What factors are most important to NFL success (1 Viewer)

[GregR_2]

In what order would you rank the following 7 factors as they matter for NFL success in the current era, but not necessarily this particular season? Also I'm interested to hear people's reasoning.

You're not building a complete team from your rankings, so don't count on synergy between multiple factors when deciding importance. For example, don't think "I'm putting pass offense #1, so I'll take pass defense #2 only because teams will also have to pass to keep up with my passing offense". Just rank each factor in the order of importance to you independent of what the rest of your team's makeup ends up being.

Passing offense

Rushing offense

Passing defense

Rushing defense

Special teams

GM aspects - Scouting / drafting / trades / contracts

Coaching aspects (gameplanning, gametime, and player development)

 

[The Man Who Met Andy Griffith]

Coach

GM

Pass D

Rush D

Pass O

Rush O

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

Assuming you mean long-term success:

GM/Front Office

Rush Defense

Rush Offense

Coach

Pass Defense

Pass Offense

Special Teams

 

[Captain Spaulding]

I really don't know the answer to this. However they always say "defenses win championships" but ironically whenever a great offense plays against a great defense.....most people jump on the bandwagon of the offense and rightfully so as I think if you look at most of the Superbowl winners from the last several decades, it was more due to great offensive play that won Superbowls. Even the Ravens over Giants...Dilfer made some big downfield passes in that game which were basically non-existent for them during the regular season. Giants probably would have won if not for Dilfer's extra-ordinary play.

You've got the Colts, Pats, Steelers (1 year they're offense clicked), Greatest show on turf, Denver (Terrell Davis years), Packers, Niners, Cowboys, Skins...almost all of those teams from the last 15 years or so were known more for offensive prowess than defense. Some of them had top notch defenses (Pack/Cowboys/Niners) to boot but more noteriety went to they're offense.

One of the only exceptions to this rule that I can recall was when the Walsh/Montana Niners stiffled the offensive great Marino led Dolphins (Duper/Clayton). That was one of the few times I can recall an incredible offense getting stiffled.

 

[RBM]

The lines

Run the ball/Stop the run

Most important things in my opinion.

 

[Rounders]

Talent Evaluation

Offense Line

Defensive Line

 

[1970's Oakland Raiders Secondary]

Passing offense is the most underated aspect of the game when discussions like this arise. Defense is very overrated. I heard something about how a good majority of the top 10 Defenses last year didn't even make the playoffs. Passing the ball well will always keep you in games.

 

[-OZ-]

In what order would you rank the following 7 factors as they matter for NFL success in the current era, but not necessarily this particular season? Also I'm interested to hear people's reasoning.

You're not building a complete team from your rankings, so don't count on synergy between multiple factors when deciding importance. For example, don't think "I'm putting pass offense #1, so I'll take pass defense #2 only because teams will also have to pass to keep up with my passing offense". Just rank each factor in the order of importance to you independent of what the rest of your team's makeup ends up being.

Passing offense

Rushing offense

Passing defense

Rushing defense

Special teams

GM aspects - Scouting / drafting / trades / contracts

Coaching aspects (gameplanning, gametime, and player development)

Coaching and the front office are easily the top two for long term success. If your GM and scouting departments do their job well and the coaching staff can develop that talent, everything else will fall into place. If they don't do these jobs well, you can wind up with teams that look good on paper, but perform horribly. Think about teams like Washington as $ was wasted, Oakland when they couldn't get squat out of Randy Moss, my Lions, among others. While teams like New England continue to succeed. After that, I want to be able to run the ball, but the success of the Patriots and Colts leaves me thinking that in this era, an open offense is the key.

 

[SSOG]

Yards per attempt and yards per attempt allowed correlate more strongly with winning than any other simple statistic available. Passing O and Passing D would be my first and foremost priorities when constructing a team. Just look at the Colts- 6 straight 10-win seasons, and 8 in the past 9, based almost entirely on the strength of their passing O and, more recently, passing D.

 

[Sopranos]

IMO its the O-line. You can have all the talent on offense and still be bad if your line is bad. If your D stinks and your O-line is solid you can score. If your D is good and the o line sucks, your defense will be on the field too long and they will lose it late in the game. Its overlooked most of the time but im convinced its the #1 most important thing

 

[SSOG]

IMO its the O-line. You can have all the talent on offense and still be bad if your line is bad. If your D stinks and your O-line is solid you can score. If your D is good and the o line sucks, your defense will be on the field too long and they will lose it late in the game. Its overlooked most of the time but im convinced its the #1 most important thing

O-line isn't one of the choices, though. Or, rather, O-Line is already incorporated in the choices. If you have a stellar passing offense, that naturally means that your O-line is capable enough at pass blocking for you to succeed spectacularly.

 

[Intergalactic Kegger]

Define success. Some may call it winning multiple super bowls. Others might say just 1. Some may say its making the playoffs a lot. Other define it as a winning record. Still others might say putting an entertaining product on the field that sells tickets and generates revenue.

 

[The Man Who Met Andy Griffith]

I really don't know the answer to this. However they always say "defenses win championships" but ironically whenever a great offense plays against a great defense.....most people jump on the bandwagon of the offense and rightfully so as I think if you look at most of the Superbowl winners from the last several decades, it was more due to great offensive play that won Superbowls. Even the Ravens over Giants...Dilfer made some big downfield passes in that game which were basically non-existent for them during the regular season. Giants probably would have won if not for Dilfer's extra-ordinary play.

You are dead wrong on this, but kudos for trying to use the Ravens as an example.Pats over Rams (big favorites), Bucs over Raiders (big favorites). Steelers won their recent title with defense.I do think that in this day and age passing is more important than running, both on D and on O.

 

[benson_will_lead_the_way]

Assuming you mean long-term success:GM/Front OfficeRush DefenseRush OffenseCoachPass DefensePass OffenseSpecial Teams

I second all of these answers.The most important position is QB....but the second....is DT. They are involved in every play and create pass rush or stop the run. Look at all the best D's...they have them.....Stroud, Haynesworth, hampton, seymour, williams, etc.

 

[Bri]

Coach

GM

These are like 1a and 1b to me, they gotta work well together. There's too many systems out there that a player doesn't necessarily fit into or that (seemingly) any player can fit into;like Denver's RBs. In Denver, if they could roll with an unproven, cheap, back that could allow the GM to spend money elsewhere.

Passing O. I would have said rushing but the Jets are a good example of this. The quality of their blocking has dropped tremendously since 06. It's not hard to find fault with Kellen or Chad in 07. I don't doubt that for 2008, someone will expect improvement for Kellen and so the Jets team will improve.

Rush Defense. Watch Minnesota, that's all they have. They're as good at pass defense as they'd be if they played DEs at CB. Watch the Titans improvement with Haynesworth.

Pass defense and by this I mean pressure on the QB. The NFL is fortunate enough to have some exceptional defensive coaches that can scheme to get this done. Giants didn't seem to need a scheme just throw 4 DEs out there and watch em' go. Their secondary is still awful and I wouldn't be surprised if every Giant fan thinks they need either a LB that can cover or some secondary help.

Rushing offense. Leads often get a team more attempts so if everything is clicking this can be relatively easy to achieve.

Special teams are not noticeable unless a team is real bad or real good. I will always believe that starters should be in and this shouldn't look like a backup unit so...this is a bit of a sore spot for me. The guy chosen to return kicks is out their on the edge, I get that. However, tackling is tackling and discipline in your lanes is discipline in your lanes, the backup LBers really bug me. PLUS every now and again you see an offensive player with some tackling ability, I'd be fine with that as a reason for him on ST too. Best people on the field.

 

[Captain Spaulding]

Time for a nice research project (I'm swamped today at work but will have time over the weekend to research).

Lets take the last 10-20 years.

Find the offensive and defensive rankings (YPG and PPG rankings) for the Superbowl winners and losers.

Then we can see if there are any trends that support if offense or defense is more important.

Personally, I think to be a perenial good team, there are several formulas to succeed and get you a team that is better than .500 every year.

Most likely way to win a Superbowl is to be very good/great in most aspects of the game.

Sometimes you can win a Superbowl by being "nearly the best ever" at one aspect of the game and weak at others, but you have to be historically "one of the best" at a given area to do so.

If someone has time (and thinks it will be enjoyable to do). Please dig up the past stats.