Disparity - 2023 Panthers

[JohnTurney]

going into the weekend Panthers 30th in points allowed and 3rd in yards allowed

I cannot recall a team with that big disparity -- they have allowed 5 defensive scores so that makes up for some if it, but even so
that is til a top 5 in yards allowed and bottom 5-7 in points allowed

often they are correlated --- if you allow fewer yards in general you allow fewer points ... within reason ...

[ChrisBabcock]

Special teams often account for big desparities in yardage vs. points. (Either offense or defense). You mentioned defensive scores given up but also return yards is probably a factor. Too lazy to look it up right now but I'm willing to bet the Panthers are near last in the league in punt/kickoff return yardage allowed. Therefore their opponents are starting their drives with great field position and gaining less total yardage in relation to points scored.

[racepug]

Special teams often account for big desparities in yardage vs. points. (Either offense or defense). You mentioned defensive scores given up but also return yards is probably a factor. Too lazy to look it up right now but I'm willing to bet the Panthers are near last in the league in punt/kickoff return yardage allowed. Therefore their opponents are starting their drives with great field position and gaining less total yardage in relation to points scored.

That's what I was wondering - if the Panthers have given up a lot of "short fields" this season.

[Jay Z]

The opponent's starting position is 31.8 yard line, which is second worst in the league. They have given up 5 return TDs, worse than average but not worst in the league.

The defense is good on a yards basis. But they have given up 25 rushing TDs, worst in the league. 11 turnovers is also a league worst. They also don't pressure the QB well. So poor field position combined with very few turnovers probably does most of the damage.

[Brian wolf]

Haha ... I lose money when the Panthers score 30 on GB but then they get shutout back to back ... timing is everything

[JohnTurney]

Special teams often account for big desparities in yardage vs. points. (Either offense or defense). You mentioned defensive scores given up but also return yards is probably a factor. Too lazy to look it up right now but I'm willing to bet the Panthers are near last in the league in punt/kickoff return yardage allowed. Therefore their opponents are starting their drives with great field position and gaining less total yardage in relation to points scored.

You're right ... usually.

But they are 5th in PR coverage, and 21st in KO which is not good but not awful --- the difference between 10th and 21s is 2 yards and so many kickoffs not returned these days

they also have decent TOP.

My thought was all these are good idea --- but the disparity is a lot bigger than you'd expect even if they had poor field position. I'd guess, and I am too lazy to look up, that teams have had worse field position and had a far less separity from top five to bottom five ... it's not that there can't be disparity- -- the often is ... but the spread took me by surprise.

[JohnTurney]

The opponent's starting position is 31.8 yard line, which is second worst in the league. They have given up 5 return TDs, worse than average but not worst in the league.

The defense is good on a yards basis. But they have given up 25 rushing TDs, worst in the league. 11 turnovers is also a league worst. They also don't pressure the QB well. So poor field position combined with very few turnovers probably does most of the damage.

Right, all that is true ... but the disparity seems unusually large even given those factors.

[Jay Z]

The opponent's starting position is 31.8 yard line, which is second worst in the league. They have given up 5 return TDs, worse than average but not worst in the league.

The defense is good on a yards basis. But they have given up 25 rushing TDs, worst in the league. 11 turnovers is also a league worst. They also don't pressure the QB well. So poor field position combined with very few turnovers probably does most of the damage.

Right, all that is true ... but the disparity seems unusually large even given those factors.

As well as the turnovers, there were only three times the defense turned the ball over on downs. This was also a league worst. Now teams only attempted going for it 10 times on fourth down, went for it seven times. 70% was also worst in the league. Carolina never had a lead entering the fourth quarter all season. Likely one of the reasons for so few attempts. Which kept the yardage down.

Most teams came up with a lot more turnovers and fourth down stops. One that didn't was the Titans. Yet they still gave up far fewer points. Because Tennessee was best in the league in preventing red zone touchdowns. Carolina wasn't the worst, but they were tied for fifth worst. All of the teams that had teams in the red zone more often did a better job on a percentage basis.

Mostly seems like not giving up big chunks of yards was about the only thing the Carolina defense did do well.

[JohnTurney]

The opponent's starting position is 31.8 yard line, which is second worst in the league. They have given up 5 return TDs, worse than average but not worst in the league.

The defense is good on a yards basis. But they have given up 25 rushing TDs, worst in the league. 11 turnovers is also a league worst. They also don't pressure the QB well. So poor field position combined with very few turnovers probably does most of the damage.

Right, all that is true ... but the disparity seems unusually large even given those factors.

As well as the turnovers, there were only three times the defense turned the ball over on downs. This was also a league worst. Now teams only attempted going for it 10 times on fourth down, went for it seven times. 70% was also worst in the league. Carolina never had a lead entering the fourth quarter all season. Likely one of the reasons for so few attempts. Which kept the yardage down.

Most teams came up with a lot more turnovers and fourth down stops. One that didn't was the Titans. Yet they still gave up far fewer points. Because Tennessee was best in the league in preventing red zone touchdowns. Carolina wasn't the worst, but they were tied for fifth worst. All of the teams that had teams in the red zone more often did a better job on a percentage basis.

Mostly seems like not giving up big chunks of yards was about the only thing the Carolina defense did do well.

Maybe it was a perfect storm of a few factors driving the scoring down more than is cases where there were only 2-3 factors rather than 4-5.

If they had given up just 3 touchdowns by the offense they'd be around 22-23-24 rather than 29th ... they moved up one today... they were the last of a tight group between maybe 22.5 PPG and 24.5 ...

the 4th down things is interesting but we're still talking about 3 vs 8 or 9 ... a difference between 5 or 6 ...Jets made only 7 4th down stops,for example ...so the poorer teams in that stat wouldn't create a huge disparity, but taken together ... all of those things.

I need to look for a historable comparison -- how many top 4 teams were 29th or 24-25-26 slots different. Cannot be too many, though.

[Jay Z]

Right, all that is true ... but the disparity seems unusually large even given those factors.

As well as the turnovers, there were only three times the defense turned the ball over on downs. This was also a league worst. Now teams only attempted going for it 10 times on fourth down, went for it seven times. 70% was also worst in the league. Carolina never had a lead entering the fourth quarter all season. Likely one of the reasons for so few attempts. Which kept the yardage down.

Most teams came up with a lot more turnovers and fourth down stops. One that didn't was the Titans. Yet they still gave up far fewer points. Because Tennessee was best in the league in preventing red zone touchdowns. Carolina wasn't the worst, but they were tied for fifth worst. All of the teams that had teams in the red zone more often did a better job on a percentage basis.

Mostly seems like not giving up big chunks of yards was about the only thing the Carolina defense did do well.

Maybe it was a perfect storm of a few factors driving the scoring down more than is cases where there were only 2-3 factors rather than 4-5.

If they had given up just 3 touchdowns by the offense they'd be around 22-23-24 rather than 29th ... they moved up one today... they were the last of a tight group between maybe 22.5 PPG and 24.5 ...

the 4th down things is interesting but we're still talking about 3 vs 8 or 9 ... a difference between 5 or 6 ...Jets made only 7 4th down stops,for example ...so the poorer teams in that stat wouldn't create a huge disparity, but taken together ... all of those things.

I need to look for a historable comparison -- how many top 4 teams were 29th or 24-25-26 slots different. Cannot be too many, though.

There are a fair number of teams that are lousy in points but at least decent in yards. Not to this extreme. But lousy record, lousy offense, behind all of the time seems to be a factor. Very true for 2023 Panthers. 2000 Chargers, 1986 Packers had similar issues. Now both of those teams gave up a lot of passing TDs, which the Panthers did not do. Panthers gave up their TDs on the ground, despite having a decent defense from a yardage standpoint. But no turnovers, poor pass rush, poor red zone performance. Most of these other teams I looked at weren't dead last in turnovers like the Panthers. Dead last in sacks.

2005 Packers were a team I watched. Fairly significant disparity in points and yards on the defense. Was another bend but don't break defense. Turnover differential is bad. Teams run the ball a lot if not for huge yardage. The Panthers are worse across the board on some of these measures than the other teams I looked up.