For the second straight week, Dallas suffered a brutal loss in a game that was more lopsided than the score would indicate. Yet again, Dallas dug themselves in an early hole, to the point that Chicago had approximately a 75% win probability at halftime. As a result, the Bears keep their playoff hopes alive, and the Cowboys face a similar situation in Week 15.
This season, the Los Angeles Rams and Chicago Bears have been quite comparable. Both have seen their young quarterbacks struggle despite talented supporting casts and offensive-minded head coaches, and they’ve largely been carried by their defensive capabilities. But coming out of 2018, not many would have predicted the Rams’ offense to descend in such a sharp manner.
Sean McVay took the league by storm, and in a league built on copy-catting, completely altered the archetype for what franchises sought in head-coaching candidates. Time will tell if this lasts as more than just a fad, but for now, it’s clear that McVay’s 2019 offense is a shell of its 2018 self.
I’ve always been of the mindset that greatness depends not only on initial aptitude, but an ability to grow and evolve. In a multi-billion dollar industry, if you’re able to find initial success, that’s a damn fine achievement. But maintaining success is what builds a legacy. So when others take note of your accomplishment, you can bet the house that they’re going to study every possible configuration to break that success.
With that in mind, I wondered how NFL defenses attempted to stop the Rams in 2018, and how that might have changed going into 2019. I’m a numbers nerd and not a film grinder, so I had to rely on what I know. Using data from the SIS DataHub, I was able to identify one interesting difference. The Rams typically operate from 1-1 personnel: that is, 3 wide receivers, 1 running back, and 1 tight end. In 2018, when Los Angeles lined up in 1-1 personnel on first down, defenses ran some combination of Cover 3, Cover 4 or Cover 6 about 48% of the time. In 2019, under the same conditions, defenses are now running those zone coverages 63% of the time.
Running a more zone-heavy scheme against the Rams 1-1 personnel would do two things: (1) keeping more players deep would hopefully limit opportunities for big-plays through the passing game, and (2) it would allow defenders to be more active in stopping the Rams potent rushing attack. If successful, we’d see a stark difference in the first-down play results from 2018 to 2019. Sure enough, that’s exactly what happened.
In case it’s been a minute since you’ve had a statistics course, what you’re looking at are box-plots.
The idea is to visualize the yards gained on each first-down play for the Rams, based on the play type. The lines in the middle of the boxes represent the median, while the bottom and top of the boxes represent the 25th and 75th percentiles, respectively. The lines on the ends stretch to the smallest and largest values, while points represent plays that are exceptionally rare given the rest of the plays.
Immediately we should notice that for both play types, the median value is lower in 2019 than the 2018 counterpart.
This would indicate the typical first-down play isn’t yielding as high of a return. On top of that, we see that the 75th percentile (top of the box) and the top of the line reach higher in 2018 than 2019, which suggests that the 2019 offense is also lacking the explosiveness we saw last year. It’s unlikely that all of this is attributable to a simple increase in zone-coverage, but it’s possibly one factor in the offensive struggles for Los Angeles.
Despite some of these difficulties, there have still been a few matchups in which Los Angeles has shown glimpses of their ceiling. And if Mitch Trubisky can right the ship enough to beat Dallas, you can be sure Jared Goff is capable of the same.
A key component to stopping the Rams offense will be shutting down Goff’s safety-net, Cooper Kupp.
On the X-axis above, we have the EPA Allowed per Slot Target (i.e. teams to the left defend slot receivers well, teams to the right don’t). On the Y-axis, we see the number of points the Rams scored against said opponent. It’s not hard to see the value Cooper Kupp brings to the Rams offense. He operates primarily out of the slot, and the Rams’ best offensive showings have generally come against teams who struggle in the slot.
So why is this significant? The Cowboys have allowed the ninth-highest EPA per Slot Target. In reality, Cowboys fans could probably have guessed this after watching Cole Beasley on Thanksgiving. Dallas desperately needs to learn from the past, or Kupp will roast them as well.
If you haven’t already, I strongly encourage you to go read Dan Morse’s latest article.
He breaks down some key insights regarding the Cowboys offensive struggles, and specifically where they manifest in the game. His article got me thinking, and so I launched my own inquiry into the volatile nature of this Cowboys squad. My goal was to retroactively observe the Cowboys win probabilities, and compare the games that resulted in wins with those that resulted in losses. What I found confirmed my suspicions.
When it comes to this Cowboys squad, the first-half generally tells the tale. That is, when Dallas has the higher win probability at the half, they’ve managed to hold on and secure the victory. But when they’ve been trailing, they’ve had a much harder time digging out of the hole.
This isn’t entirely surprising, but it does stress the importance of Dallas establishing their presence early, and seizing control of the game-script. Thankfully, despite Dallas’s recent struggles, the remainder of the NFC East also decided to take 2019 off. That isn’t something the Cowboys can rest their laurels on going forward, but for now, it’ll do. With only three games left, the Cowboys control their fate, and that’s all any fan can ask for at this point.
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