Does Defense Win Championships?

[lancerman]

7 hours ago, HorizontoZenith said:

Yes.  Not even the GOAT Tom Brady has won a Super Bowl without a top 10 scoring defense.  Neither has Rodgers, neither has Favre.  It's no wonder the #1 scoring defense is undefeated against the #1 scoring offense in all six Super Bowl matchups. 

In ppg, which is a misleading stat and often can be attributed to a cause and effect relationship with the offense. 

Dallas Cowboys are a great example. 2013 they had an abysmal defense. However in 2014 their line clicked on offense and Murray had his break out year. The Dallas defense ended up ranking higher that year despite most of their per play averages being the same. It's just the offense was better so they were on the field less. 

The ideal model is to take the burden off your defense, keep them rested, and give less time and opportunities for them to give up points. Which also makes special teams crucial. 

[lancerman]

8 hours ago, PapaShogun said:

But you can measure efficiency for a unit via every single play they are put in on the field and chart the results of those situations in comparison to a league average baseline. Which is what DVOA does. I'm just saying, I don't see how DVOA is silly, but just using points per game given up for a defense as a measure for the quality of a unit isn't. 

Yeah you don't have to be memorable to get results. I'm just saying that defense was just average in my opinion. 

DVOA is a more accurate measure of the unit. PPG is a more accurate measure of what the unit is likely to give up in the context of the entire team. Including offensive and special teams impact. A nuance that goes over most people's heads.

[Spartacus]

9 hours ago, biletnikoff said:

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

 

 

Actual Logic  Good joke. Except almost all of those average defenses prevented teams from scoring in the playoffs. Can an average to below average defense win a superbowl? Yes  but they better play a lot better in the playoffs. 

[TecmoSuperJoe]

19 minutes ago, lancerman said:

DVOA is a more accurate measure of the unit. PPG is a more accurate measure of what the unit is likely to give up in the context of the entire team. Including offensive and special teams impact. A nuance that goes over most people's heads.

PPG for the defense just takes the total amount of points divided by 16 games. Doesn't really tell you anything else other than that. And that's not really a good indicator of measuring a defense. You're ignoring hundreds of snaps that are made throughout the season and just making a conclusion based on the end result of the scoring total 16 times, which is a small sample size. Doesn't take int account opponent, point margin, or how a team is on a play by play/down and distance basis. Also special teams and offense which effect field position, or how much your defense plays are thrown out the window. 

Kind of like what I said earlier to the other poster where taking two 12 win teams and claiming since they both won 12 games they are equally dominant of a team. Which just isn't true. 

[Spartacus]

14 minutes ago, lancerman said:

DVOA is a more accurate measure of the unit. PPG is a more accurate measure of what the unit is likely to give up in the context of the entire team. Including offensive and special teams impact. A nuance that goes over most people's heads.

I would generally agree but at the end of the day no matter where the offense puts the defense in the field position battle the core objective is to allow the least points possible. In today's NFL special teams plays are so few and far between I doubt they really affect the final rankings of PPG much at all. I'm in boat that you need a good defense in the playoffs to win a superbowl. 

Whether that means the defense plays better than there averages in the playoffs, are elite from the beginning, or play great situational football. 

[ChazStandard]

10 hours ago, Carmen Cygni said:

Points allowed is primarily the most important statistic for defense, and here is doesn't have to necessarily be in the regular season, but most certainly in the team's playoff run.

Let's take NE's recent dominance for instance. In the years in which the Patriots have won the SB their defense through out the entire season for points allowed was ranked . . .

#6 in '01

#1 in '03

#2 in '04

#8 in '14

#1 in '16

Except that's only half the story, their PPG on offense were

5th

12th

2nd

4th

3rd

Not to mention that defense that won those championships gave up 24 points or over in 4 of those 5 SBs. The fact is you need to be good on boths sides of the ball to win a championship.

[Hunter2_1]

Good QBs and defenses that can create turnovers win championships. Saints, Patriots, Colts, Seahawks, Packers, Steelers all followed this mould. Saints and Pats didn't have the best defense, but they had defenses that won a lot of turnovers, whilst having Brees and Brady.

I think that's the formula with the path of least resistance 

[Carmen Cygni]

38 minutes ago, lancerman said:

There's three ways to win a Super Bowl. 

1. A great QB with a competent defense. Depending on how consistent the QB is from year to a year it is the most consistent model and can last the career of the QB.

2. All time great defense with a poor/average QB but a couple of X factors on offense than can make something happen once or twice a game. Usually only sustainable for two years.

3. Stacked all around team. 

But, as has been pointed out many times here in this thread, it's extremely rare for any great QB to win with simply competent defensive play in the postseason. It may be a decent formula to win regular season games, but merely competent defensive play through out the playoffs will not garner a championship. 

[Carmen Cygni]

18 minutes ago, ChazStandard said:

Except that's only half the story, their PPG on offense were

5th

12th

2nd

4th

3rd

Not to mention that defense that won those championships gave up 24 points or over in 4 of those 5 SBs. The fact is you need to be good on boths sides of the ball to win a championship.

That's incorrect. In NE's recent championship games their defense only allowed 24 points or over in 2 of those 5 SBs. 29 to Carolina, and 24 to Seattle. 

 

[lancerman]

13 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

But, as has been pointed out many times here in this thread, it's extremely rare for any great QB to win with simply competent defensive play in the postseason. It may be a decent formula to win regular season games, but merely competent defensive play through out the playoffs will not garner a championship. 

No you repeated a stat that doesn't isolate individual defensive play or take into the account the effect of offense and special teams. There's a lot of crappy defenses that had above average, even top 10, ppg because of an offense that kept them off the field.

[lancerman]

29 minutes ago, Spartacus said:

I would generally agree but at the end of the day no matter where the offense puts the defense in the field position battle the core objective is to allow the least points possible. In today's NFL special teams plays are so few and far between I doubt they really affect the final rankings of PPG much at all. I'm in boat that you need a good defense in the playoffs to win a superbowl. 

Whether that means the defense plays better than there averages in the playoffs, are elite from the beginning, or play great situational football. 

You haven't seen games where the kickoff or punt team kept pinning a team back and they were unable to get down the field and it limited their choice of play calls?

[Carmen Cygni]

44 minutes ago, PapaShogun said:

PPG for the defense just takes the total amount of points divided by 16 games. Doesn't really tell you anything else other than that. And that's not really a good indicator of measuring a defense. You're ignoring hundreds of snaps that are made throughout the season and just making a conclusion based on the end result of the scoring total 16 times, which is a small sample size. Doesn't take int account opponent, point margin, or how a team is on a play by play/down and distance basis. Also special teams and offense which effect field position, or how much your defense plays are thrown out the window. 

Kind of like what I said earlier to the other poster where taking two 12 win teams and claiming since they both won 12 games they are equally dominant of a team. Which just isn't true. 

 

1 hour ago, lancerman said:

DVOA is a more accurate measure of the unit. PPG is a more accurate measure of what the unit is likely to give up in the context of the entire team. Including offensive and special teams impact. A nuance that goes over most people's heads.

 

44 minutes ago, PapaShogun said:

PPG for the defense just takes the total amount of points divided by 16 games. Doesn't really tell you anything else other than that. And that's not really a good indicator of measuring a defense. You're ignoring hundreds of snaps that are made throughout the season and just making a conclusion based on the end result of the scoring total 16 times, which is a small sample size. Doesn't take int account opponent, point margin, or how a team is on a play by play/down and distance basis. Also special teams and offense which effect field position, or how much your defense plays are thrown out the window. 

Kind of like what I said earlier to the other poster where taking two 12 win teams and claiming since they both won 12 games they are equally dominant of a team. Which just isn't true. 

 

DVOA, just because it provides more data, doesn't prove to be any more valuable. DVOA is in fact a defective and inaccurate analytical representation of how different each and every game is. Every individual matchup b/w teams is vastly different from any other. Comparing a single units performance to that of the league baseline is a flawed premise. DVOA is an attempt to find answers that truly can't be had. 

[Carmen Cygni]

7 minutes ago, lancerman said:

No you repeated a stat that doesn't isolate individual defensive play or take into the account the effect of offense and special teams. There's a lot of crappy defenses that had above average, even top 10, ppg because of an offense that kept them off the field.

I get it, it's a team game, the ultimate team game in fact. It's well understood that each one of the team's three units can greatly effect the others. But the axiom does not separate the units from one another, but rather states that top defensive play is needed to win a championship with the obvious assertion that an offense is also a must to win games. 

[Spartacus]

11 minutes ago, lancerman said:

You haven't seen games where the kickoff or punt team kept pinning a team back and they were unable to get down the field and it limited their choice of play calls?

I don't disagree with that from a game to game basis but I don't think it affects the overall numbers all that much. Also I understand that PPG is flawed and i'm not really arguing the fact that it is perfect. If a team only scores 16 points against a defense I frankly don't care what field position that offense was given. The ultimate goal of a defense is to not give up points. That goal doesn't change whether they have to play from there own 20 or the opponents 1 yard line.  Same goes for the offense. 

In the playoffs you need both your offense and defense most likely to come up big. They may not necessarily have to be elite but you need both to do there part. Special teams I think as long as your hitting makeable field goals, not turning the ball over, and not shanking punts consistently which almost all NFL teams can do you is secondary. 

[Hunter2_1]

31 minutes ago, Carmen Cygni said:

That's incorrect. In NE's recent championship games their defense only allowed 24 points or over in 2 of those 5 SBs. 29 to Carolina, and 24 to Seattle. 

 

28 vs Atlanta