Week 11 Colts Offensive Rankings and Analysis:

Each week during the season, I will be walking through the data from the previous Colts game and analyzing the numbers to form a sort of “what happened” narrative, as well as comparing the Colts against all other teams in the league. For a glossary of the stats listed, reference Season Stats. Thanks to Pro Football Reference, NFL.com, Football Outsiders, and the nflFastR project for being awesome sources of weekly data.

The Colts offense was both hot and cold in week 11. They had 6 scoring drives, which is fantastic, but on the non-scoring drives, they earned 0 first downs and -6 yards. You read that right, 6 three-and-outs for negative yardage.

So, its no real surprise that their total numbers aren’t that great. A 66.7% Drive Success Rate is a 29th percentile offensive performance and 28 yards per drive is nothing to get too excited about.

However, they made it count when it mattered. Matt Gay went 3 for 3 on field goals and Anthony Richardson led two 70-yard drives for 14 points to end the game.

TEAM TOTALS

(Use the right-left arrows to toggle between stats for the week and the season).

Indy’s 2.33 points per drive ties for 15th on the week. They were 18th in conversion rate (1st/ply) and 15th in Success Rate (adj TSR). That all supports the “average” outcome of 6 three-and-outs offset by 6 scoring drives.

But as I said before, they made it count when it mattered with the 10th most explosive play yards, which helped secure the 11th best EPA per play. So, they were average in number of successful plays, but very good in keeping the value of the negative plays low and positive plays high.

The season PPD increased +0.05 to 1.88, but ironically drops 1 spot to rank 18th. They also drop 2 spots in DSR to 24th, which is not good.

PASS TOTALS

(Use the right-left arrows to toggle between stats for the week and the season).

The really good news is the passing game was on fire. 7th in EPA per dropback and 8th in passing Succes Rate are by far the best numbers any Colts QB has put up all year (maybe for a few years, but I am too lazy to look it up).

Anthony Richardson led the team to the 7th best first down conversion rate off of the 8th best net yards per dropback. The conversion rate shows that the yards weren’t just deep bombs and nothing else. He was consistently making completions of all depths, which meant moving the chains well on pass plays.

On the year, that lifts the Colts 1 spot to 19th in passing by EPA/d and 27th in Passing Success Rate.

RUSH TOTALS

(Use the right-left arrows to toggle between stats for the week and the season).

The bad news is the run game was going nowhere, literally and figuratively. Normally, I warn against using YPC as a measure of how well the run game performed, but in this case it is warranted. 2.6 YPC is the 6th worst of the week and their 14.3% conversion rate was 3rd worst.

They only went 1 for 5 on third downs, but fortunately AR managed 2 rushing TDs, which lifted the EPA measure a bit (19th EPA/d).

Overall, I rank the Colts rushing 21st for the week and that drops them 3 spots to 19th on the year. They are a bunch of teams right behind them with similar adj RSR numbers so, they could easily fall another 5 spots unless they can turn it around. The run game started so promising, but has turned into a big disappoinment.

CONCLUSION & LOOK AHEAD

Great passing + bad rushing = meh offense. The team leaned on the run and it didn’t pay off and so Anthony Richardson picked the perfect time to wake up and have a complete game. His performance was the biggest variable in the win.

On the year, the team keeps inching towards being average.

Next, the Colts offense will be tested by the 4th ranked Detroit Lion defense (PPD). They are # 1 in defensive EPA per play, partially driven by their 3rd best take-away rate. They give up the lowest 3rd down conversion rate to opponents and have the 6th best defensive play success rate. Joy.

They are great against the pass, with the 2nd best defensive EPA/d and the 9th best defensive PSR. However, opponents manage the 10th most explosive pass plays against them, so the Lions are not great against deep passing. They also don’t pressure the QB a lot (14th Pass Rush Win Rate). So, maybe there is a window there that AR can exploit.

They are also reslly good against the rush with the 6th best defensive adj Rush Success Rate and the #1 defensive Rushing DVOA. They give up the 6th lowest conversion rates on the ground to go along with the 2nd lowest EPA per carry. Kill me now.

I got no motivational speech here. It’s going to be tough. Win one for the Gipper?