Comparing Time of Possession

by moncheri on Sep 19, 2009 2:43 PM EDT

After reading Ron's O-Line analysis, I felt very inspired. So I decided to do a little research of my own to compare the Time of Possession between NE and BUF.

I know this is a bit too late, as the Bills will be facing off the Bucs very soon. However, this is the only time I have to do the research and I find the results rather interesting and might surprise some of you. Pls read on after the jump.

Mind you, living in the orient doesn't allow me to actually see the game. My research is only based on the the Box Scores and 6 pages of Play-by-Play sheets. If you find any errors please correct me.

A lot of people seem to think that the Bills' new No-Huddle offense will affect the Time of Possession (T.O.P.) of the team for the game. But does it really? Let's look at the numbers:

Bills had 48 Off Plays. 19 Running Plays + 25 Passing Plays + 4 Punts. Total TOP = 22mins52s

Pats had 77 Off Plays. 23 Running Plays + 53 Passing Plays + 1 Punt. Total TOP = 37mins08s

TOP for Bills Special Teams (including kickoffs and field goals made or missed) + penalties + 4 punts = 175s

TOP for Pats Special Teams (including kickoffs, field goals made or missed) + penalties + 1 punt = 125s

If we deduct the TOP of special teams and penalties, the Bills' Off actually used 1197s possession time to run 44 pure offensive plays (ie: punts not included). This means the Bills used on average 27.2s per pure offensive play.

Similarly, the Pats used 2103s to run 76 pure offensive plays. This means the Pats used on average 27.67s per pure offensive play.

I'd say this is only a marginal difference. The numbers would indicate the Bills' No-Huddle offense is by no means a hurried up offense. They use up time to run plays similar to the Pats. However, that begs the question: How come the Pats had such a huge advantage on TOP in this past game? Let's look at the Drive-by-Drive breakdown:

Pats Offensive Drives

# # of plays in drive Results

1 4 Turnover on downs

2 10 Missed Field Goal

3 3 Punt

4 14 TD

~~5 1 INT returned for TD (Defensive TD)~~

6 8 Field Goal

7 13 Turnover on downs

8 10 Field Goal

9 11 TD

~~10 3 TD~~

Bills Offensive Drives

1 3 Punt

2 6 TD

3 5 Punt

4 5 Punt

5 4 Punt

6 6 Field Goal

7 14 TD

8 5 End of Game (only 45s to run the drive)

For TOP comparison, Pats' offensive drive #5 and #10 can be removed, because they were both caused by/related to turnovers, thus the number of plays and TOP on those drives are shorter than normal. Of course, we all know turnovers can win or lose games in and of itself, so I'm putting away turnovers for our discussion here as that's for another subject.

As you can see, aside from drive #1 and #3, the Pats had been able to run drives with 10 or more plays, and even on drive #6 with only 8 plays, they still generated a F/G. Conversely, the Bills offense only had 1 drive (#7) which was able to go over 10 plays. The key reason for BUF's low amount of plays per drive were due to 2 main reasons: penalties and dropped balls. These are things the team must improve upon if they are to consistently win TOP and games in the future. Conversely, the Pats' success in keeping long drives come from Brady taking advantage of the 3-15yards short passes which the Bills defense was giving him.

Winning the TOP doesn't necessarily mean you'll win the game, but it does affect the stamina of your defense in the 2nd half. It also usually mean you either have more offensive drives or more yards gained per drive (if you can run 10 plays in the drive, that means you must have gained more than 30yards on the drive already). All these put the team in a better position to win the game than its opponent.

I might be stating the obvious here, but if the turnover takeaway and giveaway are the same, the game clock management of the final 3mins of each half becomes even more important, as that will possibly generate an extra drive for your team or limit a drive of the opposing team. Obviously the more offensive drives you have the better chances you have in scoring and winning games.

Brady and Belichek are the best in the business. And I thought it'd be good to learn something from them from TOP point of view.

Feel free to share your thoughts and how you analyze the data.

Just another great fan opinion shared on the pages of BuffaloRumblings.com.

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Comments

Great post. Your right that the no-huddle has no effect on the defense. Even if Buffalo were to hurry things up a touch more, it shouldn’t lead to a tired out defense as long as Buffalo does a better job at running more plays and limiting what the opponent does.

I will now go on a rant about hop TOP is a bad stat. TOP doesn’t wear out a defense, the other team running lots and lots of plays does. TOP is essentially about who ran more plays, but run vs. pass ratio is also a factor as is completion percentage. If your a team playing against a QB who completes 55% of his passes vs. 65% (and let’s assume they somehow run the same amount of plays despite that) then that’s about a 1.5 – 2 minute difference in TOP, but doesn’t factor into the defense being more or less tired at all. Running the ball more than passing is also going to lead to a higher TOP. Every time that you run the ball instead of throwing an incompletion, it’s another 30 seconds of TOP for you, but one running play is typically going to leave the defense less tired than one passing play. It’s a flawed stat if your using it to judge how tired the defense is. Those total play numbers are a much better indicator. And these guys are pro athletes too. They shouldn’t get tired out because they play a lot and a much bigger factor in fatigue are those long drives. Guys are going to be gased if they’re on the field for a long time without a break, or after two longer possesions without the offense doing much in between.

The key reason for BUF’s low amount of plays per drive were due to 2 main reasons: penalties and dropped balls.

Sacks were a killer too. Edwards went down four times and lost 26 yards in the process. Tough to get over that. The defense in general was part of the problem and you’ve shown the difference in plays per drive.

Here’s a stat: If you count sacks and QB runs (basically anything that was a passing playcall), then Brady picked up 19 first downs on 55 plays (18 passes and one run) and Edwards had 9 on 31 plays (2 runs and a meager 7 passes, four of which were short ones that Jackson turned into first downs). That may not seem like a lot and if you extrapolate Edwards’ numbers out to the same amount of plays it’s 16 first downs. But how many extra plays does the offense run with a couple extra firsts? Probably enough to take up more than a few minutes.

To simplify, if Buffalo doesn’t want to get their butts kicked in TOP, the offense and defense both need to be better.

by kaisertown on Sep 19, 2009 8:21 PM EDT reply actions

To simplify, if Buffalo doesn’t want to get their butts kicked in TOP, the offense and defense both need to be better.

No doubt

The O needs to sustain drives, no 4 or 5 and outs.

If the D doesn’t want to be tired, then get off the field! Make some stops and quit allowing 10+ play drives. The offense plays no role in that, and should bear no criticism for the D getting tired down the stretch when the D can’t get off the field pretty much ever. Five 10+ play drives allowed is absolutely pathetic. The D has a long ways to go still. They just can’t ever seem to avoid long drives, especially as games wear on.

~K
"As the governor of Louisiana once said, the only way Chris Kelsay can lose his job is if he got caught in bed with a dead girl or a live boy."

by Kurupt on Sep 20, 2009 1:53 AM EDT up reply actions

Avoiding long drives

From the limited footage I’ve seen, it seemed the Bills D was giving the short passes to the Pats — you know the “bend but not break” strategy. They were practically allowing the long drives as long as the Pats didn’t make a mistake, and that’s almost like conceding at least 3 pts per drive to the Pats. That puts a lot of pressure on the Bills offense to score on almost every drive. I understand the Pats have a high power offense, but it just goes to show the Bills absolutely need playmakers on D to create turnovers badly.

Bills fan half way around the world

by moncheri on Sep 20, 2009 10:51 AM EDT up reply actions

Jackson, Evans and Owens each dropped a pass that would have extended a drive. Each of those would have taken another 2ish minutes off the clock. If that had happened the defense wouldn’t have been worn down to a nub with 5 minutes left to play and perhaps the outcome would have been different.

Of course we could make things more challenging, Lisa, but then the stupider students would be in here complaining, furrowing their brows in a vain attempt to understand the situation--Seymour Skinner

by Ron From NM on Sep 19, 2009 9:15 PM EDT reply actions