Is NFL Week #1 a good leading indicator for the rest of the NFL season?

Let’s image the situation. NFL Week #1 is finally here.  Now it’s time to watch as much live NFL action as you can. In addition, after the games, you can check out all the highlights on cable. If you're really working overtime, you might even study every line in every NFL Box Score.

After you take all that in, is it easy to spot which squads will have a fairly decent offense and which will have a hard time moving the ball?

If an offense only generates a single field goal in Week #1, that’s not a good sign. Clearly, if a team gets shut out on opening day, that’s really a bad sign! Or is it? Before you answer, you might want to take a look at this study. The findings could surprise you!

We examined every NFL regular-season game played from 1995 to 2000. We studied every team in the NFL. We looked at Week #1 offensive output and compared it to rest-of-season production.  That gave us 180 case studies to explore. The table below illustrates just a handful of our case studies.

Table-I   NFL Case Studies: 1995–2000 (a partial listing)

In addition to the above, we reviewed 15 other variables for each Team-Year combination. Suffice it to say, we did a lot of number crunching. So what did we learn?

First, let’s look at those teams that only generated 0-3 points on opening day. We’ll pit those inept offenses against teams that really “showed us something” in Week #1. Specifically, offensive units that came out on opening day and put up 41 or more points! Let’s review Table-II and see how the Week #1 mavericks and duds performed during the rest of the NFL season.

Table-II Using Total Points as a Predictor

Guess what? As you can see from the above table, over the remainder of the NFL season, there is barely a difference between those teams that looked grand on opening day and those teams that just couldn’t move the ball. It’s amazing, but true.

FINDING #1: Simply looking at extreme Point Production Totals in Week #1 provides little help in forecasting total team offense in Weeks #2-17.

If offensive Point Production isn’t a good a predictor, then what is? We’ve all heard about the importance of a good running game in the NFL. But, is offensive rushing production in Week #1 a solid predictor of team offense?

TABLE-III, Using Total Rushing Yards as a Predictor

TABLE-IV, Using Yards per Rush as a Predictor

After consulting Table-III and Table-IV, we see rushing metrics offer us very little predictive capability. Amazingly, teams that rack up 185+ rushing yards on opening day, barely average more total yardage during the rest of the season, than teams that generate 0-55 rushing yards on opening day.

FINDING #2: Don’t assume a team displaying a dominate rushing attack in Week #1 will have an outstanding offense the rest of the season. Conversely, if a team doesn’t amass big yardage on the ground in Week #1, don’t count that offense out.

If Point Production and Rushing stats aren’t good guideposts for predicting offensive capabilities, what objective measures are?

FINDING #3: As it turns out, Passing Yards per Passing Attempt (PYPA) is one of the best objective predictors of future offensive production. However, even PYPA has limits.

TABLE-V, Using PYPA as a Predictor

If a team’s PYPA is over 8.25 in Week #1, on average, that team will generate 350 yards of offense per game during the rest of the NFL season. Thirty-four times, from 1995 to 2000, teams have been able to generate a PYPA of over 8.25 in Week #1.

To further enhance forecasting accuracy, we will combine the PYPA statistic with Passing Attempts.

FINDING #4: If an NFL team throws +25 times and can produce a PYPA greater than 8.25 on opening day, then 96% of the time, that team will end up having a reasonable offense that year. In addition, 62% of the time, that team will end up being a top tier offense.

TABLE- VI, Teams meeting the Week #1 25-8.25 Criteria

NOTE: Only one of the above teams, the 2000 Atlanta Falcons, ended up having a poor offense. After Week #1 play, the 2000 Falcons only averaged 268 yards of offense per game. On opening day of the 2000 season, the Falcons scored 15 points with 5 field goals and beat the visiting San Francisco 49ers, 36-28. However, the 49ers secondary was very inexperienced and at one point, the 49ers actually used 5 rookies on defense.  

In addition to identifying teams that should do reasonably well, the PYPA statistic can be used to find teams that will have problems on offense.

To find teams most likely to struggle on offense, locate ones that have a PYPA less than 5.1 and gained 0-80 rushing yards in Week #1. Most teams meeting the ‘5.1-80’ criteria will end up performing below NFL norms. In fact, they usually only average about 300-315 yards of offense per game the rest of the season. 

Fantasy Football and ways to exploit this research: As Week #1 ends, that’s the time to put these principles into practice. Think about these findings and see how they might work in your league.

First, look for some waiver wire pickups. Using these findings, identify and pick up an available defense that will be playing a feeble offense several times in the coming weeks.

Also, look for available player talent on a team that shows promise according to these guidelines. This research suggests opportunities exist to find sleepers and avoid duds.

In addition, look for value and try to trade for quality talent on a team that may have struggled based on traditional stats in Week #1, however, had a decent PYPA.

Also consider how you might exploit a ‘big-name’ player on your roster, if his team is likely to struggle on offense based on these findings. In making the trade, be sure to get quality for your ‘big-name’ talent.

Finally, after you think about how this research fits your situation, be sure to strike while the iron is hot!

Greg
Article by Greg Alan. Greg is a leading contributor at 4for4.com and a respected analyst with pioneering interests in Artificial Intelligence, advanced statistical methods and sports research. 

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