Week 4 Colts Defensive Rankings and Analysis: Meh

Each week during the season, I will be walking through the data from the previous Colts game and analyzing the numbers to form a sort of “what happened” narrative, as well as comparing the Colts against all other teams in the league. For a glossary of the stats listed, reference Season Stats. Thanks to Pro Football Reference, NFL.com, Football Outsiders, and the nflFastR project for being awesome sources of weekly data.

It was not an impressive day for the Indianapolis Colts defense. They gave up 3 long touchdown drives and another, that but for a fluke fumble would likely have been 7 more points. The defense yielded 23 first downs for a 74.2% Opponent Drive Success Rate that ranks 22nd on the week.

For the first 3 drives, the Colts D looked solid, but after that, Pittsburgh entered Colts territory on every drive save the last one, and again that was more due to a flukey botched snap than it was a stout defense.

TEAM TOTALS

(Use the right-left arrows to toggle between stats for the week and the season).

The Steelers 2.18 Points per Drive means the Indy defense ranked 18th for week 4. Add in the 22nd ranked DSR and the overall ranking is probably closer to 20th. For the season, those numbers are about the same (18th PPD, 25th DSR).

PASS TOTALS

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The passing defense held Fields to the 16th ranked EPA per dropback and the 15th ranked Pass Success Rate. Pittsburgh had trouble moving the chains with the pass, earning only the 16th ranked conversion rate (1st/d). Fields had a lot of explosive plays though, so he was able to have the 10th highest net yards per dropback for the week.

Overall, the passing defense was a little worse than average, but not terrible. On the season, I have them 23rd against the pass.

RUSH TOTALS

(Use the right-left arrows to toggle between stats for the week and the season).

The Steelers average rushing EPA was low (22nd) and their 3.5 yards per carry ranked only 20th, but what matters is the rate of valuable plays and Pittsburgh earned 10 first downs from rushing giving them the 10th highest conversion rate.

All of that adds up to a 15th ranked adj Rush Success Rate for Pittsburgh and so, like the passing defense, the Colts’ rushing defense was a bit worse than average. Ironically, that is enough to actually improve their season standing as the 8th best rushing defense in the league. Of course, its early in the year and that doesn’t adjust for opponent, but hey, I’ll take it.

CONCLUSION & LOOK AHEAD

The defense looked soft. I’m sure part of that was by design, but whereas week 3 was bend-don’t-break, this week was bend and break.

They are good against the run (so far) but poor against the pass. That’s not a great combo. The passing defense needs to get a lot better for this team to win.

The week 5 opponent offense is the Jacksonville Jaguars, who currently rank 27th in Points per Drive and 24th in Drive Success Rate. Dare I jinx it by saying they are not a very good offense?

Trevor Lawrence has had a miserable start to the year. He’s throwing deep passes (3rd adot) but can’t complete them (31st cmp%, 31st cpoe). He’s pressured into taking a lot of sacks and throwing the ball away (8th sck%, 10th ta%) and he’s not moving the chains (23rd 1st%). About the only thing he is doing right is not turning the ball over (31st to%).

The Jags have found a lot more success on the ground, earning the 10th best adj Rush Success Rate off of the 8th best conversion rate.

So, defensively this will be strength against strength (rushing) and weakness against weakness (passing). I’m not feeling real good about this one.