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Breaking down Ezekiel Elliott, Saquon Barkley’s miserable Week 10s

Jason Garrett and Kellen Moore fail to adjust their offense to suit the strengths of their personnel, setting Dallas back to a 5-4 record.

Half of the NFC East sat out this week on a bye, while the other half lost to teams they were favored against.  The New York Giants fell to the Jets in what’s closer to a race for draft position than the playoffs.  At the other end of the standings, the Dallas Cowboys hurt their own playoff bid with a loss to the Minnesota Vikings.

Both the Cowboys and the Giants were sunk by abysmal days on the ground for star running backs Ezekiel Elliott and Saquon Barkley.

The effectiveness (or lack thereof) of those running backs in Week 10 is easily seen with advanced box scores based on expected points.

Expected Points, the foundation of many analytical arguments, uses data from previous NFL seasons to determine how many points a team is likely to come away with on a given play based on down, distance, time remaining, and field position. The difference in expected points at the start of a play and expected points at the end is referred to as expected points added, or EPA.

A play with a positive EPA means it put the offense in a better position to score, while negative EPA implies the offense is in a worse position.

Barkley and Elliott finished with the worst and sixth-worst EPA/carry, respectively, among rushers with at least 10 carries this week.

For backs with at least 20 carries in a game without a fumble, Elliott finished with the fifth worst EPA/carry this season.

Both Elliott and Barkley even saw a below average rate of loaded box counts, per NFL’s Next Gen Stats.  That being said, there is still evidence that Elliott isn’t entirely to blame for the lack of a run game in Dallas this week.

Of Elliott’s 20 carries, 15 of them came with 10 yards to go.  He averaged 2.9 yards per carry in these situations and never gained more than six yards on a given run.  It was an ineffective ground game that the Cowboys simply refused to get away from throughout the game.  Despite a 57% success rate in the air on 14 first down throws, Dallas elected to run the ball 16 times with a 12.5% success rate.

The point at which Dallas’ commitment to the run game proved to be a fatal flaw came in the Cowboys’ final drive (excluding the hail mary drive in the final 24 seconds).  Dak Prescott threw for eight yards on first down, only to watch Ezekiel Elliott, in his first short yardage carries of the day, run for 0 and -3 yards on the next two plays.  That was enough to drop Dallas’ win probability nearly 25%.

Meanwhile, in the passing game:

After Lamar Jackson, who had another ridiculous game this week, Dak Prescott was the most effective passer in the NFL on Sunday.  He finished with the 10th highest completion percentage over expected (CPOE) in the NFL this week as well, completing nearly 4% more passes than expected based on target depth.  Daniel Jones wasn’t quite the same level, but he was above average in both EPA/pass and CPOE.  A significantly better day for him than Barkley’s 13 carries for one yard.

Top Offensive Play

Daniel Jones’ quick strike that turned into a 61-yard touchdown to Golden Tate earned the top EPA play this week in the division. (6.5 EPA)

Top Defensive Play

A big third-down sack from Robert Quinn was the biggest EPA play among the defenses in the division this week. (-2.3 EPA)

Looking Ahead

Washington comes back from their bye week with what is likely to be their weakest remaining opponent.  They’ll take on a Jets team that has been below average in the air and on the ground.  It should be noted, however, that Sam Darnold has been throwing for -0.09 EPA/pass since returning from illness.  Dwayne Haskins, Washington’s new starter, has an EPA/pass of -0.53.  Even so, Washington is still currently favored by one in their home game coming back from a bye.

Philadelphia gets the league’s top defense this week, but at least they get them at home.  New England proved that they were at least partially a product of the poor offenses they faced in the first eight weeks when Baltimore ran all over them, but Philadelphia is no Baltimore.  The Eagles will need to hold down New England’s fairly average passing attack to keep this one close.

Dallas faces what could potentially be a Matt Stafford-less Detroit Lions.  Stafford is having one of his best seasons yet and leading the NFL in average depth of target.  If he can’t go for the second week in a row, Jeff Driskel looks to take the reigns.  Driskel’s EPA/pass is in the negative, a far cry from Stafford’s 0.27.  Prescott remains in the top-3 in the NFL by EPA/pass.  Should Jason Garrett allow Prescott to throw just a bit more, and should Stafford sit out again, this should be a perfect get-right game for Dallas.

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