Nick Foles Is The Playoff GOAT

The following is a guest post by @sunset_shazz.

Nick Foles is a high-variance quarterback. His performance ricochets from abysmal to sublime with such frequency that he made me re-adjust my chart axis, twice. And yet: including the 2013 loss to the Saints (in which he engineered a comeback from a 13-point deficit and left the field with the lead) his postseason play has been consistently excellent. There have been 93 quarterbacks since the 1970 merger who have played at least 4 playoff games. Of these, Foles ranks 1st in completion percentage and 2nd in Adjusted Net Yards / Attempt (ANY/A).

Obviously, this is not statistically dispositive. Nothing about playoff analysis is. Mark Messier and Reggie Jackson’s playoff performances comprised a mere fraction of their total careers, yet their knack for elevating their game on the biggest stage is what made them memorable. One way to think about the playoffs: there is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. As I will show, Foles has taken the tide at the flood in historic fashion.

Note, from the chart above, that the fewer games played, the greater variance in ANY/A between individual players. But what about each player’s game-by-game variance? I measured the standard deviation of each player’s game ANY/A, and scaled this by his mean ANY/A, thus constructing a coefficient of variation.

Of all 93 QBs in the sample, Foles has been the 4th most consistent (i.e. has the 4th lowest variation). Moreover, he has the lowest variation of the 16 QBs who have only played 4 games.

Perhaps Foles has benefitted from playing in a QB-friendly era? I compared each QB’s game ANY/A to the league average for the year in which that game was played. One can then plot mean Relative ANY/A against the coefficient of variation:

Foles has the 5th highest Relative ANY/A in addition to having the 4th lowest variation. One way to think about the above graph is to imagine an “efficient frontier” on the upper left quadrant. When considering similar efficient frontiers in the context of financial economics, Nobel Laureate William F. Sharpe constructed a “Sharpe ratio” which compares a fund manager’s relative return (e.g. versus an index) to the standard deviation of the fund’s return.

I similarly devised a playoff QB Sharpe Ratio, which is each QB’s mean Relative ANY/A divided by the standard deviation of his game ANY/A. Think of it as one number which captures both efficiency and consistency of play. The following table shows the top 10 playoff QB Sharpe Ratios since the merger:

All 10 of these quarterbacks played in a Super Bowl, and all but two of them were champions. Only Bengals starter Ken Anderson and Bills backup Frank Reich did not win the season’s final game. (Reich, of course, will receive a ring as Offensive Coordinator of the 2017 Super Bowl champions.)

By this metric, Foles will have to settle for second place out of 93 playoff QBs. The Raiders’ Ken Stabler, who played in 13 playoff games between the 1971 and 1979 seasons, passed for 3.08 ANY/A above average (3rd) and had the 8th lowest coefficient of variation in the sample. Combining efficiency and consistency, he is the greatest playoff quarterback of all time. Here are the rankings of some other notable QBs, and Eli Manning:

Obviously, I’m not suggesting Foles is better than any of those quarterbacks (except Eli; he’s indisputably better than Eli, it’s not even close). However, in the inherently limited sample that consists of the playoffs, Foles has performed at a historically great level, in terms of both efficiency and consistency. Also, he can catch.

Keep It Going, Nick

This ESPN Insider article from Football Outsiders' Scott Kacsmar has nice things to say about Nick Foles, especially noting that even by advanced metrics, his interception-defying skills have been legendary. Plus, add this to that bounce in your step ahead of Saturday's playoff game:

Some simple math can quantify how balanced the Eagles [offense is]. I calculated averages for yards per pass (including sacks) and yards per run and compared them to the league averages, then added the two averages together.

The 2013 Eagles are a balance-adjusted 2.20 yards per play above average, which ranks 18th out of 1,285 teams since 1970. Of the 17 teams ranked ahead of Philadelphia, 12 won at least one playoff game (3-3 in the Super Bowl).

Gotta like those odds.

The Eagles Still Aren't Great, But That's OK

Before the season started, I set my expectations for 2013 at a reasonable level: an improvement from last year's disaster squad and a foundation built for future growth. As I said then, most teams as bad as the Eagles improved, on DVOA terms, by an average of about 12%. I anticipated something along those lines, with a slight record improvement but certainly no mention of playoffs.

Obviously, I was wrong. Before Sunday's loss, the Eagles had improved by nearly 33% in DVOA, one of the best turnarounds ever. That will cool slightly this week, but the team still has the inside track on a playoff spot, something most people (including Jeffrey Lurie) never expected to happen so soon.

But Sunday's game reminded us that this squad -- or at least half of it -- is still a work in progress. Chip Kelly's offense is gangbusters, even if it can sputter out for stretches. On a "bad day," Nick Foles threw for 428 yards on 30 for 48 attempts, 3 TDs and 1 INT. Plus he ran the ball 5 times for 41 yards to boot. LeSean McCoy only got 8 carries, but still finished with over 100 yards from scrimmage. DeSean Jackson had nearly 200 receiving yards plus an end-around touchdown called back due to penalty. Oh, and rookie tight end Zach Ertz ended the day with 57 yards on 6 receptions, including a one-handed TD grab. No big problems here.

The defense is still messy, though. As I've said before, you don't have to be an elite quarterback to find the holes in Billy Davis' scheme (Hint: look for the safeties). A smart, patient, accurate player will pick this secondary apart. That's what happened when the Eagles D was skinned alive during the three-game stretch against Philip Rivers, Alex Smith, and Peyton Manning. Since then, during the team's 7-2 run, opponents never scored more than 21 points. 

The great nine-game run leading up to Sunday seemed to be the defense gelling, but most of it was the horrendous, mistake-prone quarterbacks the Eagles faced. Only two of the QBs the Eagles faced in that span have positive DVOA on the year, and they played one of those in a blizzard. Matt Cassel could easily have been another one of those lightweights, but he did his best 2008 impression, throwing for the 4th-most yards of his career. That came despite the Eagles front seven holding the Adrian Peterson-less Vikings to just 2.4 yards per carry.

Worth noting: Football Outsiders never bought into the Eagles defensive turnaround. While they were bend-but-not-breaking their way to sub-22 point totals, the defense allowed over 350 yards in all but two of the last 9 games. Coming into Sunday, the team ranked 22nd in defensive efficiency, versus 3rd on offense. Even with Denver and Kansas City as past opponents, the Eagles faced the 27th-weakest schedule and registered the highest level of inconsistency in the league prior to this week. Including week 15, the Eagles have the lowest point differential of any division leader.

So again, the Eagles aren't great. If their schedule weren't so easy, including six games against the criminally ugly NFC East, I imagine the team would have finished closer to my "return to 1999" prediction than their current possible outcome of 8-10 wins. If the Eagles win the division, which I now expect them to do either against Chicago with the Cowboys losing again, or in Dallas the week after, they will have vastly overperformed -- despite being only a mediocre overall team.

But that's OK. Even if the Eagles get rolled over by a better wild card team like San Francisco, Carolina, or New Orleans, the season will have been a smashing success, and one to build on in 2014. Kelly's offense still has room to grow next year, and the defensive reconstruction will continue. Until then, enjoy this #housemoney season.

Yes, Michael Vick can be ELIte

Les Bowen:

That last part was the most important; it was what separated the Giants from, say, the 49ers. Eli was sacked 11 times in the playoffs - more than any other quarterback. He still completed 65 percent of his passes, threw for nine touchdowns and was intercepted exactly once. His QB rating was 103.3. He averaged 304.8 passing yards per game.

Good luck copying that “blueprint,” NFL GMs. And Eagles fans, do you really see Michael Vick throwing for nine touchdowns and one interception?

To be fair, Vick had 11 touchdowns and 0 interceptions through his first eight games last season. So yes, I have seen it happen. Not only that, but just a year ago Eli Manning threw for a league-leading 25 interceptions.

Vick has an important offseason ahead of him, but there’s no reason to think he can’t rebound from 2011.

A Serious Answer

Les Bowen, for the Daily News:

Reid refused to give a serious answer Sunday when asked why he thought the Eagles didn’t make the playoffs.

More specifically, Reid responded to Les’s question with “Well, we were 8-8, and the other teams weren’t. So they had better records, so they made it.”

No love lost there.

The Mirage of Late-Season Success

The central question of the moment is simple: what to make of the Eagles final month? They won four games in a row, allowed only 11.5 points per game — seemingly the make up of a long-anticipated turnaround.

Was it really?

You can make that case if you’re so inclined, citing defensive statistics like yards allowed, changed tactics, and the words of almost every player in the Eagles locker room. But I think you would be wrong.

The oft-cited Occam’s razor is typically used to defend the simplest answer, and to some minds the idea that Juan Castillo and his defense just improved over the final weeks could seem like the obvious solution. But what Occam’s razor actually recommends is the answer which makes the fewest new assumptions. A new assumption like, “Castillo is now a good coordinator.”

Instead, after the first twelve weeks of complete ineptitude, culminating in a humiliating loss on Thursday night to the Seattle Seahawks, we should give the benefit of the doubt to explanations which do not make such a radical assumption.

Explanations such as:

• Facing the vaunted quarterback lineup of Matt Moore, Mark Sanchez, Stephen McGee, and Rex Grossman.
• Playing only one game against an opponent with playoff ramifications on the line.
• Lining up against two NFC East teams that the Eagles had already shown the ability to shut down.

I could go on, keep talking about these poor offenses and, more generally, poor teams, but you know all of that. We could predict this possibility of “improved defense” weeks ago, and we did. To come back now and suggest that the Eagles are set going forward would be a mistake.

This team finished 8-8, buoyed by a 5-1 record in the putrid NFC East. In any other year, given their performance, the Eagles could count on both a worse record and a worse finish in the division. Instead, just enough optimism remains to excuse a season of failure.

What we saw over the last month was a mirage, an illusion of success encouraged by our need to see progress and find hope. It would be wise for us to accept this reality as we set expectations for the offseason, lest we remain in the desert, convinced that Castillo can lead the team to an oasis just over the next ridge.

Photo from Getty.

Charting the Eagles 2011 Playoff Odds

For the Eagles to win the division and make the playoffs, they need to win out against the Cowboys and Redskins, and hope the Giants lose this week and beat the Cowboys next week.

That’s still an unlikely string of outcomes, but it’s much better playoff chances than the Eagles have had in weeks. Football Outsiders head honcho Aaron Schatz was gracious enough to provide archives of their week-to-week playoff odds, and I’ve compiled the Eagles numbers here:

You can follow along the Eagles ups and downs, from the heights of perceived Super Bowl glory (18 percent chance of winning it all after week one) to the brief resurgence following week eight, to getting eliminated from wild card consideration completely.

Amazingly, the current 15 percent chance is the highest they’ve had in seven weeks. Still a long shot, but it at least makes this weekend interesting — a fan luxury we wouldn’t have if any of the other NFC East teams were any good.

You've Been Mostly-Dead All Day

From Monty Python to The Princess Bride, Mike Tanier explains the Eagles’ current situation:

Like 20-something underachievers who realized their girlfriends would leave them unless they stopped jamming at open mike nights and got a real job, the Eagles combed their hair and abandoned slacker chic in the last two weeks. They are now brilliantly flawed, which is a step up from their brilliantly self-destructive state of earlier this season.