The 2016 Falcons Have Exceeded The Scorched Earth Pace Set By The 1990 Bills

by Chase Stuart on February 1, 2017

Atlanta had a really, really good offense this year. My favorite statistic: the Falcons had 59 drives end in a punt or a turnover, and 58 end in a touchdown. Atlanta averaged 3.03 points per drive this year, and yet, the offense has been even better in the playoffs.

There was no stopping Matt Ryan and the Falcons against Green Bay, as the group scored 44 points on 9 drives in the NFC Championship Game. In the division round, the Falcons scored 36 points on 9 or 10 drives against Seattle, depending on whether you want to treat the Falcons final drive of the game as a real drive. In two NFC playoff games, Atlanta’s offense has scored 10 touchdowns, seen 5 drives end on punts, 3 end on field goals, with zero turnovers and one drive end with the clock running out.

Scoring 80 points on 18 or 19 drives translates to an average of 4.21 or 4.44 points per drive. Take an average of those two numbers, and the offense is still averaging a whopping 4.32 points per drive. How remarkable is that? Well, it’s the best average for any of the 102 Super Bowl teams in their pre-Super Bowl playoff games.

The NFL has not historically recorded drive stats, so I previously wrote how one can estimate the number of offensive drives a team has in a game or season. I used that formula to measure the best playoff offenses entering the Super Bowl; unsurprisingly, the 1990 Bills were the previous hottest offense.

Against Miami in the division round, Buffalo had between 10 and 12 drives, depending on how you treat the final drives of the half (the Bills received the ball with 14 seconds left on their own 32, and took a knee) and the game (Buffalo received the ball with just over one minute to go, and ran three times for a first down to run out the clock). Those other ten drives ended as follows, in order: Touchdown, Field Goal, Field Goal, Touchdown, Touchdown, Interception, Field Goal, Touchdown, Touchdown, Punt. That’s 44 points on 10 real drives.

The next week, in the AFC Championship Game against the Raiders, the Bills had 11 or 12 drives, as the final drive of the game featured Buffalo taking a pair of knees to close out a 51-3 victory. The first 11 drives went: TD, TD, Interception, TD, missed FG, TD, TD, Punt, TD, FG, Punt. That’s 44 points (Buffalo also scored on a pick six, and one extra point was missed) on 11 drives.

That’s a total of 88 points on somewhere between 21 and 24 drives. My methodology measures the starts and ends of drives, and takes an average. You can read some detail in this footnote. ^[1]Measuring the starts of drives against Miami gives them 12 drives: the Bills took over via a kickoff 7 times (to start the game, after 4 Dolphins touchdowns, and after 2 Dolphins field goals), via … Continue reading

Even giving the Bills 21 drives — which again, is probably the right thing to do — that would put Buffalo at 4.19 points per drive, still shy of even the conservative result for Atlanta. But I ran my formula (which gives Buffalo 22.5 drives) for all 100 teams that have appeared in a Super Bowl, and then calculated the numbers for the Patriots and Falcons this year. In addition, I included how these teams all fared in the Super Bowl in terms of Offensive Points Per Estimated Drive. Take a look:

Rk	Team	Year	Est Drives (E)	Est Drives (S)	Pts	OPPED	SB OPPED	Super Bowl Win?
1	ATL	2016	18	19	80	4.32	??	??
2	BUF	1990	22	23	88	3.91	1.70	Loss
3	SFO	2012	20	20	73	3.65	2.64	Loss
4	SFO	1994	21	21	75	3.57	4.08	Win
5	NWE	2014	22	23	80	3.56	2.55	Win
6	OAK	2002	22	20	71	3.38	1.20	Loss
7	DEN	1987	21	22	72	3.35	0.77	Loss
8	DEN	2013	14	16	50	3.33	1.07	Loss
9	MIA	1973	18	19	61	3.30	2.40	Win
10	BUF	1992	30	30	94	3.13	1.26	Loss
11	MIA	1984	24	25	76	3.10	0.57	Loss
12	DAL	1993	21	21	65	3.10	2.19	Win
13	NWE	2011	22	22	68	3.09	2.00	Loss
14	CAR	2015	20	23	66	3.07	0.69	Loss
15	PIT	1979	21	19	61	3.05	2.95	Win
16	CIN	1981	18	19	55	2.97	1.91	Loss
17	PIT	2005	28	30	86	2.97	1.83	Win
18	DAL	1995	23	23	68	2.96	2.57	Win
19	DAL	1992	21	23	64	2.91	3.04	Win
20	NOR	2009	23	25	69	2.88	3.43	Win
21	PHI	2004	16	17	47	2.85	1.75	Loss
22	NWE	2007	17	20	52	2.81	1.75	Loss
23	NYG	1990	18	16	46	2.71	2.00	Win
24	NWE	2016	22	25	63	2.68	??	??
25	SFO	1989	23	25	64	2.67	4.58	Win
25	MIN	1969	17	19	48	2.67	0.67	Loss
25	OAK	1967	14	16	40	2.67	1.12	Loss
28	WAS	1991	22	22	58	2.64	2.64	Win
29	PIT	1974	21	22	56	2.60	1.08	Win
30	WAS	1982	27	26	69	2.60	2.57	Win
31	SFO	1988	24	24	62	2.58	1.82	Win
32	NWE	2004	19	23	54	2.57	1.50	Win
32	GNB	1966	10	11	27	2.57	3.18	Win
34	BUF	1993	21	25	59	2.57	1.18	Loss
35	RAI	1983	23	25	61	2.54	1.85	Win
36	DEN	1997	32	31	80	2.54	2.70	Win
37	PIT	2010	19	19	48	2.53	2.27	Loss
38	DEN	1989	24	25	61	2.49	0.50	Loss
39	PIT	1978	25	29	67	2.48	2.80	Win
40	WAS	1983	27	28	68	2.47	0.64	Loss
41	STL	2001	20	23	53	2.47	1.62	Loss
42	PIT	1995	25	24	60	2.45	1.62	Loss
43	CHI	2006	27	26	64	2.42	0.80	Loss
44	KAN	1966	12	14	31	2.38	0.91	Loss
45	GNB	2010	30	34	76	2.38	2.29	Win
46	BAL	1968	21	22	51	2.37	0.61	Loss
47	BAL	2012	35	35	83	2.37	2.57	Win
48	DEN	1998	20	26	54	2.35	3.40	Win
49	ARI	2008	35	37	84	2.33	2.10	Loss
50	SEA	2013	19	21	46	2.30	4.15	Win
51	OAK	1976	21	21	48	2.29	2.17	Win
52	IND	2009	22	22	50	2.27	2.27	Loss
52	ATL	1998	20	24	50	2.27	1.26	Loss
54	GNB	1996	21	24	51	2.27	1.86	Win
55	SEA	2014	22	24	52	2.26	2.18	Loss
56	NYG	2011	37	35	81	2.25	2.24	Win
57	SFO	1981	25	28	59	2.23	2.36	Win
58	SEA	2005	24	25	54	2.20	0.87	Loss
58	DAL	1975	23	26	54	2.20	1.36	Loss
60	TAM	2002	24	23	51	2.17	2.45	Win
61	DEN	1977	23	27	54	2.16	0.67	Loss
62	NYG	2007	30	33	68	2.16	2.13	Win
63	STL	1999	23	25	51	2.13	2.71	Win
64	NYG	1986	25	31	59	2.11	3.70	Win
65	DAL	1977	27	30	60	2.11	1.80	Win
66	NWE	2003	19	19	39	2.05	2.37	Win
67	IND	2006	32	34	67	2.03	1.76	Win
68	CAR	2003	32	33	65	2.00	2.15	Loss
68	GNB	1997	23	19	42	2.00	2.09	Loss
70	NYG	2000	23	25	47	1.96	0.00	Loss
70	MIN	1973	24	24	47	1.96	0.93	Loss
72	SFO	1984	23	22	44	1.96	3.62	Win
73	SDG	1994	18	20	37	1.95	1.56	Loss
74	MIN	1976	26	29	53	1.93	1.17	Loss
75	PIT	2008	21	25	44	1.91	2.11	Win
76	NWE	1985	36	38	70	1.89	0.69	Loss
77	PHI	1980	25	29	51	1.89	1.00	Loss
78	WAS	1972	22	23	42	1.87	0.00	Loss
79	GNB	1967	27	26	49	1.85	2.17	Win
80	BAL	1970	24	24	44	1.83	1.00	Win
81	MIA	1982	35	41	69	1.82	0.50	Loss
82	CIN	1988	22	25	42	1.79	0.86	Loss
83	MIA	1971	23	23	41	1.78	0.29	Loss
84	DAL	1978	27	28	48	1.75	2.00	Loss
85	OAK	1980	38	41	68	1.72	2.70	Win
86	NYJ	1968	18	14	27	1.69	1.39	Win
87	DEN	2015	26	25	43	1.69	1.21	Win
88	NWE	1996	25	24	41	1.67	1.45	Loss
89	DEN	1986	25	28	43	1.62	2.00	Loss
90	BUF	1991	24	26	40	1.60	1.71	Loss
91	MIA	1972	20	24	35	1.59	1.14	Win
92	MIN	1974	22	25	37	1.57	0.00	Loss
93	TEN	1999	37	36	56	1.53	1.88	Loss
94	DAL	1971	24	26	34	1.36	2.29	Win
95	WAS	1987	21	25	31	1.35	3.23	Win
96	RAM	1979	22	23	30	1.33	1.81	Loss
97	BAL	2000	37	37	48	1.30	1.33	Win
98	PIT	1975	28	31	37	1.25	1.52	Win
99	CHI	1985	25	25	31	1.24	2.64	Win
100	KAN	1969	28	27	30	1.09	2.19	Win
101	NWE	2001	23	27	27	1.08	1.30	Win
102	DAL	1970	22	24	20	0.87	0.81	Loss

Of course, Bill Belichick has a history of stopping incredible offenses in the Super Bowl: he was the defensive coordinator for the Giants when they met the ’90 Bills in the Super Bowl. But make no mistake about it: after one of the best regular seasons in NFL history, the Atlanta offense has put together — through the conference side of the bracket — the best playoff run in NFL history.

References[+]

References
↑1	Measuring the starts of drives against Miami gives them 12 drives: the Bills took over via a kickoff 7 times (to start the game, after 4 Dolphins touchdowns, and after 2 Dolphins field goals), via an interception 2 times, after 2 punts, and following 1 fumble. This misses the 1 time Buffalo took over after a turnover on downs. Meanwhile, the Bills had 11 drives “end” in a certain way: 5 on a touchdown, 3 on a made field goal, 1 on an interception, 1 on a punt, and 1 on a fumble. You might think wait, how did the Bills have 11 drives end that way, when that doesn’t even include the two drives that ended due to the half/game expiring? Also, how come when we measured the “start” of drives before we had 12 even without counting the time the Bills took over after a turnover on downs? Well, the one fumble was on a punt return; that’s not a real drive, but in the boxscore it shows one fumble lost. Such is the inaccurate nature of ESTIMATED drive data. For the Raiders game, my methodology gives Buffalo 11 drives both ways, which seems like a good result.

Tagged as: Falcons, Super Bowl, Super Bowl LI

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