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.

Patrick Mahomes — 2026 Every split →

Adj EPA / dropback
+0.133
Raw EPA / dropback
+0.113
Dropbacks
199
Turnover EPA
-19.0
WPA
+0.46
WeekOpp DropbacksAdj EPA/dbRaw EPA/dbScheduleTotal adj EPA INT / FLTurnover EPASacksSack EPAWPACPOE
1DEN 29 +0.015 -0.079 +0.094 +0.4 1 / 0 -5.8 2 -3.8 -0.13 -11.9
2IND 49 +0.279 +0.274 +0.005 +13.7 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -2.0 +0.28 +3.7
3MIA 24 +0.432 +0.538 -0.106 +10.4 1 / 0 -3.6 0 +0.0 +0.30 +18.7
4LV 33 +0.000 +0.053 -0.052 +0.0 0 / 0 +0.0 2 -3.7 +0.25 -7.3
6LAC 30 +0.155 +0.092 +0.063 +4.7 1 / 0 -5.9 0 +0.0 -0.02 +9.4
7SEA 34 -0.077 -0.178 +0.100 -2.6 1 / 0 -3.8 1 -1.7 -0.23 -9.8
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 2026-10-28 11:05 UTC, from nflverse. Write-up: backtests/nfl_game_quality/FINDINGS.md.