When you look past the W/L record, Tennessee is improving

Discussion in 'Vols Football' started by Tar Volon, Oct 8, 2015.

  1. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    Let's compare apples to apples. Take the first five games from last year (Utah State, Arkansas State, Oklahoma, Georgia, Florida) and the first five games this year (Bowling Green, Oklahoma, Western Carolina, Florida, Arkansas). The opponent quality is roughly similar, so let's just look at the stats. We'll focus on yards per play, because rate stats are the best!

    2014 yards per play (first five games) offense: 4.53
    2015 yards per play (first five games) offense: 5.48

    2014 yards per play (first five games) defense: 4.75
    2015 yards per play (first five games) defense: 5.61

    2014 yards per play (first five games) margin: -0.22
    2015 yards per play (first five games) margin: -0.13

    Our offense has gotten almost a full yard per play better! That's genuinely good improvement, taking us from 2014 UConn territory to 2014 Iowa territory. So it's still not awesome, but it's gone from terrible to average.

    The defense, on the other hand, has gotten almost a full yard worse.

    Overall, we've improved by about nine-hundredths of a yard per play. With us averaging about 75 plays per game, that comes out to about 6.8 yards per game. With an average of around 15 yards per point across college football, that means we're improving by almost half a point per game! At this rate, we'll be able to take Florida to overtime in two years! Give Butch another 25-30 years improving like this, and we might even beat Bama!
     
  2. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    More seriously, what the hell Jancek? You lost four contributors from last year (Williams, Johnson, Maggitt, Coleman), how did you tank so hard?
     
  3. droski

    droski Traffic Criminal

    I bet if you compare the last 5 games of last year to the first 5 games of this year, the offense is significantly worse.
     
  4. Oldvol75

    Oldvol75 Super Bigfoot Guru Mod

    Only draw back I see in this is Worley had the first 5 in 2014 and Dobbs had the first 5 in 2015.
     
  5. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    I'm sure, but I am trying to actually give a fair comparison. The last five games of last year included games against the vaunted defenses of South Carolina, Iowa, and Kentucky.
     
  6. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    But Worley was better than Dobbs, that's why Dobbs was on the bench, don't you remember?
     
  7. chavisut

    chavisut Dan Mullen Fan Club President

    I don't care if they were against air, the offense has regressed.
     
  8. LittleDTO

    LittleDTO New Member

    Better players this year. However, coaching is horrible. Worst I've seen in years.
     
  9. kmf600

    kmf600 Energy vampire

    You can't measure the intangibles
     
  10. fl0at_

    fl0at_ Humorless, asinine, joyless pr*ck

    What's the standard deviation in each category?
     
  11. lylsmorr

    lylsmorr Super Moderator

    My blood pressure disagrees
     
  12. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    I can buy that to some degree, but I also still remember that performance against Mizzou last year, so even being dead serious, I don't want to overstate the regression on offense. The regression on defense, on the other hand, seems pretty clear.
     
  13. A-Smith

    A-Smith Chieftain

    I think the defense's problems are even more glaring. I fully expected with this talent to have a top 10ish defense. We've seen nothing of the sort.
     
  14. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    .97 for 2015 YPP margin
    2.09 for 2014 YPP margin

    .51 for 2014 offense
    1.79 for 2015 offense

    2.09 for 2014 defense (that OU game was a huge outlier)
    .94 for 2015 defense
     
  15. fl0at_

    fl0at_ Humorless, asinine, joyless pr*ck

    Standard deviations overlap.
     
  16. hohenfelsvol

    hohenfelsvol Beer run

    The only quote I ever heard that I liked from Lou Holtz was:

    Stats are for losers. If you win, who cares.
     
  17. TangoUniform

    TangoUniform Contributor

    as far as the offense is concerned ---- honestly, i'm so cross-eyed and forgetful trying to recall ----- but it seems the majority of "good" last year happened with Dobbs ****ing around and scrambling for 1st downs because the OLine sucked so hard.

    Now the OLine is supposedly better (year older, I guess) but Dobbs isn't scrambling ... so, oh no, we suck again?

    i suppose that's the difference I think I see between last year and this year on offense.... or am I way off base?

    Maybe we should go back to a shittier OLine and let Dobbs just run... better yet... Hurd/Kamara Wildcat, 24/7.


    ... think I'll go back to my 4 martini lunch now.
     
  18. VolDad

    VolDad Super Moderator

    We have had 2 stat pumping patsies so far this year. It would be interesting to compare at the end of the year after we get through the SEC schedule.
     
  19. IP

    IP Super Moderator

    As float pointed out, there is not statistical evidence that there is improvement.
     
  20. Tar Volon

    Tar Volon Me Blog @RockyTopTalk.com

    we did last year too. while there was a lot of sarcasm in the analysis of the OP, I genuinely think it's decent apples to apples as far as beginning of last year vs beginning of this year
     

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