Seattle wraps up the year at #2. There was a chance that they could overtake the Patriots in the final week, but they struggled to beat the Rams while the Patriots dominated the Dolphins. Still, the Seahawks ended the season as the as the 2nd best team in the NFL, at least statistically.

Interestingly, these rankings suggest that there are only 4 true contenders for the Super Bowl this year. Seattle and the 49ers in the NFC, and and the Patriots and Broncos in the AFC. While the Packers are generally considered the favorite in the NFC right now, a power of only 75.0 suggests that they likely wont be able to go on the road and win a playoff game.

Yds – Yards – A poorly named index that is found by subtracting the defensive index from the offensive index. Think of it as how much better the offense is in terms of yards per play than what the defense gives up.

PtDef – Point Differential per game.

ST – Special teams index. Made up mostly of return yards, and return yards allowed. Corrects made for blocked kicks and other thing that are a part of special teams play.

As expected, Seattle jumped up over the 49ers into the #2 spot. The did so by improving in almost every statistical category, which is an amazing feat by itself, especially against a team as good as San Francisco.

I didn’t expect Seattle to be able to make up the entire 8 point deficit and catch the Patriots, who have had a strangle hold on the #1 spot for a month now. They did make it close, and are now just 2 points back. Pretty impressive considering how poorly the Seahawks offense played the first month of the season, and considering that the Seahawks have played a much tougher schedule than the 49ers have.

I want to highlight one statistical category that tells an interesting story for this season. There are 3 teams who average scoring more than 10 points per game more than their opponents. Seattle is one, and the others are New England and Denver. It’s an interesting indicator of dominance, but it doesn’t the tell the entire story here. Both of the AFC teams play in completely awful divisions. If you look at the strength of schedule, the Seahawks have had the substantial more difficult road of those 3 teams.

Concentrating on points in the table this week.

PF – Points for per game

PA – Points against per game

PTDEF – point differential per game.

ST – Special team’s index. Combination os all parts of special teams play.

3rd% – The difference between 3rd down efficiency and defensive 3rd down efficiency.

There are also about 30 other things involved in determining the power level for each team. Those 5 are just the ones I wanted to include in the table this week.

These rankings are based on season stats like yards per carry and points per game. Since there have been hundred of carries, and passes, and 3rd downs, etc. it takes a massive change from a team’s “normal” performance to produce much in the way of change. That’s why the rankings become remarkably stable after about week 10. That’s because of the large sample of data we have at this point.

This week, the Seahawks jumped  7 places. That’s just incredible. By comparison, the Texans were completely destroyed by the Patriots this week, but only dropped 1 spot.

Here’s a sampling of some of the indexes (a bunch of different stats combined into one item for easier processing) that moved significantly in this game:

There are some obvious things that automatically jump out. The turnover differential went from +1 on the season to +8. Another way to think of it is that the Seahawks went from 15th in the league to 7th. Thats a big in the rankings in one category.

Another big jump shows up in the point differential. The Seahawks moved from being on average a FG better then every opponent to being more than a TD better. After 12 other games, it took a 58-0 blowout to shift things that far. Similar to the turnovers, the Seahawks jumped by 6 places in the rankings in that category from that one game.

The offense and defense indexes are a little smaller in the amount of change, but it is no less significant. In both of them, the magical number is 13.5.Offenses that are above 13.5 are generally good enough to get into the playoffs, those below generally aren’t. The Seahawks were below that cutoff point for most of the season, and only recently moved above it. After the Cardinal game they’re sitting at 14.5, which would make them one of the best in the NFL.

Defensively the numbers work in reverse. Lower numbers are better, and again 13.5 is that cutoff point that separates the contenders from the pretenders. (this index is calculated the same way, except that it used the opponent’s stats, which is why lower is better. Lower numbers mean that the opponents had less success). The Seahawks had begin the year in the low 12s, and that number has slowly risen up to being just barely below that 13.5 threshold. Now it’s back in the 12s again, putting the Seahawks back into the top tier of defenses in the league.

Even 3rd down efficiency, the one index in which the Seahawks are in the negative, move in the positive direction for the Seahawks. The only think that moved in the wrong direction was general special teams (return average and coverage units. punting and FGs are handles separately). When you have as many kickoffs as the Seahawks had, the other team is bound to break one eventually. That happened at the end of the game, when Patrick Peterson  got loose on a kickoff and brought it out near midfield. Oh well, it was only a small change.

There are plenty of other areas where there was little to no change, and thus I decided not to include them in the table; Punting efficience for instance. John Ryan was great in that game, but he’s been great all season, so there was no appreciable change for the Seahawks.

All of this put together is, at least mathematically, how the Seahawks managed to do the improbable, and move that far in just 1 week’s worth of data.

Huge movement this week for the Seahawks. That’s what a 58-0 pasting of a division rival will do for you, even this late in the season. I’m not going to go into any other details though, as I’m going to save it for a follow up post later today or tomorrow. I will add that it’s good to see them no longer entrenched at #12. They seem to have been locked into that spot for the past 2 seasons. I was beginning to wonder if they’d ever move.

This week’s opponent, the Buffalo Bills, Checks in all the way down at #24. Even on the road in the Eastern time zone, the Seahawks should be prohibitive favorites. The only aspect of the game that the Bills are good at is special teams. The Seahawks have a major statistical advantage in every other category.

On to the actual rankings:

Yds – A combination of offensive and defensive index. Generally a positive number means that a team’s offense is better at moving the move than how opposing offenses are at doing so against it’s defense.

PTDEF – point differential per game.

ST – Special team’s index. Combination os all parts of special teams play.

There are also about 30 other things involved in determining the power level for each team. Those 3 are just the ones I wanted to include in the table this week.

Once again, you see the Seahawks sitting there at #12. They’ve been there for most of the season, and even a big win over the Bears didn’t move them up in the rankings. As the offense has slowly improved as the season has gone along, the defense has deteriorated in much the same way. What you’re left with is a team that is a borderline playoff team. Hopefully they can win enough over the last month to get in.

Arizona check in all the way down at #25. I looked, and every index, even the ones not listed here, comes up negative. That’s fairly tough to do. Think of this way, take any stat you want and their opponents have been better at is than they have been. They give up more yards per rush then they get offensively. Same goes for yards per attempt, punt return average, 3rd down %, etc. All of them. This isn’t a good football team. If the Seahawks can’t beat them, especially at home, then something is seriously wrong.

Yds – A combination of offensive and defensive index. Generally a positive number means that a team’s offense is better at moving the move than how opposing offenses are at doing so against it’s defense.

PTDEF – point differential per game.

ST – Special team’s index. Combination os all parts of special teams play.

There are also about 30 other things involved in determining the power level for each team. Those 3 are just the ones I wanted to include in the table this week.

Nov 18, 2012; Foxboro, Massachusetts, USA; New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady (12) celebrates a touchdown against the Indianapolis Colts during the fourth quarter at Gillette Stadium. The New England Patriots won 59-24. Mandatory Credit: Greg M. Cooper-US PRESSWIRE

We have a new #1 this week, as the Patriots jumped past the 49ers into the top spot. I’m a little surprised that it took this long for them to get up into that spot. Any time you’re averaging almost 15 points more than you’re giving up every week, you’re clearly a dominant team. Throw in very good special teams and a good turnover differential, and you’re going to be pretty high on this rankings even if you do have a pretty week defense. That 92.7 Power ranking means they’re a rare dominant team.

After dropping from 1st all the way to 5th last week, the Bears rebounded up to the #4 spot. They’ve been in the top 5 all season, meaning they’ve been consistently one of the league’s best teams. The Seahawks have their work cut out for them if they are going to pull off an upset in Chicago this Sunday.

As for the Seahawks, they dropped down to #12 after their loss to Miami. 12 seems to be about where they’ve settled in to stay over the past 2 seasons. This team is a borderline playoff team, so 12 seems about right for them. They were higher earlier in the season, but the defensive stats have been slipping every week now for the past 6 games.

Yds – A combination of offensive and defensive index. Generally a positive number means that a team’s offense is better at moving the move than how opposing offenses are at doing so against it’s defense.

PTDEF – point differential per game.

ST – Special team’s index. Combination os all parts of special teams play.

There are also about 30 other things involved in determining the power level for each team. Those 3 are just the ones I wanted to include in the table this week.

Since we have so many new readers, here’s the basics of what this is. About a year ago, I started a massive project looking at tons of different stats and looked for correlation to winning. The result, after months of work, was a mathematical model of how each thing a team does that effects winning. I’ve parlayed that knowledge into a formula for that determines a “power” level for each team based on their stats.

Chicago holds on to the top spot in spite of the ugly game with their backup QB getting a plenty of playing time. They have a bit of a cushion over #2, so as long as Jay Cutler isn’t out for an extended period of time, they should be able to hold on to that spot.

I’m a bit surprised that the Texans are down at #4. They look like a very good and complete team on Sundays. What’s holding them back is their special teams play. The same goes for Tampa at #6. Is either of them had competent special teams units, they could be #1 right now.

The Seahawks remain at #12 in spite of a completely dominant performance over the Jets. They ended up getting jumped over by the Steelers, to keep them there, but they also closed the gap between themselves and the group above them. Another game like that, and we’ll see them jump higher in the rankings

D - Index of many defensive stats, including yards rushing attempts and yards per passing attempt. Lower numbers are better, since that means the D gave up fewer yards.

O – Index of many offensive stats, including yards per rushing attempts and yards per passing attempt

ST – index of many special teams stats, including yard per return, both offensively and defensely, for both punts and kick returns.

The power ranking is also constructed with 3rd down efficiency  turnovers, points, pass rush efficiency  and a host of other stats that aren’t included in the table above.

Since we have so many new readers, here’s the basics of what this is. About a year ago, I started a massive project looking at tons of different stats and looked for correlation to winning. The result, after months of work, was a mathematical model of how each thing a team does that effects winning. I’ve parlayed that knowledge into a formula for that determines a “power” level for each team based on their stats.

In the top spot again is Chicago. They hold that spot by the narrowest of margins over the Patriots. It’s also important to note that no team right now has broken the 90 threshold, meaning there are no genuinely dominant teams.

Also interesting is that undefeated Atlanta is all the way down at 5th in the rankings. They’ve beaten every team they’ve played, but they haven’t done so in a dominant way. There have been a lot of close wins, and the team has some weakness that haven’t been exploited in ways that have led to losses.

The Seahawks pick up some ground, and move up to 12th. Their defense power rating continues to get worse ever game, and now is downright average. The biggest problem that the Seahawks have though is their special teams. While it is generally a strength, the very poor decisions being made repeatedly by Leon Washington is showing up in the special teams stats.

D - Index of many defensive stats, including yards rushing attempts and yards per passing attempt. Lower numbers are better, since that means the D gave up fewer yards.O – Index of many offensive stats, including yards per rushing attempts and yards per passing attempt

ST – index of many special teams stats, including yard per return, both offensively and defensely, for both punts and kick returns.

PTDif – Point differential per game.