What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not the exact opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense?

We do not count special teams scores or interception/fumble returns in this equation.  This is strictly a look at touchdowns — not total points — allowed by a team as compared to how many snaps a defensive unit was on the field.  Still, however, special teams and offensive production do factor in overall.  A good special teams unit will pin an opponent deep in its own end, forcing it to string together multiple plays to score (and with each additional snap run, there’s a greater chance for a turnover).  Steady, grind-it-out offenses can also eat up clock and limit a foe’s time of possession.

Happily, the folks at ElevenWarriors.com studied our numbers and found them to be quite accurate at predicting Big Ten success just as we’ve found them to correlate nicely with SEC wins.  The more we see them applied elsewhere — and the more they work — the better we feel.

With the season now complete, we use numbers from SEC games only to arrive at our rankings.

Without further ado, our Slow Grind measure:

Observations:

*  How’s that for a pretty clear correlation?  There are really only a couple of teams slightly out of alignment.  Vanderbilt might be a win higher than expected (the five SEC teams they beat combined for six SEC wins), Ole Miss (who lost head-to-head to Vanderbilt or both would be 4-4… which would be more in line with their defensive performances), and Tennessee (whose one win came thanks to its offense against winless-in-the-SEC Kentucky).

*  As far as tomorrow’s SEC Championship Game is concerned, Alabama holds a distinctive advantage over Georgia in this category.  It takes Bama’s opponents — on average — 16 more offense snaps to score a touchdown than it takes Georgia’s foes.  However, since safety Shawn Williams’ rant about his team’s “soft” defense, the Bulldogs have allowed just one touchdown over its last three SEC games (Florida none, Ole Miss one, Auburn none).  Over it’s final three SEC contests, UGA has allowed fewer TDs than Alabama has.  Of course, the Tide faced LSU, Texas A&M (and Johnny Manziel), and Auburn in its final three league games.  If the Georgia defense we’ve seen in SEC play since October 27th shows up in Atlanta, this could be a battle for the ages.  But if the Dawgs revert to the style of defense they played earlier in the season, give Alabama the edge in this area.

What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not the exact opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense?

Read the rest of this entry »

What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not the exact opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense? Read the rest of this entry »

What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not simply the opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense?

Read the rest of this entry »

What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not simply the opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense?

We do not count special teams scores or interception/fumble returns in this equation.  This is strictly a look at touchdowns — not total points — allowed by a team as compared to how many snaps a defensive unit was on the field.  Still, however, special teams and offensive production do factor in overall.  A good special teams unit will pin an opponent deep in its own end, forcing it to string together multiple plays to score (and with each additional snap run, there’s a greater chance for a turnover).  Steady, grind-it-out offenses can also eat up clock and limit a foe’s time of possession.

Happily, the folks at ElevenWarriors.com studied our numbers and found them to be quite accurate at predicting Big Ten success just as we’ve found them to correlate nicely with SEC wins.  The more we see them applied elsewhere — and the more they work — the better we feel.

Once we get deeper into the season, we’ll look at SEC versus SEC numbers, but for now — so early in the year — we’ll take the numbers from all games against FBS foes into account.

So here’s one of our old favorites, the Slow Grind measure…

Observations:

*  Keep in mind that so far this season SEC defenses are on the field for an average of 69.96 plays per game.

*  Hey, I thought Kevin Sumlin was supposed to be an offensive coach.  The Aggies — granted against just three FBS foes — are giving up less than a touchdown a game on defense when you simply go by the numbers.

* South Caroilna, Alabama and LSU are all in the top five in the SEC in terms of our Slow Grind measure.  No surprise.  Those three defenses were expected to rank at the top of the chart before the season started and they likely will when the season comes to a close.

* Hey, I thought Dan Mullen was supposed to be an offensive coach.  Like Sumlin at A&M, Mullen’s has to be pleased that his defense is playing as well as it has.  One reason the Bulldogs give up so few touchdowns?  They turn their opponents over — 15 takeaways total.

* Missouri, Vanderbilt, Kentucky, Tennessee and Arkansas… yikes.  When your opponents score a touchdown once every 18 or 19 plays, that’s pretty bad.  When they’re scoring once every 13.95 plays — as they are against the Razorbacks — it horrific.  The Hog offense is turning the ball over too often, but Paul Haynes’ unit just hasn’t put the brakes on anyone from Jacksonville State right on through Texas A&M last week.

What’s the opposite of a Quick Strike team that piles up points in the blink of an eye?  A defense-first club that forces its opponents to slowly grind out points over a large number of plays.  Thus… our Slow Grind measure.

Over the past five years we’ve found that a very efficient way of predicting a team’s success is to look at the number of plays said team forces its foes to run in order to score touchdowns.  This is not simply the opposite of our Quick Strike number (basically: points per offensive snap), but a totally different measurement (defensive snaps run for every defensive touchdown allowed).

Simply: How many plays must an offense run — on average — to score a touchdown against a specific defense?

We do not count special teams scores or interception/fumble returns in this equation.  This is strictly a look at touchdowns — not total points — allowed by a team as compared to how many snaps a defensive unit was on the field.  Still, however, special teams and offensive production do factor in overall.  A good special teams unit will pin an opponent deep in its own end, forcing it to string together multiple plays to score (and with each additional snap run, there’s a greater chance for a turnover).  Steady, grind-it-out offenses can also eat up clock and limit a foe’s time of possession.

Happily, the folks at ElevenWarriors.com studied our numbers and found them to be quite accurate at predicting Big Ten success just as we’ve found them to correlate nicely with SEC wins.  The more we see them applied elsewhere — and the more they work — the better we feel.

As we stated earlier in breaking down our Quick Strike measurement, we know that the season is young and that all teams have not played the same types of foes to date.  Once we get deeper into the season and are able to use numbers from SEC-versus-SEC contests only, this data will become more meaningful.

Still, with a quarter of the regular season behind us, we felt now would be a good time to take the lid off one of our old standards — the Slow Grind measure.  Have a look…

So what should you make of that?  That South Carolina is pretty darn good defensively.  Against Vanderbilt, East Carolina and UAB the Gamecocks have allowed just two touchdowns on defense in 209 plays run.  Jadeveon Clowney and crew are allowing a touchdown every 104.5 plays.

On the other end of the spectrum, there’s Arkansas.  Against Louisiana-Monroe and Alabama, the Razorbacks are letting their opponents score once every 14 plays.  That’s horrific.  The return of Tyler Wilson and a little bit of life on offense should help Paul Haynes’ defense greatly.

For our next trick, let us turn our attention to defense.  Below you will find our Slow Grind statistic.

Slow Grind is our means of measuring a team’s defensive efficiency.  The object of the game is to score points.  The harder you make your opponent work for his points, the more likely you’ll win the game.  Makes sense, no?

In our Slow Grind analysis, we compare the number of touchdowns allowed by each team to the total number of offensive plays run against that team.  Obviously, this also measure’s a team’s overall strength.  A good offense limits an opponent’s time of possession.  A good special teams unit hurts an opponent’s field position.  Those teams that force their opponents to run the most amount of plays in order to score — causing a “slow grind” for their opponents — are ranked at the top of our standings.

Again, we used only numbers from each team’s eight SEC games.


Slow Grind Rankings

Observations:

* Two defenses were far away better than the rest when it came to SEC play this year.  Alabama — despite replacing at least eight starters — was still nasty.  Who would expect less with Nick Saban running the show?  The other great D was… Mississippi State.  We’ve touted the work of Manny Diaz all year and this stat shows why.  The average SEC fan would probably have a hard time naming a single player from State’s defense, yet as a unit they were excellent.  Bama, folks should have seen coming… but MSU came out of nowhere.  Kudos to both.

* And coming in third… South Carolina.  The Cocks’ secondary has been porous at times this year, yes, but SEC foes still struggled to drive the ball consistently against Ellis Johnson’s bunch.  And where’s Auburn?  Waaayyyy down at 10th in the league.  One defense seemed bad, the other was bad.  Will that make a difference tomorrow in the Georgia Dome?  Or is Cam Newton so good that he can offset even the best defenses he faces.  (Ask Alabama.)

* On average, Carolina’s defense is on the field for 65 plays per contest.  Auburn’s D is on the field for 64.  Using their Slow Grind ratios, Carolina should allow 2.64 touchdowns tomorrow while Auburn should give up 3.60.  Go back and figure that up with our Quick Strike projections and you’ve got yourself a betting guide.  Probably not a good one, though.

* Florida’s and LSU’s defenses were solid, but neither lived up to expectations.  Could it be that their offenses put them in bad positions way too often.  Yes, it could be.

* Tennessee and Arkansas looked pretty bad on defense at times this season, but look at the plays run against them.  Sure, some of that goes back to not getting off the field on third down, but some of it is also attributable to the teams’ offenses.  Tennessee’s couldn’t stay on the field for much of the year.  Arkansas’ would score quickly.  Only Vandy’s defense played more snaps than UT’s and UA’s this season.

* Ole Miss and Kentucky had the worst squads in the SEC in 2010 in terms of defensive efficiency.  Kentucky needs an infusion of talent.  That’s easy to explain.  But at Ole Miss, the Rebels were expected to be solid on the defensive side of the ball.  And coordinator Tyrone Nix was a much sought-after guy last offseason.  He didn’t forget how to coach overnight.  Mississippi’s defensive woes were a head-scratcher.  And a killer.