Before we completely shift our focus to all things Arizona Cardinals vs. St. Louis Rams, I thought we could take a look at some numbers, stats and other random musings that caught my eye. First, we can update our weekly look at Football Outsiders' stats. If you're new to ROTB and unfamiliar with Football Outsiders, or you just need a refresher course, check my previous explanations (here and here).
- As you might expect the offense is still studly ranking 5th overall in DVOA, but the defense....not so much. They're falling like a rock after being in the top 10 before the Dallas game and they check in at 15th.
- Kurt is still awesome, although he did dip slightly in DVOA (value over average) to 5th (from 4th last week). He did hold 3rd in DYAR (yards above replacement). And to update his actual season projections, he's now on pace for 4,775 yards (that would be the 5th most yards ever in a single season).
- Edge and Hightower are still rated incredibly low with Edge (-3.6%) just below average and Higtower barely above (.2%)
- Fitz, Q and Breaston are all rated very high with all three in the top ten in DYAR and in the top 20 in DVOA. Another interesting tid-bit is that of the top 25 receivers in the league, only seven of them have catch percentages above 70%. Boldin and Breaston are two of them and Fitzgerald still comes in a very respectable 63%. One final stat to consider is that all three of these guys are on pace for 1,000 yard seasons. I'm double checking this but I'm almost positive that's never happened before.
- Looking at drive stats, not much has changed. They're still 6th in yards per drive, 2nd in points per drive and first in TDs and punts per drive. An interesting note from Darren Urban is that they also lead the NFL in red-zone visits, red-zone points and red-zone TDs. On the flip side, the defense's drive stats are about what you'd expect from a unit that is struggling. They're 23rd in points allowed per drive, 24th in TDs per and 26 in interceptions per drive. One thing that doesn't help the defense is that they rank 27th in average starting field position.
- I'll leave you with some good news though. The Cardinals still have a 96.3% change of making the playoffs and winning the division. Sadly though our odds once the playoffs start have dropped. We're now only given a 21.7% chance (down from 30) to make the NFC Championship game and a 10.1% chance (down from 14.9) to win the game. Odds of a Super Bowl win have now dipped to 4.9% (down from 7.3) so all of you who were making plans to head to Tampa in February, just tap your breaks a bit.