Game quality
What each result was worth beyond the score. Every play is graded by EPA (expected points added), then adjusted for who it came against: a defence's rating is what it allowed to everyone else that season, so a big day against a bad defence counts for less. Season views include playoff games.
Andy Dalton — 2021
Adj EPA / dropback
-0.125
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.118
Dropbacks
256
Turnover EPA
-54.7
WPA
+0.12
| Week | Opp | Dropbacks | Adj EPA/db | Raw EPA/db | Schedule | Total adj EPA | INT / FL | Turnover EPA | Sacks | Sack EPA | WPA | CPOE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | LA | 41 | -0.171 | -0.266 | +0.095 | -7.0 | 1 / 1 | -8.8 | 3 | -8.4 | -0.17 | -5.0 |
| 2 | CIN | 12 | +0.198 | +0.216 | -0.019 | +2.4 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 1 | -1.3 | +0.06 | +14.8 |
| 5 | LV | 1 | +1.534 | +1.592 | -0.058 | +1.5 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 0 | +0.0 | +0.04 | +27.8 |
| 11 | BAL | 25 | +0.228 | +0.239 | -0.011 | +5.7 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 1 | -0.2 | +0.40 | -15.3 |
| 12 | DET | 40 | +0.158 | +0.299 | -0.140 | +6.3 | 1 / 0 | -4.0 | 1 | -1.9 | +0.46 | -2.3 |
| 13 | ARI | 45 | -0.327 | -0.340 | +0.013 | -14.7 | 4 / 0 | -25.3 | 3 | -3.4 | -0.40 | -5.6 |
| 17 | NYG | 36 | -0.150 | -0.138 | -0.012 | -5.4 | 1 / 0 | -4.0 | 2 | -3.3 | +0.05 | -9.4 |
| 18 | MIN | 56 | -0.373 | -0.377 | +0.004 | -20.9 | 2 / 0 | -12.6 | 7 | -19.9 | -0.31 | +0.5 |
Opponent adjustment. A unit's rating for a game is its average over its other games that
season, blended with 16 games' worth of prior (league average plus half of last season's gap from it;
24 games for pass defence, which is noisier). Early in a season that leans on last year; by
midseason it is mostly this year. Chosen by how well it predicts a held-out game: it cut that error by about
a quarter against no shrinkage, and adjusted numbers agree between odd and even weeks more than raw ones do
(team EPA margin r 0.52 → 0.55, defence 0.32 → 0.36, QB EPA/dropback 0.47 → 0.49, 2016–2025).
Win expectancy is a logistic fit of wins on EPA margin over 6,036 completed games (it names the winner 86.5% of the time). These describe what happened; one game is not a forecast. Play-by-play credits the quarterback with every sack and dropback, so a bad line shows up in his numbers. Seasons 2016–2026, built 2026-09-14 01:25 UTC, from nflverse. Write-up:
Win expectancy is a logistic fit of wins on EPA margin over 6,036 completed games (it names the winner 86.5% of the time). These describe what happened; one game is not a forecast. Play-by-play credits the quarterback with every sack and dropback, so a bad line shows up in his numbers. Seasons 2016–2026, built 2026-09-14 01:25 UTC, from nflverse. Write-up:
backtests/nfl_game_quality/FINDINGS.md.