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 — 2022

Adj EPA / dropback
+0.039
Raw EPA / dropback
+0.047
Dropbacks
404
Turnover EPA
-49.6
WPA
-0.06
WeekOpp DropbacksAdj EPA/dbRaw EPA/dbScheduleTotal adj EPA INT / FLTurnover EPASacksSack EPAWPACPOE
4MIN 31 +0.241 +0.245 -0.004 +7.5 0 / 1 -4.8 2 -6.6 +0.35 +8.3
5SEA 25 -0.037 +0.001 -0.038 -0.9 1 / 0 -4.0 1 -1.3 -0.07 -2.3
6CIN 33 +0.121 +0.101 +0.020 +4.0 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -1.7 -0.11 -7.5
7ARI 47 -0.041 -0.029 -0.012 -1.9 3 / 0 -20.8 0 +0.0 -0.10 -0.8
8LV 30 +0.257 +0.329 -0.071 +7.7 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 +0.13 +1.7
9BAL 33 -0.179 -0.138 -0.041 -5.9 1 / 0 -6.4 4 -7.5 -0.32 +0.0
10PIT 29 -0.078 -0.049 -0.030 -2.3 2 / 0 -4.5 2 -2.3 -0.01 -2.7
11LA 28 +0.395 +0.381 +0.014 +11.1 0 / 0 +0.0 3 -5.9 +0.57 +14.4
12SF 30 +0.048 +0.011 +0.037 +1.4 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -3.0 -0.04 -2.5
13TB 30 +0.134 +0.122 +0.013 +4.0 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -3.4 -0.06 +8.8
15ATL 19 +0.229 +0.296 -0.067 +4.4 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -4.2 +0.23 -5.2
16CLE 15 -0.305 -0.334 +0.029 -4.6 1 / 0 -5.8 0 +0.0 -0.10 -11.6
17PHI 28 -0.126 -0.170 +0.044 -3.5 1 / 0 -3.2 6 -10.1 -0.16 +14.5
18CAR 26 -0.199 -0.190 -0.008 -5.2 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -2.3 -0.38 -9.9
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: backtests/nfl_game_quality/FINDINGS.md.