Of course, there are plenty of tails angles within the SGPs and matchups to be played separately, and the goal is as always to match the research presented without your own thoughts. My apologies for any typos…. let’s be real, they’re kinda funny and we’re not here to read beautiful english but to talk ball and tails.

Tails Angles

CAR:

• Is Brad Izkik the truth? Young has absolutely lit up the Bears and Falcons defenses the first two weeks putting up back to back ~0.3 EPA Games. And in particular, his play and grading in system has been dominant in the 90th percentile in those categories through 2 weeks. Any metric and Young has been dominant (his passing yards also didn’t really come in garbage time Week 1, so I don’t like that counterargument)

• Now there is of course some possibility this was a function of 2 bad defenses, but this is also a QB who is in a new offense and has been far more aggressive throwing (3.3% Pass Over Expected, 6th) and throwing downfield (3rd highest ADOT in NFL) where Young has been at his best in the last few years . I love the signal of the team going Pass Over Expected positive at 3.3%, that the offense will lean on him.

• And even if Young’s performance was matchup driven, I’m not sure the Browns defense is any better here. They have started the season with the 3rd lowest disruption rate and a healthy 7.5 YPA allowed. The defense, meanwhile, also leads the NFL in Single High rate and plays heavy man which has encouraged teams to throw deep, playing right into the strengths of CAR offense so far this season ( I would also take Tet/Coker in their man matchup having advantage here).

• On the other side of the ball, we have a huge sample of Watson being terrible, and I’m not buying one half of decent play against TB as being any signal (see below for bearish TB D takes). And CAR, while struggling on Run D, gets a CLE Run O that hasn’t had a good rushing game in nearly a year, and CAR has been solid in pass defense blitzing nearly 50% of the time leading to top 10 pressure, quick pressure and pressure disruption metrics. I love the Carolina alts here.

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Leveraging Tails

(Jets , ML & Alts)

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Intro Thoughts

If I could boil down the fundamental problem with football prediction and forecasting it would live in how football operates in small samples where signals are incredibly hard to parse through. Models are trained by having large amounts of data, and football offers complexity in both in its interactions of 22 people in a complicated game, and in the limited samples of plays (17 games and slightly more than 100 plays per game) with which to work and train on.

Why do we go through this preamble? Well, in my view, there are often important contexts and confounding factors which can better allow us to understand which data points have signal and which are capturing noise. We’re going to be wrong plenty in parsing this through but hopefully we are more often right and wrong— and at the very least there is more data and context for any individual to combine with their own priors and understanding to form a view.

Q: Is it time to give up on Justin Herbert?

Through 2 weeks it has been a major struggle for Justin Herbert, with the 4th lowest PFF Grade and EPA/Play not far behind as the team lost to two of the worst projected teams in the Cardinals and Raiders.

The Chargers have begun the season by running the ball at one of the highest clips in the NFL.

Adjusted for the situation, only the Falcons have run the ball more often than the Chargers. And in terms of their ability to earn points on those runs, no team in the NFL has been worse than the Chargers. The result has been an offense often in obvious passing situations (where the team is 75%+ likely to pass) and playing behind the sticks.

Only a handful of QBs have found themselves in more obvious passing downs— and to Herbert’s credit, this has not been the main area of production where he has struggled. Of course, the base rate of success is lower on obvious passing situations and of the 20 games in the last 2 seasons he has played, he saw the 4th and 8th highest rate of obvious passing situations in the first 2 weeks of the season.

One might expect the poor running game and resulting difficult situations to show up in some of the surrounding contextual offensive stats (pass blocking and getting open are both harder when the other team knows you’re not running), but that hasn’t been the case early this season. In terms of coverage mistakes forced (forcing a blown assignment) , disruption pressures (plays where a QB can’t go through his read), perfect blocking (where nobody in protection blows their assignment) the numbers actually look better in terms of his surroundings.

The Perfect Block rate, was 5th and 6th best for games over the last two years. Coverage mistakes forced? 6th best and 7th best. Disruption pressures allowed? Average games for the last two seasons (8 and 12). In proxies we can capture his surrounding units, it has been better despite more obvious passing situations stemming from a poor run game.

Now perhaps there is a noticeable change in play style with his time to throw, or ability to extend? Taking more sacks? Not at all. His play extension is exactly the same as last year’s average, sack rate and pressure to sack rate the same. His rate of scrambling? Exactly the same. Time To Throw? Nearly identical and all in the middle of the distribution for games in 2025 and 2026 (the more statistically sound point of comparison). Has his accuracy declined? No notable differences in accuracy.

So what has been the main difference? Herbert has had some of the worst deep games of any QB in the last few years. Of QBs with 10 dropbacks in games since 2020 Herbert’s deep EPA ranks 1 1,943 / 2,847 and 2,814 / 2,847. And deep plays, both because they are rare and because they are also heavily influenced by the way a WR tracks/plays at catchpoint (peep our earlier point on sample + interaction) are often less stable than the way a QB, can for instance, evade the rush and scramble which is much more stable.

Of course, this a QB in Herbert who has not had a single year below average in production while throwing deep, and that is almost certainly going to regress to the mean here with Herbert around the same spot as he has been every other year in a larger sample.

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The other area that pops out year to year is how Herbert has played against the blitz. Herbert has had major trouble picking up blitzes early in the season, with his blitz grades in the 6th and 9th percentiles early in the season. Herbert saw pressure on 7/10 blitzes last week and has been sacked on 25% of snaps against the blitz through the first 2 weeks .

Again, if we take a look at where this would rank for the full season, it is massively lower than his career averages in the category which isn’t to compare his 2 week performance to an 18 week sample, but instead to suggest where production is likely to move over a larger sample.

Now we can return to our original questions—what can we make of this data? What part has more signal looking ahead? I don’t think Herbert has gotten magically worse in these areas, especially deep which is prone to lots of variance on a single play level (a deep drop turned into an INT for instance for Herbert). Herbert is entering a new offense and the cadence and protections are seemingly off especially in picking up the blitz. Can that continue? Perhaps. And while it might point to a flaw in Herbert’s ability to ascend into the elite tier of QBs many projected onto him— that he can’t overcome these changes and he perhaps struggles diagnosing defenses and “seeing the field”—I would think it is more likely as the offense gets more reps and gets in rhythm these problems will stabilize and Herbert will return closer to his career averages.

What I do think carries more signal looking forward is that the protection has been better holding their assignments, there are more open windows throughout the offense. And most of all, there is little to suggest a change in Herbert’s play style that would suggest he’s about to enter a declining period.

The market has sold on LAC (6-7% win probability vs a neutral opponent) and on the offense in particular. I think it is safe to say McDaniel is not the magic bullet to turn Herbert into an MVP QB in year 1. But this still has the makings of a solid QB and an offense with still potential to be one of the better offenses in the NFL.

Perhaps we will be wrong, and time will tell (beauty of betting markets is that it is the best arbiter of these opinions) but I think this be a good reminder of the randomness and variance that can happen in a small sample of NFL games. I won’t be surprised to see the Chargers putting up some big offensive numbers in the weeks ahead for, dare I say it, a better pass offensive environment than Herbert has had in years.

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Will be back shortly with the Betting Gameplan. As always, appreciate the support and encourage questions/comments/criticism here— and spread the good word about Throwthedamball!

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Quick Hitters Tails Angles::

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We’re going to discuss tails angles, matchups the market is I think not properly accounting for and some SGPs. Of course, there are plenty of tails angles within the SGPs and matchups to be played separately, and the goal is as always to match the research presented without your own thoughts. My apologies for any typos, getting this out quick here.

Tails Angles:

IND:

A game with a massive amount of variance and uncertainty which should be our best friend in Week 1. On both sides, I think, we have some major questions.

As we outlined in the AFC North Preview Jackson struggled in 2025 and his play style thoroughly changed.

Even before his injury, Jackson was extending far less than normal and the result was much worse play out of structure for him. Now the Colts might not have the best pass rush to force his hand, but many of Jackson’s pressures from 2025 were of his own creation— or pressure that arrives after the play develops where he ranked 2nd to last in the NFL at 27% of dropbacks (only Shedeur Sanders was worse). Should that trend hold onto 2026 there are some serious problems for this Ravens offense and one that I am not sure is primed to take advantage of the weak pass-rush of the Colts.

On the Colts side, this is an offense that, with Daniel Jones, was perhaps the best in the NFL before he went down. Now the team is dealing with some injuries at WR as Pierce missed some time, and playing football after a torn achilles is far different than playing football before tearing your achilles.

But there is at least some sample of Jones+ Colts as an elite offense, and much of the cast from O-line, to QB, to scheme remains the same. It is one thing to project any team to have such an offense and another for a team that has sustained in for a decent chunk of NFL time.

I guess in writing this out, I am more bullish on the Colts tails here though of course there is plenty of mass on the Ravens and Jackson returning to form and taking advantage of a weak Colts defense and this a Ravens defense at full health and getting AJ Minter, who I have as one of the best DPC’s out there. And yet, if the Colts really are going to return to an elite offense or even one slightly worse, we might be looking back questioning how they had the 19th highest team total on the board. That’s a tail worth taking.

ARI:

This one feels absolutely nasty, but I think the Cardinals are among the most mispriced team in market. Rather than clog with analysis that is already way running way way too long (I wrote the tails angles last), can read the case right here.

The tldr; We know Brissett isn’t going to a top QB, but he’s also very unlikely to be a bottom of the barrel one. This is an OC that made Mike White relevant, a terrific weapons group and a defense whose cluster injuries last year have majorly skewed their market value. I’m as big a fan of Herbert and McDaniel as anyone else, but with Minter gone from LAC, there’s huge uncertainty to actual talent and underlying of the defense and if we simmed this 1K times and updated in 3-4 weeks from now, I am buying that AZ comes out on top at more than the 19% we see on Polymarket right now.

CHI:

The Bears were #1 in Perfectly Blocked Run Rate and get a Carolina D that is bottom of league forcing blocking mistakes and was bottom 5 in Success Rate allowed and EPA. The passing offense as well is decently set up against a Carolina team that plays the soft zone Caleb Williams was terrific at attacking last year where he was 0.1 points per play better than in man coverage.

No matter how Chicago plans to attack, I think they should be able to put up lots of points and quickly. And with how aggressive Johnson gets, I think CHI can run up the score— and I don’t hate a Bryce Young Passing Yards SGP with the Bears alts as his priors and current distribution assume lots of low volume passing games, but if CHI dictates the offense and pace, against a still poor D, Young should be able to put up some yards as well.

WAS:

As we used to say in the forecast days we’ve got a better QB getting 6 points here! Jokes aside, Daniels,healthy, is the exact type of QB whose scrambling ability and play vs disruption mitigate the effects of a Philly D that should still be one of the best and where market is showing most of its value (with Washington having the 6th lowest team total). Daniels is the best at recognizing disruption to scramble (#1) which elevates his play vs disruption where he has been a top 3 QB his first two years.

And while I don’t anticipate this Washington Defense to be particularly good I am not certain Hurts will be able to fully take advantage.

Hurts struggled in his grading in system plays and when there was no disruptive event. And this was with AJB still on offense here who helped elevate production (top in EPA) despite some worse grading underlying. Life with safety help shaded to Smith might make him less effective, and we’ve got a rookie slot in Lemon who missed most of camp with a WR in Wicks where there is likely signal in his inability to earn playing time in GB. It is an uncertain set up to the left tail for a QB in a new offense with new personnel and a QB with a different playing style, even if the on paper matchup looks terrific.

Leveraging Tails

Most bettors place wagers in multiple markets — spreads, totals, teasers, props, etc. — where they generally get oriented by following a bottom-up approach: “Which spreads do I like?” “Which totals stand out this week?”

But the goal in this space is to articulate a process for trades by following a top-down approach. Consider this a weekly deeper dive into a broader process. We will consider how a specific thesis on a team, player, or trend is best applied and capitalized on the proper market. Some bets will track more traditional markets, but more often we will look to maximize our upside in the multitude of different markets offered by markets — dependent on finding the right market for the thesis! Let’s dive in!

NYJ alts

Let us begin as always by setting the game and team fundamentals as the baseline of our analysis

The Titans are slight home favorites although the price has moved towards the Jets in recent weeks. Last year, from an earned drive points perspective, or how well teams earned their points as defined by how well they can sustain and reproduce that drive.

The Titans and Jets were in their own little orbit on the bottom left as the worst teams in the NFL, with the Jets better on offense. Of course, these teams underwent some major changes, and Brady Cook’s 2025 numbers aren’t the most predictive of success. As a result, there is plenty of uncertainty and there are two main tails that I want to attack here 1) that Geno Smith’s 2025, in the context of this matchup, is potentially less an indicator of production than his previous seasons and 2) that much of the projection here of the Titans development and as favorites is premised on Cam Ward’s development, which is no guarantee.

For games like these I want to be asking: if we replayed this in 3-4 weeks time with new information in which way do I think the price is likely to move-- and I think it is the Jets as clear favorites over the Titans.

Geno was a slightly above average QB in Seattle every year before completely faltering in 2025 for Vegas. Now in some respect that I think nicely represents the wide range of outcomes for Smith-- where it would not be shocking for Smith to continue as one of the worst in the NFL like he was this season and for the wheels to come off for the 35 year old QB. But there are reasons for optimism and to say 2025 may have simply been a blip given the situation in Vegas.

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For those new here want to reiterate the goal of the newsletter is to use the data, research, and general process to match with one’s own views of the game as they craft a story and bets & trades accordingly. We have a bias towards looking at tail angles and understanding the different trades offs and ways the game might play out. With that, let’s dive into some of the angles for tonight.

SEA vs NE

We, of course, open the season with a rematch of the Super Bowl, but these are different teams with changes in roster, coaching, and player development, etc. And even beyond that, while certainly a data-point we don’t want to anchor too hard on one game that was in very different conditions (cough cough the health of Drake Maye’s shoulder).

Now at a 3.5 point spread and ~62% win probability, accounting for home field the market is suggesting a Seattle team roughly a couple of points better than the Patriots on a neutral.

But there are a few angles here worth thinking through in how this game could skew heavily towards the Patriots. As we spoke about in the AFC East Preview, Maye had a historical season throwing deep.

Maye’s production was by far the best in the NFL, but he was also the highest graded and 2nd most accurate deep passer, suggesting it was not only his WRs that contributed to his success. Now of course, Maye is unlikely to sustain that level of success seeing how much better he was than the rest of the NFL, but this is still a QB projected to be one of the best deep passers in the NFL while adding a premier deep threat in A.J Brown this offseason.

And this is an area of the Seahawks defense that might be particularly vulnerable in this spot, relative to a market pricing them as roughly best defense in the NFL. The Seahawks, number one in most categories on defense, were only 8th in explosive pass rate allowed. But beyond that number from last year, this is a defense that is likely to be without both two of its safeties in Nick Emmanwori and Ty Okada and the team lost cornerbacks Tariq Woolen and Shaq Griffin in the offseason. Replacing them is Nehemiah Pritchett and Josh Jobe both of whom had PFF grades in the the 50’s which is the bottom quartile of the NFL and they were both well below average in their ability to prevent separation and YPRR allowed.

The Seahawks defense generated so much of their value in being able to stop the run and create disruption (or plays in which no coverage player makes a mistake or where pressure arrives to disrupt a QB from his read). And Macdonald will surely be able to still scheme up some disruption even with weaker personnel.

The Seahawks were by far the best team in the NFL in Rush EPA and not far behind in their ability to generate disruption. But this has been an area where Maye has excelled.

Maye was the best QB in the NFL against disruption— and like we discussed in our preview, this is something likely sticky, given Maye’s ability to scramble around and his ability to fit balls into tight windows which are the primary two ways to defeat disruption. As such, Maye is well positioned to mitigate what the Seahawks do best— though of course if the Seahawks generate 55% disruption, and 30% pressure disruption the base case is not ideal for New England.

And on the flipside, we see this is a New England defense at the top of the NFL in their own ability to generate disruption and a QB in Sam Darnold who is in the top left quadrant of our graph as much more sensitive to disruption and doing most of his damage on the undisturbed plays. Certainly if New England can enter a positive game state where Darnold has traditionally struggled, the Patriots have a compounding path towards beating the Seahawks secondary and being able to create the conditions where Darnold has struggled.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

The Colts got off to a roaring start on offense before slowing down as Daniel Jones went down, while maintaining an average to below average defense. The Texans defense once again dominated with offense remaining mid as they’ve been the last few years. Likewise, the Jaguars generated many turnovers on defense leading to high EPA and lower EDP, while the offense was slightly above average. The Titans were plain old bad on both sides of the ball as one of the worst teams in the NFL.

IND:

Central Q: Was Danny Dimes year 7 a fluke?

The Colts offense was perhaps the biggest surprise of any offense early in the 2025 season, with the team leading in nearly every category including EPA, EDP, Success Rate until Daniel Jones injuries derailed the season.

The obvious question for a QB in year 7 is whether Jones and the offensive production was a fluke or how sustainable it would be going forward.

Jones threw to his first read at by far the highest clip in the NFL in 2025.

Jones has always been a QB who very often throws to his first read, especially as his career has gone along. The difference this past year was that Jones was far more effective when throwing to his first read. And while the Y axis is somewhat compressed his 0.18 EPA/Play is a massive gap from his league average. And these first read throws are precisely the area in which less falls on Jones and more on the surroundings. Jones in throwing often to his first read certainly traded off the ability to extend for a lower sack rate as he set career lows in both categories.

Similarly, even as Jones’ play in system was merely average relative to the league and even his play, the production was far better in the Colts system with Steichen.

Where Jones was at his best relative to past seasons was his ability to simply execute the system and not “destroy” plays with bad throws and poor throwing decisions. Now, much of the system last year was built on a good run game and the threat of RPO built off of that. With Jones likely less mobile off the achilles tear, much of that threat from last year will be mitigated (and IND might need to find another way to win).

But as per the year to year changes, the system with Steichen remains the same along with Jonathan Taylor and most of the offensive line outside of Tackle Braden Smith. The team lost Michael Pittman to the Steelers, but with Alec Pierce returning to health along with Josh Downs, Tyler Warren and the still effective in zone Keenan Allen, and this is still a decent situation for Jones and company.

On defense, the Colts really struggled in the second half of the season to generate pressure and perfect coverage, as Sauce Gardner and Charvarius Ward missed most of the second half of the season.

And the team will need those 2, who have some of the best numbers preventing separation. But coverage is a weak-link system and the team will need rookie 3rd rounder Slot CB Justin Walley along with Akeem Davis-Gaither and his 36.5 PFF Coverage Grade. And the pass rush outside of Deforest Buckner looks like some trouble and does not figure to be a strength of this defense.

This is a team with quite a wide range of outcomes, depending on your view of how stable Jones’ production was last season and with him coming off an injury. The defense looks like it will struggle even with 3 cogs as they are comprised of a couple rookies and mostly struggling veterans, leaving little room for upside here. I’ll be quick to update this team within the first few weeks, anchoring heavily to their early season play.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

The Chiefs in a bit of a lost year had a decent defense and offense that was performing at the top of the league before Mahomes went down. The Broncos rode a terrific defense and improved offense to a solid regular season even if the #1 seed was perhaps a bit of an overperformance. The Chargers defense was terrific again under Jesse Minter and the offense was merely average following the collapse of the offensive line. The Raiders were a train-wreck on offense all season and with a defense hovering around average. But in a division with plenty of coaching changes and some key QBs coming off injuries there are perhaps more questions than answers here.

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KC:

Q: Can Mahomes find his earlier career form after his ACL injury?

The 2025 Chiefs year was the first of the Mahomes era not ending in at least the Conference Championship with the Chiefs missing the playoffs and Mahomes going down with a season ending injury.

Now if we look at some of the high level data, Mahomes still had a terrific year by PFF Grade and the production of EPA/Play albeit a bit down from some of the peak years earlier in his career. And Mahomes numbers in accuracy, his grading in and out of structure have remained dominant. But what has changed for Mahomes was his sack rate and sack avoidance.

Mahomes was 95th percentile in his sack rate for the first 6 years of his career while being one of the best pocket extenders in the NFL. But over the last 2 years Mahomes has been more limited in his extension post pressure and his sack rate has gone from the S tier to simply above average. Coming off an ACL, it seems unlikely for Mahomes to improve in this area, though perhaps the Chiefs will operate a quicker offense given the trade-off of Mahomes not being able to extend as well.

While they may not be the #1 offense of Mahomes early years, this still a Chiefs offense I am bullish on.

Having a healthy (and not suspended) Rashee Rice back gives Mahomes the much needed #1 post Hill and with Kelce’s decline as Rice has been one of the games premier YPRR and YAC specialists in his small sample of time. Thornton was a sneaky great deep threat last year, where Mahomes threw deep more often and with more success opening up some of the other areas for Worthy who has been far better attacking the short and middle areas of the field rather than as a deep threat.

The defense that was above average last year, lost much of its secondary with McDuffie and Watson going to LA and breakout Safety off to Cincinnati.

Watson and McDuffie, both last year and in previous seasons, have been amongst the games best preventing separation. And for a Spagnolo defense that is man and blitz centric, the CB play is essential to the success of their defense and the team will be reliant upon L’jarius Sneed, who has been hurt and is the owner of PFF grades of 34 and 50.4 (102/112) to step up at outside CB. Chris Jones is a year older but was still the 2nd best Pass Rusher on the interior by PFF and George Karlaftis took a step up at EDGE

Combined with the heavy blitzes, the talent leaves plenty of opportunity to create disruption pressure again, an area where they were in the top part of the league.

The defensive ceiling is somewhat limited, but with Mahomes at QB, Reid at OPC and a likely upgraded WR room account for a healthy Rice, and this is still a team that can find itself right back in the AFC Championship game.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

Or a look here at 2025 EPA/Play on offense and defense

The Ravens and Steelers were middle of the pack on both sides of the ball, with the Bengals horrific on defense and average on offense. The Browns were terrific on defense, but among the league’s worst on offense.

But what perhaps defines this division are the changes year to year as this was a Ravens team dealing with a plethora of injuries last season and now entering 2026 with a new HC. Likewise, the Steelers and Browns are bringing in new coaches as well across the staff. And the Bengals were without Joe Burrow all season and if finally healthy, this should mean a far better offense.

BAL:

Central Q: Was Jackson’s 2025 a fluke?

The story of the 2025 season for the Ravens was the injuries, especially for Lamar Jackson who missed a chunk of the season with a hamstring injury. Though a small sample, in the weeks before his injury, Jackson was his usual 7th in EPA, 6th in Yard Per Dropback. But his ability to extend the play tanked as a result of injury and resulted in a far worse season.

Jackson has been among the games best at extending the play when pressure arrives, and he has used that to be one of the games premier creators and players out of system. But Jackson took a huge step back in this area going to a below average extender and his ability to play out of the system and against disruption was a far cry from career averages.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

Or a look here at 2025 EPA/Play on offense and defense

The Bills and Patriots were atop the division and league here on offense, with EDP downweighting the Patriots deep success a bit but suggesting a far better defense. Nonetheless, from a production standpoint there were 2 top offenses and with the Patriots getting a slight edge on defense. Miami was terrible on defense and below average on offense, and with the changes in coaching and at QB, this is a team projected for the fewest wins in the AFC. Likewise, the Jets were terrible on both sides of the ball and themselves have one of the lowest win totals in the AFC. But the market is suggesting this is still a heavy Bills division to win (~55%) and with the Jets and Dolphins soaking up nearly no expectancy of winning (~5%). With that framework set, let’s dive in.

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NE:

Is Maye Elite?

I usually hate to answer “is this player elite” or where does this player rank from a theoretical point of view. But this question I think gets to the core of the Patriots season and reveals an interesting process point about evaluating QBs year to year.

Let’s use disruption, or plays when the defense either generates pressure to knock a QB off his rhythm or generates perfect coverage, as a proxy for the ability to play outside structure and create when the situation is bad. And non disruption are plays in which things go right and the offense is able to run its play and generate a positive outcome. On disruption plays it is often on the QB to create on his own, either by scrambling for positive outcomes, or making accurate throws into tight windows/creating an open window via a scramble (what we call Create Rate).

Maye was dominant in his rookie season in his ability to generate EPA on disruption plays (his create rate was also top percentile), but struggled on those plays where surroundings and system matter more. But with McDaniels back at OC and an improved cast, Maye improved immensely in 2025.

Now, much of that was due to Maye’s dominant deep season.

Maye was by far the best QB in the NFL throwing deep, earning well over a point per throw. And while Maye was one of the most accurate deep throwers, his EPA per play on deep passes was the 3rd highest rank over the last 7 years— extremely unlikely to sustain itself to the same degree (even if we can reasonably assume Maye to be one of the best deep passers in the NFL).

But working against the deep regression is an offense that improved at WR adding A.J Brown and Romeo Doubs. And even in a down season for Brown, this was still a player well above average in his ability to generate separation and both of Doubs and were atop the league in YPRR and represent big upgrades from the 2025 cast. For a QB with the 4th best system grade, there is still plenty of room to improve in system for Maye, as his surroundings improve at WR and as the team brings in upgrades to the OL with Alijah Vera Tucker (10/77 in his PFF grade in 2024) as well as first rounder Caleb Lomu as depth.

It makes sense for Maye to have an improved in area where surroundings matter more and where he saw a big upgrade last year. But it is the play while disturbed that also remained elite from year 1 to 2 and I’d argue for Maye that is to be exceptionally sticky.

As we discussed in “What is Create Rate”, there are multiple ways a QB can win vs a disrupting event. Maye, despite his profile of typical “pocket passer” which tends to coincide with good in system QBs, he is dominant in multiple ways creating.

Similar to the Dak example we used in that note, one of the ways to win against disruption is the ability to fit balls into tight windows and engineer a good throw where the coverage is good. And Maye has been dominant in that area, leading the NFL this past season in tight window accuracy and with similar numbers in 2024.

But Maye too can also win on the ground with his pocket awareness and his mobility. One of the best ways to beat disruption is to recognize the disruptor and scramble which Maye did on 38% of dropbacks only behind Jayden Daniels for most in the NFL. And the result was a player generating positive outcomes on disruption, and Maye turned in a 45% scramble run rate winning with his legs as well and one of the most successful in the NFL in the run area as well.

The point of which is to say: Maye’s underlying traits and skill sets suggest his dominant play when things break down is not fluke. His ability both to fit balls into tight windows while also his pocket mobility, awareness, and scramble running are the exact traits which beat disruption and can mitigate defensive advantages whether from the secondary or a good rush (and that is my pushback to the “oh the schedule was soft.”)

Certainly if that pressure to sack rate can come down a bit from 21%, this is a player that once again has all the makings of a possible MVP campaign given his ability to win in structure and out and as his surroundings continue to improve.

Quickly, since I’ve written too much about Maye and the Pats already, this is a defense that Zak Kuhr took over as Defensive Play Caller at the dawn of the season, and was a terrific defense over the second half as they got their footing and as the team got healthier.

Over the second half of the season, this was a team 3rd in disruption rate.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

Or a look here at 2025 EPA/Play on offense and defense.

Looking at this division from EPA and EDP standpoints, we have a dominant Seahawks defense and average offense, with an all around dominant Rams team. The 49ers offense was once again terrific, but its defense, decimated by injury, was a bottom unit. And the Cardinals were below average on both sides and worse without Kyler Murray who missed the second half of the season.

And unlike most of the other NFC divisions, this one had relatively little turnover with a Cardinals team in tank mode and mostly returning coaches/QB combos. But let’s dive into the framing of what should be a grueling divisional battle.

Rams:

Central Q: Can Rams run back the 2025 script?

I think the framing and expectations is essential in breaking down the this Rams team. This is a Rams team power rated to be the very best in the NFL (double next team in SB odds despite the division) and by all accounts they should be a dominant team. But the lens by which we are basing the analysis is with an expectation of the Rams as the league’s juggernaut.

Now if we were to use the 2025 data as main anchor that would make sense. This was a dominant Rams offense. And high level looking at Stafford he had one of the better QB seasons of the last 5 years.

Stafford here was firmly in the top right here with his grading and EPA in 2025.

But also relevant is where it falls relative to some of Stafford’s other seasons. 2021 saw a similar EPA year for Stafford as the team won its first Super Bowl. The 2022-2024 years did not come close to the 2021 year (until 2025). And with a QB, coach, and similar supporting casts we have strong data and priors that it is fair to suggest that not too much changed from year to year from an underlying point of view. Rather, this was a team that in my view ran pretty hot in 2025. And if we simulated the season 10K times this one was like 90th+ percentile good (and the 2021-2024 years are a decent sample of the distribution of what else is in the cards). Given the small samples of football and randomness it is unlikely for any team to be able to keep up with the pace set by this offense, let alone a team where we’ve seen the ceiling before and other (still good) years within the distribution.

The natural question to ask is whether something changed from a play style or approach from Stafford year to year. On average Stafford threw the ball further (9 ADOT from 7.5 last 2 years and 6.6 year before) and naturally had a higher Deep Attempt % than previous season. And while Stafford had a terrific year throwing deep, it was not his best nor that different from his 2023 season in deep production. It was non deep throws where Stafford gained most relative to past seasons. Stafford set a low in sack avoidance and in particular he was dominant on screen plays which generated 0.23 EPA/Play following 4 straight years of negative EPA on screens. Did Stafford all of a sudden improve his sack rate from career average or did he run good on a small sample of plays? McVay figure something out in the screen game? Maybe. Is it likely a combination of that and randomness? I think so-- and that’s the exact sort of framing I can’t escape in thinking about the Rams.

This is a Rams offense in particular that is very fragile. The team will be starting a 38 year old QB with a major chronic back problem-- there’s a world of probability the wheels fall off there or he cannot stay healthy. All world WR Puca Nacua missed only one game last season and Davante Adams is almost 34. And behind them? This is one of weaker WR groups with Mumfield, Xavier Smith, Jordan Whittington struggling to earn their keep and 6th round rookie CJ Daniels expected to get some major work in the slot. Can McVay elevate this offense? Of course. Are there major problems if Nacua or Adams miss time? Absolutely.

What perhaps might counteract the Rams offense, is a defense that looks like an absolute wagon.

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Let’s take a quick glance at Offensive and Defensive EDP, or Earned Drive Points which measures the efficacy and sustainability of drive level success, to set the baseline for our analysis. Of course EDP is just one metric and is by no means dispositive to team success. Nonetheless it should give us a rough frame from which we can analyze the division and teams.

This was a NFC South with four below average efficiency teams with the Falcons and Bucs right at league average and the Panthers a tier behind and much worse on defense. The Saints defense was well above average and struggled offensively-- though that number includes half a season with Spencer Rattler at QB.

TB:

Central Q: Can Baker Return to his 2024 form?

Baker Mayfield heads into his 4th season in Tampa with his 4th different offensive play caller. And Mayfield has had varying degrees of success in his 3 years in Tampa.

Mayfield was sitting right around average in 2023 (70th percentile EPA, 50th PFF Grade) and a bit below average in 2025 (48th and 40th) following a terrific 2024 which saw him as one of the better QBs of the season (93rd and 85th percentiles). Now in 2024, as we highlighted last year in this space, Baker had one of the best ever season on productions on screens that was very unlikely to sustain itself in 2025, especially without Liam Coen. And while regression in certain areas was bound to happen, I don’t think that tells the full story for Baker Mayfield from 2025.

If we look at his season in varying stats we see a sharp cut off right around week 6 when Baker Mayfield injured his biceps and throwing arm.

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Let’s take a quick look at how these teams performed in EPA/play to set a rough baseline of fundamental analysis.

Of course, EPA is not dispositive of any success or lack thereof— but it roughly paints the picture here of a division with 3 good teams and a Vikings defense that was terrific but really struggled on offense marred by injury and JJM’s poor play. There is a reason all 4 teams have win totals at or above 500— this is a division which should be great. Let’s dive in.

Bears:

Q: Can the Offense Progress beyond potential defensive regression?

Williams took a massive step forward from year 1 to year 2, most notably in his ability to evade sacks. Williams went from a disastrous 9.7% sack rate on 26.3% pressure to sack in year 1, to a terrific 10.1% pressure to sack rate and 3.7% sack rate in year 2.

Now Williams style didn’t change much as he was already a terrific extender in year 1. But buying time alone is not enough. Buying time for sacks does the offense little good-- buying time to be able to create and evade sacks is where Williams went from well below to well above league average. And that as a whole, the skill improvement, led to massive improvements out of structure.

As the season wore along Williams settled into producing at a 75th percentile EPA and Yards Per Dropback clip, seeing massive improvements in his create rate and his deep accuracy. The deep game went from an area that was a major weakness—losing 5 points in total in his rookie season— to an area where Williams added 42 total points on nearly 0.42 points per play.

But the biggest jump perhaps was how well Williams was able to produce in system under Ben Johnson. Williams improved in his grade in system (throws to his first read and without a disruptive event), but despite being at league average in his PFF system grade--he produced far beyond that in his EPA at 6th best in the NFL. And that 0.25 EPA/Play number in system is a bit below where Jared Goff had been in each of the previous 2 years, suggesting a heavy Ben Johnson influence unlikely to go away.

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Of course, life was also far easier for Williams with a run game under Johnson that was 2nd in Rush Success Rate and 6th in EPA/Play. Williams was in obvious passing situations on nearly 61% of play in his rookie season, compared to 47% in his sophomore year. Life under Johnson is far easier for a QB and I think that should remain sticky heading into 2026.

And it only helped in the second half of the season Luther Burden and Colston Loveland took on full time roles, both of whom were the leaders in YPRR for the offense. This is an offense that should be terrific and if Williams takes another leap from year 2 to year 3 especially in his ability to play in system, this is an offense with as elite a ceiling as any other in the NFL.

The problem for the Bears is a defense, that, excluding turnovers, was one of the very worst in the NFL.

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Eagles

Central Q: Can the Eagles survive another offensive change and this time without AJB?

Jalen Hurts once again has another offensive coordinator with Sean Mannion taking over as offensive coordinator. Of course, Mannion is somewhat of an unknown and there is a world of possibility he is the next great coordinator coming from the Lefleur tree. But that world of possibility is still small and while it does increase the range of outcomes, we still have plenty of data from Hurts to build a case around.

Hurts had his worst marks as full time starter across multiple categories including PFF Grade and EPA.But what is perhaps most troubling about those numbers is the play style difference which enabled that.

Hurts is at his best extending plays and creating with longer pockets.

And while Hurts took fewer sacks in 2025, it also meant he was extending the play less. His ability to generate EPA out of system tanked as well, posting his lowest EPA out of system as a pro, losing -0.12 EPA per play. (we can define plays in system where a QB goes to his first trad and where the defense does not move him off his reads). And this has been an area where Hurts has excelled, and one that is less scheme dependent, as it happens after the play breaks down.

Hurts scramble run rate is on a continual decline, and if Hurts is no longer the player who can extend, he will need to reinvent himself as a different player— one whose play style we have yet to really see succeed in the NFL.

Making matters worse for Hurts is that the team traded AJ Brown, who has been such a dominant receiver for Hurts. Since arriving, AJ Brown in man coverage— where receiver talent shines through—accounts for nearly a third of Hurts total EPA generated despite being only 8% of Hurts total dropbacks.

The Eagles will need to rely on DeVonta Smith who has been terrific himself to win against man coverage. But life will be far more difficult without AJB soaking up the attention on the other side and with safety help cueing in on Brown.

Likewise, Hurts entirely relied on the deep pass for his success last season, generating a career high 50 EPA on deep passes (0.64/EPA Play), but his non deep passes lost nearly 12.5 points. For context, Hurts was 39.5 on deep throws and 44 EPA on non deep throws in 2024. This alone is a worrying sign for a QB in Hurts. But compounded with a player who has seemingly gotten weaker in his mobility both as a runner and extender, that they lost their #1 deep threat in Brown and there are some worrying signs for the Eagles offense.

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And as a reminder, I will be freezing all paid subs, there is no need to unsubscribe and staying subscribed will lock you into your price point (without being charged for the non writing months). Let’s get into the games.

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Podcasts:

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CAR-TB:

As we’ve been writing about for weeks this is TB defense that is extremely vulnerable to the pass, one of the biggest pass funnels in the NFL while being bottom 5 in YPD, not far behind in EPA/Pass and many other pass defense metrics. And even the run defense has been less dominant over the second half of the season below average in Success Rate and Rush EPA over the second half. The result has been the Bucs facing more passing adjusting for situation than any other team in the NFL.

Now I think the main question for this game is how each team chooses to attack.

The Panthers have been a low play volume team with only one game above 10% Pass Above Expected. Should they come out throwing the Bryce Young alts and Panthers builds are intriguing given the matchup. And the Bucs top 10 single coverage, top 5 blitz rate plays nicely into Jalen Coker who leads the team in YPRR against single coverage. But more likely is the same gamplean for the Panthers of trying to play very slow, while having decent success running the ball.

On the flipside, the Bucs have been at the extremes of pass rate over the past few weeks switching off weeks of 10%+ pass over expected. And while the Panthers pass defense has been middle of the pack EPA wise, that has been a large function of a team forcing a huge turnover rate (nearly 20% of opponent drives are ending in turnovers).

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