I ask because of Drew Brees. In his previous three seasons with losing records and bad defenses, Brees had over 300 yards passing per game. This year, he’s at about 275 yards per game — I’m guessing because he doesn’t have to pass, pass, pass to catch up in games where the other team’s offense is putting up tons of points.

Not only that, but both his touchdown and interception percentages have dropped significantly — 4.3% to 5.5%, 5.1% and 5.0% and 1.3% to 2.2%, 1.8% and 2.6%.

That follows the logic that he doesn’t have to be as aggressive to try to catch up in games, which has led to a boost in his ANY/A for this season compared to the last three — 7.86 to 7.27, 7.26, and 6.77.

The idea that bad defense, especially bad scoring defense, leads to more interceptions and poor efficiency in QBs isn’t exactly shocking — but I do find it interesting that with bad defenses, Brees saw a boost in metrics we usually consider positive, touchdown percentage and a high volume of passing yards.