Game quality
How well each team played, beyond the score: EPA (expected points added) per play, adjusted for the opponent. A big day against a bad defence counts for less. Season views include playoff games.
Sam Darnold — 2026 Every split →
Adj EPA / dropback
-0.062
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.071
Dropbacks
228
Turnover EPA
-45.8
WPA
-0.57
| Week | Opp | Dropbacks | Adj EPA/db | Raw EPA/db | Schedule | Total adj EPA | INT / FL | Turnover EPA | Sacks | Sack EPA | WPA | CPOE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | NE | 3 | -0.652 | -0.692 | +0.040 | -2.0 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 1 | -2.1 | -0.07 | -24.2 |
| 3 | WAS | 45 | +0.004 | +0.091 | -0.086 | +0.2 | 2 / 0 | -13.5 | 0 | +0.0 | +0.18 | +5.3 |
| 4 | LAC | 25 | -0.148 | -0.207 | +0.059 | -3.7 | 1 / 0 | -5.7 | 3 | -1.8 | -0.04 | +0.3 |
| 5 | SF | 34 | -0.392 | -0.354 | -0.038 | -13.3 | 2 / 0 | -8.9 | 5 | -7.5 | -0.53 | +0.1 |
| 6 | DEN | 55 | -0.042 | -0.121 | +0.079 | -2.3 | 2 / 0 | -6.8 | 5 | -10.1 | -0.25 | -4.6 |
| 7 | KC | 28 | +0.477 | +0.434 | +0.043 | +13.3 | 1 / 0 | -5.6 | 0 | +0.0 | +0.22 | +3.8 |
| 8 | CHI | 38 | -0.167 | -0.171 | +0.004 | -6.3 | 1 / 0 | -5.4 | 3 | -2.2 | -0.09 | -16.9 |
How the ratings are built
Opponent adjustment. A unit's rating for a game is its average over its other games that season, blended with 16 games' worth of prior (league average plus half of last season's gap from it; 24 games for pass defence, which is noisier). Early in a season that leans on last year; by midseason it is mostly this year. Chosen by how well it predicts a held-out game: it cut that error by about a quarter against no shrinkage, and adjusted numbers agree between odd and even weeks more than raw ones do (team EPA margin r 0.52 → 0.55, defence 0.32 → 0.36, QB EPA/dropback 0.47 → 0.49, 2016–2025).Win expectancy is a logistic fit of wins on EPA margin over 6,036 completed games (it names the winner 86.5% of the time). These describe what happened; one game is not a forecast. Play-by-play credits the quarterback with every sack and dropback, so a bad line shows up in his numbers. Seasons 2016–2026, built 2026-11-07 11:05 UTC, from nflverse. Write-up:
backtests/nfl_game_quality/FINDINGS.md.