Buffalo Rumblings
The six seed Buffalo Bills are en route to Colorado to take on the one-seeded Denver Broncos in a Divisional Round playoff game many expect to be close. Both teams have their strengths and weaknesses to leverage and exploit, as you’d expect.
If you’re looking for a what-if scenario for a Bills loss, it’s looking pretty safe to say that if Denver wins, it’ll be their defense getting the credit.
For a brief refresher, per my rule of four only the top four teams in the league get to use the “elite” label. The next four (5-8) are considered “good.” The middle 16 teams (9-24) are average. That means 25-28 are considered “bad” with ranking in the 29-32 range considered “terrible.” Now that that’s out of the way…
The stats outside the score that I put the most stock in are the per-drive numbers. With the score being the single most important stat in my opinion, it stands to reason then that I absolutely love points-per-drive numbers. In that regard Denver is for sure elite, with the third-fewest points allowed per drive with 1.64 (Seattle Seahawks and Houston Texans are the two better).
The question for Bills fans then, is has Buffalo faced similarly good offenses and what was the result? Based on just this measure, the Bills have faced one better defense in the Houston Texans. That’s it in the elite tier, but Buffalo has faced 75% of the “good” tier of teams in this measure. Cleveland Browns, Philadelphia Eagles, and Jacksonville Jaguars. Respectively, the Bills scored 19 points against Houston, 23 (Browns), 12 (Eagles), and 27 (Jaguars, playoffs).
Buffalo averaged 28.3 points this season, which means that they fell short of their usual mark against Houston and Philadelphia. They were a little shy against Cleveland, and did just fine against Jacksonville. Let’s explore some factors in those four games.
Against the Texans, quarterback Josh Allen was sacked eight times and was hit 12 times in total. The Bills committed three turnovers. They had no issues moving the ball though, with a respectable 7.44 yards per passing attempt and an absurd 5.95 yards per carry.
Against the Eagles, Buffalo had a similar yards per pass but only 3.63 yards per carry. Allen was sacked five times and the Bills had one turnover.
In Cleveland, Allen was kept cleaner with only two sacks and zero turnovers. They ran the ball well, with 5.65 yards per carry. If anything held them back it was their 6.84 yards per passing attempt. Allen’s completion percentage looks acceptable, but a lot of short passes behind the line of scrimmage limited opportunities.
Allen took a beating against the Jaguars despite only being sacked once and sustaining three QB hits. Remember that QB hits measures the quarterback being knocked to the ground after a pass. It’s a specific set of conditions, not just the amount of times contact occurred (which makes Houston’s 12 impressive). Their 7.8 yards per pass...
