FanPost

By the numbers: Chief Week

Perhaps the biggest game of the year is less than a week away. I can't remember a game I've been more anxious for in a quite awhile. First some thoughts on the SD game.

35

The Chargers ran 35 times against us, thinking they could run to victory. What a plan McCoy! I wasn't a fan of McCoy when he was in Denver (I'm a huge fan if he's in San Diego though) and his game plan against us was exactly why. He might be able to change an offense to fit Tim Tebow (not an easy task) but thinking that TOP can beat Manning is crazy considering it's been tried over and over and failed over and over. It would be forgivable if he didn't have a decent QB, but Rivers has been terrific this year. Fine with me though.

21-6 at the half

This game was basically over at half time. According to pro-football reference, SD had a 2.4% chance of winning when they went to the locker room at halftime.

0

Zero penalties on the late hits on Manning. To me it looked like the Chargers were Vickersoning throughout the game. Maybe not as obvious as the master himself, but that last one where PM got hurt really chapped my you know what. I'm usually not one to gripe about officiating, but the officiating has reeked so far this year. That said, our line better be ready to play against KC. I have a feeling KC will try Vickersoning too so we'll need to make sure the refs are watching.

25 plays for 32yds, 1 FL, 2 sacks

Our offense was feast or famine. On the 6 drives where we didn't score a TD, we gained 1.3 yds per play and lost a fumble. On 5 of those drives Manning only completed 5 of 11 short passes for 28 yds. Our short passing game sucked. Welker was out of sync. We need the short passing game against KC.

Kansas City

The "Actual" row is the current team stat after 7 weeks.

The "Expected" row is the average of the opposing team's games.

The resulting "Difference" row suggests whether a team is out performing or under performing their opponents. Please note that on offense we want a positive number, on defense a negative one.

Offense

QB Rating

Yds/Rush

3rd D Conv. %

Turnovers

Points

Denver Actual

120.6

3.7

49.5

18

371

Denver Expected

94.4

4.2

39.1

12.4

212

Denver Difference

+ 26.2

- .5

+ 10.4

-5.6

+ 159

Denver Diff. Per gm.

+ 26.2

-.5

+ 10.4

-.6

+ 17.7

KC Actual

81.4

4.2

36

8

215

KC Expected

89.8

4.1

40.1

12.7

216

KC Difference

- 8.4

+ .1

- 4.1

+ 4.7

- 1

KC Diff. Per gm.

- 8.4

+ .1

- 4.1

+ .5

0

The first thing I will say is that KC's offensive numbers are not typical of an undefeated team. We all know this but the numbers objectively prove it. The key stat here is QBR which correlates to winning in 2013 almost 90% of the time. We have a huge edge here. The TO picture is the scary part to me. KC is a good ball control offense in terms of taking care of the ball, although if they are forced in to 3rd down situations, they underperform their competition. They have scored about what you'd expect to, though this is only because their defense has scored so much. In other words their offense is actually worse than this looks. I think KC is one of the poorest offenses we'll face this year. We way out class this team offensively, so the interesting part of this game to me is the defense.

Defense

QB Rating

Yds/Rush

3rd D Conv. %

Turnovers

Points

Denver Actual

83.7

3.4

38.3

16

238

Denver Expected

84

4.0

38.3

14

198

Denver Difference

- .3

- .6

0

- 2

+ 40

Denver Diff. Per gm.

- .3

- .6

0

- .2

+ 4.4

KC Actual

67.8

5

25.8

23

111

KC Expected

80

4.1

35.6

14.7

171

KC Difference

- 12.2

+ .9

- 9.8

- 8.3

- 60

KC Diff. Per gm.

- 12.2

+ .9

- 9.8

- .9

- 6.7

Denver Diff Per gm last3

- 11.5

- .5

- 6

- .6

+ 2

KC Diff Per gm last3

+ 8.5

- .6

+ 6.4

0

- 5

First of all we need say this is a good defense. It is difficult to score on them, they take the ball away, and they get after the QB. They are holding their opponents about a 7 points below their average. They are most vulnerable against the run, but this is a passing league, and they we're a passing team. I will be shocked if we run all over them.

On the other hand our defense is improving. Most of our "difference" numbers were positive just a few weeks ago and now they are negative. At the bottom of the graph above, I've taken out just the last 3 games for both defenses. As you can see, our QBR is much better, as is 3rd D Conversion %, and even points. We are only giving our opponent a little over a FG more than they average which really isn't bad.

But if you look at KC, their defense is going the other direction. They have been much better against the run, but much poorer against opposing QB's and on 3rd down. This defense has peaked and hopefully we can expose them further.

The following data is a collection of information about the offenses taking the field on Sunday night. I was impressed just how poorly KC has performed on offense. This chart is broken down into two different scenarios: offensive production when getting the ball off a kick (punt, KO or long field scenario) and offensive production when getting the ball off a turnover (INT, FR, DOWNS, Missed FG, or short field scenario).

Off Kicks

# Drives

Yds to EZ

TD

FG

# 3&out

Drives

70+yd Drives

Total Pts

KC

83

74

12

14%

8

10%

24

29%

10

12%

108 pts

Den

88

75

36

41%

9

10%

22

25%

27

31%

279 pts

Off TO

KC

21

39

4

19%

10

48%

4

19%

1

5%

58 pts

Den

16

49

8

50%

3

19%

3

19%

1

6%

65 pts

KC is easily one of the 5 worst scoring offenses on almost every column. Only TB and NYJ has fewer 70 yard drives (even Jacksonville has more). Only Jacksonville, TB, and Oak have scored fewer points when getting the ball off a kick. I could go on but suffice it to say that KC has an awful offense. I even went back and looked at the data from the infamous Tebow led offense from 2011 and KC is even worse than that was.

What really surprised me was that even with a short field, KC still can't get the ball in the EZ. All those turnovers the defense gets them only has led to 4 TD's on the year. I won't belabor the point, the data speaks for itself. This is the worst offense we'll face this year except for Jacksonville. But they are 9-0...

KC will need to win this game with their defense and ST. They have the potential to upset us, but they will have to play lights out. The most interesting part of this match up to me will be to see whether our defense continues it's recent trend of improvement. We should be able to easily hold them under 20 pts. which won't beat us unless their defense also scores.

Closing fact: In 96 drives that opponents have gotten the ball off a punt or KO, the KC defense has forced their opponents into 36 three and out drives. In 97 such situations, the Denver defense has forced 35. Is our defense as bad as people think? No.

This is a Fan-Created Comment on MileHighReport.com. The opinion here is not necessarily shared by the editorial staff of MHR.