 80 yards down the field to get the winning TD, even if his defense played well.  Like last year, while Pats were number 1 ranked scoring D, they still gave up 28 points to the Falcons, and it was up to Brady to get those points back. 

And oftentimes it's the kicker, that wins you the game with his clutch 40 yard field goal.

When push comes to shove, you need someone to step up and make something happen, on either side of the ball.

But you're right, great defense is extremely important, and that's why the Patriots are a dynasty.  They've paired great defense with a great QB for a prolonged period of time.  Without either, they're not a dynasty in my opinion.

[Carmen Cygni]

3 minutes ago, PapaShogun said:

Yeah you only play who you are scheduled, but the sample size in football is so small that you can't always get a clear indication of what teams are truly dominant, and what trams happen to have a good amount of luck on their side for several games. The point total of a defense doesn't take into account things like field position from offense or special teams either. There just isn't as much context as one would like from "total points allowed".

That Patriots defense that year isn't really seen as a memorable unit. Even by basic stats they ranked 24th in given up and were 19th in YPA via the pass and 21st in YPA via the run.

I don't know, dismissing it all as silly comes across to me as either a lack of understanding or unwillingness to look at a broader picture.

Every game, every play even, is situational and it's reasons vary greatly. So trying to make sense of total yards given up, yards given upper pass or run, etc. by mere statistics is essentially irrelevant without a proper chart breakdown of the each and every game. A unit also doesn't have to been even remotely "memorable" to be properly effective in concerns to the most important aspect of the game which is the results of the scoreboard. 

[CriminalMind]

Let's look at some playoff stats, not the regular season stats when evaluating stars regarding championships

[Jlowe22]

1 minute ago, CriminalMind said:

Let's look at some playoff stats, not the regular season stats when evaluating stars regarding championships

Or how about just the superbowl stats, since the number 1 offense or defense can play like garbage for that one game and voila, you don't have a championship.

[Carmen Cygni]

1 minute ago, Jlowe22 said:

If you want to get it down to the details, oftentimes it's the QB that has to march 80 yards down the field to get the winning TD, even if his defense played well.  Like last year, while Pats were number 1 ranked scoring D, they still gave up 28 points to the Falcons, and it was up to Brady to get those points back. 

And oftentimes it's the kicker, that wins you the game with his clutch 40 yard field goal.

When push comes to shove, you need someone to step up and make something happen, on either side of the ball.

But you're right, great defense is extremely important, and that's why the Patriots are a dynasty.  They've paired great defense with a great QB for a prolonged period of time.  Without either, they're not a dynasty in my opinion.

Ah, but NE's defense only gave up 21 points vs Atlanta in the SB holding that #1 offense to almost 13 points below their average. Brady threw a pick 6 to relinquish the 3rd TD scored by the Falcons. 

NE's defense also did a great job adjusting in the second half and forced mutiple 3 & outs to quickly get the ball back to the offense. 

*Very quickly, while we're on the subject of the Patriots defense in SB LI, Belichick made a masterful strategic move by flexing NT Branch off the LOS by a 1/2 yard to force C Alex Mack to reach him for blocking on his broken fibula which proved to be a great adjustment and stalled the Falcons run game. 

 

[Jlowe22]

Just now, Carmen Cygni said:

Ah, but NE's defense only gave up 21 points vs Atlanta in the SB holding that #1 offense to almost 13 points below their average. Brady threw a pick 6 to relinquish the 3rd TD scored by the Falcons. 

NE's defense also did a great job adjusting in the second half and forced mutiple 3 & outs to quickly get the ball back to the offense. 

*Very quickly, while we're on the subject of the Patriots defense in SB LI, Belichick made a masterful strategic move by flexing NT Branch off the LOS by a 1/2 yard to force C Alex Mack to reach him for blocking on his broken fibula which proved to be a great adjustment and stalled the Falcons run game. 

 

You're right I forgot about the pick 6.  But my point was that was a deficit that could not be overcome without an elite QB.  Yes, the defense played well in the second half, but they couldn't make those points up without the QB.