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.

Tyrod Taylor — 2021

Adj EPA / dropback
-0.128
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.092
Dropbacks
162
Turnover EPA
-26.2
WPA
-0.58
WeekOpp DropbacksAdj EPA/dbRaw EPA/dbScheduleTotal adj EPA INT / FLTurnover EPASacksSack EPAWPACPOE
1JAX 34 +0.287 +0.413 -0.126 +9.8 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -0.9 +0.23 +1.7
2CLE 11 +0.828 +0.809 +0.019 +9.1 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 +0.25 +19.0
9MIA 47 -0.258 -0.308 +0.051 -12.1 3 / 0 -12.3 5 -6.3 -0.43 -3.4
11TEN 24 -0.026 -0.012 -0.013 -0.6 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 +0.03 -8.9
12NYJ 31 -0.539 -0.415 -0.124 -16.7 1 / 0 -8.2 5 -9.6 -0.36 -1.9
13IND 15 -0.681 -0.674 -0.007 -10.2 1 / 0 -5.7 2 -2.2 -0.29 -30.7
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.