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.

Russell Wilson — 2022

Adj EPA / dropback
-0.125
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.106
Dropbacks
538
Turnover EPA
-55.3
WPA
-2.48
WeekOpp DropbacksAdj EPA/dbRaw EPA/dbScheduleTotal adj EPA INT / FLTurnover EPASacksSack EPAWPACPOE
1SEA 44 +0.312 +0.345 -0.032 +13.7 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -1.8 +0.43 +7.8
2HOU 34 -0.011 +0.009 -0.020 -0.4 1 / 0 -2.8 3 -4.2 +0.32 -12.6
3SF 38 -0.279 -0.310 +0.030 -10.6 0 / 0 +0.0 4 -6.3 -0.39 -4.9
4LV 28 -0.115 -0.037 -0.079 -3.2 0 / 0 +0.0 3 -6.2 +0.08 +0.3
5IND 43 -0.320 -0.302 -0.017 -13.7 2 / 0 -7.6 4 -6.5 -0.78 -8.4
6LAC 32 -0.200 -0.213 +0.013 -6.4 0 / 0 +0.0 4 -7.7 -0.50 -4.9
8JAX 32 +0.029 +0.086 -0.058 +0.9 1 / 0 -3.2 3 -5.0 +0.05 +3.5
10TEN 48 -0.134 -0.131 -0.003 -6.4 1 / 0 -1.9 6 -9.0 -0.17 -10.0
11LV 34 -0.033 +0.043 -0.076 -1.1 0 / 0 +0.0 3 -5.9 -0.30 +16.6
12CAR 38 -0.386 -0.373 -0.012 -14.7 0 / 1 -4.3 3 -7.4 -0.31 -1.2
13BAL 24 -0.003 +0.033 -0.037 -0.1 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -2.8 -0.03 +16.0
14KC 42 -0.178 -0.166 -0.012 -7.5 1 / 0 -7.9 6 -9.8 -0.23 -6.6
16LA 33 -0.272 -0.269 -0.003 -9.0 3 / 0 -13.5 6 -9.2 -0.18 -5.7
17KC 42 -0.314 -0.298 -0.016 -13.2 1 / 1 -8.6 4 -9.0 -0.61 -0.5
18LAC 26 +0.176 +0.156 +0.021 +4.6 1 / 0 -5.6 2 -4.4 +0.15 +1.1
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.