by Aaron Schatz

With a big win over division rival St. Louis, the Seattle Seahawks once again ascend to the top of the Football Outsiders DVOA ratings, just in time to finish No. 1 for the entire season for the third straight year. The Seahawks also take over the top spot in weighted DVOA and are our current favorite to win the Super Bowl, taking the Lombardi Trophy in 26.2 percent of our simulations. Seattle now looks like the best team in the league whether you are asking about the short term (recent weeks), medium term (the full 2014 season), or long term (since 2012). It's been a remarkable run of quality football.

Seattle is only the second team to ever finish No. 1 in DVOA for three straight seasons, going back to the first year we currently have ratings (1989). Dallas did it as well from 1992-1994. The only other team to repeat at No. 1 overall was Green Bay in 1996-1997.

Seattle also climb past Detroit and Buffalo this week to finish the year as the No. 1 team in defensive DVOA for the second straight season. The 1993-1994 Pittsburgh Steelers were the only other team to finish No. 1 in defensive DVOA for two straight years. On offense, the Seahawks finish with one of the top five team rushing DVOA ratings we've ever measured, just below 30.0%. The only teams above that were the 2000 Rams, 2011 Panthers, 1998 Broncos, and 1993 49ers.

This year's Denver Broncos held the top spot in overall DVOA since Week 5, but they've gradually been fading over the second half of the season and they finally fall into second place this week. Yes, that also means that Seattle and Denver have now finished 1-2 for three straight years. From 1989 through 2012, the same two teams never finished 1-2 for two straight years.

Green Bay finishes third for the season, followed by New England and then Baltimore to round out the top five. There's a clear gap at that point between the top five teams and everybody else, led by Dallas at No. 6. However, that gap disappears in our weighted DVOA ratings because the Cowboys have been playing so well over the second half of the season. Actually, a more accurate statement is that the gap moves up. It's still there, but in weighted DVOA the gap is between the top two (Seattle and New England) and the next few teams (Green Bay, Denver, Baltimore, and Dallas -- still sixth, but much closer to the Ravens).

You may be wondering if it is accurate for our ratings to penalize the Patriots for a game where they sat many of their starters -- some for the entire game, some for just the first half -- and didn't necessarily try to win. This is a frustrating problem that we run into every couple of seasons. We've done research on it and never figured out a way to account for teams sitting starters that actually improved our ability to predict playoff results with the overall DVOA ratings. There are all kinds of issues here. Does it make sense to come up with an arbitary bonus to give a team to make up for the fact that they are playing backups? If we do this for Week 17, why not for other weeks when there are injuries? If we want to do that, how do we separate every player from his teammates to determine the value a team loses when he's out? Even if we wanted to only consider adjusting for situations where a team plays a backup quarterback, and only when it is on purpose (i.e., not a midseason injury), how do we deal with the fact that Tom Brady actually did play in the Week 17 loss, at least in the first half?

Plus, how do you handle the situation if a team plays better with the backups than with the starters? Of course, the overall ratings for the Patriots were affected by the players who were inactive for the entire game -- Rob Gronkowski being the most important, but also Julian Edelman, Donta Hightower, Brandon Browner, and two starting offensive linemen. However, the Patriots had a number of regular starters who came out around halftime. The offense had virtually the same offensive DVOA with Tom Brady at quarterback (-3.4% DVOA before halftime) as it had with Jimmy Garappolo at quarterback (-2.8% DVOA before halftime). And the defense was much worse with most of the starters on the field (36.1% DVOA before halftime) than it was in the second half with players such as Darrelle Revis, Jamie Collins, and Vince Wilfork on the sidelines (-19.6% DVOA after halftime).

And just in case the whole "sitting starters" issue isn't annoying enough, there's also the problem that some teams (like the Patriots yesterday) will specifically play vanilla schemes in a meaningless Week 17 game, as if it were the preseason, even if they actually are using their starters on the field. Good luck adjusting DVOA for that.

The moral of the story is that in DVOA, pretty much every play counts, except for time-wasting nonsense at the end of a win or multiple-lateral silliness. When it comes to teams that sit starters in Week 17, we do the same thing we do when dealing with games where a team struggled because of specific player injuries -- we use common sense to talk about it when we talk about the numbers, and write words instead of just running tables.

Maybe we just have to deal with this every five years. You might remember the Colts deciding they didn't care about a perfect season back in 2009, and the Eagles playing a bunch of nobodies for two weeks because they were so far superior to the rest of the NFC in 2004.

OK, enough digression on this issue. Let's get back to talking about 2014. One of the general running themes of the DVOA commentaries this year has been that this was a year with very few extremes, very few examples of teams that were historically efficient or inefficient on either side of the ball. The final numbers for the year continue with this theme. This was only the third season since 1990 where no team was better than 12-4. (The others: 1993 and 2002.) The Seahawks were No. 1 in DVOA, but this year's rating (31.3%) is nowhere near their ratings for 2012 (38.7%, seventh all-time) and 2013 (40.0%, fifth all-time).

The lack of extremes is particularly strong when it comes to overall defense. The Seahawks' final defensive DVOA of -16.3% may lead the league for this season but is only 46th in DVOA history. Only twice has the No. 1 defense been closer to average than this year's Seahawks: the 2001 Eagles (-15.5%) and the 2007 Titans (-14.4%). In a fun bit of symmetry, the last-place Atlanta Falcons rank 46th among the worst defenses in DVOA history (+15.2%).

Split defense into passing and rushing, and things are a little different. The Buffalo Bills led the league with -18.1% pass defense DVOA, the first time in history that no team had pass defense DVOA below -20.0%. The Bills don't even rank among the 60 best pass defenses of the DVOA era. However, the Detroit Lions end up with one of the best run defenses in DVOA history. On both sides of the ball, the only place to find extreme quality this year was on the ground.

BEST RUN DEFENSE DVOA 1989-2014 x BEST RUN OFFENSE DVOA 1989-2014 Year Team DVOA Year Team DVOA 2000 BAL -36.6% x 2000 STL 36.5% 1991 PHI -34.9% x 2011 CAR 32.1% 1998 SD -32.9% x 1998 DEN 31.4% 2014 DET -31.3% x 1993 SF 30.5% 2006 MIN -30.5% x 2014 SEA 29.9% 1995 KC -30.5% x 2002 KC 29.3% 2010 PIT -29.0% x 1990 DET 29.2% 2008 BAL -28.6% x 2003 KC 28.9% 2000 TEN -27.4% x 1998 SF 27.8% 2007 BAL -27.3% x 2006 SD 27.2% 2000 SD -26.6% x 2005 DEN 26.8% 2011 CHI -26.5% x 2000 PIT 26.4%

By the way, when we looked at these tables a couple of weeks ago, the Denver Broncos also ranked among the best run defenses in DVOA history, while the Oakland Raiders were threatening to rank among the worst run offenses we had ever measured. In the three weeks since, the Raiders running game improved a little bit, saving them from that ignominy, while the Denver Broncos run defense hasn't been quite as strong as it was early in the season. Run defense DVOA turns out to be yet another of the many stats where Seattle passed Denver over the last couple weeks of the season.

This year brings us a couple of teams with a huge disparity between win-loss record and DVOA, particularly Arizona (which ends up 22nd despite going 11-5). However, for the most part, the teams with the most wins this year are at the top of DVOA, and the teams with the most losses are at the bottom. The five 12-4 teams all rank in the top six in DVOA, and the top ten teams in DVOA all had winning records The seven teams that went 5-11 or worse are the bottom seven teams in DVOA. The Jacksonville Jaguars end up at the bottom of the league for the third straight year, but just as this year's Seattle team isn't as good as the 2013 edition, so too the Jaguars were not as bad as last year. In fact, this is only the third season of the DVOA era where no team had an overall DVOA worse than -30.0%. (The others: 1995 and 2001.) The Jaguars also improved over the course of the year, moving up to 27th in weighted DVOA. Washington, on the other hand, was 28th in overall DVOA but dead last in weighted DVOA.

Philadelphia stayed in first place in special teams pretty much all year, with Baltimore right behind in second place. Miami ends up in last place for special teams, passing the Lions once Detroit figured out at midseason how to find someone who could actually hit a field goal.

[ad placeholder 3]

Other interesting notes on 2014:

Check out how close the Saints and Falcons ended up in all three phases of the game. The Saints are slightly better on offense, the Falcons slightly better on special teams, and the two rivals ended up with the two worst defenses in the NFL.

One preseason prediction that certainly did come true for us: Oakland had the hardest schedule in the league by leaps and bounds. The easiest schedules were in Texas, with Houston at No. 32 and Dallas at No. 31. The top four teams, who also won the four first-round byes, all had schedules close to the league average.

The Minnesota Vikings lost a player generally believed to be the best running back in football for almost the entire season and ended up fourth in run offense DVOA but 29th in pass offense.

Cleveland had a better pass defense than any team except Buffalo, but a more porous run defense than any team except New Orleans.

The Rams finished strong but were the least consistent team in the league. They had the highest variance overall, the highest variance on defense, and one of the five highest variance ratings on offense.

* * * * *

All team and individual stats pages are now updated with final 2014 stats. (Final pending later play-by-play changes by the league, of course.) FO Premium is also updated with all 2014 stats, and we've added special matchup pages for the four wild card games. We'll get individual 2014 stats onto all of our player pages sometime in the next few weeks.

Vince Verhei will discuss which players had the best and worst seasons by FO stats in tomorrow's Quick Reads Year in Review. Loser League results will be announced in Scramble for the Ball Wednesday, and our Playoff Challenge game will go up on the site sometime tomorrow.

* * * * *

Once again in 2014, we have teamed up with EA Sports to bring Football Outsiders-branded player content to Madden 15 Ultimate Team. Each week, we'll be picking out a handful of players who starred in that week's games. Some of them will be well-known players who stood out in DVOA and DYAR. Others will be under-the-radar players who only stood out with advanced stats. We'll announce the players each Tuesday in the DVOA commentary article, and the players will be available in Madden Ultimate Team packs the following weekend. We will also tweet out images of these players from the @fboutsiders Twitter account on most Fridays. One player each week will only be available for 24 hours from the point these players enter packs on Friday.

The Football Outsiders stars for Week 17 are:

LOLB Justin Houston, KC (24-HOUR HERO): 4 sacks, FF, PD

4 sacks, FF, PD WR Michael Floyd, ARI: No. 2 WR of the week by FO Stats, with 76 DYAR (8-for-12 for 153 yards and 2 TD).

No. 2 WR of the week by FO Stats, with 76 DYAR (8-for-12 for 153 yards and 2 TD). DT Bennie Logan, PHI: 6 run tackles for a combined 1 yard, including 2 TFL.

6 run tackles for a combined 1 yard, including 2 TFL. LOLB Pernell McPhee, BAL: 5 Defeats (2 sacks, PD, run TFL, and tackle to prevent third-down conversion on reception).

5 Defeats (2 sacks, PD, run TFL, and tackle to prevent third-down conversion on reception). LG Josh Sitton, GB: Helped limit Detroit defense to just one sack and QB hits.

* * * * *

[ad placeholder 4]

These are the Football Outsiders team efficiency ratings through the entire 2014 regular season, measured by our proprietary Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) system that breaks down every single play and compares a team's performance to the league average based on situation in order to determine value over average. (Explained further here.)

OFFENSE and DEFENSE DVOA are adjusted to consider all fumbles, kept or lost, as equal value. SPECIAL TEAMS DVOA is adjusted for type of stadium (warm, cold, dome, Denver) and week of season. WEIGHTED DVOA represents an attempt to figure out how a team is playing right now, as opposed to over the season as a whole, by making recent games more important than earlier games. As always, positive numbers represent more points so DEFENSE is better when it is NEGATIVE. LAST WEEK represents rank after Week 16, while LAST YEAR represents rank in 2013.

To save people some time, please use the following format for all complaints:

<team> is clearly ranked <too high/too low> because <reason unrelated to DVOA>. <subjective ranking system> is way better than this. <unrelated team-supporting or -denigrating comment, preferably with poor spelling and/or chat-acceptable spelling>

TEAM TOTAL

DVOA LAST

WEEK LAST

YEAR W-L WEI

DVOA RANK OFFENSE

DVOA OFF.

RANK DEFENSE

DVOA DEF.

RANK S.T.

DVOA S.T.

RANK 1 SEA 31.3% 2 1 12-4 32.8% 1 16.7% 5 -16.3% 1 -1.7% 19 2 DEN 29.5% 1 2 12-4 23.9% 4 19.9% 3 -13.3% 4 -3.7% 27 3 GB 23.3% 4 20 12-4 24.0% 3 24.6% 1 -1.0% 16 -2.3% 22 4 NE 22.4% 3 5 12-4 31.4% 2 13.6% 6 -3.4% 11 5.5% 5 5 BAL 22.2% 5 23 10-6 23.0% 5 9.7% 9 -4.6% 8 8.0% 2 6 DAL 13.8% 6 17 12-4 21.0% 6 17.0% 4 4.1% 22 0.9% 13 7 PHI 12.8% 7 8 10-6 16.8% 7 1.0% 13 -3.5% 10 8.3% 1 8 PIT 12.1% 8 15 11-5 14.8% 8 22.5% 2 11.3% 30 0.9% 12 9 BUF 10.6% 10 18 9-7 14.5% 9 -11.1% 26 -15.6% 2 6.2% 4 10 KC 9.9% 9 6 9-7 11.9% 10 4.6% 12 1.4% 19 6.7% 3 11 SF 6.6% 14 7 8-8 8.4% 11 -0.4% 16 -10.0% 5 -3.0% 24 12 IND 4.7% 15 13 11-5 1.8% 13 -0.9% 17 -2.3% 13 3.3% 8 13 CIN 4.6% 12 9 10-5-1 0.5% 17 -1.8% 18 -2.2% 14 4.2% 6 14 DET 4.4% 13 16 11-5 0.9% 15 -3.7% 19 -13.8% 3 -5.7% 31 15 MIA 3.4% 11 22 8-8 0.7% 16 10.2% 7 0.6% 17 -6.2% 32 16 SD 0.0% 16 12 9-7 -3.0% 20 7.6% 10 4.9% 24 -2.7% 23 TEAM TOTAL

DVOA LAST

WEEK LAST

YEAR W-L WEI

DVOA RANK OFFENSE

DVOA OFF.

RANK DEFENSE

DVOA DEF.

RANK S.T.

DVOA S.T.

RANK 17 NO -1.4% 17 4 7-9 -2.4% 19 10.0% 8 13.1% 31 1.6% 11 18 STL -4.4% 19 14 6-10 2.6% 12 -11.6% 27 -3.7% 9 3.5% 7 19 HOU -4.5% 20 30 9-7 1.7% 14 -6.7% 21 -6.1% 6 -3.9% 28 20 ATL -5.0% 18 25 6-10 -9.3% 24 7.2% 11 15.2% 32 3.0% 9 21 NYG -5.9% 21 27 6-10 -6.8% 22 -0.3% 15 5.0% 25 -0.6% 15 22 ARI -6.0% 22 10 11-5 -8.1% 23 -9.3% 23 -5.5% 7 -2.2% 21 23 CLE -6.9% 23 28 7-9 -10.0% 25 -10.0% 24 -2.6% 12 0.6% 14 24 MIN -8.8% 24 26 7-9 -2.0% 18 -7.4% 22 4.4% 23 3.0% 10 25 CAR -8.9% 26 3 7-8-1 -6.7% 21 -5.0% 20 -1.6% 15 -5.5% 30 26 CHI -14.0% 25 11 5-11 -23.6% 29 0.0% 14 10.9% 28 -3.1% 25 27 NYJ -14.9% 27 24 4-12 -10.9% 26 -10.7% 25 3.6% 21 -0.7% 16 28 WAS -26.7% 29 29 4-12 -39.0% 32 -11.7% 28 9.6% 27 -5.4% 29 29 OAK -27.0% 28 31 3-13 -28.2% 30 -19.5% 30 5.8% 26 -1.7% 18 30 TB -28.4% 32 19 2-14 -23.1% 28 -26.4% 32 1.2% 18 -0.8% 17 31 TEN -29.3% 30 21 2-14 -35.2% 31 -16.3% 29 11.2% 29 -1.8% 20 32 JAC -29.5% 31 32 3-13 -22.1% 27 -24.4% 31 1.5% 20 -3.6% 26

NON-ADJUSTED TOTAL DVOA does not include the adjustments for opponent strength or the adjustments for weather and altitude in special teams, and only penalizes offenses for lost fumbles rather than all fumbles.

does not include the adjustments for opponent strength or the adjustments for weather and altitude in special teams, and only penalizes offenses for lost fumbles rather than all fumbles. ESTIMATED WINS uses a statistic known as "Forest Index" that emphasizes consistency as well as DVOA in the most important specific situations: red zone defense, first quarter offense, and performance in the second half when the score is close. It then projects a number of wins adjusted to a league-average schedule and a league-average rate of recovering fumbles.

uses a statistic known as "Forest Index" that emphasizes consistency as well as DVOA in the most important specific situations: red zone defense, first quarter offense, and performance in the second half when the score is close. It then projects a number of wins adjusted to a league-average schedule and a league-average rate of recovering fumbles. 2014 SCHEDULE lists average DVOA of opponents played this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative).

lists average DVOA of opponents played this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative). PYTHAGOREAN WINS represent a projection of the team's expected wins based solely on points scored and allowed.

represent a projection of the team's expected wins based solely on points scored and allowed. VARIANCE measures the statistical variance of the team's weekly DVOA performance. Teams are ranked from most consistent (#1, lowest variance) to least consistent (#32, highest variance).

TEAM TOTAL

DVOA W-L NON-ADJ

TOT VOA ESTIM.

WINS RANK 2014

SCHED RANK PYTH

WINS RANK VAR. RANK 1 SEA 31.3% 12-4 27.2% 12.6 2 0.8% 13 11.9 1 13.6% 10 2 DEN 29.5% 12-4 29.3% 13.2 1 1.5% 12 11.0 4 8.5% 3 3 GB 23.3% 12-4 22.8% 10.7 5 -0.9% 16 11.2 3 13.2% 9 4 NE 22.4% 12-4 19.9% 10.9 4 1.6% 11 11.8 2 15.9% 18 5 BAL 22.2% 10-6 25.6% 11.6 3 -5.0% 30 10.9 5 8.9% 4 6 DAL 13.8% 12-4 16.3% 10.3 6 -5.4% 31 10.8 6 20.7% 27 7 PHI 12.8% 10-6 10.4% 9.7 7 -3.4% 28 9.7 10 14.7% 12 8 PIT 12.1% 11-5 13.4% 9.4 8 -4.2% 29 9.7 11 14.2% 11 9 BUF 10.6% 9-7 10.1% 9.0 10 1.7% 10 9.6 12 9.4% 6 10 KC 9.9% 9-7 9.4% 9.4 9 2.3% 6 10.1 8 19.5% 26 11 SF 6.6% 8-8 1.3% 9.0 11 2.0% 9 7.0 24 15.7% 15 12 IND 4.7% 11-5 7.2% 8.8 13 -3.1% 26 10.2 7 17.6% 22 13 CIN 4.6% 10-5-1 3.5% 8.9 12 0.3% 15 8.6 14 22.8% 31 14 DET 4.4% 11-5 9.1% 8.7 15 -2.1% 23 9.2 13 7.0% 2 15 MIA 3.4% 8-8 6.7% 8.7 14 2.9% 5 8.4 15 17.5% 21 16 SD 0.0% 9-7 -0.2% 8.1 16 4.2% 4 8.0 17 15.7% 16 TEAM TOTAL

DVOA W-L NON-ADJ

TOT VOA ESTIM.

WINS RANK 2014

SCHED RANK PYTH

WINS RANK VAR. RANK 17 NO -1.4% 7-9 -2.5% 7.6 17 -1.7% 20 7.4 20 21.1% 28 18 STL -4.4% 6-10 -5.7% 6.0 26 2.1% 8 7.1 21 26.9% 32 19 HOU -4.5% 9-7 3.6% 6.7 24 -6.2% 32 9.8 9 6.7% 1 20 ATL -5.0% 6-10 -2.3% 7.3 20 -3.3% 27 7.1 22 14.7% 13 21 NYG -5.9% 6-10 -9.9% 7.0 23 -2.0% 22 7.5 18 17.0% 20 22 ARI -6.0% 11-5 -7.0% 7.5 18 4.5% 3 8.3 16 9.0% 5 23 CLE -6.9% 7-9 -5.2% 7.1 22 -2.6% 25 6.9 25 18.0% 23 24 MIN -8.8% 7-9 -6.7% 7.2 21 -1.6% 18 7.5 19 11.6% 8 25 CAR -8.9% 7-8-1 -9.4% 7.4 19 0.7% 14 7.0 23 15.3% 14 26 CHI -14.0% 5-11 -18.5% 6.3 25 2.3% 7 4.9 26 9.9% 7 27 NYJ -14.9% 4-12 -18.6% 6.0 27 4.6% 2 4.8 27 17.0% 19 28 WAS -26.7% 4-12 -25.9% 4.4 29 -1.7% 19 4.5 28 22.4% 30 29 OAK -27.0% 3-13 -35.0% 4.8 28 7.3% 1 3.1 32 19.3% 25 30 TB -28.4% 2-14 -24.2% 4.0 30 -1.5% 17 4.4 29 21.3% 29 31 TEN -29.3% 2-14 -25.8% 4.0 31 -2.4% 24 3.3 31 18.7% 24 32 JAC -29.5% 3-13 -26.1% 3.3 32 -1.8% 21 3.6 30 15.9% 17

Please note that while this article is called "Final 2014 DVOA Ratings," we will continue with our unofficial postseason weighted DVOA ratings each Monday through the playoffs.