Analytics Recap: Kansas City Chiefs Defeat Atlanta Falcons 17-14
The Kansas City Chiefs improved to 14-1 and clinched home-field advantage on the road to Super Bowl LV after narrowly defeating the Atlanta Falcons 17-14. Patrick Mahomes had among the worst games of his career, throwing an interception and had at least a couple more turnover worthy plays. It is likely that Mahomes and several other major players will be done for the regular season with just one game remaining and nothing in the big picture to gain.
The final game of the Chiefs' regular season will be at Arrowhead Stadium on Sunday against the Los Angeles Chargers. The Chargers are on a three-game winning streak with their star rookie quarterback Justin Herbert off to one of the best starts to a career in NFL history.
Here are the advanced numbers from the Chiefs' win over the Falcons from Ben Baldwin's rbsdm.com.
EPA = Expected Points Added, SR = Success Rate, 1st% = First Down Rate
Behold, the rare sight where the Chiefs offense has a lower EPA per play than their opponent. Neither offense was particularly good, but the passing game for the Falcons was clearly the best working thing for either offense, having a 56% success rate and an EPA per play of 0.18. On early downs, both passing offenses were quite good, but the Chiefs' late down passing offense, in particular, was very poor.
Falcons wide receiver Calvin Ridley was totally dominant for Atlanta in this one, getting 7.4 EPA on his 10 targets. Hayden Hurst also balled out as the Falcons' second option, getting 5.2 EPA on his eight targets.
For the Chiefs, Tyreek Hill was the top receiver in regards to EPA with 3.5 EPA on six targets. However, Travis Kelce was the real top receiver, getting 5.5 EPA on 12 of his 13 targets. Kelce lost 7.0 EPA on the Mahomes interception because he was the targeted receiver, so that must be taken into account. Demarcus Robinson also did well, getting 3.3 EPA. His game-winning touchdown catch added 3.5 expected points.
CPOE = Completion Percentage Over Expectation (Completion Percentage minus Expected Completion Percentage), QBR = ESPN's Quarterback Rating metric
This is one of the uglier QB reports you'll see this season from a Chiefs' perspective. Patrick Mahomes had 2.5 EPA, a -7.6 CPOE and a 54.7 QBR on the game and those got saved a bit with Mahomes having 3.6 EPA and a 4.6 CPOE in the fourth quarter. Matt Ryan was much better than Mahomes, though, as he had 13.4 EPA, 16.4 CPOE and a 70.1 QBR.
The two biggest plays of the game, by a wide margin, were made on the defensive side of the ball, one for each team. The Chiefs lost 7.0 expected points on Patrick Mahomes' interception, while the Falcons lost 6.0 expected points on a forced fumble by Willie Gay Jr. and recovered by Darius Harris. The third biggest play was a 54-yard pass to Calvin Ridley, one of four 15+ yard receptions on the game for Ridley. After that, the next four biggest plays went in the Chiefs' favor, with two passes for 51 yards and a touchdown, an 11-yard run and a 39-yard field goal missed by Falcons kicker Younghoe Koo with 14 seconds left.
The Chiefs had the win probability advantage for the majority of the game but were unable to hold it for the entire game. They began the game with an 84% win probability, but a wild three-minute time span changed it from 76.2% to 54.7% in the late second quarter as the Falcons took a 7-0 lead. The Chiefs were able to get it back to 73% for halftime after tying the game up.
In the fourth quarter, there were five different wild swings in the win probability. The win probability was at Chiefs 58.1% and jumped to 85.3% after the fumble forced by Willie Gay Jr. and recovered by Darius Harris. Then it went to Falcons 59.0% following a Laquon Treadwell touchdown, the first time of the game they were likelier to win. It then hopped back to Chiefs 81.8% following a Demarcus Robinson touchdown right at the two-minute warning. It jumped back to Falcons 59.4% when they had the ball at the Chiefs' 21-yard-line with 27 seconds left and then the predictable result after Falcons kicker Younghoe Koo missed the potential game-tying field goal.
The Chiefs are finally no longer first in offensive EPA per play, as they currently have 0.253 EPA per play and the Packers have 0.254 EPA per play. The Chiefs, Packers and Bills are the clear top three teams in the NFL at the moment, with all being higher than 0.2 offensive EPA per play and above the league average number of defensive EPA per play, though the Chiefs are currently 17th in defensive EPA per play.
The Chiefs have finally jumped back into first across the NFL in early-down passing rate with a 62.3% pass rate, passing the Texans who have a 62.1% rate and staying above the Steelers' 61.9% rate, Bills' 61.5% rate and Seahawks 61.4% rate. The sixth-place team in early-down passing rate is the Buccaneers with a 57.0% rate. There is a less than one percent difference between first and fifth place, yet a 4.4% difference between fifth and sixth place.
For just Week 16, the Chiefs were fourth in early-down passing rate, passing on 65.2% of early downs with a 20-80% win probability excluding the final two minutes of each half. Two teams with high pass rates did really poorly (The Browns with -0.379 EPA per dropback and the Cardinals with -0.408 EPA per dropback), while four teams with high pass rates did tremendously (The Buccaneers with 1.816 EPA per dropback, the Raiders with 0.608 EPA per dropback, the Texans with 0.470 EPA per dropback and the Packers with 0.571 EPA per dropback).
Finally, we have quarterback rankings by EPA and CPOE. Aaron Rodgers has once again increased his lead in the EPA+CPOE composite score rankings over Mahomes while he has been narrowly passed by Josh Allen of the Bills. Last week, Allen was passed by Baker Mayfield for third in the rankings, but Mayfield fell from third to seventh after this week. For just EPA, Mahomes remains second with a 0.347 EPA per play on the season.
For just Week 16, out of 26 quarterbacks that played more than 15 plays, Patrick Mahomes finished 20th in EPA+CPOE composite score (0.041), 16th in EPA per play (0.104), 23rd in CPOE (-7.6) and 14th in success rate (51.1%). The top quarterbacks of the week were Tom Brady (0.992 EPA per play and 28.2 CPOE), Andy Dalton (0.870 EPA per play and 18.2 CPOE) and Aaron Rodgers (0.652 EPA per play and 19.9 CPOE).
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