Does Double Coverage mean anything?

[Dunleavy]

seems like passes get completed in double coverage like it's no big deal, guys are just as likely to "break free". let me know if i'm way off

[MalcPow]

Primelord did a great statistical study of something like 10,000 plays that showed pretty decisively that double coverage is working (or that passes thrown into double coverage are less successful at least). It should be linked in the reference thread, although the link may or may not be dead at this point. If I remember correctly, his numbers even seemed to show that a pass "thrown away from double coverage" was ever so slightly less effective than a pass thrown when there was no double coverage anywhere on the field.

You're not the first person to feel this way though. I think it's tough to overcome our natural biases when trying to observe something like this.

[primelord]

Sorry for the late response on this. I only just now saw it. My initial study was slightly flawed in that the defense will obviously never be in double coverage when it is expecting the run. So my initial numbers on pass % when there was no double coverage may have been a bit high since you will always get better results when you throw and the D is expecting the run. So obviously the best way to look at this is when the defense is expecting the pass. Here are numbers just from IHOF last season where the defense is expecting the pass:

No DC: 3167 for 5298 59.77%
Thrown Into DC: 1041 for 2374 43.85%
Thrown Away From DC: 3469 for 5511 62.94%

So as you can see throwing into double coverage certainly results in less completions. Now I suppose you could argue that 44% is still too high, but the difference between completing into and out of DC is pretty significant.

[Yoda]

I would really be interested to see what that is broken down by quarters.

That would take data mining way beyond my programming skills.

[primelord]

As requested:

1st Quarter:
No DC: 747 for 1117 66.87%
Into DC: 241 for 436 55.27%
Away DC: 772 for 1111 69.48%

2nd Quarter:
No DC: 873 for 1422 61.39%
Into DC: 286 for 637 44.89%
Away DC: 912 for 1384 65.89%

3rd Quarter:
No DC: 802 for 1266 63.34%
Into DC: 258 for 519 49.71%
Away DC: 832 for 1244 66.88%

4th Quarter:
No DC: 730 for 1472 49.59%
Into DC: 254 for 775 32.77%
Away DC: 936 for 1745 53.63%

The data by quarter seems to line up pretty nicely with the overall numbers. I imagine the 4th quarter percentages are down as a whole due to the being the most frequent time you will get the defensive familiars, but in all quarters the pattern remains the same. Throwing into DC is the worst and away from DC is the best.

Edit: Anyone wondering why the totals don't quite lineup it is because I don't have the over time quarter in here, but that only accounted for 55 pass plays so I don't think it is worth adding.

[Yoda]

It's interesting to see the 'No DC' in the 4th Q being so low. And while the throwing away from DC is only a little higher, there is a significant drop throwing into DC.

Thanks for doing that, I truely appreciate it.

[markusg77]

Thanks for this bit of info!

I was also wondering about the effectiveness of double coverage because I do like to double the best receiver of my opponent to take him out of the game. But I sometimes got really annoyed at how often a pass thrown into DC was complete - my gut feeling was way too often.

Is there a way to set or to determine which players are double covering? I wouldn't want to waste a LB in DC on a stud-WR.

[CraigSca]

I'm also thinking that 4th quarter completion percentage is down because of the general "let'er fly!" attitude of the FOF coach when behind in a ball game. Hopefully this has moderated a bit since the last patch.