by Vincent Verhei

The following is a slightly edited version of a conversation from this weekend's edition of Audibles:

Me: Do the Falcons have the NFL's best "triplets" with Matt Ryan/Devonta Freeman/Julio Jones? Ben Roethlisberger's injury takes Pittsburgh out of the equation. Cincinnati and New England don't qualify because they can't pick a running back. Only other option I can see is Aaron Rodgers/Eddie Lacy/Randall Cobb in Green Bay. Aaron Schatz, my boss: Freeman is not one of the best running backs in the league. I appreciate what he's done the last couple weeks, but that's significantly about the defenses he's faced. In the preseason, it seemed like he was going to gradually lose his job to Tevin Coleman over the course of the year, but now Coleman's on the sidelines with a rib injury. I don't remember ever reading anyone saying that Freeman even had the possibility of developing into one of the top five backs. Not to take away what he's done in these two games, he's been great, and it's not just because he has huge holes. But when Roethlisberger comes back, the Steelers easily have the league's best triplets. Otherwise, even though I prefer a downfield receiver like Julio Jones to a slot guy like Cobb, I would have to go with Green Bay. Tom Gower, my colleague: Not watching this game today aside from the highlights I see on Red Zone, but Freeman is having success the same way Justin Forsett is, by being in the right scheme, where he's a good fit and you can utilize his strengths. Have people really been talking about him as one of the best backs in the league?

Well, since Quick Reads is a column devoted to the study of individual statistics, this seems an ideal place to look at each team's triplets (top quarterback, top running back, and top wide receiver/tight end) and determine which is best. Let's start with the Atlanta trio. Matt Ryan ranks fifth among quarterbacks with 435 DYAR (424 passing, 11 rushing). Devonta Freeman leads all running backs with 131 (87 rushing, 44 receiving). And Julio Jones is second among all receivers with 175 (all receiving).

How does that compare to the triplets of other teams? The simplest way to answer that question would be to just total the DYAR of all 32 sets of triplets and see who comes out on top, but to a large part that ends up being a ranking of all quarterbacks. Instead, we can use the harmonic mean of each player's individual DYAR. You can learn all about the harmonic mean here, but in layman's terms, it accounts for all numbers within a given dataset, while "penalizing" low figures more than it "rewards" high figures. It's not a perfect measurement, in part because it breaks down in analysis of negative numbers, but since were only looking for the elite anyway, it'll be good enough for now.

The Falcons' triplets have a harmonic mean of 192 DYAR, which is the highest total of the league through Week 4 (not counting the Detroit-Seattle Monday night game).