Broncos at Bills: DVOA Preview

Four head coaches and seven quarterbacks ago, the Denver Broncos brought forth unto Mile High a new title, winning Super Bowl 50. They’ve spent the succeeding eight years wandering around in the desert, their longest playoff drought since the merger. But they’re finally back, with Sean Payton and rookie quarterback Bo Nix finally returning them to the postseason – and in style, to boot, with the second-highest DVOA ever for a seventh seed. Their reward? The 13-4 Buffalo Bills. Buffalo’s window looked to be closing after this past offseason’s salary moves, but Josh Allen has responded with an MVP-caliber performance and the second-best offense in football. It’s not a great draw for either team, and even if Buffalo is rightfully a substantial favorite, it wouldn’t be absolutely shocking if Denver managed to pull off the upset.

Week-to-week charts represent that team’s single-game total DVOA. The extra line is a rolling five-week average. If you’re checking out FTN’s DVOA for the first time, it’s all explained right here.

We’ve removed Week 18 from the weighted DVOA numbers below, but all the other numbers in this table include Week 18.

All of Denver’s stats have to come with a bit of an asterisk, as they put up tremendous, record-style numbers against a Chiefs team that clearly did not care in Week 18. Because DVOA’s baseline is for the entire season, it is giving the Broncos too much credit for their 38-0 demolition of what was the sixth-ranked team in DVOA coming into the week. Clobbering any NFL players to that score is impressive, but not to the tune of 140.9% DVOA. Remove Week 18 from the data, and Denver’s weighted DVOA drops from 21.6% to 10.9%. That still ranks 10th, but it’s more accurate to call Denver a good team rather than a great team coming off of one of the most impressive victories in NFL history. Their weighted offensive (6.0% to -0.9%) and defensive (-11.6% to -7.9%) DVOA ratings similarly drop.

The marquee side of the matchup is when Buffalo has the ball and Denver is on defense, with both teams being in the top four in DVOA on that side of the ball. EPA-based stats love Denver’s pass defense – our own EPA model has them first – but DVOA has them fifth at -5.2%. That’s still good, but Denver sees a fairly notable dropoff between their plain VOA and the defense-adjusted version. Struggling against better teams is a theme with this Denver team – they’re 8-0 in games where Vegas made them a favorite, but just 2-7 as an underdog.

Denver’s strength defensively is big splash plays; turnovers and sacks. Denver leads the league with 93 such plays and is first in both adjusted sack rate (10.6%) and plays with pressure (250). Denver falls from fifth to eighth in pass defensive DVOA if you take out interceptions and sacks. They’re certainly not helpless when forced to just play coverage but they lose a bit of their special sauce. Buffalo, meanwhile, has the lowest adjusted sack rate in the league (2.7%), the third-lowest allowed pressure (23.0%) and the third-fewest interceptions (6), even if their turnover-worthy throw percentage is more towards the middle of the pack. The turnover situation is somewhat luck – Buffalo has recovered 75% of their offensive fumbles – but the lack of pressure isn’t. Can Denver pierce the line and generate the big plays they need to win?

Denver has a few Achilles heels defensively that Buffalo can look to exploit. While the Broncos are the No. 1 defense in the league against tight ends, they’re just 31st versus running backs as receivers. The Bills only threw 82 passes to running backs this season, but Ty Johnson, James Cook and Ray Davis all finished in the top 14 in receiving DYAR at the position.

Denver defense is fifth against left passes and ninth against right passes, but only 29th against middle passes. Josh Allen threw fewer middle passes than average but was fifth in DVOA on those passes.

On the other side of the ball, under Bo Nix’s development, the Broncos are better at passing than rushing – their running back rotation has been a mess all year long. Bills fans are worried about their run defense, but DVOA thinks that’s misfounded – they’re actually eighth in run defense DVOA, but only 14th against the pass. It’s far more likely Nix finds room to work than the running game stomp over Buffalo.

Specifically, the Bills are 30th versus short passes, 31st versus passes up the middle, and 28th and 29th versus WR1 and WR2, despite the presence of Christian Benford, who has the second-best cornerback DVOA in the league. This may call for a return of early season dink-and-dunk Nix, and the zillion crossing routes that peppered his route tree before he began experimenting with passes that traveled more than five yards beyond the line of scrimmage. Since December, Marvin Mims Jr. ranks 12th with 71 DYAR and a 27.7% receiving DVOA on passes marked either short or up the middle, though that’s mostly due to a couple deep shots against Cleveland in Week 13.

Denver’s best weapon is the offensive line. They’re second behind Buffalo in adjusted sack rate, and a respectable 13th in adjusted line yards despite the running backs being 23rd in the league at just 4.1 yards per carry. They’ve kept Nix upright and opened up enough holes for the running game to not be a total disaster. Unfortunately, Broncos rushers ranked 30th in avoided tackle percentage and win yards per rush attempt – they’re getting almost exactly what the line gives them and no more.

Denver could stand to get a few more explosive plays if they want to pull the upset. While they don’t turn the ball over much, they also don’t gain a ton of yards on first or second down. As a result, they face third down on more than half of their drives. Only the Giants and Bears get to third down more often.

If the game is close enough to come down to special teams, the Broncos have the advantage. Denver is positive in all five special teams ratings and Buffalo is negative in everything but punt returns. The gap is particularly large when the Bills punt. Sam Martin and company rank 30th in our punt stats, while Marvin Mims Jr. and Denver rank second in punt return value. Mims has yet to break a punt return for a touchdown, but he’s come close – Denver might need one from him to pull this out.