the watchtower: Lions vs. Bears

In the previous Watchtower, I really struggled.  There was no data for the Ken Whisenhunt-Gunther Cunningham matchup; they’d never coached against each other.  The limited data for the Cardinals’ DC, Billy Davis, indicated a very strong systemic advantage when facing Scott Linehan offenses—which is bizzare; 3-4 defenses typically struggle against Linehan’s schemes.

However . . .

Every single piece of data I have, both objective and subjective, points to a Cardinals blowout. However, there has not been a more “off” and “on” team over the past two seasons than the Cardinals. The one thing they haven’t done in this Warner/Fitz/Boldin/Whisenhunt era is meet expectations—they beat teams they shouldn’t beat and look amazing doing it, and they lose to teams they have no business losing to, and look horrible doing it.

Further, I can’t imagine that a Jim Schwartz team comes back for a home game after a bad performance and rolls over from the opening gun--if so, it should raise some serious red flags. My instincts tell me this will be more like a 35-21 loss—but if Culpepper plays, and Fitz and Boldin don’t take the game off, I don’t see how the Lions keep it that close.

The only hope for the Lions is the Cunningham/Whisenhunt matchup—they’ve never faced each other before, and Gunther’s certainly much more experienced. Maybe, just maybe, a little dose of Guntherball flummoxes Warner early, and the sacks and turnovers come—as they did on Monday Night.

My instincts turned out to be as right as the numbers were wrong: the Lions lost, 31-24.  What does this tell us?  Only that it’s extraordinarily rare for a team to take a 40-plus-point beatdown two weeks in a row.

After a week off of doing the Watchtower—sorry, again!—we find ourselves at the end of the line.  This home contest against the Bears is the last game of the Lions’ season—and, therefore, the last Watchtower of the season.  As I’ve hinted at before, and as Neil commented response to the last post, it’s getting harder and harder to do this.

With Matthew Stafford on the shelf, and neither Drew Stanton nor Daunte Culpepper playing well enough to allow the Lions to win, this all seems pointless.  However, it’s not pointless to the Lions who are fighting for jobs in 2010—so let’s at least take a cursory look.

Gunther Cunningham vs. Ron Turner

Tur	Gun	Ornk	PgG	YpA	YpC	Drnk	PpG	DYpA	YpC	PTS	YpA	INT	YpC	Sack
CHI	KCC	26th	17.7	5.78	3.64	11th	18.8	6.60	4.12	10	6.44	1	1.84	2-11
CHI	DET	22nd	19.3	6.08	3.89	31st	30.5	7.83	4.36

In the previous Watchtowering of the Bears, I used both data from the actual Bears’ OC, Ron Turner, and his brother Norv.  This was a conscious attempt to expand the data set, knowing I might be including spurious data.  It wasn’t too ridiculous—besides being brothers, the Turners were assistants to several different coaches from the same tree.

However, this didn’t give me anything useful, and I concluded:

So, IF we consider Ron and Norv Turner interchangable--and we don't--then given greater, equal, or lesser talent, Gunther Cunningham's hyperagressive 4-3 appears to match expectations versus a Turner Bros. Coryell-style downfield passing offense (albeit while generating very high sack and turnover numbers). That is to say there is no systemic advantage or disadvantage for either team.

Thanks in part to a horrendous performance by the Lions’ special teamers, the Bears turned an average starting field position in Lions’ territory into a whopping 48 points.  This was not a systemic thing.  Up until Monday’s 36-point game against the Vikes, the Bears had only topped 20 points three times: against the Lions, Browns, and Seahawks.  Moreover, Cutler’s arm and Chicago’s group of speedy—if not skilled—wideouts posed all sorts of matchup problems for the Lions’ secondary.

So, what happens this time?  The Bears’ scoring offense has been, as I said, underwhelming.  In fact, it’s been barely any better than the Lions’ offense!  With an anemic 6.08 YpA, and unimpressive 3.89 YpC, they may well outstrip their averages again—but without another record-setting performance by their special teams, they shouldn’t outstrip the Lions’ average-allowed figures.

Therefore, despite a matchup advantage that has a lot more to do with talent and personnel than system, the Bears should outperform their season averages—but not exceed the Lions’ season average-allowed numbers.  I project 28-32 points, 7.50-8.00 YpA, and 3.00-3.50 YpC.  I have low confidence in this prediction.

Augmenting/Mitigating Influences

First, the biggest influence is going to be the meaning of the game. The first contest was the 1-2 Lions visiting the 2-1 Bears, in a critical early divisional contest.  This will be the 6-9 Bears visiting the 2-13 Lions—and those Bears just finished a dramatic, deep-into-overtime win over the Vikings.  That Monday Night Football went so long it extended into Tuesday!

So the Bears have a short week after a season-reclaiming signature win, and the Lions will host a sellout crowd.  All of the elements are in place for the Lions to close this season out on a high note.  If the defense can play as they have the past few weeks—limiting offenses like the Bengals’ and Cardinals’—instead of the way they did in Week 4, this will be a close, winnable game . . . if the offense can actually find the end zone.

Scott Linehan vs. Lovie Smith

Lin	Smit	Ornk	PgG	YpA	YpC	Drnk	PpG	YpA	YpC	PTS	YpA	INT	YpC	Sack
MIN	STL	6th	26.0	7.60	4.75	17th	20.5			17	6.88	1	7.27	8-54
MIN	CHI	6th	25.3	7.16	4.71	13th	20.7			27	11.61	0	4.04	4-10
MIN	CHI	6th	25.3	7.16	4.71	13th	20.7			14	8.45	3	6.64	5-34
STL	CHI	10th	22.9	6.69	4.26	3rd	15.9			27	6.47	1	4.59	3-24
DET	CHI	27th	15.9	5.30	3.95	21st	23.5	6.31	4.35

The first time around, I concluded:

Given greater, equal, or lesser talent, Lovie Smith's relatively aggressive Tampa 2 will surrender a disproportionate amount of yards to Linehan's balanced offense, but also generate high numbers of sacks and turnovers, disproportionately disrupting scoring.

the most likely outcome involves Stafford getting rattled by the Bears, getting sacked 3-to-5 times and surrendering at least two turnovers. Despite moving the ball as well as they have all season, the Lions should score below expectations (currently 19, though a 3-game average is nearly useless).  This is much less well defined, but my guess is that the Bears will match or slightly outperform their scoring expecations (also currently 19, equally shakily), with one dimension of the offense working much better than the other.

And this all was pretty much spot on:

• Stafford was sacked five times, for a loss of 42 yards.
• Stafford lost a fumble on one of those sacks, and threw an interception.
• The Lions generated a season-high 398 yards of total offense, and scored 24 points--for reference, they scored 20 points off of 231 offensive yards in Week 1.
• The Bears scored 41 offensive points. As a team, they ran 20 times for 151 yards (7.55 YpC) and 3 TDs. They passed 28 times for 141 yards (5.04 YpA) and 2 TDs.

If we apply that to the Lions’ current averages, and account for the Bears’ defense’s averages, my projection looks like this: 13-16 points, 6.00-6.25 YpA, and 4.50 YpC.  I have medium to high confidence in this prediction.

Augmenting/Mitigating Influences

Of course, the ongoing problem with projecting the Lions’ offense has been the game of musical chairs at quarterback.  The Lions’ offense is simply a different beast with healthy Matthew Stafford . . . and it’s bestial without him.  Whether it’s Stanton or Culpepper is at the helm, the Lions’ offense is incapable of generating touchdowns.

On the other hand, this game really does set up well.  All of the momentum, intangibles, hunches, home-field advantage, etc. swings in the Lions’ favor—and they’re also much better at home than on the road.  If whoever is playing quarterback can avoid turnovers, this game will be much closer than the data would indicate.

Unfortunately, neither Stanton nor Culpepper has shown an ability to avoid turnovers. A couple of early INTs, and the rout could be on . . .

Conclusion

I’ve said throughout this piece that I don’t think this game necessarily follows the data. The Lions are unquestionably better at home than on the road, and the defense is also unquestionably better now than it was in Week 4.  The Week 4 contest was also totally skewed by they absolutely horrific performance of the Lions’ special teams units, an area which has been addressed in personnel.

That having been said, the Lions’ offense has been so completely moribund, that I have a hard time believing they’ll meet even my meager projections.  Therefore, I’ll go with the data: 28-32 points for the Bears, 14-16 points for the Lions.  My instincts tell me this is a very winnable game, but the data just doesn’t support it.