American sports, Sport

5 key stats in American football

Scoring touchdowns is the most important thing in american football. It’s very hard to win games kicking only field goals. How about other statistics? Are they as important as putting numbers on scoreboard? Below you will find other key stats, that will help a team succeed on the field.

  1. Total offense/defense yards – one of the best football minds – coach Vince Lombardi once said: “Football is a game of inches and inches make the champion”. One yard can determine the outcome of the match. In the past there were plenty of games in which 36 inches made all the difference. Super Bowl XXXIV comes to mind as a perfect example. Last play of the game, that went into NFL lore as “One Yard Short”, when Kevin Dyson was stopped by Mike Jones exactly one yard short of the goal line. One yard can crush the dreams of one team and fulfill the other.
  2. Turnovers – name a team sport in which turnovers are more important, than in american football. You can’t, right? Turning the ball over is the worst thing a player can do. Losing a fumble or throwing an interception literally can lose you the game. The worst turnovers are the ones, that are letting other team to score within the same play (pick 6’s and fumbles recovered for TD’s).
  3. Time of possession – very underrated statistic. The longer you keep the ball, the more chances to win you get. No huddle offenses are not very common in the NFL nowadays. Usually when a team has high average time of possession per game, they end season with a winning record.
  4. Quarterback rating – a measure of the performance of Quarterbacks. Passer rating is calculated using a player’s passing attempts, completions, yards, touchdowns, and interceptions. Passer rating in the NFL is on a scale from 0 to 158.3. 0 is the worst, 158.3 is the best.
  5. Sacks – what is a sack you may ask? A sack occurs when the quarterback (or another offensive player acting as a passer) is tackled behind the line of scrimmage before he can throw a forward pass. The conclusions are obvious. Making life miserable for opposing Quarterbacks is key for success. When your team is constantly forcing rival signal caller to escape from the pocket, his confidence fades. Currently NFL record for sacks in a single game belongs to Derrick Thomas (7). When you see a number like this, you know his opponent didn’t have an easy day at the office.

 

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