by Aaron Schatz

Philadelphia pulls out to a comfortable lead in this week's DVOA ratings. There's a lot of shifting at the top, as most of last week's top teams lost this week. Pittsburgh plummets from fourth to 22nd after the Eagles blew them out. Carolina, Arizona, and Detroit were also ranked in the top six last week and now rank 14th, 15th, and 16th, respectively.

Next week, of course, we begin adding in opponent adjustments for the first time, and this will definitely affect Phildelphia's rating. Two of the Eagles wins come against the teams currently ranked 31st and 32nd, Chicago and Cleveland. However, I think it's fairly reasonable to assume that their third opponent, the Steelers, are not going to have a below-average DVOA all season, especially now that they are getting Le'Veon Bell back.

Opponent adjustments will also drop some of the top teams in offensive and defensive DVOA. The top two offenses, Oakland and Atlanta, have both played New Orleans this year, which is awful on defense again. Those two teams have also played each other, and each ranks in the bottom four for defense. Meanwhile, the top defense, Seattle, has played San Francisco (No. 28) and Los Angeles (No. 31). This makes the Vikings defense even more impressive with a closer look. The Vikings rank third on defense without opponent adjustments, but they haven't played an offense that ranked lower than 20th (Tennessee).

Taking our view from one specific team to the big picture, the overall trends in DVOA look remarkably similar to the overall trends for last year.

The league is much more condensed than usual. For most of last season, until Seattle went on its hot streak at the end of the year, whichever team ranked No. 1 was among the worst teams to ever rank No. 1 in DVOA. The worst team was usually among the best teams to ever rank last. The same thing is happening this year. The big win over Pittsburgh means that Philadelphia is no longer the lowest-rated No. 1 team ever through Week 3, but the rest of the top teams generally rate lower than the top teams usually rate after Week 3. At the bottom of the league, Cleveland has the highest DVOA ever for a team in last place after Week 3.

Defenses are more extreme than offenses. Last year was the rare year where the best defense was stronger than the best offense, and the worst defense was weaker than the worst offense. It's happening again so far this year. The top defense (Seattle) is farther from zero than the top offense (Oakland). The worst defense (Atlanta) is farther from zero than the worst offense (Houston).

The best teams generally feature the best defenses. If the best defenses are generally stronger than the best offenses, that means the top teams will mostly be powered by defense more than offense. Actually, last year the top teams were generally powered by both. Every team that finished in the top 10 in overall DVOA last year also had a top-12 defense. However, those teams also all had above-average offenses except for Denver. This year, a lot of the top teams so far are much stronger on defense than on offense. No. 1 Philadelphia ranks in the top five in both categories. However, four of the next five teams in overall DVOA this week have a defense in the top five and an offense with DVOA below zero: Kansas City (2), Seattle (3), Minnesota (4), and Baltimore (6). The only top teams that are balanced, other than Philadelphia, are Green Bay (5) and -- referring to this team as balanced is mind-blowing, but so far that's actually the case -- Denver (7).

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Then come the teams that are built more on offense than defense, plus the team that is built heavily on special teams: New England, now ranked 12th. The Patriots' huge win over Houston last Thursday night took care of our "undefeated teams with very low DVOA" problem. New England no longer has a really low DVOA, and Houston is no longer undefeated. The Patriots may seem too low at No. 12, but as noted in past weeks, their first two wins were built heavily on an unsustainable ability to convert third-and-long. Of course, in a week they will get Tom Brady back and won't have to worry so much about being stuck in third-and-long, so Patriots fans can probably feel good that their team is okay in the long run no matter what DVOA says.

As for the Texans, they now go from one of three 2-0 teams with negative DVOA to one of three 2-1 teams with negative DVOA. The Giants are still part of this group. Pittsburgh is now part of it too after that big loss to Philadelphia. But neither team is as low as Houston. The 2-1 Texans are way down at No. 30 in DVOA right now, ahead of only hapless Chicago and Cleveland.

And yet, the Houston Texans do not have the worst DVOA ever for a 2-1 team, and the Steelers and Giants don't even come close. It's kind of shocking how many teams have put up a really awful DVOA through three games by combining two close wins with one huge loss.

Year Team W-L DVOA Rank Final

W-L Final

DVOA Final

Rank Week 1-3 Results (loss in italics) 1991 PHX 2-1 -38.3% 26 4-12 -24.3% 25 24-14 at LARM, 26-10 at PHI, 24-0 at WAS 2007 DET 2-1 -29.8% 26 7-9 -29.0% 29 36-21 at OAK, 20-17 (OT) vs. MIN, 56-21 at PHI 1996 BUF 2-1 -29.1% 23 10-6 (WC) 2.4% 15 23-20 (OT) at NYG, 17-10 vs. NE, 24-6 at PIT 1992 DEN 2-1 -28.5% 21 8-8 -14.9% 22 17-13 vs. LARD, 21-13 vs. SD, 30-0 at PHI 1991 MIN 2-1 -27.1% 23 8-8 0.5% 16 10-6 at CHI, 20-19 at ATL, 17-14 vs. SF 1991 DET 2-1 -26.7% 22 12-4 (DIV) -1.2% 17 45-0 at WAS, 23-14 vs. GB, 17-13 vs. MIA 1989 PHX 2-1 -26.6% 23 5-11 -26.8% 27 16-13 at DET, 34-24 at SEA, 35-7 at NYG 2016 HOU 2-1 -26.5% 30 -- -- -- 23-14 vs. CHI, 19-12 vs. KC, 27-0 at NE 1998 PIT 2-1 -26.2% 25 7-9 -1.2% 16 20-13 at BAL, 17-12 vs. CHI, 21-0 at MIA 2010 ARI 2-1 -25.9% 27 5-11 -37.1% 32 17-13 at STL, 41-7 at ATL, 24-23 vs. OAK 2007 SF 2-1 -22.8% 23 5-11 -33.4% 31 20-17 vs. ARI, 17-16 at STL, 37-16 at PIT 2001 MIA 2-1 -22.8% 25 11-5 (WC) 9.0% 10 31-23 at TEN, 18-15 vs. OAK, 42-10 at STL 2012 CIN 2-1 -22.1% 27 10-6 (WC) 6.1% 12 44-13 at BAL, 34-27 vs. CLE, 38-31 at WAS

My, that's a lot of Arizona Cardinals teams, huh? Notice how the league used to keep them out of the desert early in the season, before they built the current retractable-roof stadium. You may also notice that the 1991 Redskins play a big role for two of these teams, so those are games that got moved significantly upwards with opponent adjustments. The 1991 Vikings are weird, the only team here that didn't have one big loss -- at least, not according to the score. They had three interceptions and two fumbles against Chicago in the 10-6 game in Week 1, but recovered both fumbles.

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Once again this season, we have teamed up with EA Sports to bring Football Outsiders-branded player content to Madden 17 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, beginning at 11am Eastern on Friday. We will also tweet out images of these players from the @fboutsiders Twitter account on most Fridays. The best player of each week, the Football Outsiders Hero, will require you to collect a set of the other four Football Outsiders players that week, plus a certain number of Football Outsiders collectibles available in Madden Ultimate Team packs.

The Football Outsiders stars for Week 3 are a special combination. It's both NFC North Week and Brotherly Love Week!

TE Travis Kelce, KC (FOOTBALL OUTSIDERS HERO) : Led all NFL tight ends with 38 DYAR in Week 3 (6-for-7, 89 yards, TD).

: Led all NFL tight ends with 38 DYAR in Week 3 (6-for-7, 89 yards, TD). C Jason Kelce, PHI : No sacks or hurries allowed; Eagles RB had 53 yards on 10 carries up the middle.

: No sacks or hurries allowed; Eagles RB had 53 yards on 10 carries up the middle. WR Marvin Jones, DET: Led all NFL receivers with 93 DYAR in Week 3 (6-for-8, 205 yards, 2 TD).

Led all NFL receivers with 93 DYAR in Week 3 (6-for-8, 205 yards, 2 TD). ROLB Nick Perry, GB : NFL-leading 5 defeats in Week 3. Three run TFL, 2 sacks, PD.

: NFL-leading 5 defeats in Week 3. Three run TFL, 2 sacks, PD. CB Xavier Rhodes, MIN: Shut down Kelvin Benjamin, whose only target of the day came when covered by Marcus Sherels. Rhodes had 75 percent success rate on four targets while covering other receivers.

It's too bad we did Jordan Berry last week, and doing punters in two straight weeks would be a bit silly. Otherwise, we would have Ryan Allen this week for his absolutely insane performance against Houston last Thursday night: 47.6 gross yards per punt with 0 punt return yards allowed and four punts inside the Houston 10.

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All stats pages are now updated through Week 3 of 2016. Snap counts and playoff odds are also fully updated. A quick note on playoff odds: performance of the Dallas offense after three weeks suggests that the drop in production from Tony Romo to Dak Prescott is not as large as originally projected. Therefore, the playoff odds now increase the Dallas rating by 5.5% when Tony Romo returns, rather than 11.5%. (The Dallas rating with Romo still ends up being close to what we expected it to be before the season, but the rating without Romo is now higher.)

Please note that next Tuesday's posting of DVOA and commentary may be delayed a bit due to the Jewish holidays.

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These are the Football Outsiders team efficiency ratings through three weeks of 2016, 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. As always, positive numbers represent more points so DEFENSE is better when it is NEGATIVE.

Please note that there are no opponent adjustments in DVOA until after Week 4. (It's still listed as DVOA instead of VOA because I don't feel like going through and changing all the tables manually.) In addition, our second weekly table which includes schedule strength, variation, and Estimated Wins will appear beginning after Week 4.

DAVE is a formula which combines our preseason projection with current DVOA to get a more accurate forecast of how a team will play the rest of the season. Right now, the preseason projection makes up 65 percent of DAVE. (This is a slight change from previous years, when the preseason projection made up 60 percent of DAVE after Week 3.)

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>