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.
Malik Willis — 2026 Every split →
Adj EPA / dropback
-0.082
Raw EPA / dropback
-0.069
Dropbacks
205
Turnover EPA
-24.8
WPA
-0.35
| Week | Opp | Dropbacks | Adj EPA/db | Raw EPA/db | Schedule | Total adj EPA | INT / FL | Turnover EPA | Sacks | Sack EPA | WPA | CPOE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | LV | 32 | -0.240 | -0.172 | -0.068 | -7.7 | 1 / 0 | -2.3 | 5 | -8.5 | -0.02 | -8.9 |
| 2 | SF | 27 | +0.143 | +0.165 | -0.022 | +3.9 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 4 | -4.4 | +0.01 | -8.6 |
| 3 | KC | 36 | -0.087 | -0.112 | +0.025 | -3.1 | 1 / 0 | -3.3 | 0 | +0.0 | +0.01 | -7.1 |
| 4 | MIN | 19 | -0.530 | -0.653 | +0.123 | -10.1 | 0 / 1 | -4.7 | 2 | -7.3 | -0.30 | -12.3 |
| 5 | CIN | 30 | -0.431 | -0.370 | -0.061 | -12.9 | 2 / 1 | -11.9 | 3 | -9.0 | -0.34 | -1.8 |
| 7 | NYJ | 23 | +0.382 | +0.496 | -0.114 | +8.8 | 0 / 0 | +0.0 | 2 | -3.1 | +0.38 | -4.5 |
| 8 | NE | 38 | +0.116 | +0.080 | +0.035 | +4.4 | 1 / 0 | -2.5 | 5 | -6.2 | -0.09 | +2.3 |
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.