The most efficient rushing team in the league, the Baltimore Ravens, still only averages -0.03 EPA per rush play. Averaging across the whole league, the average rushing play is -0.09 EPA and the average dropback play is 0.06 EPA.
Taken at face value, teams should abandon the run and just pass. This of course would be too simplistic as one could argue that the threat of a run helps unlocking the passing game and improves the EPA.
However, another way to look at this is perhaps EPA is just a flawed metric and is either too simplistic or is missing a key nuance in its modelling. Perhaps there’s a flat EPA adjustment we need to apply to all plays that would make rushing EPAs positive? Perhaps too much weight is given to the explosive pass? Perhaps we need to adjust the era data from when teams rarely played two high safeties to counter today’s passing league?
Nevertheless, I wonder if more and more OCs in the league are using EPA and other advanced analytics and coming to the conclusion you might when looking at this data that passing is far superior to running and ending up with too many teams trying to pass it on too many downs, abandoning the run and putting too much pressure on their average QB?
Yes
The context that made me consider and ask this is the Seahawks this season seem to have abandoned their old philosophy of establishing the run and even when we’re ahead and the passing game isn’t quite working, we continue to call a dropback on almost every play including 3rd and short.
I am starting to wonder if our OC, Shane Waldron, is too wedded to analytics.
how is EPA currently calculated
Sounds like a you problem.
There are a few flaws with EPA. It assumes the goal of every play is to score points, which isn’t necessarily the case. It also is based on results of past plays, and so garbage time passing plays against soft defenses increases the apparent effectiveness of passing plays. (Passing is still way more efficient, even without that effect)
That doesn’t mean EPA needs to change, you just need to know the flaws and how to interpret.
There’s nothing inherently flawed about rushing being negative. Passing is more efficient than rushing, which is why teams pass more than rush. This has been known for many years. But both are useful, which is why both are used. Nothing needs to be changed with regard to EPA.
I think the real answer is EPA isn’t the end all be all of constructing a football offense or grading how a team does.
Long throws are the best plays in terms of EPA, but you won’t see a team lining up to throw it 20 yards minimum on every play
League average rush EPA is negative because most teams don’t use the run game properly.
Historically there was the idea that you need to “run to set up the pass.” Smart teams now know that it’s basically the total opposite.
There’s also the idea of “3rd and manageable” where teams opt to run the ball on 2nd and 10 because they want to avoid 3rd and long. Again, running the ball on 2nd and long is a very negative EPA play, yet even today some teams still do it religiously, which tends to drag down the average.
It’s not that teams should abandon the run entirely. It’s that the run game should largely be used situationally (i.e short yardage and clock-chewing situations) as opposed to being the staple of a modern offense. Multiple teams every year still have positive EPA/rush. Even the most pro-pass, analytics-based people aren’t going to argue a team like Philly or Baltimore should abandon the run.
My guess: Passing EPA and rushing EPA aren’t independent. That is, rushing some optimal amount “earns” you more passing EPA than you “spend” in EPA by rushing, such that your net EPA is better than if you only pass.
Think of it like investing in a business. Invest a few dollars upfront in marketing, better employees, etc. (rushing) to improve your profit margins later (passing).
Of course, as with any business, if your profits increase by less than you invested, you’re going to lose money. Same here. If you run too much, your net EPA will decrease. So teams have to figure out that optimal balance.
Yeah there’s going to be a different graph two different curves, one for dropback epa and one for rush epa with the x-axis being % of plays are dropbacks, and you’re most likely going to see a big dip in passing EPA as the proportion of dropbacks increase.
You could have a third curve showing dropback_epa*(%dropback)+rushing_epa*(1-%dropback) and look for maxima on that to figure out your ideal proportions
perhaps EPA is just a flawed metric
boom, nothing else needs to be said. Basic statistics are the only thing that give a general idea of how teams are. Everyone wants to turn the NFL into Money Ball and it just isnt the case. There aren’t enough games for sample sizes, football is 90% “any given Sunday” every week
This thread (and sub) do not apply brains to stats often enough. Suppose you want to catch fish.
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Keeping the lure still results in negative FPA (fish probability added).
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If you move the lure constantly, you will not catch very many fish.
Plays aren’t independent, and you can’t pretend they are. Poor assumptions lead to poor conclusions.
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EPA can be skewed by a good play or two. I recall a sequence this year where Buffalo was backed up inside the ten, completed a 35 yard pass to Diggs and then proceeded to throw 3 straight incompletions and punt. The EPA for the long throw was like +2 and for the incompletions it was like -.7 or something so, although it was a pretty shit drive they still gained +1.3 EPA
Brother/sister, after the nerds were using it to defend Dorsey, I don’t want to hear about EPA ever again lmao.
It is a VERY flawed metric, zero consideration to situational football, to how the defense reacts when there is the threat of the run game (weird that Sunday we ran the ball a lot and then our receivers found room on their routes…).
This is a made up stat. So yeah probably
what? i mean yea it’s a “flawed” metric but coaches have been running the ball more, not less in the last couple seasons. EPA is only flawed if you misunderstand what you’re looking at—it tells us, in a certain sense, how many points a team is earning from play-to-play. It is more meaningful than just counting yards, because it accounts for down-and-distance and that sort of thing. You could just as easily ask “teams are gaining 6.0 yards on pass attempts but only 4.2 yards on rush attempts, is Yards/attempt a flawed statistic?” and you’d be just as wrong. It tells us exactly what it’s telling us both times. The point is, both with rushing and with passing, is that coaches understand that football isn’t just about scoring as many points as possible on every single play, just in the same way it’s not about scoring as many yards as possible on every play. teams are rushing a lot, and EPA just gives us more information to understand the game.
To paraphrase
All metrics are flawed but some are useful.
People just need to know the weaknesses of various stats and they are fine.