by Aaron Schatz

Damn the torpedos, the conventional wisdom, and even other advanced metrics: DVOA is going to stick with the Kansas City Chiefs come hell or high water.

Last week, I noted that the No. 2 team had won the last five regular-season "DVOA Bowl" matchups pitting the top two teams in our stats against each other. The Los Angeles Rams made that six in a row with last night's win. But it was a close win. Kansas City's DVOA rating drops by less than one percentage point, and the Chiefs are still comfortably in first place.

In fact, the Chiefs finished with a higher DVOA than the Rams for the game, despite the loss. The Chiefs outgained the Rams 7.9 yards per play to 6.1 yards per play, and they had a 53 percent success rate compared to 45 percent for the Rams. That was enough to outweigh Patrick Mahomes' three interceptions, and give the Chiefs 47.4% DVOA for the game compared to 31.0% DVOA for the Rams. (Yes, that's higher than Kansas City's total DVOA for the season; the Chiefs went down insead of up overall because of changes in opponent adjustments on past games.)

It's worth noting that because of turnovers and some defensive stops late in the game, not to mention very strong opponent adjustments for playing each other, both Kansas City and the Rams ended up with better than average (i.e. negative) defensive DVOA in this game.

This was not the only game this week where the winning team had the lower DVOA rating. The first game of the week really stands out, as Green Bay lost to Seattle but earns 45.3% DVOA compared to -10.6% DVOA for the Seahawks. Green Bay outgained Seattle 7.5 yards per play to 5.5 yards per play; there were no interceptions and Seattle had both of the game's fumbles. Seattle did a much better job of grouping its successful plays into extended drives, as Green Bay had only one drive of seven plays while Seattle had five drives of at least seven plays. That big DVOA difference moves Green Bay up to No. 8 while Seattle drops from No. 8 to No. 12.

Another game where the winning team had the lower DVOA rating: Dallas 22, Atlanta 19. The Falcons had 6.4 yards per play with 56 percent success rate, while Dallas was at 5.1 yards per play with 48 percent success rate. Atlanta ended up with 17.8% DVOA while Dallas was at -10.2% DVOA. That lifted the Falcons from No. 22 to No. 18, while the Cowboys moved up just one spot from No. 23 to No. 22.

Cincinnati also ended up with slightly higher DVOA than Baltimore, and Jacksonville with slightly higher DVOA than Pittsburgh, but in those two cases the issue was that opponent adjustments were much different for each team.

There's one other game where the winning team had the lower DVOA rating, and after looking at a lot of splits from this game, I can't figure out why. Houston outgained Washington 5.5 yards per play to 3.8 yards per play, yet the final DVOA ratings were 17.4% for Washington and -9.3% for Houston. The best I can tell is that this comes from comparing gains to average in the down-and-distance, and Washington faced a lower average yards to go and therefore would need less yardage to have success. But overall I'm pretty stumped on this one. It moved Washington up from No. 19 to No. 16, while Houston dropped a spot to No. 14.

One game where the DVOA ratings clearly agreed with the score was New Orleans' blowout win over Philadelphia. In fact, I'm a little surprised the Saints' rating for this game is "only" 59.3%. The Saints have had their two best games of the year in the past two weeks, and while DVOA may not agree with other advanced metrics on how dominant the Saints have been for the entire season, DVOA definitely agrees that that the Saints are red hot.

Conventional wisdom says the Saints are the best team in the league. Our numbers put them behind not only the Chiefs and Rams but also (narrowly) behind the Chicago Bears. I explored the issues in last week's commentary, but another issue here is that the Saints' three weakest games were clearly the first three games of the season. The Saints were upset by Tampa Bay, then beat Cleveland by only three points and went to overtime with Atlanta. Since then, the Saints have been a far superior team, both on offense and on defense. The offense has gone from eighth in Weeks 1-3 to third in Weeks 4-11; the defense has gone from 31st in Weeks 1-3 to 13th in Weeks 4-11.

Here's a look at the top four teams, comparing Weeks 1-3 to Weeks 4-11. I'm throwing Chicago in here too, although as you can see, the Bears are structured in a very different way than the other top teams.

Weeks 1-3 Off DVOA Def DVOA ST DVOA Total DVOA KC 49.3% 19.0% 17.0% 47.3% LAR 27.5% -12.1% 1.0% 40.6% NO 10.0% 18.5% -0.9% -9.4% CHI -19.0% -26.8% 2.4% 10.2%

Weeks 4-11 Off DVOA Def DVOA ST DVOA Total DVOA KC 36.1% 0.4% 5.4% 41.1% LAR 32.9% 2.7% -0.2% 30.0% NO 30.6% -1.6% 4.0% 36.1% CHI 17.7% -18.9% -7.0% 29.5%

That's certainly a lot more like the team we all see on the field for New Orleans these last few weeks.

Let's finish up with an update on where Kansas City stands among the top teams in DVOA history. Again, last night's loss didn't cost them very much.

BEST OFFENSIVE DVOA

THROUGH 11 GAMES, 1986-2018 Year Team DVOA 2007 NE 49.8% 1998 DEN 41.5% 1993 SF 40.7% 2010 NE 40.4% 2004 IND 40.4% 2018 KC 39.5% 2002 KC 37.3% 1999 WAS 37.3% 1995 DAL 35.9% 2012 NE 35.2% 2011 GB 33.4% 2005 SD 33.2%

BEST TOTAL DVOA

THROUGH 11 GAMES, 1986-2018 Year Team DVOA 2007 NE 71.9% 1991 WAS 59.7% 1998 DEN 48.6% 2004 PIT 43.4% 1987* SF 43.4% 2018 KC 42.4% 2003 KC 42.1% 2002 TB 42.0% 2004 NE 41.7% 1994 DAL 40.2% 1995 DAL 40.2% 1999 STL 40.1% *No strike games included.

* * * * *

Playoff odds are currently updated through Week 11. The FO Premium DVOA database and snap counts should be updated by later tonight. (In fact, it looks like they're being updated as I post this.)

* * * * *

These are the Football Outsiders team efficiency ratings through 11 weeks of 2018, 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.

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.

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>

RK TEAM TOTAL

DVOA LAST

WEEK WEI.

DVOA RANK W-L OFFENSE

DVOA OFF.

RANK DEFENSE

DVOA DEF.

RANK S.T.

DVOA S.T.

RANK 1 KC 42.4% 1 42.1% 1 9-2 39.5% 1 5.7% 26 8.6% 1 2 LAR 32.1% 2 31.4% 2 10-1 31.3% 2 -0.6% 16 0.1% 16 3 CHI 22.4% 4 24.0% 4 7-3 5.7% 12 -20.9% 1 -4.2% 29 4 NO 21.8% 6 25.3% 3 9-1 24.1% 3 4.7% 24 2.5% 6 5 LAC 19.5% 3 20.0% 6 7-3 22.4% 4 -3.5% 11 -6.4% 32 6 PIT 19.2% 5 21.9% 5 7-2-1 16.8% 5 -3.3% 13 -1.0% 21 7 DEN 14.6% 9 16.4% 7 4-6 6.4% 11 -11.0% 4 -2.8% 26 8 GB 13.9% 10 15.3% 8 4-5-1 15.1% 6 -0.8% 15 -2.0% 25 9 BAL 12.6% 7 11.6% 10 5-5 4.1% 13 -8.5% 7 0.1% 17 10 NE 9.7% 11 11.7% 9 7-3 9.9% 9 0.1% 17 -0.1% 18 11 IND 9.0% 15 10.9% 11 5-5 6.8% 10 0.1% 18 2.4% 7 12 SEA 9.0% 8 8.6% 12 5-5 3.4% 14 -3.9% 10 1.7% 10 13 MIN 6.1% 14 7.4% 13 5-4-1 -2.6% 17 -10.4% 5 -1.8% 24 14 HOU 5.3% 13 5.9% 14 7-3 -10.2% 25 -13.3% 3 2.2% 8 15 CAR 5.1% 12 5.3% 15 6-4 10.1% 8 5.7% 25 0.7% 13 16 WAS -3.7% 19 -4.7% 17 6-4 -8.3% 23 -1.4% 14 3.1% 4 17 JAX -4.2% 17 -5.2% 18 3-7 -16.1% 28 -8.9% 6 2.9% 5 18 ATL -5.5% 22 -4.7% 16 4-6 14.3% 7 20.9% 32 1.1% 12 19 CIN -5.7% 21 -8.6% 20 5-5 0.0% 16 6.3% 27 0.6% 14 20 MIA -7.3% 20 -10.2% 21 5-5 -7.2% 21 4.6% 23 4.5% 3 21 NYG -9.1% 24 -7.6% 19 3-7 -2.7% 18 7.7% 28 1.4% 11 22 DAL -13.0% 23 -13.5% 24 5-5 -9.6% 24 1.9% 21 -1.5% 23 23 PHI -13.3% 18 -13.2% 23 4-6 -7.9% 22 4.2% 22 -1.3% 22 24 TEN -14.1% 16 -13.0% 22 5-5 -14.1% 26 1.8% 20 1.8% 9 25 CLE -15.5% 25 -15.6% 25 3-6-1 -18.1% 29 -7.8% 8 -5.2% 31 26 SF -18.3% 26 -18.4% 26 2-8 -14.2% 27 1.0% 19 -3.1% 27 27 NYJ -18.5% 27 -20.6% 27 3-7 -27.3% 30 -3.4% 12 5.4% 2 28 TB -23.4% 28 -26.2% 29 3-7 1.0% 15 20.2% 31 -4.2% 30 29 DET -24.7% 29 -22.5% 28 4-6 -5.8% 19 18.6% 30 -0.3% 20 30 OAK -27.6% 31 -29.1% 31 2-8 -6.1% 20 17.5% 29 -4.0% 28 31 BUF -28.5% 30 -26.5% 30 3-7 -43.2% 32 -14.8% 2 -0.1% 19 32 ARI -30.8% 32 -29.8% 32 2-8 -37.8% 31 -6.9% 9 0.2% 15

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. Teams that have had their bye week are projected as if they had played one game per week.

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. Teams that have had their bye week are projected as if they had played one game per week. PAST SCHEDULE lists average DVOA of opponents played this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative). It is not adjusted for which games are home or road.

lists average DVOA of opponents played this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative). It is not adjusted for which games are home or road. FUTURE SCHEDULE lists average DVOA of opponents still left to play this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative). It is not adjusted for which games are home or road.

lists average DVOA of opponents still left to play this season, ranked from hardest schedule (#1, most positive) to easiest schedule (#32, most negative). It is not adjusted for which games are home or road. 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).