In trying to evaluate the teams in the playoffs this year one thing jumped out in the statistics. Many of the high powered offenses in the NFC had played few top defenses, and many of the defensive leaders in the AFC had played few top offenses. The question is to what degree the opposing defenses in the NFC are deficient as opposed to simply having bad numbers due to facing Rodgers, Brees, Stafford, etc. To address this I geeked out for a while with bunches of numbers and came up with a power index that takes into account average opponents O&D rankings, net points per game adjusted for opponents NPPG, number of wins, number of games played against teams with winning records and turnover differential. I then discovered some stats Brian Billick compiled and from his numbers I added rankings for, explosive play differential, 3rd down O&D efficiency, and red zone O & D efficiency. I then checked injury status for each team, made up a number to account for them and adjusted each accordingly. Below the Kosmark for table of rankings and predictions for wild card weekend....
KBPI-III
TO Net TO factor New Index Billick Total injuries KBPI-III
Bal 39.1 +2 0.4 39.5 12.2 51.7 -1.0 50.7
Pit 42.0 -13 -2.4 39.6 7.6 47.2 -6.0 41.2
GB 28.2 +24 4.5 32.7 5.2 38.2 0.0 38.2
NO 32.5 -3 -0.6 31.9 7.6 39.5 -2.0 37.5
Hou 39.5 +7 1.3 40.8 6.8 47.3 -10.0 37.3
Atl 24.7 +8 1.5 26.2 6.0 32.2 0.0 32.2
SF 24.9 +28 5.3 30.2 1.8 32.0 0.0 32.0
Det 19.6 +11 2.1 21.7 10.2 31.9 -1.0 30.9
NE 24.2 +17 3.2 27.4 2.8 30.2 0.0 30.2
Cin 17.9 0 0.0 17.9 0.0 17.9 0.0 17.9
NYG 11.1 +7 1.3 12.4 4.0 16.4 0.0 16.4
Den -6.8 -12 -2.3 -9.1 0.6 -8.5 -3.0 -11.5
Wildcard weekend predictions:
Atlanta O #10, D #12 adj O #14.3 D #10.5 Net 24.8 val 7.2 Index 32.2
New York Giants O #8, D #27 adj O #8 D #25.6 Net 33.6 val -1.6 Index 16.4
33 - 24 Atlanta
Detroit O #5, D #23 adj O #9.5 D #21.4 Net 30.9 val 1.1 Index 30.9
New Orleans O #1, D #24 adj ... O #5.8 D #24.1 Net 29.9 val 2.1 Index 37.5
42-27 New Orleans
Pittsburgh O #12, D #1 adj ... O#7.6 D#7.1 Net 14.7 val 17.3 Index 41.2
Denver O #23, D #20 adj O #26.2 D #18.6 Net 44.8 val -12.8 Index -11.5
20-3 Pittsburgh
Cincinatti O #20, D #7 adj O #15.1 D #12.6 Net 27.8 val 4.2 Index 17.9
Houston O #13, D #2 adj O #10.6 D #2.2 Net 12.8 val 19.2 Index 37.3
23 - 13 Houston