Recommended Historical team rankings (some perspective on the importance of our pass offense)

[percyhoward]

Defense's average rankings, 2003-13

2003 3rd, 3rd (3.0)
2004 27th, 20th (23.5)
2005 9th, 17th (13.0)
2006 20th, 11th (15.5)
2007 5th, 17th (11.0)
2008 20th, 8th (14.0)
2009 16th, 4th (10.0)
2010 21st, 12th (16.5)
2011 25th, 6th (15.5)
2012 29th, 26th (27.5)
2013 26th, 26th (26.0)

 

[Rockport]

To get an idea of teams' strengths and weaknesses over the history of the franchise, I looked at pass offense, run offense, pass defense, and run defense rankings for every Cowboys team since the beginning. For each category I used the stat with the highest correlation to winning, that being pass rating in the pass categories, and touchdowns in the run categories. IOW, the ranking you see for pass offense is offensive pass rating, pass defense uses defensive pass rating (opposing QB rating), run offense uses rushing TD, and run defense uses rushing TD allowed.

The rankings are in the order of offensive pass rating, rushing TD, defensive pass rating, and rushing TD allowed. I then took the average of the four rankings to make a team ranking (in parentheses). For example, this...

2007 4th, 10th, 5th, 17th (9.0)*

means that in 2007, the team finished 4th in offensive pass rating, 10th in rushing TD, 5th in defensive pass rating, and 17th in rushing TD allowed, for an average team ranking of 9th. The asterisk means that team qualified for the playoffs, as you would expect a team with an average ranking of 9th to do.

I also adjusted the average ranking for league size. For example...

1965 8th, 12th, 5th, 8th (18.9)

Even though the 1965 team had an average rank of 8.25, that team played in a 14-team league. Obviously, their "8th of 14" was not as good as the 2007 team's "9th of 32". To facilitate comparison of teams across eras, all rankings have been adjusted to what they would be in a 32-team league. That 1965 team's four rankings averaged out to about 19th in a 32-team league, which would be no surprise for a .500 team (That team was 7-7).

Here are the 54 regular seasons.

1960 12th, 13th, 12th, 13th (30.8)
1961 8th, 14th, 7th, 12th (23.4)
1962 1st, 6th, 13th, 7th (15.4)
1963 8th, 2nd, 9th, 4th (13.1)
1964 14th, 4th, 6th, 1st (14.3)
1965 8th, 12th, 5th, 8th (18.9)
1966 3rd, 1st, 5th, 1st (5.3)*
1967 7th, 9th, 6th, 4th (13.0)*
1968 4th, 1st, 7th, 1st (6.5)*
1969 3rd, 1st, 6th, 1st (5.5)*
1970 5th, 3rd, 3rd, 9th (6.2)*
1971 1st, 1st, 7th, 5th (4.3)*
1972 15th, 8th, 14th, 2nd (12.0)*
1973 1st, 4th, 12th, 1st (5.5)*
1974 9th, 2nd, 23rd, 5th (12.0)
1975 7th, 10th, 6th, 6th (8.9)*
1976 6th, 9th, 9th, 8th (9.1)*
1977 2nd, 1st, 4th, 7th (4.0)*
1978 1st, 3rd, 4th, 8th (4.6)*
1979 1st, 18th, 18th, 10th (13.4)*
1980 7th, 1st, 7th, 14th (8.3)*
1981 5th, 14th, 1st, 14th (5.4)*
1982 6th, 10th, 8th, 2nd (7.4)*
1983 5th, 3rd, 16th, 8th (9.1)*
1984 23rd, 20th, 2nd, 1st (13.1)
1985 7th, 23rd, 4th, 17th (14.6)*
1986 11th, 4th, 12th, 21st (13.7)
1987 11th, 5th, 10th, 27th (15.2)
1988 18th, 23rd, 28th, 8th (22.0)
1989 28th, 27th, 28th, 21st (29.7)
1990 28th, 14th, 13th, 23rd (22.3)
1991 7th, 12th, 18th, 12th (14.0)*
1992 3rd, 2nd, 10th, 11th (7.4)*
1993 2nd, 2nd, 14th, 5th (6.6)*
1994 4th, 1st, 1st, 3rd (2.6)*
1995 5th, 1st, 8th, 14th (7.5)*
1996 16th, 10th, 2nd, 9th (9.9)*
1997 17th, 28th, 16th, 12th (19.5)
1998 8th, 2nd, 11th, 10th (8.3)*
1999 11th, 5th, 7th, 2nd (7.0)*
2000 27th, 9th, 16th, 15th (17.3)
2001 30th, 26th, 19th, 19th (24.3)
2002 28th, 30th, 8th, 5th (17.8)
2003 23rd, 21st, 3rd, 3rd (12.5)*
2004 24th, 13th, 27th, 20th (21.0)
2005 12th, 14th, 9th, 17th (13.0)
2006 8th, 3rd, 20th, 11th (10.5)*
2007 4th, 10th, 5th, 17th (9.0)*
2008 13th, 22nd, 20th, 8th (15.8)
2009 6th, 15th, 16th, 4th (10.3)*
2010 12th, 29th, 21st, 12th (18.5)
2011 4th, 30th, 25th, 6th (16.3)
2012 9th, 27th, 29th, 26th (22.8)
2013 7th, 18th, 26th, 26th (19.3)

When the average ranking is above 12.0, the team always makes the playoffs (24 of 24 seasons).

When the average ranking is 12.0-14.6, the team makes the playoffs half the time (6 of 12 seasons).

When the average ranking is lower than 14.6, the team never makes the playoffs (0 of 18 seasons).

5 of the last 6 years, the team's average ranking has been below 14.6, which is the first time in franchise history that such a run has happened. The last four seasons, the average ranking has been worse than 16.0 every year. Also a first in franchise history. And this despite a pass offense that has ranked 13th or higher nine straight seasons, which is the second-longest such streak since the Cowboys began.

Factoring out pass offense then, the average rank of the rest of the team has been below 20.0 for each of the last four seasons. This is something that had only happened four times in the history of the franchise prior to 2010. Now it's happened four years in a row.

Team's average ranking excluding pass offense
(years when worse than 20th)
1960 13th, 12th, 13th (31.2)
1961 14th, 7th, 12th (25.1)
1989 27th, 28th, 21st (28.9)
2001 26th, 19th, 19th (21.3)
2010 29th, 21st, 12th (20.7)
2011 30th, 25th, 6th (20.3)
2012 27th, 29th, 26th (27.3)
2013 18th, 26th, 26th (23.3)

Those are the rankings for run offense, and pass/run defense only. This can't be good. The only times the rest of the team (minus pass offense) was this bad were the first two seasons as an expansion team, Jones and Johnson's first year (1-15), and Campo's second year. The combined records of these teams was 9-46-2. But remember, those seasons were spread out over three decades, with the only consecutive years being the expansion years of 1960-61.

We're on a streak of four years in a row that is ongoing.

It always has and probably always will come down to who can run the ball effectively and stop the run effectively. Simple as that. If you run the ball, it opens up your offense and it becomes less predictable. You can run out the clock when the need arises. That is HUGE. When you stop the run, it makes the offense 1 dimensional and more predictable.

 

[Idgit]

Defense's average rankings, 2003-13

2003 3rd, 3rd (3.0)
2004 27th, 20th (23.5)
2005 9th, 17th (13.0)
2006 20th, 11th (15.5)
2007 5th, 17th (11.0)
2008 20th, 8th (14.0)
2009 16th, 4th (10.0)
2010 21st, 12th (16.5)
2011 25th, 6th (15.5)
2012 29th, 26th (27.5)
2013 26th, 26th (26.0)

It's like our defense has been getting worse, or something.

 

[percyhoward]

It always has and probably always will come down to who can run the ball effectively and stop the run effectively. Simple as that. If you run the ball, it opens up your offense and it becomes less predictable. You can run out the clock when the need arises. That is HUGE. When you stop the run, it makes the offense 1 dimensional and more predictable.

Some of what you said is true to a degree, but rushing yards don't correlate highly to winning. As stated above, rushing TD are worth more than the yards it takes to get them, when it comes to winning. Teams with a lot of rushing TD are usually also good at racking up passing yards (to get into position to score by the run).

 

[MichaelWinicki]

And who were the starters on the front-4 of the very good 2003 defense?

DE Greg Ellis
DT Leroy Glover
DT Willie Blade
DE Ebenezer Ekuban

The Cowboys were only 21st that season in sacks with 32, but were 2nd in yards given up per attempt.

One might say, OK, they were very good against the pass so that means they must not have been as good vs the run...

Well they were 3rd in ypg at 89.1

So it wasn't a case of teams running the ball down the Cowboys' throats.

Gosh, maybe you can have a solid pass defense without having a ton of sacks. Ellis led the team that season with 8 sacks. Glover was 2nd with 5.

 

[big dog cowboy]

I'm repeating myself (again) but I want defense with each draft pick. The only exception is if we have a higher ranked OL on our board when we are on the clock. The ranking the last few years is an embarrisment.

 

[DallasEast]

Gosh, maybe you can have a solid pass defense without having a ton of sacks. Ellis led the team that season with 8 sacks. Glover was 2nd with 5.

In my book, a solidly consistent pass rush will always thump sacks. Sacks are just icing on the cake. When a defensive front can pressure the quarterback, it makes him both nervous and prone to making mistakes. The battle is half-won at that stage. It's up to the secondary to win the other half. Lack of a strong consistent pass rush over the past few years has hurt Dallas far more than lack of sack production.

 

[DandyDon1722]

It's always interesting hot me that these threads with really high informational content don't get a lot of post traffic or generate more discussion.

If nothing else, they should put some debates to rest in other threads. Instead, you get a dozen posters saying how much they love them, and then it's business as usual.

That's because threads like this are avoided by the ten percenters who are anti-Romo because one - they hate it when facts interrupt their agenda's (once we get rid of Romo we'll be fine because it's all his fault) and two - they can't fall all over themselves patting each other on the back after each post. I also think the thread title, if tweaked, would've drawn more attention. Unfortunately this is where I would really like to read what they have to say because it would be an interesting debate based on the fact that you simply cannot win with the product we've been putting on the field based on historical numbers and not hyperbole and conjecture. But, alas, not one of the usual suspects can be found.

It's another phenomenal post by Percy and a big thanks for the work that was put into it. BTW - if the numbers showed something different and things pointed squarely at Romo I would be just as grateful for the information and accept it as such.

 

[Idgit]

...It's another phenomenal post by Percy and a big thanks for the work that was put into it. BTW - if the numbers showed something different and things pointed squarely at Romo I would be just as grateful for the information and accept it as such.

I would, too.

That's probably because your'e basing your current opinions on data, too. That makes it easy to change ground when he data teaches you something you didn't know already.

 

[DandyDon1722]

I would, too.

That's probably because your'e basing your current opinions on data, too. That makes it easy to change ground when he data teaches you something you didn't know already.

Yes exactly, and make no mistake, I'm preparing myself to change my ground as Tony ages and injuries take their toll. There will come a day when he simply won't be as effective and I will be clamoring for change but until then he is our first, best and only option to have a chance to win as we are currently put together. Anybody who says differently ignores the every shred of empirical evidence to the contrary.

 

[Rockport]

Some of what you said is true to a degree, but rushing yards don't correlate highly to winning. As stated above, rushing TD are worth more than the yards it takes to get them, when it comes to winning. Teams with a lot of rushing TD are usually also good at racking up passing yards (to get into position to score by the run).

Like I said, SMH, you have to be able to do BOTH, i.e. run the ball effectively and stop the run. Try and come up with those stats and compare.

 

[jterrell]

And who were the starters on the front-4 of the very good 2003 defense?

DE Greg Ellis
DT Leroy Glover
DT Willie Blade
DE Ebenezer Ekuban

The Cowboys were only 21st that season in sacks with 32, but were 2nd in yards given up per attempt.

One might say, OK, they were very good against the pass so that means they must not have been as good vs the run...

Well they were 3rd in ypg at 89.1

So it wasn't a case of teams running the ball down the Cowboys' throats.

Gosh, maybe you can have a solid pass defense without having a ton of sacks. Ellis led the team that season with 8 sacks. Glover was 2nd with 5.

RW31 made All Pro after that season. He and Woody were absolutely phenomenal that year. Offenses were scared to death of running across the middle on us.
--then they tried(and eventually achieved) to penalize both our safeties out of football.

 

[jterrell]

Like I said, SMH, you have to be able to do BOTH, i.e. run the ball effectively and stop the run. Try and come up with those stats and compare.

he has. running is far less correlative to winning than passing is.
he has shown that 5 or 6 different times now.

rushing yardage is one of the biggest red herrings there is.
as he mentions rushing TDs has more correlation but overall passing is far more important the past 10-12 years.

passing successfully and stopping the pass are how you win games.
any NFL team can stop the run with 8 or 9 in the box.

Arizona had the best run defense in football last year. They finished behind two teams who had lesser rush defense in their own division and thus missed the playoffs.
BOTH those teams finished ahead of Arizona in pass defense.
All 3 teams were pretty darn good at both.

 

[percyhoward]

Like I said, SMH, you have to be able to do BOTH, i.e. run the ball effectively and stop the run. Try and come up with those stats and compare.

No, I'll let you do that.

 

[Brooksey]

To get an idea of teams' strengths and weaknesses over the history of the franchise, I looked at pass offense, run offense, pass defense, and run defense rankings for every Cowboys team since the beginning. For each category I used the stat with the highest correlation to winning, that being pass rating in the pass categories, and touchdowns in the run categories. IOW, the ranking you see for pass offense is offensive pass rating, pass defense uses defensive pass rating (opposing QB rating), run offense uses rushing TD, and run defense uses rushing TD allowed.

The rankings are in the order of offensive pass rating, rushing TD, defensive pass rating, and rushing TD allowed. I then took the average of the four rankings to make a team ranking (in parentheses). For example, this...

2007 4th, 10th, 5th, 17th (9.0)*

means that in 2007, the team finished 4th in offensive pass rating, 10th in rushing TD, 5th in defensive pass rating, and 17th in rushing TD allowed, for an average team ranking of 9th. The asterisk means that team qualified for the playoffs, as you would expect a team with an average ranking of 9th to do.

I also adjusted the average ranking for league size. For example...

1965 8th, 12th, 5th, 8th (18.9)

Even though the 1965 team had an average rank of 8.25, that team played in a 14-team league. Obviously, their "8th of 14" was not as good as the 2007 team's "9th of 32". To facilitate comparison of teams across eras, all rankings have been adjusted to what they would be in a 32-team league. That 1965 team's four rankings averaged out to about 19th in a 32-team league, which would be no surprise for a .500 team (That team was 7-7).

Here are the 54 regular seasons.

1960 12th, 13th, 12th, 13th (30.8)
1961 8th, 14th, 7th, 12th (23.4)
1962 1st, 6th, 13th, 7th (15.4)
1963 8th, 2nd, 9th, 4th (13.1)
1964 14th, 4th, 6th, 1st (14.3)
1965 8th, 12th, 5th, 8th (18.9)
1966 3rd, 1st, 5th, 1st (5.3)*
1967 7th, 9th, 6th, 4th (13.0)*
1968 4th, 1st, 7th, 1st (6.5)*
1969 3rd, 1st, 6th, 1st (5.5)*
1970 5th, 3rd, 3rd, 9th (6.2)*
1971 1st, 1st, 7th, 5th (4.3)*
1972 15th, 8th, 14th, 2nd (12.0)*
1973 1st, 4th, 12th, 1st (5.5)*
1974 9th, 2nd, 23rd, 5th (12.0)
1975 7th, 10th, 6th, 6th (8.9)*
1976 6th, 9th, 9th, 8th (9.1)*
1977 2nd, 1st, 4th, 7th (4.0)*
1978 1st, 3rd, 4th, 8th (4.6)*
1979 1st, 18th, 18th, 10th (13.4)*
1980 7th, 1st, 7th, 14th (8.3)*
1981 5th, 14th, 1st, 14th (5.4)*
1982 6th, 10th, 8th, 2nd (7.4)*
1983 5th, 3rd, 16th, 8th (9.1)*
1984 23rd, 20th, 2nd, 1st (13.1)
1985 7th, 23rd, 4th, 17th (14.6)*
1986 11th, 4th, 12th, 21st (13.7)
1987 11th, 5th, 10th, 27th (15.2)
1988 18th, 23rd, 28th, 8th (22.0)
1989 28th, 27th, 28th, 21st (29.7)
1990 28th, 14th, 13th, 23rd (22.3)
1991 7th, 12th, 18th, 12th (14.0)*
1992 3rd, 2nd, 10th, 11th (7.4)*
1993 2nd, 2nd, 14th, 5th (6.6)*
1994 4th, 1st, 1st, 3rd (2.6)*
1995 5th, 1st, 8th, 14th (7.5)*
1996 16th, 10th, 2nd, 9th (9.9)*
1997 17th, 28th, 16th, 12th (19.5)
1998 8th, 2nd, 11th, 10th (8.3)*
1999 11th, 5th, 7th, 2nd (7.0)*
2000 27th, 9th, 16th, 15th (17.3)
2001 30th, 26th, 19th, 19th (24.3)
2002 28th, 30th, 8th, 5th (17.8)
2003 23rd, 21st, 3rd, 3rd (12.5)*
2004 24th, 13th, 27th, 20th (21.0)
2005 12th, 14th, 9th, 17th (13.0)
2006 8th, 3rd, 20th, 11th (10.5)*
2007 4th, 10th, 5th, 17th (9.0)*
2008 13th, 22nd, 20th, 8th (15.8)
2009 6th, 15th, 16th, 4th (10.3)*
2010 12th, 29th, 21st, 12th (18.5)
2011 4th, 30th, 25th, 6th (16.3)
2012 9th, 27th, 29th, 26th (22.8)
2013 7th, 18th, 26th, 26th (19.3)

When the average ranking is above 12.0, the team always makes the playoffs (24 of 24 seasons).

When the average ranking is 12.0-14.6, the team makes the playoffs half the time (6 of 12 seasons).

When the average ranking is lower than 14.6, the team never makes the playoffs (0 of 18 seasons).

5 of the last 6 years, the team's average ranking has been below 14.6, which is the first time in franchise history that such a run has happened. The last four seasons, the average ranking has been worse than 16.0 every year. Also a first in franchise history. And this despite a pass offense that has ranked 13th or higher nine straight seasons, which is the second-longest such streak since the Cowboys began.

Factoring out pass offense then, the average rank of the rest of the team has been below 20.0 for each of the last four seasons. This is something that had only happened four times in the history of the franchise prior to 2010. Now it's happened four years in a row.

Team's average ranking excluding pass offense
(years when worse than 20th)
1960 13th, 12th, 13th (31.2)
1961 14th, 7th, 12th (25.1)
1989 27th, 28th, 21st (28.9)
2001 26th, 19th, 19th (21.3)
2010 29th, 21st, 12th (20.7)
2011 30th, 25th, 6th (20.3)
2012 27th, 29th, 26th (27.3)
2013 18th, 26th, 26th (23.3)

Those are the rankings for run offense, and pass/run defense only. This can't be good. The only times the rest of the team (minus pass offense) was this bad were the first two seasons as an expansion team, Jones and Johnson's first year (1-15), and Campo's second year. The combined records of these teams was 9-46-2. But remember, those seasons were spread out over three decades, with the only consecutive years being the expansion years of 1960-61.

We're on a streak of four years in a row that is ongoing.

Poor defense, terrible running game, no balance in play calling, that's what I see.

 

[Rockport]

he has. running is far less correlative to winning than passing is.
he has shown that 5 or 6 different times now.

rushing yardage is one of the biggest red herrings there is.
as he mentions rushing TDs has more correlation but overall passing is far more important the past 10-12 years.

passing successfully and stopping the pass are how you win games.
any NFL team can stop the run with 8 or 9 in the box.

Arizona had the best run defense in football last year. They finished behind two teams who had lesser rush defense in their own division and thus missed the playoffs.
BOTH those teams finished ahead of Arizona in pass defense.
All 3 teams were pretty darn good at both.

You don't get it either. And I'm not going to argue with you because no matter what idiotic stats you show me I know I'm right on this.

 

[Idgit]

You don't get it either. And I'm not going to argue with you because no matter what idiotic stats you show me I know I'm right on this.

You don't get it either. And I'm not going to argue with you because no matter what idiotic stats you show me I know I'm right on this.

Nobody ever "gets it" Amber, because you're choosing to believe something that's just not supportable factually. Which is, of course, your prerogative.

 

[Rockport]

Nobody ever "gets it" Amber, because you're choosing to believe something that's just not supportable factually. Which is, of course, your prerogative.

What type of team just won the Super Bowl?

 

[Idgit]

What type of team just won the Super Bowl?

One that passes efficiently and is the best in the league at defending the pass.

 

[Rockport]

One that passes efficiently and is the best in the league at defending the pass.

Wrong. One that runs the ball efficiently and stops the run. Step away from the video games.