I know the Thursday night game between the Commanders and Bears is not the most appealing matchup in the world. Yet, at least Justin Fields looked a lot better in Week 4 compared to the rest of the season. He set career highs with 28 completions, 335 passing yards, and four passing touchdowns. It was much-appreciated for my Scott Fish Bowl team where the Fields/Moore stack finally netted me a win. Yet, the main thing that both starting QBs on Thursday have in common is their propensity to take sacks.
Howell and Fields: Pressure from College to the Pros
I mentioned a few weeks ago that the percentage of pressures that turn into sacks is a sticky stat. It tends to carry over from college and is correlated year-over-year in the NFL. Among FBS QBs with at least 100 pass attempts in 2021, Howell was 7th in the percentage of pressures that turned into sacks according to PFF. Similarly, Fields was 23rd in 2020, which was in the top 20% of qualified QBs. Meanwhile, in the NFL, Howell is second-to-last and Fields is in the bottom four in the component of EPA derived from sacks.
The graph below shows pressure-to-sack rate on the x-axis and passing TD rate on the y-axis for the 2023 season. Howell is far in the bottom-right corner, while Fields is essentially the only QB in the top-right. I’m showing TD rate here because I think sacks continue to be an under-discussed element of an offense’s potential. For the 2023 season, 27.8% of drives without a sack resulted in a TD. On drives with a sack, that number plummets to 14.8%. You’re nearly twice as likely to score a TD on a drive where the QB avoids a sack.
That’s the reason there are essentially no QBs in the top-right of the graph. And even Fields’ position is buoyed by the 4 TD performance in Week 4. Sacks cap the potential for an offense to have high-end TD efficiency. And unfortunately, pressure-to-sack rate doesn’t tend to change drastically for QBs. Get ready to see some sacks on Thursday night.
CJ Stroud: Passing the Eye Test
CJ Stroud has had an excellent start to his NFL career. He’s 8th in EPA/play among qualified QBs according to Sports Info Solutions (SIS). And he’s passing the eye test as well. Benjamin Solak had an excellent tweet where he shows Stroud manipulating the defense with his eyes and slinging the ball to Nico Collins running a dig route. With this success, I’ve seen a lot of praise for how Stroud has played versus pressure. That was one of the concerns for Stroud when making the transition from college to the NFL. Unfortunately, the numbers don’t back up improved play versus pressure yet. He’s in the bottom 8 of qualified QBs in EPA/play when facing pressure according to SIS. He’s 27th in turnover-worthy play rate according to PFF. Again, Stroud has looked and played great. But there’s still some room for improvement, especially versus pressure.
Josh Allen: Absolutely Unreal
Josh Allen is playing outside of his mind right now. He had an absolutely massive 0.52 EPA/play in Week 4. It was one of the best quarterback performances I’ve ever seen. The graph below shows offensive pass EPA on the x-axis and rush EPA on the y-axis for the 2023 season. It’s not a surprise that the Bills are in the top-right alongside the Dolphins and 49ers given how Allen is playing.
Continuing along the theme of pressure for the week, Allen is one of only three QBs with a positive EPA/play mark when facing pressure. And his 0.13 EPA/play is more than double second place (shoutout to Baker Mayfield, a surprise second on the list). In my mind, this is where he’s differentiated himself from Tua and Purdy, who are also putting up insane efficiency metrics.
Danny Dimes: 10 Sacks
This is the last topic about pressure I promise. But I couldn’t focus on pressure and not mention the Giants. It will surprise no one who watched the Giants-Seahawks game that the Giants faced the most pressure in Week 4. The 20 pressures on the Giants turned into 10 sacks, three more than the next closest QB Aidan O’Connell. And that was from a defense in Seattle that was 22nd in pressure rate coming into the week. It looks almost impossible for the Giants to have a functioning offense with the current state of their offensive line. Maybe things get slightly better when Saquon returns, but I’m not optimistic about anyone on this offense for the rest of season.
Broncos Defense: Historically Bad
Last week I thought my model was broken because it had the Broncos defense giving up 50 fantasy points per game to opposing RBs. I thought “surely that must be their total for the season”, forgetting that they played the Dolphins and Achane/Mostert in Week 3. It’s unfortunate for the Broncos offense as they’ve been much-improved on the season. They’re in the middle of the offensive EPA graph above for context. Unfortunately, the Broncos’ defense has taken a massive step in the wrong direction.
The graph below shows defensive pass EPA on the x-axis and defensive rush EPA on the y-axis. The Broncos are in the top-right corner, which would be ideal on offense but less-than-ideal on defense. They are dead last in passing EPA and second-to-last in rushing EPA. The Broncos now have the pleasure of facing Patrick Mahomes in two of their next four games. Fire up your Chiefs in fantasy.
Jordan Addison’s Favorite Number: 11
Jordan Addison remains behind KJ Osborn on the Vikings WR depth chart. As a result, it’s been a common saying that Addison only plays in 3 WR sets. I didn’t realize how true that was. So far in 2023, Addison has played literally 1 snap outside of 11 personnel. The problem with this is he’s off the field for about a third of the Vikings’ snaps when they employ heavier packages. And Addison had a particularly bad Week 4, goosing fantasy manager for zero fantasy points.
It’s easy to say there are better days ahead but honestly there just have to be. The biggest problem for Addison in Week 4 was the number of pass attempts. Here are Kirk Cousins’ pass attempts by week: 44, 44, 50, and then 19 in Week 4. Additionally, KJ Osborn has been bad. He has a pretty ugly 0.80 yards per route run (YPRR) and only an 11% target share. Addison has doubled Osborn’s YPRR on the season. Keep betting on the talent and hope the coaches give Addison the shot at 2 WR sets.
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Jaxon Kincaid Njigba
Speaking of betting on talent, here’s hoping there are better days ahead for both Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Dalton Kincaid. I stole the section header here from John Daigle. It initially made me laugh but then after digging into it, it mostly made me sad. Not adding in any qualifiers for effect, JSN is 153rd in team air yards share and 219th in average depth of target (aDoT). Dalton Kincaid is 159th in team air yards share and 210th in aDoT. I can understand JSN remaining third on the WR depth chart when you have players like Metcalf and Lockett ahead of him. But why aren’t the Bills throwing the ball to their talented, young TE down the field? I can’t overly criticize the Bills given how well they’re playing, but I don’t really understand this one. For some optimism, Kincaid ran more routes than Dawson Knox in Week 4; here’s hoping that continues.
Kyle Pitts and Jonnu Smith: Not All TEs Play TE
This is not another “Kyle Pitts will be fine” take. I don’t think he will be fine this season. I do think he will have some spike weeks given his talent but I have no idea when they’re going to happen. From a fantasy perspective, Jonnu Smith has been outscoring Kyle Pitts. On the season, Jonnu has about 10 more fantasy points, with 4 more receptions and 60 more receiving yards than Pitts. I do think the comparison doesn’t make a ton of sense because even though both have TE listed next to their name, they essentially play different positions.
Jonnu’s inline rate is about twice as high as Pitts’, according to PFF. Similarly, Pitts’ snap rate out wide is about twice as high as Jonnu’s. They are also on the field together a lot. On the season, Jonnu has been on the field for about 70% of Pitts’ snaps. Theoretically, the high number of snaps where they play together would open up Pitts to play more like a WR and avoid some of the blocking tasks assigned to Jonnu. I say theoretically because we haven’t seen it yet and I’m not confident we do see it consistently with this version of the Falcons offense.
Kupp and JT: Offseason Questions Answered
As of writing this, the 21-day practice windows for both Cooper Kupp and Jonathan Taylor have been opened. We still don’t have answers to whether Cooper Kupp is fully healthy and if Jonathan Taylor will play for the Colts, another team, or play at all. Having said that, some of the biggest questions we had about these players in the offseason have since been answered.
For the Rams, it’s that they’re actually pretty good and will be competing this year. The Rams are top-10 in passing EPA per dropback on the season. If you remember going into the year, that was not at all the consensus expectation. Especially after the Kupp injury news, there was concern that Kupp wouldn’t come back if the Rams were already out of playoff contention. The Rams playing well is excellent news for anyone who took Kupp in the first round like I did before the injury news.
Similarly, for the Colts, Anthony Richardson has been a better passer than expected out of the gate. The Colts are 18th in passing EPA per dropback, which is completely functional. They’re second-to-last in rushing EPA but I think Jonathan Taylor can help that number if he ultimately plays for the Colts this year. This is largely just a reminder that if you have Kupp and JT, there have been some positive updates since the start of the year; namely, their offenses are better than anticipated.
Predicting Picks
This is slightly away from traditional fantasy football but I wanted to share it anyway. I’ve started getting into pick’ems on Underdog this season. If you’re not familiar with the concept, you pick 2 to 5 higher/lower outcomes for players and if you get all of your selections correct, you win a multiple of your money. In full transparency, it’s been a tough start. Where I’ve found some success and decided to lean into have been Underdog’s interception lines. The only line I’ve seen for a QB’s interceptions has been 0.5. Essentially, the bet is whether the QB will throw an interception this game or not.
From 2021 through 2023 Week 2, QBs have thrown an interception in a game about 47% of the time. So, in general, it seems like you should be leaning toward the “lower” on many interception lines but it’s close. Additionally, Underdog does not provide an interception line for every QB, which is to say they’re not in the business to lose money.
I created a machine learning model that tries to predict whether a QB will throw one or more picks in their next game. Big shoutout to Seth Walder of ESPN Sports Analytics for his feedback. Unsurprisingly the number of passing attempts per game is an important variable; more attempts generally lead to more interception opportunities. Pass rate over expected (PROE) has a similar logic. Past turnover worthy play and interception rates are also crucial, along with the spread of the upcoming game. As the number of points a QB’s team is expected to win by increases, the probability that they throw a pick decreases.
For my test dataset, the model was right about 59% of the time, which is 3% better than if you simply guessed that every QB threw at least one pick during the test weeks. It’s not amazing, but it should theoretically be profitable over time. For instance, if the events are independent, you’d be expected to be right on 5 events each with a 59% probability about 7% of the time (0.59^5). To breakeven with Underdog’s payout structure, you’d need to be right 5% of the time (if you bet $1 on a pick 5 pick’em, you win $20). We also get the advantage of not having to decide on every QB but instead pick the situations where we’re most confident (if Underdog offers the bet).
We’re going to test out that theory this season. At the end of my articles moving forward, I’ll try to highlight some QBs with interception lines I like for the week. For Week 5, I like Kenny Pickett (if he plays), Trevor Lawrence, and Kirk Cousins to throw a pick. I like Jalen Hurts, Lamar Jackson, and Tua Tagovailoa to avoid throwing interceptions. And remember, lean toward the lowers, as the line is always 0.5, slightly higher than the historical average.
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