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.

Davis Mills — 2023

Adj EPA / dropback
-0.066
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.148
Dropbacks
42
Turnover EPA
+0.0
WPA
-0.08
WeekOpp DropbacksAdj EPA/dbRaw EPA/dbScheduleTotal adj EPA INT / FLTurnover EPASacksSack EPAWPACPOE
11ARI 1 -1.038 -0.952 -0.086 -1.0 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 -0.01 +10.4
13DEN 1 +1.521 +1.543 -0.022 +1.5 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 +0.03 +22.5
14NYJ 6 -1.446 -1.512 +0.066 -8.7 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -1.3 -0.00 -40.4
15TEN 1 -0.227 -0.183 -0.044 -0.2 0 / 0 +0.0 1 -0.2 -0.10
16CLE 32 +0.210 +0.114 +0.096 +6.7 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 +0.00 -18.5
19CLE 1 -1.065 -1.183 +0.117 -1.1 0 / 0 +0.0 0 +0.0 -0.00 +27.8
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 2026-09-14 01:25 UTC, from nflverse. Write-up: backtests/nfl_game_quality/FINDINGS.md.