I had thought that main reason him and Chase's efficiency went down from 2021 to 2022 was because of defensive adjustments but know I starting it is because of Burrow's extreme dink-dunk play. I do think he can get back to 2021 form. In 2023, over his last six games he mostly replicated his 2021 stat line: 0.183 Adj EPA/Play, 6.2 CPOE, 6.7 air Yards (!) on 257 plays. The biggest difference is obviously the air yards. I don't think Burrow is necessarily overrated (I have him in a tier behind Mahomes and Allen) but I do think his reputation out paces his play. I think winning an AFC championship and competing in a second has gotten him a sort of cache which I think is underserved. People have been trying to find the next Manning vs Brady with Mahomes, but I think you arguably have a lighter version of it with Burrow and Allen. Allen out paces him in every meaningful statistic but Burrow beat Mahomes and Allen in the playoffs, so he gets to be QB 2
You make a good point Marc, but be careful. Most of that production near the end is stacked into two games (SF and Buffalo), albeit the best two games to stack that production into. Also included in that stretch is playing worse than most against the horrendous Cardinal defence (0.15 EPA/Play against a defence that allowed 0.193 season long is worse than average), and legitimately playing badly against the fourth worst pass defence in the NFL (Seattle).
I'm getting nitpicky, but if you get to nitpick two great games I get to nitpick two less than stellar ones. Again, I wrote an article just a few months ago big-upping Jordan Love. Claiming Joe is on the level of a Jordan Love (in my mind) is not an insult. However, this does mean that Joe is nowhere near QB2. Reputationally maybe, but in actual fact, would you rather have Joe Burrow or Josh Allen for next season? We all know what the correct answer is.
This feeds into my larger argument (one that I may write a whole article on in the future) that winning is not contagious. Past winning does not lead to future winning in the way that most claim it does. Aaron Rodgers won a Super Bowl in relatively dominant fashion in his third full season, and never made another. Ben Roethlisberger after making the Super Bowl three times in his first seven years never got close to another. Tom Brady, in between two stretches of playoff dominance, was the biggest playoff choker in the world for more than half a decade (2006-13).
I have a question for you Marc. If the Tennessee Titans were able to capitalise on any of the million chances Joe gave them in the 2021 playoff game, and the Bengals just lost (as by all means they should have), where would you have Joe on your tier list then?
You just know if Trent Green or Aaron Rodgers ever generated -4 EPA in a playoff game, they would've just lost 34-17 and everybody would've laughed and moved on. For whatever reason Joe never gets the same hate, and I've never been able to get it with him. His rep has even lived through losing a very winnable 2022 AFC Championship that if Joe had been able to help at all (he generated almost exactly zero EPA) the Bengals would've won, and I have no idea why this is.
The crux of the disconnect with me is if you were to ask me if Joe Burrow is a great playoff performer, I would say no. His career playoff EPA/Play is 0.09, which does not cut it in any way shape or form. Should I bring up 'playoff choker' Peyton Manning, and his career 0.105? If you want to say 'but he won,' I would bring to your attention that his greatest career accomplishment (losing a Super Bowl that really easily could've been won) is dubiously similar to that of Matt Ryan, a man who nobody ever talked up as being a winner in the way they've talked about Joe.
I think we agree on all major points on Burrow (Maybe I didn't communicate my thoughts well enough).
1. I don't think Burrow is a great playoff performer.
2. I think Josh is clears Burrow pretty comfortably. I was just saying that his reputation is boasted to QB2 because of postseason wins
3. I want to say the Titans game wouldn't have an effect, but I think subconsciously it might.
4. At this point the way I look at QBs is this
Mahomes and Allen are on tier by themselves; I think there are the only two in my mind I would consider the best QB
Then there are give or take 11 QBs who I am not really sure how to rank but I have grouped into tiers:
Burrow-Dak-Lamar
Love-Herbert-Hurts-Stafford
Purdy-Stroud-Tua-Goff
5. I am not very confident in my rankings outside of the top 2 mainly because most of these guys have come into the league since 2020 or have had somewhat roller coaster careers in terms of performance.
No doubt man. Forward looking rankings are very hard to make. That's why all my Tier lists exclusively look backwards.
For example, I am not a fan of CJ Stroud's rookie season at all. I think he held back what could've been a fantastic Texans offence, but considering QBs always take the big jump in year two, he may win MVP for all I know. Same goes for Justin Herbert. He hasn't been a top ten QB in either of the last two seasons, but a bounceback is always possible.
It's sort of like the talk we had about Tony Gonzalez, where he was never actually the best TE in the NFL, but considering he kept finishing second to different people that means he was the best on average. No different for the QBs.
Last season, Brock Purdy, Dak Prescott, Josh Allen, Tua Tagovailoa, Lamar Jackson, and Jalen Hurts were all better than Patrick Mahomes, and Jordan Love was about even. Would you bet on any of those guys to be better than him again? Maybe Allen but likely nobody else.
That's why these forward looking things are so hard to make. We're all really just guessing with only slightly more info than the general public has.
I'll write a whole article on this if you'd like, but here are the cliffnotes.
CJ's CPOE was approximately zero, because despite the fact that his throws were quite long (fourth longest in the NFL on average), they were not especially difficult (middle of the pack expected completion percentage). This kind of thing is why I can talk about how Justin Fields (61.4% completion) is so improved in terms of accuracy, yet not be impressed by CJ's 63.9 at all.
Accuracy isn't the only thing CJ was mediocre at. He also was middle of the pack in terms of avoiding negative plays. While he was fantastic at avoiding turnovers, his inability to avoid any other kind of mistake (mostly sacks) puts him in 23rd in the NFL in terms of my Turnover Equivalent Plays stat. Not exactly impressive.
So now we're left with an offence with the NFL's 3rd (Nico Collins) and 10th (Nethaniel Dell) best WRs according to ESPN's receiver tracking metrics, but a QB who's mediocre in terms of accuracy, and mediocre at avoiding negative plays, who also must go through a learning curve on how to play at the NFL level. This cost the Texans badly.
With even a little bit better QB play, the Texans win week one in Baltimore, week five in Atlanta, week eight in Carolina, week eleven against Arizona would've been the drubbing it should've been, etc., and there would've been no need to worry about the last week of the season and all that excitement. Cleveland was injured and falling (already fallen?) apart, so he gets a lot less credit for that win from me than he'll get from most, and in Baltimore in the playoff game he got exposed for the rookie he was.
Wrap all that into a package, and it explains why a team with likely the second best (non SF) group of receivers in the NFL ends up ranked 13th in EPA/Pass. These are still fantastic numbers for a rookie, but unfortunately, offences this good don't come around very often, and to have to waste it on a rookie's learning curve must be depressing for any Texan fan who knows what they're looking at.
Imagine if the Texans had a QB as good as Dak Prescott. You think they'd be ranked 13th in EPA/Pass? I think not. Top ten certainly. Top five almost certainly. Top three likely. Look at what he did with a Dallas offence not near as good as this Houston one. Heck, every QB down to Baker Mayfield (wherever he is on your tier list) I think could've done better than this, because he did do the exact same thing (with great help but less than CJ) down in Tampa, holding back a great offence down there, except finishing with more EPA/Play than CJ, and not impressing me either.
Complacency will be the death of you. In my opinion it's my responsibility to be realistic and say CJ was about league average last year, which once again is fantastic when grading on the rookie curve, as they're normally terrible, but when your offence is as elite as that Houston one, it's such a waste of a season to have to grade on a curve. It was Super Bowl calibre.
I'd also like to note for the record that I'm not projecting this forward. With the year two QB jump the sky is the limit from here for him. I'm strictly saying his 2023 was wildly overrated, and if you think CJ Stroud was a top ten QB already I think you're well off the mark.
I had thought that main reason him and Chase's efficiency went down from 2021 to 2022 was because of defensive adjustments but know I starting it is because of Burrow's extreme dink-dunk play. I do think he can get back to 2021 form. In 2023, over his last six games he mostly replicated his 2021 stat line: 0.183 Adj EPA/Play, 6.2 CPOE, 6.7 air Yards (!) on 257 plays. The biggest difference is obviously the air yards. I don't think Burrow is necessarily overrated (I have him in a tier behind Mahomes and Allen) but I do think his reputation out paces his play. I think winning an AFC championship and competing in a second has gotten him a sort of cache which I think is underserved. People have been trying to find the next Manning vs Brady with Mahomes, but I think you arguably have a lighter version of it with Burrow and Allen. Allen out paces him in every meaningful statistic but Burrow beat Mahomes and Allen in the playoffs, so he gets to be QB 2
You make a good point Marc, but be careful. Most of that production near the end is stacked into two games (SF and Buffalo), albeit the best two games to stack that production into. Also included in that stretch is playing worse than most against the horrendous Cardinal defence (0.15 EPA/Play against a defence that allowed 0.193 season long is worse than average), and legitimately playing badly against the fourth worst pass defence in the NFL (Seattle).
I'm getting nitpicky, but if you get to nitpick two great games I get to nitpick two less than stellar ones. Again, I wrote an article just a few months ago big-upping Jordan Love. Claiming Joe is on the level of a Jordan Love (in my mind) is not an insult. However, this does mean that Joe is nowhere near QB2. Reputationally maybe, but in actual fact, would you rather have Joe Burrow or Josh Allen for next season? We all know what the correct answer is.
This feeds into my larger argument (one that I may write a whole article on in the future) that winning is not contagious. Past winning does not lead to future winning in the way that most claim it does. Aaron Rodgers won a Super Bowl in relatively dominant fashion in his third full season, and never made another. Ben Roethlisberger after making the Super Bowl three times in his first seven years never got close to another. Tom Brady, in between two stretches of playoff dominance, was the biggest playoff choker in the world for more than half a decade (2006-13).
I have a question for you Marc. If the Tennessee Titans were able to capitalise on any of the million chances Joe gave them in the 2021 playoff game, and the Bengals just lost (as by all means they should have), where would you have Joe on your tier list then?
You just know if Trent Green or Aaron Rodgers ever generated -4 EPA in a playoff game, they would've just lost 34-17 and everybody would've laughed and moved on. For whatever reason Joe never gets the same hate, and I've never been able to get it with him. His rep has even lived through losing a very winnable 2022 AFC Championship that if Joe had been able to help at all (he generated almost exactly zero EPA) the Bengals would've won, and I have no idea why this is.
The crux of the disconnect with me is if you were to ask me if Joe Burrow is a great playoff performer, I would say no. His career playoff EPA/Play is 0.09, which does not cut it in any way shape or form. Should I bring up 'playoff choker' Peyton Manning, and his career 0.105? If you want to say 'but he won,' I would bring to your attention that his greatest career accomplishment (losing a Super Bowl that really easily could've been won) is dubiously similar to that of Matt Ryan, a man who nobody ever talked up as being a winner in the way they've talked about Joe.
I think we agree on all major points on Burrow (Maybe I didn't communicate my thoughts well enough).
1. I don't think Burrow is a great playoff performer.
2. I think Josh is clears Burrow pretty comfortably. I was just saying that his reputation is boasted to QB2 because of postseason wins
3. I want to say the Titans game wouldn't have an effect, but I think subconsciously it might.
4. At this point the way I look at QBs is this
Mahomes and Allen are on tier by themselves; I think there are the only two in my mind I would consider the best QB
Then there are give or take 11 QBs who I am not really sure how to rank but I have grouped into tiers:
Burrow-Dak-Lamar
Love-Herbert-Hurts-Stafford
Purdy-Stroud-Tua-Goff
5. I am not very confident in my rankings outside of the top 2 mainly because most of these guys have come into the league since 2020 or have had somewhat roller coaster careers in terms of performance.
No doubt man. Forward looking rankings are very hard to make. That's why all my Tier lists exclusively look backwards.
For example, I am not a fan of CJ Stroud's rookie season at all. I think he held back what could've been a fantastic Texans offence, but considering QBs always take the big jump in year two, he may win MVP for all I know. Same goes for Justin Herbert. He hasn't been a top ten QB in either of the last two seasons, but a bounceback is always possible.
It's sort of like the talk we had about Tony Gonzalez, where he was never actually the best TE in the NFL, but considering he kept finishing second to different people that means he was the best on average. No different for the QBs.
Last season, Brock Purdy, Dak Prescott, Josh Allen, Tua Tagovailoa, Lamar Jackson, and Jalen Hurts were all better than Patrick Mahomes, and Jordan Love was about even. Would you bet on any of those guys to be better than him again? Maybe Allen but likely nobody else.
That's why these forward looking things are so hard to make. We're all really just guessing with only slightly more info than the general public has.
In what way did Stroud hold back the Texans offense?
I'll write a whole article on this if you'd like, but here are the cliffnotes.
CJ's CPOE was approximately zero, because despite the fact that his throws were quite long (fourth longest in the NFL on average), they were not especially difficult (middle of the pack expected completion percentage). This kind of thing is why I can talk about how Justin Fields (61.4% completion) is so improved in terms of accuracy, yet not be impressed by CJ's 63.9 at all.
Accuracy isn't the only thing CJ was mediocre at. He also was middle of the pack in terms of avoiding negative plays. While he was fantastic at avoiding turnovers, his inability to avoid any other kind of mistake (mostly sacks) puts him in 23rd in the NFL in terms of my Turnover Equivalent Plays stat. Not exactly impressive.
So now we're left with an offence with the NFL's 3rd (Nico Collins) and 10th (Nethaniel Dell) best WRs according to ESPN's receiver tracking metrics, but a QB who's mediocre in terms of accuracy, and mediocre at avoiding negative plays, who also must go through a learning curve on how to play at the NFL level. This cost the Texans badly.
With even a little bit better QB play, the Texans win week one in Baltimore, week five in Atlanta, week eight in Carolina, week eleven against Arizona would've been the drubbing it should've been, etc., and there would've been no need to worry about the last week of the season and all that excitement. Cleveland was injured and falling (already fallen?) apart, so he gets a lot less credit for that win from me than he'll get from most, and in Baltimore in the playoff game he got exposed for the rookie he was.
Wrap all that into a package, and it explains why a team with likely the second best (non SF) group of receivers in the NFL ends up ranked 13th in EPA/Pass. These are still fantastic numbers for a rookie, but unfortunately, offences this good don't come around very often, and to have to waste it on a rookie's learning curve must be depressing for any Texan fan who knows what they're looking at.
Imagine if the Texans had a QB as good as Dak Prescott. You think they'd be ranked 13th in EPA/Pass? I think not. Top ten certainly. Top five almost certainly. Top three likely. Look at what he did with a Dallas offence not near as good as this Houston one. Heck, every QB down to Baker Mayfield (wherever he is on your tier list) I think could've done better than this, because he did do the exact same thing (with great help but less than CJ) down in Tampa, holding back a great offence down there, except finishing with more EPA/Play than CJ, and not impressing me either.
Complacency will be the death of you. In my opinion it's my responsibility to be realistic and say CJ was about league average last year, which once again is fantastic when grading on the rookie curve, as they're normally terrible, but when your offence is as elite as that Houston one, it's such a waste of a season to have to grade on a curve. It was Super Bowl calibre.
I'd also like to note for the record that I'm not projecting this forward. With the year two QB jump the sky is the limit from here for him. I'm strictly saying his 2023 was wildly overrated, and if you think CJ Stroud was a top ten QB already I think you're well off the mark.
League average with a lot better than league average results as a result of the players around him. I should've stated that clearer.