[washingtonismoney]

I\'m a big fan of yards per play as the best statistic to show how you\'re doing as a team; it helps remove some of the noise from a team like Oregon, which fits so many plays into a game that both its offensive and defensive statistics are inflated.

Speaking of Oregon, did you realize that their offense through seven games is better than it was last year? (6.1 last year, 7.2 this year, a pretty crazy yard a play tacked on.)

But to focus on Stanford: our offense is marginally better than it was last year (6.8 versus 6.5. Interestingly, the Pac-10 offenses are much better this year than last: 6.5 yards/play was good enough to lead the conference last year. This year? 6.8 gets you third place, behind Oregon and USC, though there\'s a big gap between us and the rest of the conference--4th place, Arizona, only averages 6.3 yards/play) while our defense is much better (5.3 yards/play versus 6 yards/play). It\'s not immediately clear our statistics have been inflated by inferior opposition: while we\'ve only faced two of the top six defenses (Oregon and UCLA), we\'ve faced the two best offenses (as mentioned previously, Oregon and USC).

Point being, we\'re probably better than last year, which would\'ve surprised me to hear at the beginning of this year.

[washingtonismoney]

I\'m a big fan of yards per play as the best statistic to show how you\'re doing as a team; it helps remove some of the noise from a team like Oregon, which fits so many plays into a game that both its offensive and defensive statistics are inflated.

Speaking of Oregon, did you realize that their offense through seven games is better than it was last year? (6.1 last year, 7.2 this year, a pretty crazy yard a play tacked on.)

But to focus on Stanford: our offense is marginally better than it was last year (6.8 versus 6.5. Interestingly, the Pac-10 offenses are much better this year than last: 6.5 yards/play was good enough to lead the conference last year. This year? 6.8 gets you third place, behind Oregon and USC, though there\'s a big gap between us and the rest of the conference--4th place, Arizona, only averages 6.3 yards/play) while our defense is much better (5.3 yards/play versus 6 yards/play). It\'s not immediately clear our statistics have been inflated by inferior opposition: while we\'ve only faced two of the top six defenses (Oregon and UCLA), we\'ve faced the two best offenses (as mentioned previously, Oregon and USC).

Point being, we\'re probably better than last year, which would\'ve surprised me to hear at the beginning of this year.