Traditional NFL stats often act like funhouse mirrors –- making a quarterback’s performance look like something it isn’t.
For example, take a look at these stat lines from the 2015 NFC wild-card game between the
Green Bay Packers and
Washington Redskins:
Aaron Rodgers: 21 of 36 passing, 210 yards, 2 touchdowns, 0 interceptions, 93.5 passer rating.
Kirk Cousins: 29 of 46, 329 yards, 1 touchdown, 0 interceptions, 91.7 passer rating.
If you asked 100 random people in a “Pepsi-Coke”-type challenge which quarterback had the better game based on these stats, chances are Cousins would win in a landslide. But any objective observer who watched this game would acknowledge that Rodgers was the better quarterback in Green Bay’s 35-18 win.
Traditional box score stats distort the performances of Rodgers and Cousins in this game because they (1) fail to account for all of the ways a quarterback can affect a game, (2) don’t put plays into the proper context (a 5-yard gain on second-and-5 is very different from a 5-yard gain on third-and-10), and 3) don’t acknowledge that a quarterback has teammates who affect each play and should also get credit for everything that happens on the field.
ESPN’s Total Quarterback Rating (Total QBR), which was released in 2011, has never claimed to be perfect, but unlike other measures of quarterback performance, it incorporates all of a quarterback’s contributions to winning, including how he impacts the game on passes, rushes, turnovers and penalties. Also, since QBR is built from the play level, it accounts for a team’s level of success or failure on every play to provide the proper context and then allocates credit to the quarterback and his teammate to produce a clearer measure of quarterback efficiency.
Leaving out key areas of impact can make a quarterback’s performance look very different. Omitted from Cousins’ stat line, for example, are his 6 sacks taken, 3 fumbles (1 lost) and 2 pre-snap penalties on Washington’s offense. Rodgers, on the other hand, took only one sack, did not fumble and drew a number of defensive penalties that kept drives alive. Each quarterback impacted the game through these plays, but none of them are reflected in the traditional stats.
The lack of context for each play also increases the distortion of the performance. Most would acknowledge that a 7-yard completion on third-and-10 is not a successful play, but base-level statistics treat all yards equally. Coaches, players and fans know what wins games; it only makes sense that the statistics that judge the most important position in the game do, too.
QB rating isn't "better" than QBR it's just been around longer and people are used to it. College football doesn't even use the same formula as NFL, just a bunch of arbitrary equations.
